The overnight train journey had been very comfortable: I had the upper berth, while wife and son had lowers. Berths were arranged lengthwise in a ribbed body Korean built stainless steel car. There a rectangular window which starts at your hip level and extends to the knee when you are on the upper berth: lower berth passengers have full width picture windows. My wife apparently been looking out from her window at each stop. She said she had spotted a Hindu temple at one of the stops, complete with illumination and chanting of prayers. She had also spotted the historical Malaysian city of Malacca. Hmmm. There is no way one could reach Malacca by train. Maybe it was an 'alight here for Malacca' sign.

'Good morning, passport checking' rang a voice just one hour before Singapore. Two Malaysian passport officials checked passports and scribbled an exit note after taking away the departure cards. An attendant then distributed the arrival cards for Singapore: these too carried a dangerous sounding warning like in Malaysia: Drug trafficking carries the death penalty' printed in red.

We stopped a few minutes short of Singapore. The whole train had to be emptied out: passengers as well as luggage, for customs and immigration. We went through the routine: we were attended to by a stern sounding Singaporean girl. Once our passports were stamped and luggage x-rayed, we we back on the train again. A fifteen minute ride brought us into Singapore.

Our locomotive had gone by the time we had disembarked and got to the head of the train. The first thing we saw in Singapore was this train which was on its way back to Kuala Lumpur. We wished we could have simply switched trains and done the journey all over again!

We took a taxi to our hotel on Serangoon Road in the Little India district after waiting for a while in a long queue. Buses too were an option: just like Hong Kong, Singapore too is well served by a large fleet of airconditioned double decker buses, with a small selection of single deck buses as well.

We landed at the hotel and freshened up a little. I was rather aback by this very sarcastic note pasted on the door of our hotel. I do not know if the management was trying to be funny, but I thought the note was in very bad taste. Petty thefts were apparently a common problem at the hotel.

We took it easy in the morning, as we were quite groggy after the overnight train journey. We went downstairs to pick up some tour brochures: again, the tours were not upto much. At any rate, two MUST SEE attractions in Singapore for first timers are the Sentosa Island and the Zoo. One had to do both these under one's steam if one wants to do full justice to them. Only one tour seemed attractive, we decided to do that on the third day.

We eventually decided to do Sentosa that afternoon. We had an early lunch at the Komala Vilas Indian vegetarian restaurant which we spotted on the way, and also dropped into the Veera Kaliamman temple opposite to the restaurant.

Here is a closer view of the temple tower.

The manager at Komala Vilas informed us that we ought to take bus # 97 from the next road to World Trade Centre, which is jump off point for Sentosa Island.

We made our way to the bus stop. While waiting for the bus, we spotted this group of trishaws. Once one of the more popular modes of transport in Singapore, these vehicles are now limited to giving joy rides to delighted tourists. All passengers in all the trishaws in this group were European tourists, with glee writ large on their faces!

Bus # 97 did not come, but we got another double decker, # 85, which too terminates at the World Trade Centre. It was one heck of a long ride. We could see cable cars at an astounding height as we approached the WTC, we could also see a clump of green which marked the Sentosa Island. On reaching the WTC, we learned that there are three ways to get to Sentosa from there: by cable car, by bus from the same stop, or by ferry. We opted for the cable car, as thats what we had missed out on in Hong Kong.

After the long walk to the cable car stop,through construction barricades and security offices at the waterfront, we spotted the ticket counter for the cable car almost hidden in a jungle of construction paraphernalia. We got sold on a package which included entry to three attractions on Sentosa, plus a long-ish cable car ride, which backtracked to the next station on the opposite side, Mt. Faber, and then turned round and went all the way into Sentosa. Total ride time, 12.5 minutes.

Here we are then, preparing for the ride of our lives.

We learnt that there are two types of cars: regular and glass bottomed. The glass bottomed ones cost a little more, but we opted for them. The cable cars go at an astounding height: its almost like flying high up in an airplane! The ride must be at least seventeen storeys high! Here is a view from the front window of our cable car. Too bad the black band on the top spoils this picture. Thats the car's window frame,but then, it didn't show in the viewfinder when I was shooting it.

Here is a panorama of Sentosa Island, again from the window of our cable car. You can see the 'merlion' statue, which is now the official symbol of Singapore.

