South East Asia – Where is Phil now?

Singapore. Part 3.

Saturday 26 January 2019 – Singapore. Part 3.

With Chinatown visited yesterday it would have been rude to not visit Little India and Kampong Glam, the historic Malay Muslim section of Singapore. After eating our body weight in hotel breakfast we were back down to the metro and off to Little India. Just after rush hour it was still quiet early in the day, particularly for Little India, and even more so for Kampong Glam.

Our first stop was the Tekka Centre, a must for anyone visiting Singapore. I always take a walk though here, often stopping to buy a snack, though not today after the amount I hoovered down during breakfast. The ground floor of the building is all about food, the outer ring being well patroned food courts and the centre a large fresh food market. The upper level is pretty much all about the sari, lots and lots, and lots of saris. With the occasional tailor tossed in to balance things out. The middle of the ground floor is a large fresh food market, selling everything from live (short lived) chickens, to fish and seafood and on to that wonderful range of Asian vegetables and fruit. Including the dreaded durian. It wa very quiet.

We did not stay long in Little India, there was not a lot open and not many people out and about, way too early. We crossed over towards Bugis and walked past the Kwan Im Thon Hood Temple.

There is a lot happening in the streets here, and towards Bugis with quite a few market stalls selling all the tat you would ever need for Chinese New Year. There was a good mix of European tourists and Chinese here, probably the most diverse crowd we have been in since we arrived.

I like Kampong Glam, it is my favourite part of Singapore, mainly because it is the most hipster-ish east London area. It has changed massively since I last came here seven years ago. There are a lot more bars and cafes and a lot more street art. I still liked it, and if I wasn’t so tired all the time we should have come here one evening to experience it more fully. We found a Scandinavian coffee shop and stopped for the first flat white since we left NZ. It was good.

I like the contrast between the older shop houses and the ultra-modern glass towers, along with the very un-Singaporean awning on the sandwich shop. Public profanity! Outrageous!

Leaving Kampong Glam we started a walk down to the City Hall metro station, it was getting quite warm, and time again to think about getting off the open streets. On the way we passed by the magnificent Parkview Square building. Being a sucker for Gotham Gothic architecture this is one of my favourite tall buildings anywhere. Straight out of a Batman movie. Belying its 1930s art deco look the tower is entirely modern, being completed in 2002.

There is a small art gallery on the third floor, showing a collection of Chinese prints; we had a look but it was not really my thing. The ground floor lobby was pretty stunning!

Continuing on the journey we happened to come across Raffles Hotel next to City Hall station.

It seemed to be very rude to not complete the ultimate Singapore tourist task and go to the Long Room and have a Singapore Sling cocktail. Not being rude people, that is exactly what we did. All the tables in the Long Room bar have a large bag of peanuts for customers to graze on with their drinks. Shelling the nuts and discarding the empty shells on the floor is all part of the pleasure of visiting. The nuts were so wonderfully fresh, I ate quite a few, leaving a decent size sea of mess around me.

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Today is the sixth anniversary of El and I meeting, so El had booked dinner in one of the restaurants in Marina Bay Sand Hotel. After an after of relaxing and writing back at the hotel we headed down to the metro and out again in to the late afternoon. We arrived early so had a bit of a walk around the marina.

Walking through the mall to the hotel we passeda very large and impressive DC comics shop. we were tempted to buy a little something to take back as gifts, but decided not too.

Dinner was early, it was the only table we could get at such short notice. The restaurant was an all you can eat buffet and was pretty amazing. There was a terrific array of foods, and it is fair to say I ate a lot. Including things I do not normally eat, like crab and lobster. I also got to have what turned out to be only laksa I had during the stay. It was very nice, I love laksa. nooodle soups in general. This will be another thing I will endeavour to cook at home.

There is a night time light trail here, I was really looking forward to seeing some of the installations, but found it all a little uninteresting, though there are works over quite a large area of downtown Singapore and all around the marina. I was expecting BIG, but big was not the thing.

Saturday was our final day in the city, we had a whole day to kill before our evening flight back to London. We lingered in the hotel for a while, making the most of breakfast again, and the air conditioning. We had decided to take one of the city bus tours. I don’t normally do them, but found the one I did do in Dubai to be quite a good time killer, and we had a lot of time to kill today. The weather foreacast was not brilliant either, so this really made sense.

We jumped on one near the hotel and it took us to the massive Suntec Plaza where we had to wait for a different tour. The bus was not that interesting, there was a huge amount of traffic and it moved very slowly, mainly past the places we had already been. After consulting the map and we jumped off one bus and on to another heading in a different direction and ended up by the riverside. Something I wanted to do today anyway.

We found a riverside, and touristy, Vietnamese place and sat down for a drink and a couple of Vietnamese snacks and just enjoyed sitting by the river in the warmth, no work to do and no real cares. The last until our next holiday. It was a pleasant end to the afternoon, and to the trip.

Soon enough it was back to the hotel, a shower and a change in the gym bathroom before a final glass of wine on the rooftop bar and then the airport and home.

It was a good few days, I am glad I got to share one of my favourite cities with El. We will come back to Singapore, it is an easy place to visit.

