Asia Holiday 2013, August 12 (The Re-Arranger)

Back to Bugis Junction for breakfast, Four Leaves for a muffin straight out of the oven (it's hot but it actually crumbles apart too much), a mini donut and I had exactly enough change for a slice of red bean, what luck!

Since I had reconfigured yesterday's plan, every other day needed to be changed too. I started with the places that were close by, starting in the Arab district which has the Masjid Sultan Mosque, - it looked pretty cool from the outside. The streets around have interesting names like Baghdad and Kandahar, but you probably wouldn't want to say you spent the morning in Baghdad. There was some other mosque that was a bit sad by comparison, and I stopped in for a banana milkshake - $2.20 without ice, $2.80 with ice!?

Masjid Sultan Mosque.

Also Masjid Sultan Mosque.

Across to Little India next, the main street appeared to be Serangoon Road so I went along it. Heaps of cheapo shops along there, they extend out into the footpath so you're basically walking through the stores instead. Lots of cheap stuff around, but quality was pretty questionable. The best thing about Little India was the amount of vegetarian restaurants - I found it funny that they advertise as vegetarian *AND* non-vegetarian. At the end of the road was City Square Mall where nothing much was open until 11am, so I went back to the hotel to pack for the afternoon instead.

At the hotel I had to put together a survival kit to survive the night - addng bread, fruit, drinks, pants, jacket and inspect spray to everything I already had. I had to quickly take two trains and make it to a bus stop outside Sheraton Towers hotel, to take me to the Singapore Zoo and Night Safari at a pre-designated time. I figured that like at every other train station so far there would be plenty of shops around buy extra food, but when I got out there was nothing but hotels! The SAEX (Singapore Attractions Express) bus came along soon and I was the only one on it for about twenty minutes. It was good though, as while the driver was checking the other pickup points I got a free siteseeing trip around the city, particularly the Orchard Road area. Finally one family jumped on board and we were off to Singapore Zoo.

Three parks in one, I didn't go to River Safari.

I stopped in at the KFC before entering the park to get some chips (no other choices) for lunch...only to discover they sell thin-cut french fries. The chunky fries were the best thing KFC had going for them, and now they've ruined that. THE HORROR. THE HORROR. After getting a park map the plan was to take it easy so my knee had a day to recover, and try to see everything without much repeat, but that's a bit difficult when the park is designed like one of those kids placemat puzzles you find at a fast food restaurant.

THE HORROR. THE HORROR.

THE HORROR! THE HORROR!

Half way through the park everything was going well, I'd seen some animals, some the same and some different, then I started to develop a blister on my small right toe. So much unbearable pain with my left knee and foot before and during the holiday already, and now the right was out of action too. I limped to the elephant show next, I got there early but it was still standing room only. They have the animals do tricks like move logs around and they have a script memorized, but wasn't sure whether to be impressed by the training capacity or sad for the elephants in captivity.

Alligator or crocodile? They never do anything entertaining.

They really do have white tigers.

I think he's dead.

Elephants on parade.

Giraffes don't do much either.

I came across a place selling slushy drinks in a flask for $6, but for that price they had better be frozen margaritas! There was another show starting up in the sea section called Splash Safari (maybe) and since I couldn't walk at all anymore I got there early and got a good seat. This time it was a seal or sea lion (is there a difference?) doing some tricks to claim food, probably better than the elephant show. They had one event where they have a kid drop his (hopefully) waterproof watch into the tank so that the seal can retrieve it. The presenter joked that the kid would have to go get it himself since the seal wasn't co-operating, and he was actually about to jump in.

Seal show.

I ran down to get a tram ride through the park before it closed, because sitting down has become the thing to do - from the mightiest pharaoh to the lowliest peasant, who doesn't enjoy a good sit? I didn't see much I hadn't already seen by walking around, but it didn't take too long either.

