And hot it was, not only the temperature which was nicely hot and humid for my liking, being a tropical blossom these days, but it was also hot on sightseeing and shopping. Brenda (my next door neighbour) and I could keep suitably fit just shopping in Singapore and there are hundreds of malls to choose from. I arrived in Singapore at around 7.30 pm, the plane was full of Germans and the couple in front had two small children, the smallest of which alternated between smiling at us over the back of the seat to chucking temper tantrums and pooing his pants (three times in 8 hours) adding a certain odiferous ambience to the otherwise trouble free flight. I travelled on a Qantas flight operated by Jetstar, a stop over in Darwin and I have no complaints other than the odiferous exploits of our small fellow passenger.

On arrival at the hotel I showered, had a feed, watched telly and had a relatively early night. The first thing I did after breakfast was hit the streets for a looksee and the first things I saw of interest just one street away from the hotel were an Indian Temple and Chinese Temple side by side in amongst all those new buildings. I liked the way Singapore had well maintained old architecture nestled in with the modern. Later in the day a tour guide told me that in Singapore they are very tolerant of each others beliefs which I found refreshing in our modern world. I saw many different races of people, most with no obvious signs of their beliefs but some wearing the Moslem Hijab were happilly going about their business. I must say that I found the people naturally friendly and even the customs officer at the airport greeted me and smiled nicely so my experience of Singapore was very positive. Enough of the gabbing here are some pictures

Things I had not encountered before included automatically flushing toilets in some locations and counters on pedestrian traffic lights to let you how many seconds you had to get across the road before the lights for traffic changed and you got run over. Lounger beds in the airport Terminal 1 were bonus too, you can request a free blanket and have a sleep. I also heard you can use a swimming pool for a price at the hotel near Terminal 3 if you have a long stopover and want to kill time.

Singapore has lots of rules apparently which is why it is so clean, no littering, no spitting, no jaywalking (although I saw plenty of that) and chewing gum is banned. I didn't see any police whilst trundling around Singapore, a couple at the airport did not look too scary and, as I said previously, I encountered the friendliest customs officer ever there too, not like the one I got at Heathrow who gave me the third degree.

I had a nice time in Singapore, it was clean, I didn't come across any dodgy people, no persistent street hawkers and it felt quite safe there. While I was on the river cruise I saw a boat going up and down fishing rubbish out of the river so no wonder everything looked so clean. On the way to the airport the taxi drive told me that all the industry was on the western side of the island and that Singapore actually had houses with gardens further north. I would like to spend a week or so there at some stage so I can go see the rest of the island. The shopping was not cheap in the western style malls but on the return journey I will visit China town, Arab Street and Litle India as that kind of shopping is more to my liking anyway.