Part 5: Hong Kong (part 2) and Singapore - days 23-30

DAY 23: chris and i started the day at an internet cafe uploading pics and watching the stupid Canucks lose. Good to see the Sedins playing so well though....

Once the score got to be 4-1 for the kings, we gave up and went to an outlet mall by the airport. Nothing too special, but it was something to do. At this point we had spent so much time walking around the city that we needed to get away. There was some cable cars that you could ride up a mountain and at the top was big Buddha (of course...) but the line was too long so we passed.

Craig arrived in the evening looking very hot and tired. After some room reorganization we dragged him out for dinner at an Irish pub, where we had the most expensive beer of the trip to date. I guess they figure the Irish will pay whatever it takes for beer and potatoes, so the prices are excessive for both. Oh well. DAY 24: by this point I was getting pretty tired of hong kong, but as Craig needed to see the city, i re-did a number of the key attractions with him. We did the star ferry again, went back up Victoria peak, walked around central, etc. Chris spent the day with his family in hong kong.

For dinner we had really good vegetarian in Soho and once again took advantage of happy hour drinks between 4 and 9pm (so its really not "happy hour", its more like "happy evening", but I'm not complaining. Some places even had "happy hour" all day on Sundays....)

One weird thing we came across must have been a Sunday only kind of thing. Around central there are raised, covered walkways between a number of buildings. For some reason hundreds of women were there that night picnicking on flattened cardboard boxes. They would be in groups of 5 to 10 and were spread out all over the walkways, eating, playing on computers, playing cards, etc. Some women had enough cardboard that they made forts and would sit in them. It was very bizarre.

We went back to the night market again for Craig's benefit. Bought a few more little things.

DAY 25: in an attempt to get out of hong kong for a day and do something different we took a fast ferry to Macau. It's about an hour away. Like HK, it used to be a territory of a European country (Portugal) but was only reclaimed by china within the last 15 years. Also with HK, you have to cross a boarder and clear customs.

There are lots of Portuguese heritagey things to do and see there (like churches) but we didn't go to any of them. Instead we took the free shuttle buses provided by the casinos and casino hopped (more money changes hands in macau in a year than anywhere else in the world...including vegas....those old chinese people love to gamble). We went to the venetian, the hard rock hotel, the Wynn and the MGM Grand. It's kind of a weird set up....the venetian is in a new location that is the future strip....it's a fantastic hotel, jut like the one in Vegas, but nothing is around there now. We had a few drinks here and there, but didn't gamble much. The gambling was expensive....minimum blackjack bet was $20...losing $100+ is not in my backpacking budget.

Also in Macau is the worlds largest bungee jump.... 322m off a tower. I had seriously considered doing it, but than the price and the fact that it's fucking insane, got the better of me. I might try one about 1/4 the height and price in Bali. When I saw the tower and saw someone jump off, I was happy with my decision not to do it.

Craig wanted a Chinese dinner so we had one. It was fine....not the best Chinese food I've had, but decent.

DAY 26: finally! Time to leave China. I really enjoyed the country, but after being there for nearly a month it was time to move on. We had a late morning flight to Singapore and arrived mid afternoon. By the time we got to our hostel, it was 5pm so we just headed out to a hawker centre for dinner. Hawker centers are basically budget food courts. They are hot and crowded and full of a tonne of food kiosks of every variety. We went with Indian and had fantastic pratha (which is a hot flakey bread with two types of curry). It was so good and so cheap; $3. Our hostel was in a great location in china town, just steps from the subway. We stayed in a dorm room that slept 10. The first two nights it was really quiet and the other people were pretty cool, but the last night the place emptied out and we got 8 Chinese girls who had no consideration for anyone else. They woke up at 7, opened all the curtains, talked loudly and rummaged through their luggage/packed. I was super annoyed because I didn't sleep well that night to begin with.

Anyway, Singapore is a very interesting and weird place. It's a real mishmash of cultures; Indian, Chinese, Malay, western, etc. It kind of seems like it's a country going though a bit of an identity crisis. We've spent 4 days here and I am still unclear what the language is. The official language is Malay, but apparently Chinese is the most dominate language. I haven't noticed that; English seems to rule in most places. Then there is Indian, which is obviously spoken amongst the large Indian population. On the subway children speak chinese to their parents, school girls gossip in english and Indian teens speak Indian. Most signs in public places are presented in about 5 languages and restaurant menus are a toss up as to what language is used.

