Hello from Singapore

Hello from Singapore. It is 3:00 p.m. the 11th of May. We arrived last night just before midnight having left Los Angeles at 12:30 p.m. 9th May. Something like 20 hours including a two-hour layover in Narita (Tokyo).

We have traveled on the subway this morning and are resting now before we go out again in the evening.

The weather is hot and humid but mot nearly so bad as when we were in Japan a year ago and Hong Kong a while back. I expected worse being so near the equator. Everything is green and brightly colored. We are in the Phoenix hotel (the cheapest offered) and it is beautiful, no one has smoked in this room, the carpet is clean and fresh. All you have to do when you are on the street is stop and study a map and someone comes up and asks if they can help, this has been true of all of our Asian trips.

The room is equiped with a Gateway computer and connected to the internet!

Rub it in! I still hope Singapore is in my future. Take lots of photos to post for us.

George enjoy ur trip in Singapore. be sure to stop at some local nursery to see the exotic orchids, plumeria's, ginger plants and other exotic tropical plants.

I want to the cleanest country in the world too =) I hope I can get to internet somewhere when we got to E- and C- Europe next month. :z

that's a place I'd love to visit too!! have a great time, is it work or vacation? hope the weather treats you good!

Oh Geoge I can smell it from here!! That heady, balm warm air. I lived in Changi for three years. You must go to the Raffles Hotel just for tea!! The gardens are magnificent but watch out for those little monkeys and don't carry food with you!! lol!!! The cleanest country in the world. Boogie Street is no longer the attraction it once was, but believe the street food markets are still there. Those piles and piles of huge shrimp so artistically arranged!! I envy you!! Keep us posted so that we can do the tour with you!!

Wow - another world traveler! You sure found a great hotel, George! Have a blast!

Well we are home! Does it ever feel good. Arrived home Saturday afternoon, the cats were leary of us when we first walked in. (A neighbor had been feeding them and looking in twice a day.)

Singapore is so pretty and the people seem very happy. There does not seem to be any single-family homes, everyone lives in high-rise apartments although they are of good size. In Hong Kong it is the same situation except that the apartments are very small. I have always detested apartments.

I took a lot of pictures of flowers and now I have to learn how to set up a home page her at DG.

Kuala Lumpur was another story. Innumerable projects that appeared as though they would never be finished. For instance in the neighborhood where we stayed they had poured a great deal of concrete in preparation for setting tiles. But workmen had walked through the wet concrete and left huge irregularities. I places bales of tiles were stacked. All of this looked as though it was quite old.

The Light Rail system which is nearly finished looks old, dirty, and decaying.

Our last night in Singapore (after visiting Kuala Lumpur) we met a man who is captain of an oil drilling platform. He has worked many places in the world, he was coming back from L.A. (lower Alabama). He works 28 days and then is off 28 days. He felt quite bad that we were disappointed. He said that Malaysia had been badly hurt by the world economy downturn.

Then on the segment of the flight home from Narita (Tokyo) to Los Angeles the man seated next to me was a designer of artificial joints. Currently he owns a company that produces a global spinal fixation system. He gave me his card and said that he could recomend surgeons with good track records if I was interested. I was hurting enough that I was almost ready to be talked into replacements!

George when we lived in Singapore in the 70s people were still living in the jungle right across from our house but it soon changed. I think it is a beautiful country and under the excellent, but rather stern, approach from the leader Lee Kwan Yu (sp) it has become one of the most lucrative countries in the world!! I can still remember the fines for spitting or dropping litter, even cigarette butts!! Very hefty!! Did you visit the Tiger Balm Gardens?? You must have done!! It's always nice to come home though and I bet your pets are happy to see you too!! :-)

Were you living in a single family house? We rode the North subway to the end and then transferred to the West and rode it to the end. At every stop there were large appartment houses. We never saw a single family home.

We didn't make it to the East end of the island. Just ran out of energy.

Saw so many interesting plants, got some pictures. Others I saw from a moving vehicle and so only had a glimpse. We walked from the Lavender subway station to the Lavender Hawkers square. Along the way I saw a tree that had baseball size nuts. They were very light and I was able to pull one open. Inside in a brown husk was a white kernel. Did not taste it since I had no idea.