Singapore. Part 2.

Saturday 26 January 2019 – Singapore. Part 2.

Having gained a little knowledge on the Singapore metro system yesterday we avoided the streets and took the lift down to the metro station underneath the hotel. Speaking of hotels, I should mention breakfast. OMG (as the kids used to say, but probably not any more as that was so 2016). The breakfast buffet was enormous. One of the things I love about a large Asian hotel is the wide and wonderful array of Asian and European breakfast choices. Every day was a treat, and I could indulge in fried rice and egg for breakfast again. Mmmmmm.

We left fairly early for our visit to the amazing Gardens by the Bay. The walk from the metro to the gardens exit was a pretty good start to what was a very good day. I am loving this combo of hooped t-shirt, check shorts and sandals that I am modelling here. Travelling allows me to indulge in terrible fashion, while pointing and laughing at other tourists poor fashion choices. El, was far more elegant, I am surprised I was allowed to take this photo of me standing next to her dressed as I am.

I was expecting there to be a fee to get into the gardens, but the area is free, you just pay for things you want to do. I like this. We wanted to visit the magnificent Supertree Grove. I saw these from the rooftop viewing platform of Marina Bay Sands Hotel last time I was here, and they are the number one thing I wanted to see.. They did not disappoint, they are quite amazing. Standing between 25 and 50 metres tall and with a viewing walkway between two of the taller ones, they totally dominate this section of the gardens.

We were there reasonably early so there were not too many people queuing for tickets, or to take the lift up to the walkway. I would hate to be here when it was busy, it would be brutally hot waiting for entry. The view was pretty special, obviously not the same as being at the top of those three towers, but lovely none the less. These SuperTrees are pretty awesome!

I had a bit of a plan in mind for a walk. It was not much past 10:00 when we left the gardens as we didn’t visit any of the other attractions, yesterdays botanical morning was enough garden for this trip. Something saved for next time. We crossed back over the road and entered the strange world of Marina Bay Sands shopping mall. It is big, not massive, but still pretty big. As I observed seven years and a few days ago when I first came here, it is full of shops I could never afford to even walk in, not that I ever would. Seven years ago today I was 27 days into the jounrey that started this blog and diving in Malaysian Borneo, I cannot believe it was that long ago!

We stopped for a cold drink in a small gallery on the far side of the marina and after consulting a map decided to skip plan A and do freshly conceived plan B; a short walk to China Town. It was a good a plan. Chinese new year is not far away, and preparations are well under way to welcome in the year of the pig. If planning had been better, it would be great to have been here for Chinese New Year.

It was starting to get quite hot and China Town was busy as mid-day approached. I wanted El to visit a temple while we here, get a feel for the things I love about visiting SE Asia and its mix of religion and culture that is so different to our experience in the west. I am fairly sure I have visited Thiang Hock Kem temple before, but am not 100% on that. I still enjoy walking through Buddhist temples. My abiding memory of those months travelling, and the subsequent trip to Sri Lanka, was visiting these small oasis’ of calm and peace. Singapore is a young country and this is not an ancient place of Buddhist worship, only being established in 1840. It was an enjoyable visit.

We walked through some of the side streets backing on to the temple before the heat overcame us and we found the nearest metro, jumping into a nicely air-conditioned train back to Orchard Rd.

Somewhere along the way I must have dropped my cap. I had just bought it in NZ, specifically as I left one back in the UK and I didn’t want to get sunburnt here in Singapore. We decided to visit some of the lower-end malls on Orchard Rd to find a replacement. One that didn’t cost more than a small number of pounds. There is a vast array of shopping choice on this street.

Arriving back in the hotel in the afternoon, I chose to start on one of my priorities for these four days in Singapore. Finding a quiet spot in the hotel bar (me and the bar person) I started writing a very short story, my first piece of fiction since school, 40 years ago. El and I have set a challenge to write a short story each month. It is going to be tough; it is close to the end of February as I write this and I haven’t started on this month’s story yet. I want to be a better writer, I love words, stories and books, and all sorts of written things. One of the reasons I have maintained this blog for so long is to be able to write more than a few words in an email, though I have yet to find my ‘voice’. I did enjoy writing some fiction in a bar in Singapore though.

As the evening settled into something cooler than day and we had recovered from earlier activities we headed out from the hotel to look for a local food court I had found on the internet. I wanted Malaysian food, to be specific I wanted char keow teow; a flat noodle dish with chicken and prawns. This was one of the first meals Alex introduced me to when I stayed with him in Kuching, and my introduction to local Malay food. It is simple, hearty and delicious and I cook it badly on occasion. I found one, and It was good.

One of the things I love about food court food, is being served the meal, and then being able to add the garnishes; choosing from dishes of chilli, spring onions, coriander, soy sauce. Adding that little extra zing, exactly how you want it to be. In the spirit of not being in London, I added a pile of diced red chilli. Maybe it was a little too much…

I cannot remember what El had, but she visited a different stall to me. It was good too.

Singapore. Part one.

Saturday 26 January 2019 – Singapore.

