02/18/99
Live from the City of the Merlion
Ted and I made it to Singapore yesterday evening as planned. Spent our
first hours here lugging our packs around, trying to locate an ATM and a
recommended guesthouse. Finally found both. Our guesthouse is not quite
as nice as the famous Raffles Hotel located just down the street, but it
is bugfree and clean and our room comes complete with free morning
toast.
Today was an official errand day for the kids. Spent most of the morning
running around the Marina Bay area and Financial District, changing
money and changing plane tickets (those of you have been paying
attention will have noticed that we are running a couple of months
behind schedule). So...
The new and improved itinerary is:
Mon, Feb 22: Singapore -> Hat Yai on the Thai border (14 hour bus);
catch another bus to Champon (7 hours); hang out for night ferry to Ko
Tao; arrive Ko Tao on Wed. morning; catch boat to a better beach than
the one the ferry docks at; sleep and dive for as many days as it takes
us to recover from the 2 day transportation process.
Tues, Feb 30: Ko Tao -> Bangkok (6 hours by bus? that's the rumour
anyway); stay in Bangkok only as long as it takes to arrange visas for
Laos and Vietnam, hopefully no longer than a week; then Laos -> Yunnan
Province, China -> Vietnam -> Cambodia -> Bangkok
May 16: fly Bangkok -> Dhaka, Bangladesh
May 21: fly Dhaka -> Kathmandu, Nepal
June 20: fly Kathmandu -> New Delhi, India; find work? freak out? head
home? head for the middle east? join a cult? our plane tickets end here
- the options are virtually limitless.
In the meantime, we'll spend the next 2 days here. Although Singapore
has a reputation for being sterile and dull, the city's history,
colonial architecture, and cultural diversity make it worth exploring.
Being in an ultra-efficient, hyper-organized city-state feels
comfortable right now. Everyone is polite and well-behaved. Everything
is clean. Everyone speaks English. This could almost be America except
that Ted and I are in the minority and it's against the law to chew gum.
--j
jalondon@hotmail.com
