Singapore

From Tioman Island, we ferried back to the mainland and eventually boarded a delayed bus to the Malaysia-Singapore border town of Johor Bahru.  The border crossing into Singapore was possibly the most efficient and easiest of our trip so far.  A local express bus took us from Malaysia via two immigration posts directly to the main downtown bus terminal in Singapore.  After a quick stop at a mid-range hotel to convert our remaining Ringgit into Singapore Dollars, we began our hunt for some budget accommodation.  Sleeping cheap in Singapore is comparable to slumming it in Beverly Hills...highly improbable, nearly impossible.   

We headed to Chinatown in search of cheap hotels, only to find that the area bore no resemblance at all to the 'real' China; immaculately clean streets lined with trendy PR companies and over-priced boutique hotels.  Even the local 7-11 was fitted with wood paneling and marble floors.  Tired and hungry, we settled for the cheapest room we could find and resolved to continue our search the following morning.  The next day we moved to a much more budget friendly room in the heart of Little India.  We had swapped our comfortable hotel suite for a windowless room directly above an Australian-run pub!


Our accommodation was above the 'Prince of Wales' pub in the heart of Little India, it came complete with friendly dog and live house bands every evening.

With our accommodation for the duration of our stay in Singapore finally sorted out, we began our exploration of the city and headed to the famous Orchard Road.  A wide boulevard lined with giant shopping malls and super trendy shops, Orchard Road is a place to observe the Singaporeans practicing their national pastime: shopping.

We also stopped by the world famous Raffles Hotel, named after Singapore's founder, and home to the Singapore Sling.

Singapore is a city renowned, and often criticized, for being too clean, too clinical and lacking any character; however, after spending the last ten months backpacking through Asia, we found it's cleanliness, modernity, civility and almost universal air conditioning a complete and utter luxury.  


Singapore's trademark - the merlion - guards the harborfront of the city's financial district.

Sunday cricketers brave the humidity to play a game in front of the City Hall.

Our days in Singapore were a blur of shopping malls and fruit smoothies; nevertheless, we did seek out some places of historical and cultural interest (there are some in Singapore if you look hard enough).  Our favorite being the Prisoner-of-War Changi Prison Museum.  The museum gave an excellent overview of the Japanese occupation of Singapore during World War II and what civilians and armed forces endured during their imprisonment.  We spent three hours wandering the exhibits and reading some quite harrowing accounts.  As we left we lit a candle of remembrance in the POW replica chapel.   

We also paid a visit to Sentosa Island - a small island at the foot of Singapore.  With it's manicured parks, beaches, educational rides and attractions, and resort type facilities, it offers an excellent escape from the concrete jungle.  We went to Sentosa to blend in with Singapore's numerous white-collared executives and play some golf... mini golf in our case.  

Eric lines his putt up for a birdie, whilst Nikki gets a hole in one.

Our overall impressions of Singapore were very favorable; with it's cleanliness (did we mention it was clean??), accessibility and friendliness.  Singapore is certainly unlike any other Asian city; even it's citizens differ greatly from their Asian neighbors: they apologize when accidentally bumping into you in the street and can often be seen forming orderly queues. 

Amazingly the best thing about Singapore was still to come. As we left to catch our flight to Jakarta, we entered Singapore Airport - truly the best airport in the world!!!  Free internet, free movies at the cinema, rooftop swimming pools, etc... we seriously considered delaying our flight out.  Much to our delight, we realized we would be back again to the airport when in transit en route from Indonesia to the Philippines.  

Jakarta

If Singapore is Asia's cleanest city, Jakarta is doing well in its bid to become Asia's most polluted city.

Having arrived in Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, one of our first tasks was to obtain some local currency.  When we found an ATM machine we attempted to take out 3.6 million (how often can you say that!), however it would only allow us to withdraw 1.5 million at one time.  With hindsight, this was probably a good thing as we would have struggled to put 3.6 million worth of 50,000 Rupiah notes in our pockets.  We then took a taxi from the airport to downtown Jakarta and headed to Jaksa Road, the hub of all things backpacker... i.e. cheap hotels.

After dumping our stuff in an 'adequate' hostel, we went on a short exploratory walk around the neighborhood.  There were a few noteworthy shops and restaurants in the surrounding area but to reach them we had to negotiate busy streets lined with heavy traffic, hawker stalls, open sewers, scavenging cats, scuttling rats, rogue motorcyclists, and the usual groups of Asian men hanging around doing nothing but staring.  We certainly were not in Singapore anymore!