This is my fifth visit to Singapore and El’s first. I was keen to come here for a few reasons. Obviously, it is on the way back from New Zealand and is sort of half way. Not having been here before it is a fun place for El to visit and for me to show her around. It is a nice city and an easy introduction to SE Asia. Finally, I have done everything I want to do in Singapore, except Gardens at the Bay, so with four nights here I was planning on spending some proper time doing nothing. Not that we did much of that of that nothing. I didnt finish my book!

Before I launch into Singapore I have to confess that I made by first ever flight scheduling blunder. I was trying to book everything via BA and the only way BA does NZ to Singapore is via Australia. I grudgingly booked us via Sydney, but absolutely missed that there was a six hour layover, only noticing a couple of days before the flight. Sydney airport is not too bad, but six hours is a long time. We ate.

We arrived in Singapore quite late on Tuesday night, but with time enough to check in to the hotel on Orchard Rd, get up to the 19^th floor rooftop bar and pool and indulge in an end of a long day drink. We also got to enjoy the amazing view over the city and towards the magnificent structure that is the Marina Bay Sands Hotel. It was humid, but not outrageously so, and it wasn’t too hot, conditions that remained for the whole trip. Thankfully.

In what seems to have become a standard activity for this holiday we hit the Botanical Gardens on Wednesday morning, a recommendation from a friend who had been here recently. A very good recommendation too. I could get into this plant thing. The gardens were seemingly not too far from the hotel, so I decided we should walk, time wise it was the same as taking the metro. The metro is air-conditioned, walking isn’t. We were hot before we arrived, so our first stop was a cool drink in one of the many cafes.

The gardens are huge, laid out in different blocks, we got to see about a third of it before getting too tired and hot. I really liked it, tropical plants are so utterly different to what we see in the UK, and to a lesser degree NZ. The difference is just so pleasurable, big, big leaves, los of weird shapes and am amazing colour.

These leaves looked like someone had painted the colour on.

I particularly enjoyed the orchid garden, I know these are fancy flowers with a billion varieties and shades, shapes and colours, but seeing so many in one place really did make me appreciate nature, and her human tweaked variations so much more.

There was a nice fake waterfall that was very much the key attraction for a large group of small children on a school trip.

After lunching in the park we headed to the nearby metro station and with a bit of help from the ticket counter got ourselves metro passes and took the, very long, ride back to Orchard Rd. We learned how to use the Metro as we went. It is a good system for the centre of the city.

I have to say that in the four days we spent in Singapore, not one single person I/we interacted with was anything but courteous, friendly or helpful. I know Singapore is very touristy, and very authoritarian and retail and hospitality jobs are probably better than other options, but it was a really friendly place and it made me very happy. I was walking down a road one afternoon and a cycle courier clipped my shoulder with the very edge of his bag, it was the most minor thing ever. I was shocked when he stopped, apologised and asked if I was OK. England used to polite like this, but now we have Brexit.

I love this big and very old plane trees outside the entrance to the President’s residence.

One of the things on El’s list of things to see in Singapore was Emerald Hill, a street of lovely old shop houses that I had taken photos of on previous visits. Purely by luck, definitely not good planning, the street was literally over the road from the hotel. Emerald Hill is a conservation area so the houses that remain here from the early 1900s have been well preserved, they are a small snapshot of what a lot of Chinese influenced SE Asia looks like. They are very nice.

Our hotel from Emerald Hill.

Emerald Hill from the hotel bar.

We were pretty whacked when we got back to the room, so the decent thing to do was to head up to the roof, have a swim and then relax by the pool. Conveniently it was happy hour with half price Singapore Sling cocktails. It would have been rude not too….

The view from the roof.

We didn’t venture too far for dinner, the tiredness and jetlag that had plagued me in New Zealand followed me to Singapore. We found a ‘street’ curry house for dinner, and enjoyed a very nice meal, and not too far away from the hotel.

It was a good first day in Singapore!

Singapore

Friday 18 November 2016 – Singapore.

I arrived in Singapore at 7:00 am on Tuesday after a not too bad a flight from Delhi on Air India. I have booked myself into a good hotel, in Singapore’s East City where I am getting a whole lot more room for my pound than I would in the city centre. I also booked myself in for last night so I could check straight in and go to my room rather than having to hang about until mid-afternoon to check in. I had barely any sleep in the hotel in Delhi and after 14 hours in the airport, plus 5 half hours of flying I just wanted to lie down in peace. I didn’t leave the hotel until Wednesday. The view from my room was not the most exciting, residential Singapore. Cleaner than India though !

I have been to Singapore twice before and have seen all the things I want to see. When I decided to leave Delhi I initially thought about other places to go for the three days, but I have a flight booked from Singapore to Brisbane on Friday so it seemed the logical choice. It gives me three days to relax, do a little sightseeing, and unwind from the last couple of days in India.

My first day was spent lounging about in my room, getting laundry done, contacting airlines to cancel flights and seek refunds, editing photos and writing some blog posts. I had dinner in the hotel bar, a nice big juicy burger and a glass of wine. I missed wine when was I was in India!