As for the stereotype about Singapore that everything is illegal, its true. There are excessive and arbitrary fines in place for just about everything (including a $150 fine for failing to flush the toilet - not sure how you get caught for this one). Chewing gum is illegal and carries the same fine as urinating in an elevator ($1000). I do consider those two offenses to be of similar severity, so that seems reasonable. Eating and drinking on the subway carries hefty fines and don't even think about spitting. Pretty funny.

What's not funny is the price of alcohol. Prices are comparable to Perth; $15 for a martini. The cheapest beer (tiger - the local shitty brew) is still $5 a can at the hawker centers and $10+ at restaurants. Getting drunk is a seriously pricey activity and we have had to be clever; finding cheap bottles of wine or specials on pitchers of margaritas. We even went to 711, thinking that we would buy a bottle of vodka from there and mix our own drinks. A two-six of shitty vodka was S$76 ($60 CAD!!!). More than 3 times what you would pay at home. I did some research and found that the government imposes hefty import duties on all alcohol, so other than tiger (which is brewed in singapore) all liquor is affected. Apparently the duty is S$70 per litre of hard liquor. S$70!!!!! that would explain why 750mls was S$76.... And yet people seem to be drinking just as much, if not more, than anywhere I've been so far.

DAY 27: we had a busy day. The Singapore zoo is supposed to be one of the best in the world, so we went. I'm not a big zoo fan, and ive already been to 3 since July, but we decided to go anyway. As far as zoos go, it was pretty good....it's all open, no cages, so you can get really close, but it still wasn't my favourite. Moats and trenches separate the animals.

After the zoo we went to little India and had a really good Indian lunch for under $10. We didn't really know what anything on the menu was, so we just ordered a bunch of stuff and it turned out to be soooo much food. Good though. After we walked around the streets and markets. It was good because the stuff being sold was different than the chinese crap that i have become accustomed to.

We went to Clarke Quay for dinner which is a trendy, expensive, western area. There were some pretty cool bars, but so expensive. My fav was one called "clinic" where the seats were wheelchairs and drinks came in IV bags that you sip though a long hose. I wanted one, but it was $50 per bag.

We ended up finding a place with $30 pitchers of margaritas...what a steal...

DAY 28: we spent the morning walking around the city and visiting a few interesting temples. My favourite was a Hindu one we visited; crazy bright colours, statues of possessed looking women, giant statues of heads, etc. It was pretty cool.

In the afternoon we went to sentosa island, which is just off mainland Singapore. I had heard it was touristy, but there is a beach there, so I figured we would go relax. I hated it. Firstly the beach wad garbage...not very nice. Secondly everything was insanely over priced; it made Clarke Quay look cheap. Thirdly it was a huge cash grab everywhere you looked; zip linesv, street luge, segways, wave pools. It was horrible.

We had dinner close to the hostel and then went back to the quay for wine (we found a bottle for under $50!!!). On the way back to the hostel, we found a bar that has board games....you buy alcohol and then have the selection of a wide range of board games to play. I dominated Craig at guess who and connect four. We also played darts. Wine was only $38 a bottle, so that was exciting.

DAY 29: I didn't feel well this morning and I didn't sleep well the night before, so we started late. We checked out of the hostel and into the fairmont! I won't explain the whole story, but as a result of a business trip taken 3 years ago, and what appears to be an oversight on the part of the fairmont, we had vouchers for a free suite, free meal, etc for any fairmont in the world. Our suite is normally worth more than $1000 a night and it's gorgeous! Other perks include an "executive lounge" (which has free drinks (FREE!!!) and appies in the evening), a private gym, a fruit basket with the most ridiculous assortment of fruit (how do you eat a dragon fruit? How about a star fruit?), free dinner and breakfast and the most amazing jet shower ever invented. Needless to say we spent the day at the hotel. I worked out for the first time in a month and it was fantastic. We also swam in the 8th floor pool with city views, and took advantage of the free drinks and food.

DAY 30: we spent the morning enjoying the fairmont. So nice! After a month of backpacking, this was a really nice treat. I am in the executive lounge right now, gorging on cheese and posting this blog. We have to check out in half an hour and head to the airport. We have an afternoon flight to Bali!!!!

4 weeks down, 7 more to go!

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