Day 157/8 - Adventures with Scotsmen

Day 157 (Thursday 20th) - Night Safari!

I met two Scottish guys named Tony & Stuart from Aberdeen, who were also going on the Night Safari - they are both doing conservation work in a national park in Malaysia, and seem like top blokes. We chatted all the way there, clearly excited by the idea of seeing various animals in an unusual setting. The Night Safari was, it turned out, only kind of OK. Most of the animals wandering around were types of deer and cattle, which I suppose are the only ones they can keep without fences. There were some really cool ones too, like two types of Hyenas, a Rhino, massive Hippos, Lions, Elephants (including Chawang, an enormous bull with 6ft tusks) and Giant Anteaters - all of these were easily visible due to the Zoo's use of moats instead of fences. We saw two Leopards, a load of Civets and a Malayan Tiger all pretty close up, which was awesome - the walking trails were pretty interesting, and the guide on the tram sounded like a sexy female Borat character, as she purred her way through the park. It was cool, but probably not worth the S$33 it cost us. We returned and had a couple of drinks and played a few rounds of Shithead, before heading to bed. When we did so it was incredibly noisy outside and my earplugs were in my locker, so I had to put up with the sounds of the Hindi club opposite for hours, and then had to contend with some buffoon's alarm going off 5 times in the morning, gradually annoying the other people in the dorm more and more.

Day 158 (Friday 21st) - Sentosa

Tony, Stuart and I decided to head to Sentosa today, the touristy island off the south coast of Singapore. We opted for a tour package, as it seemed the best value - although at S$54 (20 quid!) it was by no means a bargain. This included the cablecar up to Mt Faber, a disappointing viewpoint, and back over to Sentosa Island. Here we went to the Cineblast Cinema, which was basically a load of 6 seater simulators pointing at a screen, showing a 3D experience of what it would be like to be a log felled in some kind of future civilisation - that's not very accurate but I have no idea how to describe it. It was again pretty cool, but not worth the price. We then got the bus to the Dolphin Lagoon, where we saw some Pink Dolphins doing some cool tricks, and walked along the various beaches to the Underwater World Aquarium. The beaches were actually really nice, the sand was clean and the water was pretty clear, even though you could see a load of container ships and tankers filling up in the distance. The sun was really bright in a cloudless sky, the first one I've seen in 3 weeks, so I went for a bit of a swim to cool down - in the 10 minutes I was in the water loads of clouds formed, and thunder began to rumble, so we carried on walking, hoping to get indoors before the rain started. The Aquarium was pretty cool, it had a load of Rays in a tank that you could reach in and stroke, as well as lots of colourful reef fish and a tunnel running through the massive tank full of Leopard Sharks, Nurse Sharks, Giant groupers and some other cool stuff. The best part of it all, however, was the tank outside where there were at least 8 Green and Hawksbill Turtles, including the biggest one I've ever seen - a 4 ft Green Sea Turtle, who came up and splashed about in front of us for ages - really impressive, much bigger than any of the ones I saw diving or snorkelling. I would say taht Sentosa would be worth it if you got the cheaper Monorail over there, and just hung out on the shiny, wierdly fake beach all day, while avoiding any of the "activities"

After this we headed back on the cablecar and went for dinner in Chinatown. I had my first taste of Laksa, a curryish noodle soup with (in my case) Char Siew pork and tofu - it was really delicious and cheap, which was a relief after our expensive day out. I was left with the same feeling after Sentosa as I was after the Night Safari - that i knew I'd had fun and seen some cool stuff, and I was glad I had done it, but it certainly wasn't worth the cost. I've had that feeling about all of Singapore apart from the food, and consequently I'll be glad to get to Bali tomorrow night - 50p a beer, 2 quid accommodation! After dinner we came back and played more cards, got chatting to some Australians who had slept on the street last night, and who joined us for Shithead and a few beers. I went for an awesome Indian meal quite unexpectedly about half 11 - I intended to get a naan or some roti, ended up with a mutton-based feast, which was delicious and cheap.