The following day I ventured out for a couple of hours. I had found the weather in India to be really good, I was in the drier north so there was not a huge amount of humidity and the temperature had been pretty moderate; it had been a lot cooler than I had expected anyway. Not so in Singapore; walking out of the hotel mid-morning was like walking into a sauna. I had forgotten how humid it is here. It was 91% according to my weather app, though only 27 degrees; it could have been a lot worse.

I caught a bus to as close as I could to the Marina, last time I was here I did not make it to the viewing deck on the ‘surfboard’ at the top of the Marina Bay Sands hotel. I was going to go up but it poured with rain when I arrived and as it was almost closing time I decided not to go up. This time there was no such issue.

It is quite a long way up!

The view from the top is spectacular, sadly only one end of the platform is open to the public, so no 360 degree views, but still, it is pretty good. Next time I come to Singapore I will go and explore the botanical gardens below, I love those massive constructed ‘trees’.

I was not planning on being out for long, I had a Skype call with El mid-afternoon my time, and before she went to work so my list of activities for today was very small, the next objective was to find the recently opened National Art Gallery. I walked around the small Harbour and quickly nipped between the tall blue towers of the finance centre.

I seemed to have missed this little area of old buildings the last two times I was here, it is really nice, not quite surrounded by towers, though they are standing quietly on the horizon in all directions. The Victoria Theatre.

The gallery is in two converted court houses.

I spent quite a bit longer in there than I had planned, it was quite interesting, obviously the focus is on SE Asian art, and a lot of it was very modern, something I do not see much of, I enjoyed it. There was a good view from the roof deck of the Marina Bay sands and the Victoria , dwarfed by the towers in the background.

I headed back out of the comfort of the air conditioned gallery and back out on to the sticky streets, I was looking for the road I got off the bus on, with the expectation that I could wait on the opposite side to get the bus back. I hadn’t noticed it was a one way street… I did find some street art though. There is not a lot in Singapore, it is strictly illegal unless permission has been granted by the wall owner.

I ended up getting the metro back towards the hotel, and had to do a 2.5km sweaty power walk back. A lesson for tomorrow; make sure I know the return bus stops.

The following day, Thursday, I ventured back out again, but this time later in the day. I wanted to roam Little India and China Town and then head to the big shopping street of Orchard Rd to get myself a t-shirt and some jeans for Aussie and New Zealand.

I got to Little India OK, I could see a heavy cloud looming as I walked up from the bus stop on Orchard.

I had just got to the Tekka Centre when the heavens opened and the heaviest rain I have seen in a very long time fell on Singapore; it was probably a small shower by local standards, I took a walk around what seemed like a mall full of saris. I guess it is Little India.

The heaviest bit of the shower took 15 or so minutes to pass, and it was still raining when I finally left the shelter to continue to my walk through Little India and on to China Town. I was looking for shop houses, some of the old Singapore that has survived the bulldozers and modernisation that is modern Singapore. There are plenty about in this part of town, but there are also a lot of large vans and small trucks about. I did find a couple that I could take photos of, in between the rain drops that fell for the rest of the afternoon.

I was also looking for some street art, I had read there was some around the north end of China Town. Street art and graf, are definitely not condoned in Singapore, so there is very little around, only on buildings where the owners have given permission, and that seems to be few and far between. Singapore is a very ordered society. I did find some, and I was specifically looking for this piece, though it has been commercialised by the building owner since it was originally painted by Lithuanian artist Earnest Zacharevic.

I also found a piece on a graffiti wall by Alex Face who has painted in London in recent years.

The rain started to get quite heavy again and most conveniently I just happened to be walking past one of the very few bars I have seen (naturally it was an Irish bar – name a country without one!) so I stopped in for a beer and to wait out the rain.

I was not far from Orchard Rd, the shopping mecca of Singapore, so headed up there to try and achieve my shopping aims of a t-shirt and a pair of jeans. These seem like quite simple tasks, but I can assure you that if I am not in a shopping ‘zone’ then any form of shopping is no easy task. It took me a while, but I did achieve my goal. I then fled…

But I take a quick detour to Emerald Hill, a small side street from Orchard Rd, which has some lovely old Singapore homes, well it did when I came here five years ago, now they just seem to all be bars – maybe I was in the wrong street, I hope so as I was disappointed in what was there.

And then there was Christmas. Damn, I was really trying to avoid it so early in the year!

I caught a very busy late rush hour bus back to the hotel, grabbed some food in the mall over the road and then headed back to my room to get ready for the flight to Australia tomorrow.

I like Singapore, when I first came here I was not that impressed, it seemed too nice, but I have seen a lot more of the world in the five years since. Maybe it was the total contrast to India that appealed to my Virgoan sense of order and tidiness. I did like the noise, chaos and cow shit on the street feel of India, but the order of Singapore sits more easily with me. When El and I next visit New Zealand I will suggest we come via Singapore, I suggested Hong Kong last time as I thought it more interesting than here, but I am not sure if that was really correct. El can be the judge of that!

Jumping ship

Wednesday 18 April 2013 – Auckland, New Zealand.

I originally started this post on April 18, it is now May 5. I managed to get four words written that day in April before running out of whatever it was I ran out of. Even now, when I have had some time to reflect, I am not entirely sure what it was; motivation, inspiration, energy, mojo – is it possible to run out of mojo ? I know it is possible to have mojo and then to not have it, but does it run out ?

