31 May 2015 - Singapore

On Friday, the day before departure, Jim came down with a good head cold. Lots of Codral and rest seemed to improve things. Saturday he stayed in bed quite a while and then we left for the ferry. We just made the 6:15PM ferry as we were using an old timetable which had departure at 6:30. Still, we had plenty of time up our sleeves as the flight left near midnight.

Air NZ's smart checkin made life very easy. Jim had to smile at the Air NZ lady watching the baggage being checked in. He reckoned she was at least ten years older then him.

The Dreamliner Boeing 777 would not be on Jim's list of preferred airliners. Air NZ has squeezed in the seats so that he had an inch to spare on his knees when sitting upright, however when his seat and the others were reclined, he had to assume a contorted Yoga position in order to sit down. The aisle gap is so small that all passengers sitting in the aisle seats are continually being bumped by traffic in the aisle. It's particularly exciting when you have a cup of hot drink.

The flight was reasonable and we were on time, but it took a while for the baggage to come off.

You certainly know you are in Singapore when you walk to the taxi. 33C and about 95% humidity. Not quite the “knock you over” temperatures of Hong Kong last year.

We knew we had picked a good hotel when the taxi driver didn't know where it was. We arrived about 8AM and were allowed the use of the disabled toilet to sort ourselves out and change. Then we left the baggage at the hotel and had a coffee across the street. We wandered around the Bugi District for a couple of hours. (This area used to be famous for its transvestites.) We went to the Hotel Bencoolen, where we had stayed in 1978, but while it was the same name the building was new. We did find a building that looked like the hotel we stayed in down the street and are quite sure this is where we had stayed.

The old Bencoolen Hotel that we stayed in, in 1978

Our wanderings around town took us to a few malls and market areas. Lynette tried the toilets in one of the malls and was excited to pay 20c for the opportunity to stand over a two footer and hole.

A two footer.

Street vendor selling mushrooms etc

A Chinese temple

One of the many gods that are around.

Back at the hotel, the boys had sorted out the room and taken our baggage up. It's very cosy, just 12' by 12', or in Ian's terms 3.5 metres by 3-5 metres. That gives you a double bed, shower, toilet, wash basin and a few square feet in which to stand up. Ideal for our needs.

31 May

After another shower (yes, you need at least three per day), we sat in the foyer, waiting for Choy and Yat Keng and when they arrived, they looked very similar to when we last met them 13 years ago. Haven't changed much at all. We chatted for a while and then went down the street 100 yards to a french restaurant and met Christina.

Singapore almost deserves its own book. Jim has been coming here since 1980, initially for training and then business. In those days he worked for the world wide Racal company, which was a large multinational electronics company with about 200subsidiary companies. It had many companies and set up a joint venture mobile phone company called Racal Vodafone, which it later sold off. Jim worked for the data communications (networking) company called Racal-Milgo and Choy worked for Racal Singapore, a local company that handled all Racal's products and services. Racal made military radios and was quite strong in the South East Asian market. Christina worked for Racal Singapore as the accountant keeping the beans in line. Yat Keng, Choy's wife has always worked for one of the universities as a lab technician and and is now a lab technologist. Still the same work by the sound of things. After leaving Racal, Choy ended up working for MCI Sprint, a major communications company, and while there over 20 years, the company's name changed a number of times but the function and people remained. Choy was a great electronics engineer who like Jim, moved into Project and then Program Management. He was made redundant at the end of last year and has been enjoying being a kept man as Yet Keng brings in the money.

Singapore is a fantastic country to visit. It's extremely safe, clean and continuously changing. It's also a major hub. When Jim was travelling as the Technical Services Manager for Racal-Milgo, the Florida company, he used to stay here, on and off, for up to a month, and visit the other countries in the region. He always used to smile as the airplanes approached Singapore, they would announce that there were severe penalties for drug trafficing in Singapore and that the minimum sentence was Death. There was never a mention of the maximum sentence. It was quite surprising to hear that today the Police had shot three people and killed one at at security conference, when the car failed to stop. Inside the car they found some drugs, so it looks like the drug policy hasn't worked out.

The older colonial style buildings in some areas of Singapore.

After lunch, Choy drove us around the block to a cafe that just serves desert and their specialty is shaved ice fruit deserts. The fruit used is tropical such as Mango, Honey Dew Melon and even Durian, the favoured Asian fruit. They were plentiful, cooling and very nice. Perhaps it's a good time to discuss eating styles.

In NZ, we eat at particular times of the day and then race around burning up energy at other times. In Singapore it's quite different. People eat smaller meals and more often throughout the day. Jim calls it “continuous grazing” and used to comment on Choy's ten or more mini-meals during the day. Choy says he doesn't eat as much these days but still probably has about seven sit down small meals in a day. Food and drink can be quite cheap. We had Copio (black coffee with about an inch of sweetened condensed milk in the bottom of the cup) for $2 in a larger street cafe, about half the price in NZ. In a hawker centre, where there was lots of competition, an iced version of the same thing was less than a dollar. (The Singapore and NZ Dollars are about equal in value.)

