Stop #4 Singapore

Singapore was fantastic... we really enjoyed it!

We got in late Thursday night. We tried to 'beat the system' by not flying into the expensive Singapore airport, but instead flying into the cheaper Johor Bahru airport across the causeway in Malaysia. This turned out to be a 'not-so-great' choice! We first had to wait, and wait, and wait for the first bus. This bus dropped us off at another station and told us to run onto another bus, which we did! We were the only ones with luggage (should have been a sign that we were the only idiots). Bus #2 dropped us off at immigration. We walked through the big building, had our passports stamped and got onto Bus #3. Bus #3 took us to another immigration building... can't remember what we did there... then Bus #4 took us to a few blocks away from our hotel (thank god! otherwise we would have had no idea where we were). All that travel took us about 3.5 hours, to travel a small distance. Nice ;)

Anyway, we arrived alive and well and went immediately to an area of hawker-style stalls and had a late (11:15pm) dinner... delicious. Then we returned to our hostel where we slept in a room with no windows and the most freezing (and smelly) air-conditioner! ;)

The next morning we walked around town--saw the music/concert hall and several shiny/fancy malls. You can get lost amongst the endless air conditioned sub-ground malls. The MRT subway connections to malls is quite the tribute to capitalism. Anyway, after a delicious lunch we went off to the zoo.

The Singapore zoo is part zoo, but mostly just an amazing garden. The animals were great and the scenery amazing. Billy says it is the best zoo he has ever visited. We sat and watched the orangutangs for ages. They have the 'cages' set up so the animals appear to roam freely above you via fake vines connecting all the trees. If you look closely at the trunks of the trees, you'll see they have wires set up as deterrents, so the animals stay up in the canopy until they find a tree that takes them down to a proper enclosure. Anyway, those orangutangs were just like us... one was lounging with his back to a tree trunk, with one leg crossed on the other, chewing no a piece of grass.... it was quite funny. Another was hanging upside down on a vine for show. Anyway, it was great. We got to sit down next to 3 of them to take a photo ;)

We also saw 2 white tigers demonstrating the process of reproduction... unfortunately for their offspring, they are related. We learned all white tigers in captivity are decendants of the same tiger captured in India in the 50s. (or 1850s? ... I was tired-memory poor).

After hours of walking around the zoo I was completely exhausted. BUT, no rest for the weary. We went next door to 'Night Safari'... for 3 more hours of zoo, this time in the dark. Luckily we got to ride a tram around for some rest. We also watched a night animal show which was okay. It did make me lose all faith in humanity. In general, people are just idiots and can't be helped. The trainer must have said, 'please, NO FLASH' in 8 different languages, over and over and over again... and yet, it seemed like the Papparrazzi was there taking pictures of brangelina. The highlight of the show for billy was the python. The zoo keepers pretended they had an emergency and asked us all the remain calm while they ran through the stadium asking us to lift up our legs and bags. I was freaked out, not sure if it was a joke or not! They stopped at a big metal door in the ground... asked those sitting above it to move away quickly... they opened it up and pulled out a MASSIVE PYTHON. Scary...! But I was glad to realise it was a skit, and that they hadn't accidentally lost that 3 m snake.

Anyway it was pretty fun to see the nocturnal animals 'out and about'. The highlights... 2 giant ant eaters, male lions roaring, sun bears, fruit bats and some rhinos.