To cut a long story short – I was not enjoying myself on the boat, it was nothing to do with the boat or life on board, I was just not having fun. I was never sea-sick or felt cramped or uncomfortable or anything and in the main my boat mates were great. I was also really looking forward to going to Layang Layang to do some diving and possibly seeing the hammerhead sharks as well. But it was not too be.

If I step back a week or so, I had noticed I was not taking many pictures during my last week in Sri Lanka and really did not do much sightseeing at all. I should have taken this as a sign that I was ready to call the trip ‘over with’ and gone straight to New Zealand; my half final destination.

My first plan had me visiting Jordan for a couple of days, followed by a day or so in Dubai and then Sri Lanka for two or three weeks, all up I was thinking of a three to four week transit to New Zealand. Somehow this plan got skewed and extended and my trip turned into a nine week journey and I didn’t go to Jordan or Dubai, damn that mis-placed enthusiasm ! If I had stuck to what I had first considered then I certainly would have saved some money and maybe some sanity.

My last blog post had me on the yacht Infinity which was anchored off Pulau Aur a small island between the Malaysian mainland and the larger island of Pulau Tioman. We spent a couple of days there before motoring over to Tioman where we passed through immigration and were officially in Malaysia.

I had a couple of dives off of Tioman, the first dive had really bad visibility and almost no life but the second dive at this reef was quite good and finally after thirty nine dives I saw some rays – only small blue spotted rays, but I was dying to see any kind so I was very happy.

When we left Tioman we were going to be at sea for around three weeks before next land fall and it was here I decided I was just not having fun anymore and it was time to get off the boat, change my flights and head to New Zealand a month earlier than planned…

There were a couple of other people leaving from Tioman on 16 April so it made sense to jump ship and ferry over to the Malaysian mainland and catch a bus up to Kuala Lumpur. That is tea by the way, not beer – it is 7:00 AM !

I stayed the night in KL and had to do a wee bit of shopping the following day to get some clothes for the flight and my first day back in Auckland and then it was all over. I was back on a plane and heading off to see my boys, the rest of my family and my friends. Yay 🙂 – I should have just gone straight there from London.

So, here I am in Auckland a month earlier than planned, and a fair bit poorer after having to shuffle around flights to Sydney and back to London. The good news is I get back to London sooner than expected and can start the process of job hunting, something that is weighing heavily on mind as I write this. The even better bit is I get to see El in May rather than June: )

I am pretty much ready to start writing again, so it is now on to updating the past two weeks in Auckland. The best news, for me anyway, is I have started to use my camera again.

Maybe the mojo is coming back again after all.

Snorkelling at Pulau Aur.

Tuesday 08 April 2013 – Pulau Aur.

I managed to get a couple of hours sleep in the cabin before it got too hot, so I went to find a spot on the deck and discovered everyone in the cabin again as it had poured with rain sometime early in the morning. I pulled up a piece of floor and surprised myself by getting another hour or so on the hard wooden floor. Most people just sleep on a blanket on the floor so I will try that tonight.

I think I will enjoy life travelling on the boat, as everyone has a turn on watch people came and went all morning, once your daily chore was completed there was no routine to anything, though you needed to be quick for breakfast or lunch.

There was little wind in the morning so we continued to motor north east, we were free of the main shipping lanes by mid-morning and had the sea fairly much to ourselves for the rest of the day. It was still quite overcast, which was not such a bad thing though it did of course keep the humidity levels right up there.

After lunch it was my turn on watch again, there was not a heck of a lot to see as we headed towards Pulau Aur (Aur Island) our stop for at least tonight. We dropped anchor at 2:30. Almost as soon as the anchor had found purchase on the sea bed people were jumping overboard into the warm South China Sea, relieved to wash some of the accrued sweat away and relieve some of the stickiness. A few people jumped off the crows nest, I only managed to go from a third of the way up but will work up to it over the next few days, maybe…

We had lunch after the swim and then after a wee break a large group of us donned masks and flippers and swam over the island for a look, it was a long swim.

We had a small explore on island, climbing up one of the many rock falls to above the tops of the trees.

The reef goes right up to the sandy beach so we could not get the dingy in there until full tide, but there was plenty of drift wood on the beach so we will come back later for a beach fire. It is a great spot and right now we are totally alone. Though you can see that there have been fishermen here quite regularly and there is the usual collection of rubbish all over the beach and into the tree line.

It was a slow swim back to the boat, stopping to dive down on the reef and I took a few pictures with my snorkelling camera. There was a reasonable amount of small fish to see and the reef was lovely with some stunning coral. I very much enjoyed being back in the sea again – and being able to see clearly.

After the chores were all completed in the afternoon we prepared some food to take to the beach for an open fire BBQ. It was very nice sitting on the sand, listening to the sea wash on the shore and eat some freshly speared and cooked grouper. A nice end to the first full day at sea.

Out to sea.

Monday 07 April 2013 – On the sea.

After a brief attempt at sleep in the cabin I moved back into the library room and slept on the wooden floor and surprised myself by getting a couple of hours sleep before getting up around 7:30.