After the desert, we left Christina and went to Choy and Yat Keng's house. Housing in Singapore is very expensive and Choy and Yat Keng have worked hard to get where they are today. Because they could not get married until they had somewhere to live, they were engaged for seven years so that they could get their name on the government housing list for an apartment, and then only after one had become available did they get married. That is a long engagement. It's nowhere near as bad today but now the major thing holding young people back is the deposit required to get the first apartment, so many people get married and still live with one set of  parents.

Choy and Yat Keng's house.

Choy and his Chinese fiddle

Their earlier apartments were quite a way from the city and well up the apartment tower. Parking was always a problem too. Jim can remember Choy having to go to the City offices to buy parking coupons to display in his car window outside his apartment block. Choy had to go and get a new set of coupons every month. That same coupon system is used today, especially for street parking. You buy a stack of coupons and push out the holes that represent the time when you arrive at a parking space, and depending upon the colour of the coupon, you must depart before the coupon expires. The standard time seems to be 90 minutes, and the ticket inspectors work seven days a week. There's also an electronic system for parking in parking buildings and collecting tolls on the roads that hits your cash card regularly. Tolls and parking fees seem quite reasonable in price, but they were everywhere, so you would notice their cost.

Choy and Yat Keng jumped off the apartment ladder about 20 years ago and invested in a house about halfway between the airport and city. It's a spacious (2,700 square feet) multistorey house that's situated on about 1,000 square feet of land area. By comparison, our single storey house is about 1,100 square feet and our half acre land is close to 20,000 square feet. Value-wise, their Singapore property is three to four times the value of ours. They were very smart to invest when they did and live in a very nice house in a quiet street.

Besides being skilled at his job Choy is quite artistic. He has been making Origami items for years, and we have one of his framed ones on our wall dated around 1988. He also plays a Chinese musical instrument like a drum/fiddle with a single string and belongs to an orchestra.

Cars are very expensive in Singapore. There are higher road taxes than NZ, the cost of purchase is much higher, probably two to three times NZ costs but fuel costs are very close. You'll see cars with red number plates. These are weekend only cars. They are only allowed on the roads after 7:30PM during the week, after 10:30AM on Saturday and all day Sunday. Not sure it would catch on in NZ. Despite the higher costs, you see sports cars regularly and we saw new Ferraris and Lamborghinis. (Lambos for short). Choy drives a ten year old Toyota that is is good condition and well decorated with his origami and stickers on the window. Driving here is extremely courteous with people letting others in all the time, definitely not like in NZ.

They then drove us out to see the newly developed Marina area. Development is very noticeable in Singapore. When we first came here, there was bare open land on the way to the airport. Now it's covered in manicured trees and apartment buildings. Buildings are going up and coming down and the skyline looks like an architects playground, where each architect is trying to outdo the previous one.

The marina area used to be the old sea waterfront and Singapore river junction. Jim often walked along here looking at the boats and old style housing. The river was pretty sad. It was black, dirty and you could almost walk across it. You can still recognise some of the buildings, but today the water is so clean that you wouldn't believe the story of walking across the river. They reclaimed a whole area of land, built new buildings and cleaned up the river so much that it is now a sparkling tourist attraction.

We came across a large number of people flying kites. There was plenty of wind but very little space for parking and Jim left his zoom lens behind so Lynette took most of the photos. The kites were large and small and flying very high, over 300 metres. One presumes it was a no-fly area for planes.

Kites

A multikite, kite  Very large

Then we went to the Marina parkland or gardens and met Christina again. The gardens were laid out to represent a number of old style villages that were in Singapore before the development took over. Buildings represented the older kampong or village style of houses and there are lots of displays which are changed regularly.

Yat Keng and Christina

Singapore is a bit of a concrete jungle and you know it when you come to the gardens. The “trees” are concrete pillars, like those used to support a motorway, and there are plastic “branches” coming out. The plants that are growing up the trees are real and the trees are festooned with light bulbs. When it's dark there is a 15 minute sound and light display which is well worth viewing.

Then it was across the Marina to the city side to see the sights from there and have dinner. We were beginning to to flag by this stage as it was well after midnight (NZ time) and we didn't get that much sleep on the plane. Jim's throat was a little tender, mainly from the talking.

We got back to the hotel around 2AM NZ time and had our third shower of the day. It was a fantastic day catching up and seeing what has changed.

The photos were a challenge, coming from two cameras.  We'll improve things as we go along, I, sure

Yat Keng and Choy

Large "trees" in the Marina garden

This is a group of three individual hotels that are topped with a stainless steel like curved boat.  The boat or liner has a restaurant, viewing platform and swimming pool

One of the fountains in the Marina garden s

One of the illuminated trees

Looking across to the new marina complex from the old Collyer Quay