Nilesh's Posterous

Last Day in Singapore, First day in Bangkok..

So, today is already our last day in Singapore. Our flight departs in the afternoon for Bangkok, but we have to check out at noon. Rather than waiting for noon, we checked out around 10:00 and asked the hotel to keep our bags and we took a taxi for last bit of touring. Went to the Bugis market and strolled around checking out the various stalls and foods. After that, went to the famous Mustapha Center - a multi storey multi purpose mall that sells basically everything. Navigated through the maze of the shopping center in the little time that we had. I managed to try on a few things in the mega tiny changing rooms and bought something. We had a south indian vegetarian set meal close to Mustapha and then took a taxi back to the hotel to pick our luggage, then take the MRT to the airport.

We flew Tiger Airways (http://www.tigerairways.com) out of Singapore. I had bought the tickets a couple of months and I got them for SGD $ 0.01.. Yes you read right.. 1 cent singapore, but then with taxes and surchages, it came to $40 SGD, but still a great deal. Changi Airport is very nice and all terminals are accessible by the skytrain in the airport Except for the Budget Terminal. I guess being budget, these airlines can't afford the prices to afford skytrain charges or other fancy stuff. So, we had to go to the basement of terminal 2 by skytrain, then wait for a bus to go to the budget terminal. We checked in there after waiting in a long line and then walked our way to the plane, up the stairs of the old school plane stairs (just like the old days) rather than the automated longnecks.

Flight was good and we reached Bangkok on time in the dark. Did immigration formalities easily and got out and changed some dollars to thai baht and then started looking for Taxis inside the airport itself rather than go out and face the many touts and private taxis waiting. They have the Aiport of Thailand (AOT) official limosine service that one can book from inside. I asked one side and they quoted me 1300 Baht and then asked another counter of same company and it was 950Baht to Sukumvit Soi 15. Took the latter and we got a nice BMW suv to take us to our hotel.

Reached hotel, checked in and went for a walk on Sukhumvit avenue. We reached a night and little did we know, Sukumvit is the heart of Bangkok's red light district. As we walked around on Sukumvit, many girls dressed in skanky dresses standing on the side of the road waving at single guys and many fat old white guys walking hand in hands with young thai girls - sad scene. I knew the scene was such, but did not know the hotel was so close to it. I picked the hotel to be very close to the BTS (skytrain) Asoke Station. Well, anyways, its always good to experience a bit of all kinds of sceneries. So, we walked about from Soi 15 to Soi2 then back to our hotel. Mom, sis and Sid went to sleep and I ventured out again and walked the opposite way from soi 15 to soi 27 or so and had some pad thai on one of street food sellers. Met a french backpacker and had some good late night dinner conversation over the pad thai.

Pic 1 : View from our hotel room in singapore
Pic 2 : Mum Drinking coconut from street vendor
Pic 3 : Laksa that I had for breakfast
Pic 4 : Rickhaw Drivers waiting for customers at Bugis
Pic 5 : Dragon Fruit
Pic 6 : Bangkok Street Food (where I had dinner)

Singapore : Sentosa Island, Underwater World and Little India

So, after we got back from the rickshaw ride in Clark Quay, I was still not yet sleepy. So I browsed a bit on the internet to plan the second part of my trip. Then at around 3:00a.m, I had a craving for some Chinese food. So, I decided to walk to Chinatown. Chinatown is not too far from where we were staying, maybe some 2 kms. Weather was great - perfect for an early morning walk ! Walk there was great and empty, barely anybody in the streets until I reached Chinatown itself and there, many people eating at the various open hawker stalls. I sat down at one of the stalls (I think I was the only non-chinese looking) and ordered some chicken rice. Chicken Rice in the early mornings is the best ever !! As soon, as I finished, heavy rain started pouring.. like torrential rains. Waited for some 30 mins for it to finish, but it continued heavily. So, now, I had to be in line in hailing for a taxi. Many people waiting and I managed to find one as well, after a long waiting time and getting completely dripped. Reached hotel and had a great night's sleep.