Much later in the day I discovered there was a duty roster stuck to a wall by the door, I was expecting there to be one, but no-one had pointed it out to me, so I had missed a couple of chores. One of the daily jobs is to be up early to make bread, so I had fresh homemade bread with vegemite for breakfast.

I was going to go into town with one of the dive instructors, Zach, to pick up some new tanks and a couple of other bits and pieces. I also wanted to get myself a mask, a dive log book and if possible a rash top for snorkelling.

We caught the train into China town mid morning and got the shop just before 12:00. The tanks were not going to be delivered until 1:00 so Elvin, the shop owner took Zach and I to the local food hall for some lunch and I had more noodles, this time with tofu chicken, it was pretty good.

I managed to get all the stuff I wanted from the dive shop and Elven took us and the tanks back to Infinity which was cool. We got back at 2:30 and I was keen to get a swim in the pool as it was quite warm and very humid under a low and thick sky. I was advised we would be leaving in twenty minutes so took a quick walk up to the convenience store to grab some supplies for the next leg of the journey as I was not sure how long till we arrived at Tioman Island, the next location with shops.

There had been a lot of thunder and lightning all afternoon and just as we were about to up anchor the skies finally opened and the rain came down in buckets. Which meant we were not go depart for a while, at least until it had slowed to a mere storm. I put my boardies on, took my shirt off and went and stood outside in the heavy rain – it was lovely and cool out there in the rain so I grabbed my little waterproof camera and hung out on deck for a while.

We finally departed Singapore at 5:00, it was an interesting exercise getting a 36metre boat off of its mooring. Not something I had been involved in before. It was a frenetic few minutes of shouted commands, rope pulling and running around in the small tender boat disconnecting the ropes from the buoys holding us in place.

And finally we left the marina in Sentosa into the open sea.

Once out of the harbour we spent half an hour rolling ropes up and tidying the deck before raising the tender for storage on deck.

We motored out to the edge of the shipping lane ‘super highway’, two streams of east and west bound vessels, there is a vast number of ships here, mostly huge! We had to wait to be cleared by Singapore immigration and customs and then further for clearance to cross the ‘super highways’ to the lane we were going to be motoring in. The sun was setting under very cloudy skies and the lightening was still flashing over the city.

And then finally as the light slowly disappeared we were under way – for me to a whole new adventure of living on a boat for a month, and hopefully some awesome diving.

I had my first dinner on the boat, a spicy vegetable dish with rice. The kitchen is pretty well appointed but it gets furiously hot when the oven is on. When I was cleaning duty the other day we were working in the kitchen while coffee was being made and it was roasting in there.

There is a watch roster for all the crew and my turn started at a reasonable 10pm. I tried for a nap prior to my shift as it was not too hot in the cabin, however we seemed to have mobile data for most of the time before my shift so I was on the internet for a while rather than sleeping.

The shifts are three hours long and split into three one hour sessions. Watching, steering and supporting – in that order. It is surprisingly hard to spot things in the night, especially on the Singapore / Malaysia coast – there are so many vessels it is hard to work out what is a vessel and what is something on the shore. It was my job to keep an eye on everything that was moving and we were passed by some massive ships as we cruised east at 5.5 knots. The three shifts mean there is three people plus a master on duty at any one time, with a new person on each hour, so plenty of people to chat to while on duty.

The steering part was challenging to start with, it is a large boat so takes quite a few seconds to react to any steering changes – and by the time it does I would have over corrected and be heading a few degrees in the wrong direction. It took a while to get used to :

My final session of supporting started with filling in the log book, a task that is done every hour as the steering shift changes and then it was hanging around till 1:00 am till my shift was over, no one wanted coffee so there was not much to do.

I collapsed into bed at 1:15 and fell to sleep fairly quickly. It is so good to be out of the marina and on the way to new adventures. I had a good day.

Infinity

Saturday/Sunday 05/06 April 2013 – Singapore.

My next adventure begins today!

I have just over one month on the yacht Infinity, sailing out of Singapore to a number of dive sites around southern Malaysia.

My flight out of Colombo was at 10:50 pm and with little else to do in the evening I left Trudy’s place quite early. Which was quite fortunate as the traffic was really bad and it took almost two hours to make the 30km journey to the airport, The first 13km alone taking up most of took one and half hours.

Colombo airport was an odd place, we walked through scanners and were patted down on entry but the bags were not scanned or checked. Check-in was a bit confusing but a breeze to complete as I was there fairly early. A latte was $7NZD so I flagged that as a really bad idea and then sulked for a while in the lounge. I had given my Sri Lanka SIM card to Colleen so she could loan it to visitors, even after a month of constant internet use and a few text and phone calls I had only barely used half of the $10NZD I put on it. Mobile is such great value in Sri Lanka.

The flight was a little late and fairly full, I am flying Tiger Airways for the first time, it is Singapore’s budget airline and apart from not getting anything on board the flight was excellent, comfy seats and as I paid for an exit row I had a ton of leg room as well. I think I even dozed for an hour – miracle upon miracles. Colleen had given me a few sleeping pills but I stupidly did not have any water so couldn’t use them. Doh… I am sure they will get used on the yacht though.

