Singapore and Christmas

Singapore is like a woman with all the looks but none of the personality: the place has lots of skyscrapers along the harbour which gives the beautiful skyline you see on all the pictures, however apart from this we couldn’t find much else going on. The weather wasn’t on our side and it rained cats and dogs most days. Christmas though was nice enough and different from the norm.

Our hotel was in Little India which was a short tube ride from the city centre, the room was OK, nice bed, hot shower, but we did have to share the room with some little critters (cockroaches), well the ones I didn’t manage to squish anyway. I don’t think many white people go to Little India as we were often stared at while walking around there, no one said anything to us but they loved to stare, this never made us uncomfortable, more annoying than anything.

We spent the first couple of days walking around, getting a feel for the area, which didn’t take too long as Singapore feels much like Malaysia, same sort of food, same language and people. First thing you notice is the amount of shopping malls, if you like shopping (and can afford it) then Singapore is the place to be; it is said that Singapore is the world’s only shopping mall with a seat in the United Nations, and I have to agree. Problem is we didn’t have the money to shop, especially not at those prices. Another thing is Singapore is really expensive when compared to all other countries in the area, you’re talking 3 times more than Malaysia.

We went up the Marina Bay Sands building on Boxing Day evening and took some nice pictures (see below), and went around a photography exhibition at the museum.

Christmas day was a lazy one, we rose at about midday and went downstairs to the restaurant for a curry (it was a very nice one), we then headed to Orchard Road which is known for its Christmas decorations and shops. It definitely felt more Christmassy there and all the shops were open til late, still full from our curry we just had a coffee and cake from Costa for our Christmas dinner! We didn’t stay too long after that as we had no money to shop with and the crowds were starting to annoy us, there were far too many people, must have been hundreds of thousands there.

The rest of our time in Singapore was spent walking around and sheltering from the rain (mainly by watching Game of Thrones).

We left Singapore yesterday via train and arrived in Kuala Lumpur late last night. The train was about 7 hours and was comfortable enough, the Chinese ladies across from our seats even took a liking towards us and provided us with nuts and bought us some water..?!

We haven’t ventured out too much yet so I’ll do another update about Kuala Lumpur soon!