The following day we strolled out to explore the city - strolling is probably the wrong word, it was more like stumbled.  The pavements were uneven and covered with litter, foul smelling puddles, and other delights.  A constant stream of traffic was doing a grand job of ensuring there was no fresh air; after 5 minutes our throats began to itch and ache from the fumes.  We walked to the Monas - a tall column topped with a golden flame, it is Indonesia's national monument to independence.  We took the elevator up to the viewing platform where we enjoyed an amazingly cooling breeze.  The views, however, were blurred by a pollution haze, but we were able to make out many high rises and even the harbor and sea in the distance.  We became a tourist attraction ourselves when a local guy asked us to pose for a photograph with his family.  It was to be the first of many such requests during our trip through Indonesia.

The Monas (left) was one of the many monuments scattered around the capital.

Mosques as well as skyscrapers dominate the city skyline as viewed from the top of Monas.

We visited the National Independence Museum at the base of the monument; viewing the 50 or so dioramas - scenes from Indonesia's history - the artwork was quite impressive, the adherence to time lines and historical accuracy was not.  After returning to wandering the streets, and getting very hot and sweaty, we dived into the nearest air-conditioned restaurant for lunch, a McDonald's; unfortunately, whilst McDonald's has reached the shores of Indonesia it seems the ability to cook the burgers properly has not.  Visiting the restroom after lunch we looked in the mirror for the first time in over 24 hours (our hostel room has no mirrors) and discovered that we had been feasted upon by mosquito's as our faces, necks and torsos were covered in bites (we had each assumed that the other was suffering from a few sweat spots and politely not commented).  It was time to return to our hostel, upgrade to a room with an air conditioner and erect the mosquito net!

As part of our sight seeing of Jakarta, we visited Taman Mini, the 'little Indonesia' park, which has cultural displays and model houses from all corners of Indonesia.  The displays are build around a country 'map' lake which offers the novelty of boating around all the islands of Indonesia in under 20 minutes.  In the lake are grass islands made in the shape of the major islands of Indonesia; if you squint hard enough they do bear a vague resemblance, some even come complete with molehill-style volcanoes.  

Examples of the traditional houses of central Sulawesi and East Kalimantan

We wandered around learning about the different tribal houses and customs, and gathering useful information about some of the areas we would be traveling to over the next few weeks.  We again became a tourist attraction having to pose for some photographs and endure some staring and giggling.  We tried out a gamalang set (traditional Indonesian musical instruments) but didn't really stop to watch any of the traditional dancing or cultural shows, as stopping meant having half the audience turn around to watch us instead. 

Whilst admiring displays such as this gamalang set we were often asked to pose for photographs with the local tourists.

We took a taxi back from Taman Mini to the center of the city and stopped at one of Jakarta's new swanky shopping malls.  Affluent citizens can now shop at the likes of Gucci, Prada, and Tiffany's - though we were hard pressed to think of anywhere in the city one could wear such expensive designer gear.  All vehicles pulling up at shopping malls and large hotels in the capital undergo bomb checks, and we ourselves frequently had to pass through metal detectors and bag checks, even to get into fast food restaurants.  These checks serve as very visual reminder of the civil unrest the Indonesian government tries so hard to conceal from the outside world.

Having exhausted Jakarta's main tourist attractions, it was time for us to move on.  During our time in the city we had rarely encountered other foreign tourists; it seems they all bypass the streets of the capital and head straight for the over crowded beaches of Bali.  Much to the surprise of locals and touts alike we had decided not to go to Bali but instead to explore more of Java.

Penang
Northwest Malaysia

Our first stop in Malaysia was the northwestern island of Penang, where our plane from Laos landed amidst a spectacular lightening storm just before midnight.  Upon arrival, we were soon whisked away by taxi to the island’s capital, Georgetown.  The town was originally named after king George III; as Penang was once an important British colonial trading post in the early to mid 1900s. 

The Georgetown city hall and clock tower reflect the colonial history of the town.

Malaysia is officially a Muslim state, the first of our trip.  When we initially arrived we found the Muslim presence very visible as many of the women wear headscarves and the men don white skullcaps; however, the Islamic influence is not oppressive and mixes well with Malaysia’s increasingly western culture.  

We booked a room at a centrally located hotel just minutes away from the bustling streets of Chinatown and a few streets down from Little India.  The ethnic and cultural diversity that seemed to blend together in the everyday life of the local population was fascinating.  Indians, Chinese, Malaysians, Thais, Indonesians etc… all mixing and living together with no visible prejudices.  A very impressive sight!