Woke up to a still gloomy and rainy morning. We decided to go to Sentosa Island today. Before going, as we were not sure if they'd get vegetarian food, we crossed the street over and got some vegetarian food from across the street and we headed off to MRT to Harborfront station. From there, we had 3 options to go to Sentosa - monorail, bus or cable car. We decided to do the touristy cable car ride. Paid $24 for each of us for a round trip. As it was still quite rainy and grey, even with the glass bottomed cable car, we did get magnificent views.

Reached Sentosa and we took one of the free shuttle lines to the Underwater World where we had lunch and then went in to see the fishies. Good variety of fish, hands on aquariums, where you can touch the rays, starfish, fishes etc.. Then the star of it all is the revolving underwater tunnel where we could see a 360view of the fishes in the aquarium.

After underwater world, we took a rainy walk in sentosa, checked out Siloso artificial beach (pretty nice), then took the tram to the MerLion (Singapore's national symbol - half lion, half fish) garden. Lots of fountains and sculptures in the Merlion garden. Enjoyed the walk and then before we left, me and Ashveena, went for the Cineblast movie - I've done a similar one in Disneyworld, but different story at this one - in this one, we were supposed to be a piece of log journey's though canyons, rivers, sawmills etc.. with the lots of motions, shocks and jerks from the chair as the log goes through its numerous stages.

Took the cable car back to MRT station and we deided to go to Little India directly from there to have dinner before we go to the hotel. Little India is very very different from the other places we've been in Singapore. As soon we got off the station, we could see thrash on the streets (we barely or never saw any other dirty streets elsewhere in singapore), lots of people sitting on the streets and eating and drinking (most probably bangladeshi workers), fruit and vegetable sellers all over, flower sellers with jasmine fragrance, saree and churidar shops, music sellers broascasting over loudspeakers  tamil or telegu religious songs, ladies in saries and churidars grocery shopping, Indian Restaurants. We walked around a little bit to experience the sounds, sights and smells and then found a restaurant serving Vegetarian food - Appollo Leaf. They had non-veg too.. thankfully :) We had our meal there and they served us on a real banana leaf. It was very nice. We taxied our way back to the hotel. I was still not too sleepy. So I went out again for a long night walk and came back around 2:00.am to have some good rest for our flight tomorrow.

Pic 1 : Ashveena with Sid in front of Merlion
Pic 2 : Sid Talking to Rat in the Merlion Garden
Pic 3 : Standing in the rotating Aquarium Tunnel
Pic 4 :  Sea Anemone
Pic 5 : Sea Horse
Pic 6 : Nilesh and Sid Standing in MRT
Pic 7 : Our Dinner - North Indian Set meal on banana leaf

Singapore : Guided visit by Jimmy, Jurong Bird Park, New Hotel, Ice Cream Sanwich (in sliced bread !) and Rickshaw Ride

As soon as I got home last night, I slept like a log, until Jimmy phoned at 10:00a.m.. He had told me he'd come by around 10:00a.m to pick us up for some singapore visit. Even my sister or mum or nephew were fast asleep and did not get up before. I guess that's why vacations  are for -- sleeping late. So we woke up, got ready, had some breakfast (unfortunately american breakfast) and packed out things to check out already of the Orchard Hotel. I had booked only one night in Orchard as its pretty uneventful apart from shopping and huge crowds. the next 2 days, I have booked a hotel in a more central place - City hall area, which is closer to everything at walking distance.

We checked out and Jimmy came to get us. He drove us around town showing us the different parts of Singapore and general descriptions. After our driving our, we went to Jurong Bird Park. I was initally not too excited to go there, as I was thinking, it'd be boring to go see birds in cage, but I actually very much enjoyed the visit .They have a section where the birds live freely in an open air cage and we can feed them. They come and get the good from your hands. It was impressive and we had a really good time checking out the various sample of birds. Excellent for pictures and so many colors too.