We did arrive on time in Singapore at the charming hour of 5:30 am, Singapore is two and a half hours ahead of Colombo which is really going to screw with my head timing wise as I have just got used to daylight savings changes in the UK when I arrange Skype calls with El. The best thing about Singapore airport at 5:30 am is there is no one about, I breezed through immigration, grabbed a bottle of gin from duty free, and was on my way out the door when I realised I did not have my pack! So back to the baggage carousel to collect it! I found an ATM and got myself a much needed coffee and a bottle of water. I was most of the way out of the airport when I realised I had left my pack in the coffee shop! This has not been a good start to the day at all – and I was lucky it was still there.

I took a cab to the One15 Marina on Sentosa Island to meet my home for the next five weeks – the 36 metre yacht Infinity! It was dark and raining when I arrived and of course everyone was asleep. I climbed on board and found myself a spot to sit and wait for everyone to wake up, with the first person struggling out just before 8:00.

Most people normally sleep the night on the deck but it rained very heavily in the night so there were a number of people on mats on the floor in the main cabin. I met so many people in a brief period of time I had very little idea of who was who by the end of it. Most seem to be in the mid-twenties though there are a couple of people closer to my age, there are eleven nationalities in the twenty people as well, everyone speaks reasonable English. Everyone seems friendly and all are here for diving and adventure, so it should all be good fun.

Infinity is in Singapore until Monday, which was longer than I anticipated so there was not a lot of running around on my behalf. I went to the nearby mall to pick up a few bits and pieces and had my first laksa in ages in the foodcourt and it was damn good too. While I was in the mall the heavens opened outside and it just poured for most of the rest of the day.

After lunch I went to the swimming pool in the marina and had a nice swim in the rain on my own. The tables and chairs were actually in a small pool, which I have never seen before, but then I do not think I have been anywhere this fancy either…

We all went for dinner to one of the big food halls in the middle of downtown Singapore, I had a really nice Bombay noodles, but was fading after no sleep in thirty six hours so went back to the boat with the half the group after eating.

My first night on the boat was OK, my room was not going to be available until tomorrow so I slept in the ‘library’ on a couple of mats on the floor. It was an OK sleep. The boat is quite quiet considering the amount of people and the fact that all doors are open to allow as much air as possible to move some of the stifling humidity. It was a warn night, but not too bad due to the rain.

Sunday was a busy day with virtually the whole day spent on chores on the boat, it was scrubbed inside and out and from top to bottom and we pretty much did not finish until 5:00. After that it was back to the pool for a relax and then to the beer shop for a couple of cans. I moved into my bunk in a room I am sharing with a young Swedish guy and that was about it really.

I took a photo of Infinity, next to a massive super yacht.

And my room a small box with two bunks, mine has the pack on it. There is some storage and each bunk has a small fan.

In the early evening the boat captain, Clemens, went into town with a small group to go grocery shopping for the next leg of the voyage. They arrived back at Infinity at 3:45 AM – having taken over five hours in the market. There was a lot of stuff and we all had to help get it to the boat.

I started the night in my bunk but it was so hot, even with the fan on, that I went and lay on the desk, I think I had just dropped off when the food arrived. It took an hour to sort out so I didn’t get back to bed till 5:00 and ended up sleeping on the floor in the library again. Tonight I will be more organised and find a squab to take on deck as they had been moved during the clean up and 5:00 am is not a good time to go looking for things.

It is Monday afternoon now and we are heading out to sea now so will update when I can when I next have some internet – no idea when that will be !

T-1- shopping

Day 152, Monday 4 June 2012, Kota Bahru – Kuala Lumpur

Another lousy night, finally got to sleep just before I had to wake up. I seem to be having all these weird dreams that never come to conclusion as the alarm interrupts before the end, I can recall the dream for about five minutes before it all just fades away. Maybe I should write them down as soon as I wake. They could make for some interesting reading for any future shrink 🙂

I checked out of my overly expensive hotel at 6.45 and got a taxi to the airport, I was advised I would have to pay 60 Malaysian ringit for the ride as it is double prior to 7.00 AM, though my driver only charged me 30, which was still more than ‘fair’. The airport is a few kilometres from town, but considering I paid 50rm to do 75km the day before I considered 60 to be a rip-off. Sadly, being rip-offed by transport operators will be one of the enduring memories of SE Asia.

The flight to KL was excellent, shorter than expected and not a hint of turbulence, we also had one of those wonderful smooth Air Asia landings which I have come to expect. I can see why it was voted No1 budget airline. I will miss flying with them !

I was in no rush when I arrived in KL so took the opportunity to have a coffee and muffin breakfast at the airport – and the use of the free wifi, before catching an airport bus into KL Sentral, the main transport hub for the city. I had selected Melia KL (an overpriced hotel) in the main shopping district, purely based on its proximity to a mono-rail station. Last time I was in KL it was so hot and humid, I did not want to spend a lot of time wandering around the streets trying to find accommodation, and I knew it was all going to pricey in Bukit Bintang. As it turned out the Melia was about 50 metres from the Imbi monorail station so I was there before lunch time, and luckily I had access to a room straight away. The place was expensive and I was pissed off to have to also pay $20NZ for wifi in my room, I am used to free wifi everywhere – guess this is what happens when you the want to stay where the rich people are – bastards !