The zoo shuts down at 6pm, then it's just across the entranceway to Night Safari, only it doesn't open until 7:30pm, and there's nothing else to really do since you're in the middle of nowhere... For some reason everything at the Night Safari was proportionally more expensive than the zoo, like soft drinks suddently went from $3 to $4, that's highway robbery! Ben & Jerry's were selling a $13 smoothie, I didn't buy one but I imagine if you did you'd be required to say "I don't know if it's worth thirteen dollars but it's pretty f*cking good". There was a place called Bongo's Burgers or something that finally had a vegetable burger for sale! The $14 price tag wasn't the breaking point as much as the line to order and pay wasn't moving. So lamentably I gave up on that and had an apple left for dinner instead :(

Night time (disregard the bright sky).

Bongo Bargains.

Not much else to do for about an hour until the night safari opened, other than to ensure I had enough insect repellent applied to create a new endangered species. I also discovered while waiting that I needed to change the watch band size on my wrist, only I don't know if it's for better or worse...

At about 7:10 I went up to entrance to see a massive line for the tram rides and the first animal show. Also, I found out that if you just wanted to walk around, you could already go in and do that! - so why do the maps and all the signs say the park opens at 7:30? I didn't want to spend all night at the safari and get back to the hotel after midnight, so I went into power walk mode to try and get through everything as quick as possible, blister be damned.

Because I was one of the first to realise the park was, in fact, already open, I was walking around the trails pretty much in the dark by myself. Probably not so much a problem with the wildlife being caged up, but it did feel like the bugs were out on the attack and I was the only target. When I reached the flying possum cage they had a double door system in place where the inside door cannot be opened until the outside door shuts, and vice versa. This, obviously, is to prevent both doors from being open at the same time and the possum somehow flying out. Anyway, I was the first person in, only there was a bunch of people right behind me that kept holding the outer door open. So I'm stuck at the front waiting to open the inside door, except idiot after idiot keeps squuezing through the entrance and people are just piling up. I'm looking back at them waiting for the door to close, and they're looking forward with confusion as to why we aren't going in, despite all the signs and instructions. I'm even calling out to shut the damn door! but people just don't listen...

Off to tribal council.

I had bought a new Sony Cybershot camera just before the trip and wasn't too familiar with all of the settings yet (other than 1: point and 2: click). I was wondering why some of my photos were coming out so well before noticing an infrared light was activating for a few of the shots. I had turned the flash off as soon as I got the camera, but this other setting was set to automatic, and it took forever to find it in the menu. So while I wasn't that one idiot with flash turned on and blinding the animals, I was a close second place. Despite the IR features the photos still came out somewhat blurry and basically useless.

I finished the circuit in record time and got back to the entrance to find the same mass of people waiting for a tram ride. One of the attendants came up to me and we had this conversation:

• Me: (About to say) Where is the exit to this place?
• Attendant: (Jumps in) Can I help, are you looking for the tram?
• Me: (Not really interested) Uhh how long is the queue?
• Attendant: How many people?
• Me: Just one
• Attendant: Here you go, front of the line!

So not having to line up was a good enough reason to take the tram around, plus there's a lot more stuff at night you only have access to on the tram. Once we got going there was so many people with their flash turned on, they had to keep stopping the tram and telling people to stop it. The animals didn't seem to be enjoying it much either. The tram ride was ok, but you don't really get any good photos out of it, and the trip was quite long and slow too.

So then it was finally time to get back to the city, only it was 8:45 and the first SAEX bus didn't start up until 9:30, probably assuming everyone takes AT LEAST two hours to visit the park. Instead I figured I'd just take a public bus to Ang Mo Kio, since there was a train station of the same name, and hoped that the final stop would be an interchange with the rail line. Lucky I was right for once, and there was even shops at the station this time! but everything was just starting to close so I went straight to the train.

Back at Bugis the shops were still open. I bought some food for the morning and have made the following observations about shopping:

• Staff take and return your money with two hands - it does seem much more formal than just using one
• You get a receipt for EVERYTHING, even if you're just buying a drink at 7-Eleven
• Almost everything comes in a plastic bag, again even if you're just buying a drink

I checked a McDonalds but the store only had an Oreo McFlurry or a Durian McFlurry. What the hell is a durian, it looks like some spiky fruit?

I had to buy a new packet of blades for my shaver, only they came in one of those hard plastic-sealed packages, which are impossible to tear open. The closest thing to scissors I could find in the hotel room was a coat hanger, so I probably spent about 20 minutes trying to get the packet open.

STEP-O-METER: 34102 steps