After Jurong Bird Park, Jimmy dropped us at our new Hotel the Peninsula Excelsior hotel. We checked in and loved our room. We had a corner room on the 15th floor. So two great views on both sides. On one side, we had a view of the Singapore Flyer, Fullerton Hotel and on the other side a nice white cathedral and nice buildings. As we did not really have lunch, we went for pre-dinner food break. We went to the Raffles City mall nearby and their good court was excellent. My mom and sister found some faratha seller and had these, while I had South Korean Food - Dol Sop Bi Bim Bop.. Then for Desert, we had Ice Kachang - such a great desert on hot days !! It was my first Ice Kachang ever and I really enjoyed it :)

Then for actual dinner, found a full Vegetarian restaurant just in front of our hotel. We had some set meals there and it was great. Funny that next to our table, there were other Maurtians, speaking in creole, but we did not speak to them, nor did they.

After dinner, me, Ashveena and Sid, went for a walk to nearby Clark Quay. Love the area and good things around there. Had some ice cream bar in sliced bread (yes sliced bread) and then walked around the numerous bars and entertainment places. Young and energetic place. Love the mood and atmosphere. To go back to the hotel, we decided to be a bit touristy and we took a Rickshaw back.

Only now, did I just finally manage to connect to the internet on the Free Singapore wireless network. I lived for 2 days without !! :) They have free wireless for the whole country, but one need to sign up for it and to sign up for t, you need to have a cell phone where they you the code by sms.. So I had to buy a sim card to be able to receive sms. Its much cheaper than what the hotel charges me for a whole day internet though - $30 and the sim card was only $8, with $10 free credit and sms.. so its actually -$2.

Singapore friends, I'll be in singapore next 2 days, my short lived cell phone number here is 83690894 and I'm in city hall area if you care for a coffee/drink/chat :)

Pic 1,2 and 3 : Ashveena, Nilesh and Mum feeding the birds

Pic 4 : Posing with Pink Flamingos

Pic 5 : Mum, Sis and Sid with mini waterfall and birds

Pic 6 : Jurong Souvenir Picture (these were live birds)

Pic 7 : Chance encounter in the mall with Spongebob squarepants

Pic 8 : My Bi Bim Bop Dinner

Pic 9 : An enormous ghee dosa for sid

pic 10 : AShveena eating ice cream in a bred slice

pic 11 : Me in Rickshaw

Pic 12 : Mango Ice Kachang !

Singapore : Reached from Mauritius, Orchard Road Christmas Spirit and Late Chinese Style Breakfast

I reached Singapore yesterday after a nice quite empty flight from Air Mauritius. As it was pretty empty, I had the chance to get my own row of seats and sleep a long nice good sleep. Reached Singapore about noon and took the MRT to go to Orchard. Checked in to Orchard Parade hotel. They somehow upgraded my reservation to a suite for free. So it was a pretty nice start of the trip with a nice room. We spent most of the day checking out the bustling and hyper active Orchard Road. Just the usual orchard crowd and activities.

My mom and sister, being vegetarians, we had quite some trouble finding some dinner around Orchard. Everything was with meat. The vegetarian concept was not really something too cool in there. For lunch, we somehow managed to find something for them. I think they had some kind of bee hoon. Then at night, as they were pretty tired from the flight and walking around Orchard, they decided to chill and stay in. I went to Little India by MRT to get some vegetarian food. Even there, surprisingly, totally vegetarian was not an easy thing to find. There was a totally vegetarian south Indian restaurant though. I took a set meal to go and brought it to the hotel for them to eat.

After dinner with the family, one of my university friends, Jimmy came to pick me up for some night time action. Checked out a few night spots - We had a couple of drinks around the Duxton area, just catching up in general and at 3:00a.m, we ended up in a Hawker Center in the Geylang district for some authentic chinese food. I don't quite know how the food I had called, but we had some kind of fried donut, some sweet silky soy milk with bean curd and peanuts inside, some shanghai dumplings with shredded ginger,  egg and meat floss toast, glutinous sticky rice with 'something' inside. It was pretty good and energetic at 3:00a.m in the morning.

Pretty busy first day !

Pic 1 : Orchard Road Street Decorations

Pic 2 : 3:00a.m chinese food

Pic 3 : Sis, Sid and Mum in Airplane

p.s : I am glad I asked what were the taiwanese noodles though before ordering. Taiwanese noodles are actually just pig's intestines cooked liked noodles.