However – the newly expanded mall is directly over the road and the IT/photo mall is next door, so I am not complaining – I am here to shop ! The IT mall is six floors, five purely IT and mobile and one just selling all sorts of camera stuff, though prices were consistent and bargaining was not encouraged.

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The shopping mall over the road was even bigger, in fact it was MASSIVE – it even had its own funfair, including a rollercoaster – awesome!

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I was looking to buy a new wide angle lens for my big camera – a Canon 5d MK1, that had safely arrived at my uncle and aunty’s house in England. Much as I have loved the Panasonic GF1 that I have been using for the past five months I am keen to get my hands back on my trusty old Canon – though now the mkIII is out a cheap mkII was sooooo tempting !
I had heard prices in KL were not that hot compared to the UK, but well, unless my research was wrong, prices in KL were massively cheaper than the UK, so I ended up with two lenses – and a murdered bank account ! I picked up a 70-200 f2.8L USM (not the IS version as that was too much) this is a great gig camera as well as being the quintessential white Canon zoom lens – no Canon photog is complete without this bad boy in his kit. I also got a 16-35 f2.8L II USM wide angle zoom – which was the intended purchase ! I am now wondering if my camera bag will fit it all. I also had to buy a new small suit case to fit them !

I was also after some road running shoes as well as a pair of jeans, some street shoes and at least one t-shirt so I would not arrive in England looking like some sort of hobo. But finding Levis proved to be extremely frustrating, and I am a Levis guy – none of those $400 jeans for me ! After a while I gave up in and had a wee rest in the hotel and then went to the big flash (read expensive) mall in the evening and at least got myself a pair of 502’s – they were cheaper than NZ at least.

I wanted a pair of Asics 2070 road running shoes (I know, I know- but I have to get some running in before CPR and there ain’t no trails in Brentwood – and I am not wrecking my trail shoes on tarmac) as well as some decent street shoes – if you know me, this means sneakers. It is very hard to find reasonably priced shoes in Asia for UK size 10 feet !! i found loads of shoes I liked but no one had my size, in the end I did get some Puma’s that were OK – but nothing like my beloved Adi’s I left in NZ.

You can tell the first leg of travelling is over, I seemed to have accumulated more stuff.

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[Edit] I am typing this on the plane as I wing my way to London and the hostie seems to have taken an interest in how much red wine I can drink – so apologies for the very long tale of shopping in KL, normally I would say I went shopping and bought stuff. Though I could go on about buying camera stuff for ever…. I am really looking fwd to testing the fast wide lens at a gig – I know it is not the uber-cool Zeiss, but I am not that well off !

I pretty much killed myself shopping, thankfully it was either not as hot as it was last time I was here or I have acclimatised myself somewhat after five months, but four hours of wandering around malls not being able t find anything I wanted was enough. I hit the hotel bar for a beer and almost had heart failure at the price, $10NZ for a handle – I know this is Muslim Malaysia and beer is expensive, but this is taking the piss. I had one, and then went in search of cheap beer on the road, pretty much to no avail. I grabbed a couple of cans at a 7-11 and went to my room for the rest of the night.

T-2

Day 151, Sunday 3 June 2012, Kota Bahru.

Two more sleeps

It was a really noisy night, lots of people walking up and down the paths making lots of noise till all hours, so a lousy sleep was had, I had been on a pretty good roll with the sleep too damnit. I was up at 6.45 and met Daniel in the reception area and we walked down to the wharf at Coral Bay to get the ferry back to the mainland.

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It was a good run, not too rough and we were there nine. Before heading back up to Kota Bahru (KB) we had a final roti chanai then went our separate ways. Daniel was going to hitch and I was going to try and find some other travellers and share a taxi. After half an hour of waiting and interrogating people as they came past I ended up getting a taxi on my own to KB, it was about $20NZ for the 75km journey so not outrageous. This is a job I would be good at !

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The hostel I had to chosen to stay at didn’t exist any more and it appears a lot of the cheap ones are closed for the season – or maybe just closed ? so I ended up staying in a hotel at vastly more than I wanted to pay. But it had awesome broadband so I didn’t mind too much, I did catch up on blogs and then went walkabout.

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Loved this shop.

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And these bikes.

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Not sure if was just a Sunday thing but all the sites in KB -museums, grand palace etc were shut! So I wandered around had some lunch and then found the only place in KB that retailed booze. KB and the north east of Malaysia is quite a strict muslim region.

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I bought a bottle of NZ Pinot – it was not bad.

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In the afternoon it rained so hard I could not here the music from my laptop. From my window.

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After a couple of hours of wine and Youtubing I went for a walk out again to find a Chinese restaurant for dinner, the Chinese generally sell beer where the Malay’s don’t. I found a decent place and my last big Tiger and a very nice chilli chicken meal before wandering back to the hotel and snapping some graffiti on the way.

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I didn’t do much else after that.