Chris and Chandi’s Worldwide Adventures

Since we have been back in Singapore we have been pretty lazy. Laura, Chandi and I went to little India and Arab street one day and it was pretty interesting. We went to a Hindu temple and a Mosque and went to a pile of interesting shops. Laura and Chandi bought some cool tableclothes. The next day Chandi and I went to the Changi Museum which is all about what happened in Singapore over WWII, basically the allied forces (no Canadians!) gave up when they outnumbered the Japanese three to one then they all spent the next three years suffering under the Rising Sun. It was very interesting and makes you wonder how Singapore and Japan can be such good buddies right now. Chandi has spent a lot of my money shopping, I got a t-shirt for S$5 which is like $3CDN.
On Wednesday Chandi and I are heading to Malaysia and then onto Thailand for adventure ++. Maybe we will be able to the blog while there but I doubt it, I will be too busy taming wild elephants and hunting for the elusive southeast asian finger monkey.
They have crazy food here. To list some of the weirdo things I have eaten; Japanese shrimp balls, some kind of weird desert with ice, milk, tapioca balls and fruit, Japanese cheese pancakes which are like giant twinkies, lots of different fruits, lots of vegetarian food, thai food, Indian food.
We just went to a modern dance show at the Singapore Art Festival tonight. I did not know what was going on but Laura and Chandi got it I guess. The people in the audience were very annoying, they talked a lot. I was surprised because this is a polite society here.
Tomorrow morning we are off for adventure ++. I want to ride on an elephant and see some crazy thai boxing.

Hi Everyone!

We are in Singapore and having a great time with my mom (Laura) and Es. As we both said we would be setting this up, I thought it was about time we delivered on our promise.

After barely getting on the ferry to Vancouver (we were one of the five last cars to get on) we made it to the Vancouver International Airport with plenty of time to spare – thanks for the ride Grani!!! This is a good place to note that unless you are flying to the States do not go through security if you are hungry. There is not much to be had once you pass through those metal detectors!!

The flight was good, with not so good airline food but that is expected. On the Vancouver to Tokyo leg we even got to sit upstairs in the plane something which I have never even done before. We were a little rushed getting our connection in Tokyo as our flight was delayed an hour leaving Van. and we only had about 15min once we landed to catch our Singapore flight. The JAL staff were very helpful and gave us these huge airplane stickers to put on that had the gate number on it so we would now where to go. I am not kidding these stickers were huge and in the end they had the wrong gate number but we got on the plane we needed to be on eventually. Our luggage on the other hand was not so lucky and was not in Singapore when we arrived. It all worked out though and our luggage was delivered to the apartment the next day.

It has been really nice having Mom and Es showing us all their hangouts. They even had a birthday cake for Chris when we arrived – it was a very tasty! We have mostly been exploring the Orchard Rd. area which is just a block away from their apartment. It is a shopping and eating street and we having been doing lots of both! We took the MRT down to the Merlion the other day and have done a few walks to the Botanic Garden as well. And after all that shopping, eating and walking around it is really nice to go to the pool at the apartment. The pool is huge and there is never anyone in it – if it wasn’t raining we might even be in there right now!

Tomorrow the four of us are heading to the island of Bintan (Indonesia). For all you worry warts: we did not feel the earthquake and we are OK and we are not going to be in that area. We are going to a hotel that they have been to before and it will be nice vacation/rest for everyone and a chance to get out of the big city. Sounds like there is tons to do there and so we will fill you in when we return in four days or so. We also have all our reading material on SE Asia so we will be deciding on where Chris and I will head next – Thailand most likely.

Looking forward to comments and place suggestions from anyone that has been to this area before!