March 21 2012

Had a lovely evening yesterday with Andrew and Veronica.We started with the inevitable drink in the Long Bar at Raffles, which was an experience, although Andrew told us that the hotel has been extensively remodelled in recent years and the original Long Bar is long gone. Good fun, nonetheless.

As you walk into the bar, you realise that there is something crunchy underfoot. Dotted around the bar are square wooden containers of monkey nuts and it is, apparently, a tradition in Raffles that you eat the nuts and drop the shells on the floor. This makes it the only place in Singapore where you can drop litter with impunity. If you are caught littering anywhere else, it's a S$300 (£150) fine for the first offence and community service for the second offence. Not many people are convicted a second time, because they make you wear high visibility clothing which is clearly labelled to identify you as an offender, and you spend time picking up litter around the city. The shame and loss of face is so unbearable in this culture that most people avoid it at all costs!

After leaving Raffles, we wandered down to Harry's Bar on the waterfront and had another sharpener before settling in at a Thai restaurant for supper.

This morning we had breakfast in the hotel and set off for a cruise on the river, but soon discovered that the cruises don't start until noon, so we rode the Singapore Flyer instead. This is very similar to the London Eye, but bigger! The views are outstanding, but sadly the weather has continued to be a bit humid and misty - we've seen hardly any blue sky at all - and the murkiness continues to degrade the pictures.



View from the top of the Flyer across Marina Bay to the financial district

 After our circuit on the Flyer, we walked across to the far side of the financial district and joined a guided walking tour of Chinatown. This wasn't quite as interesting as we had hoped, because Chinatown is packed full of shops selling tourist tat, and as the guide herself was quick to point out, very little of the area is old or original. Nevertheless, it's a busy and colourful district and we managed to find a couple of spectacular temples - one Buddhist, one Hindu - which were interesting.

A section of the roof decoration on a Hindu temple in Chinatown

Tonight we have to pack and be ready for an 8.50am flight to Kota Kinabalu in the morning, so the next post will be from Borneo.

Jenny's bit:  A very nice man helped up to jay walk across a busy street so we could catch a cab.  We waited behind two people who hailed the first free one but he refused to take them so we took it instead - I guess they were going south of the river. Jx