Unfortunately, one of our own stereotypes was exposed during our hunt for outgoing bus tickets.  The bus ticketing business in Georgetown is primarily run by the Chinese and Indians.  Although we initially paid a visit to both Chinese and Indian vendors, our problematic bus ticket experiences in India were still very fresh on our minds, so we couldn’t quite cope with going back down that route.  Without too much thought, we headed to the Chinese vendor to purchase our tickets.  Upon hearing our request, the Chinese salesman picked up the phone and called the Indian travel agent next door to confirm seat availability on the bus.  The Indians owned the bus… and yes, we felt very embarrassed!!  Perhaps we should take a leaf out of the Malaysian example and leave our prejudices at home.  Later that evening, we boarded the 9-hour overnight bus to the Perhentian Islands. 

The Perhentian Islands
Northeast Malaysia

After a surprisingly comfortable bus ride (the best bus journey we’ve had on our trip so far – the seats reclined until practically horizontal!!!), we arrived at the Kuala Besut jetty, where an hour-long speed boat dropped us off at Long Beach on the Perhentian Kecil Island.  The Perhentian Islands have made a strong case for being Malaysia’s most idyllic islands, with crystal clear waters, stretches of long white sandy beaches and acres of untouched lush green rain forests. 

The view from our beach towels...apologies to those of you viewing this from your windowless offices.

The scramble for accommodation began as soon as we landed on the beach.  The island is covered with thick unpenetrated rainforests, with the only signs of man, ie guesthouses and restaurants, were clustered around the shore, sandwiched between the trees and the sand.  We secured ourselves a simple hillside bungalow, dumped our bags and went for a long cooling swim in the sea. 

Our hillside bungalow came complete with 2 'pet' lizards who kept us entertained in the evenings with their nightly moth hunting antics.

We spent most of our time on the island snorkeling and resting in the shade, making the most of the island’s cooling sea breeze.  We did manage to explore some parts of the rainforests by embarking on a small jungle trek across the breadth of the island.  Sweltering heat, swarms of mosquitoes and giant spiders deterred us from wandering too far away from the beach.  Even so, we did mange to see some wildlife, which included giant monitor lizards  (2 to 3 meters in length!!), and large sea eagles, which stood over half a meter high as they perched on the beach. 

Eric relaxes on the beach after a busy morning snorkelling. 

Our visit to the Perhentian islands also brought with it the first and long anticipated opportunity to go scuba diving on our trip.  Our first dive was a five-minute speedboat trip up the coast to the dive site, D’Lagoon.  We spent an hour diving down to 12 meters and exploring the reef and admiring the plenty of colorful corals and fish – which included Nemos (also known as clownfish), angelfish, batfish and a huge porcupine fish with giant bulging eyes.  The highlight was most definitely our stop at a ‘cleaning station’, where we saw tiny shrimp (less than a cm long and almost completely transparent) emerge from the coral and swim on to our fingers to clean our cuticles… amazing!!! 

Our second dive took us down to 18 meters to explore a reef formed on huge boulders and rock that seemed to have tumbled into the sea.  We swam up, around, down, under and through the gaps.  Fish highlights included large angelfish, bright yellow boxfish (literally the shape of a 3-d box – quite a bizarre shape for a fish), a well-camouflaged scorpion fish and more large porcupine fish.

The island also gave us the opportunity to get plenty of snorkelling done.  The 'house' reefs weren't the best, but they were teaming with plenty of fish.

Eric tries to blend in with the locals.... 

Don't you hate it when you try to take a photo of someone and a school of fish keep getting in the way?

In the evenings we feasted on beachside seafood BBQs, before falling asleep to the almost nightly thundering tropical rains and enjoying the cooling drop in temperature they brought with them. 

After a week on the island, we packed up our stuff, took a speedboat back to the mainland and boarded a mini bus which took us to our next destination, Taman Negara National Park.

Taman Negara
Central Malaysia 

Taman Negara gave us the opportunity to visit one of the most pristine primary rainforests in the world.  This area of the jungle is claimed to be the oldest in the world, and has been in existence for the last 130 million years – having been untouched by ice ages, volcanic activity and other geological events. 

We stayed just outside the park in the small village of Kuala Tahan.  The following morning we crossed the river and started our 3-hour trek through the rain forest.  There was no need for a guide as the trail was well-marked, and large and dangerous animals usually stayed clear of the tourist-trod areas.  We headed towards a treetop canopy walkway and encountered our first dangerous creature along the way – an extremely poisonous Red Headed Krait.  We stood and watched the snake slither away into a carpet of dead and rotting leaves before continuing on our way, a little more cautiously this time!

Eric: "Well it's big, but it's not quite a redwood".

A few km’s later, we reached the canopy walkway and were soon exploring the 400m long creaky set of ropes and planks suspended 25 meters high amongst the treetops of the forest.

Eric gingerly makes his way along the canopy walkway....

...with Nikki bounding on ahead.

Our wildlife sightings were mainly centered around the resort at the entrance to the park where we saw a highly poisonous Pope’s Pit Viper and some playful monkeys.

After lunch we went for another 2 hour walk through the jungle, but saw little of interest other than some giant ants and monitor lizards.  The heat and humidity quickly took its toll and upon returning from our day in the jungle we were in much need of a good shower to wash away the grime and sweat.  Unfortunately the shower head in our bathroom was situated immediately above the toilet meaning we had to lean over the toilet bowl in order to wash….’a good shower’ is certainly not the correct description, but it worked nonetheless.

Kuala Lumpur
Southwest Malaysia

The following day we headed to the capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur ('KL' as the locals call it).  We found a hotel in the heart of KL’s vibrant Chinatown district where the streets were lined with hawker stalls selling fake watches sunglasses, bags, t-shirts, etc; all of which seemed to attract every Aussie tourist in town.  KL is a very modern Asian city with clean streets, skyscraper shopping malls and an efficient monorail transport system.  Within this small city, the Muslim influence still prevails; mosques are found between tall concrete buildings and the Islamic star and crescent adorn many building facades.  The crown jewels of the city’s skyline are the famous Petronas Towers – the world’s highest twin towers.  We climbed (took the elevator) to the sky bridge, which links the two towers via the 41st floor, to admire the great views it provides out across the city.

The view from the bottom of the towers.

The view from the skybridge.

We spent the next couple of days strolling through the city streets and also paid a visit to South East Asia’s biggest shopping mall.  Our visit to KL was brief as we planned to travel back to the east coast of Malaysia to Tioman Island where more diving was on the cards.

Tioman Island
Southeast Malaysia

An overnight bus and a short ferry ride brought us to the shores of Tioman.  The island gained its fame in the 1950’s when it was the setting of the mythical Bali Hai in the film ‘South Pacific’.  Since then it has been proclaimed as one of the world’s most beautiful islands…and also a duty free zone….both of which have helped keep the tourists flocking in. 

Despite the size of the jetty, the beach wasn't overrun with tourists, making it a great island escape.

We rented an ‘A frame’ bungalow on Salang beach.  Our accommodation came with a few dozen mosquitoes, an ant’s nest, 5 or 6 jumping spiders, and a sprinkling of mice droppings; but after 10 months of travelling none of this bothered us and we had soon rearranged the beds, put up the mosquito net and made it livable. 

Our 'A' frame was set in a picturesque garden..... even the monkeys liked to visit to search the nearby bushes for grubs.

The setting on the island was similar to the Perhentians, a carpet of thick rainforest fringed by thin strips of white sandy beach.  Tioman (in our humble opinion) lacked the more isolated charm of the Perhentians, but more than made up for this with its excellent snorkeling.  Along with the abundance of underwater life the island could also rival the jungles of Taman Negara, with its population of monitor lizards, squirrels, monkeys and the usual contingent of alarmingly large insects. 

  

Large monitor lizards feast on left-over scraps of fish from the local kitchens.

Whilst in Tioman we did two more dives.  Our first dive took us down to a deep 28 meters where the visibility was excellent.  We did some narrow swim-throughs coming across large batfish and giant star puffer fish.  On our second dive we brought along a small disposable underwater camera; unfortunately our underwater photography skills leave much to be desired but luckily we did manage to get a few good shots.  On the dive we encountered some large cuttlefish flapping their ‘skirts’ and dancing around, rapidly changing color in a courtship ritual; we watched, fascinated, for a few minutes then quietly left them to it.  We also saw some blue spotted rays and menacing moray eels.

Eric floats over a field of 'potato' coral.

Nikki swims through a school of fish (the vague yellow stripes behind her).

Nikki takes a closer look at a moray eel hidden in the coral.

Eric exits a very narrow swim-through.

One of our few successful photos of life on the reef.

Colourful fish seek protection under overhanging red coral.

Little 'Nemo's' hide amongst the stinging tentacles of sea anemones.

In Tioman, we rediscovered the much-undervalued board game ‘Ludo’, to which we have now become addicted.  In the evenings we could be found in the local restaurants frantically rolling the die and accusing each other of cheating, much to the amusement of the waiters (and wonderment of the 6 year olds sitting at the next table).  Lightening storms continued to be a nightly event.  We were often woken up by loud crashing noises and the shaking of our hut as rain dislodged coconuts from the surrounding trees and they fell heavily onto (but not through) our roof.

Time flies when you spend your days snorkeling and diving, so five days and a few dozen mosquito bites later we left the island and headed south by bus to Singapore.