On landing, we were told that the three attractions covered in our ticket are the Images of Singapore Wax museum, Butterfly and Insect Garden and Underwater World. A very charming lady of Singapore-Japanese descent was to be our guide. OK, first, photo time, this time next to the dragon at the very entrance to Sentosa.It appeared that almose every visitor to the Sentosa Island starts his tour of the island by posing for a picture with this dragon.

We saw lots of Indian families at Sentosa, in fact, you can see one right here in the above picture.

Next stop, butterfly and insect garden. To us, it was a bit of a repetition as we had seen one in the Ocean Park in Hong Kong just four days ago. Nonetheless, I did manage to actually shoot a butterfly here in Sentosa: I couldn't manage it earlier in Hong Kong. I only wish a brighter colored specimen had lended itself to photography.

My son was terrified by a chap in the display area of the buttefly garden who had three live scorpions on his lap, and a live snake in a glass case by his feet. We felt uneasy too, and made a hasty retreat to the outside, where our attractive girl guide awaited us. As it turned out, all the others in our group had made their way to the Dolphin Pool in Underwater World, which closes at dusk. We were not too keen on the Dolphin show as we had seen one in great detail a couple of days ago at Ocean Park in Hong Kong. So the, we had the guide to ourselves! Some luxury, that. The girl too seemed relieved.

Next stop, Images of Singapore, a small museum which traces the history of Singapore through wax images. Shock # 2 for my son: on the way, a bloke was offering photo opportunities with a live white and yellow albino python. Fortunately, he was on the other side of the road. We have seen an albino python before in the Dubai zoo, so no big deal for us.

The girl patiently explained to us the various stages in the formation of Singapore, how the Japanese invaded, their atrocities etc. She sounded almost regretful of her Japanese descent saying her great grandfather was Japanese, but she didn't care to reveal that. She said she loves Indians and Indian culture, and her boyfriend had been an India etc. Here are some views in the Images of Singapore museum.

Here we are posing at another of the exhibits.

The show then ended with a film show. Our guide gave us our tickets to the last of the three attractions in the package, the Underwater World and left us to ourselves. Underwater World was a repeat for us as we had seen Coral Reef and its shark aquarium in Hong Kong a couple of days earlier. We decided to see another of the islands's attractions on our own, the Cinemania.

Cinemania is where you sit on a chair and put on your seat belt. A large screen in front of you screens a larger than life movie of your going on a roller coaster, into a mine, coming to a dead end etc. Your chair is rocked for effect. In other words, its like riding a roller coaster without actually riding it, if you get my drift. On the way to the cinemania, we saw a monitor lizard roaming freely as he calmly crossed the road.

We stopped off for an early dinner in the food court of Sentosa, and were pleasantly surprised to find South Indian thali meals on sale. The two pleasant ladies were thrilled when we longingly gulped down on the piping hot 'rasam' (sour lentil soup), and gave us a free refill each!

The monorail is one of the more interesting ways to get round the island, and although its not quite as large as a regular monorail, it is by no means a toy, and carries quite a lot of passengers. We rode this monorail from the stop near the gate, via Fort Siloso to the Underwater World. Here we are at the station as the monorail pulls in.

While on the subject, it would interest you to know that Sentosa was once a military outpost. It was known by a different name then. Fort Siloso was a real fort then: you can still see two of the howitzers outside the fort gate. Mercifully, they are dummied now. Below the Fort is the Siloso beach. We could not visit any of these for want of time.

As it was fairly late when we reached Underwater world, we could only see the aquarium exhibits and the shark tunnel. For some reason, the interior of underwater world was pitch dark. The Hong Kong one was more modern and better organized.

I saw sea anemone at close quarters for the first time, and took this picture of it.

We also saw these backlit jelly fish in another tank. My Olympus IS200 SLR refused to focus in the dark, so I had to use my Konica Big Mini point and shoot camera in flash off mode.

Although most of the sharks in the shark tunnel were in pitch dark, you do come across this projection of a Great White just as you come round a bend in a dark corner. Again, this is a photograph projected into the water, I have shot this with my Konica Big Mini in flash off mode. The scene is indeed a tad unnerving, especially as you suddenly come face to face with this terrifying beast in one of the darkest corners.

We rode the monorail back to the main gate, and barely managed to catch the last cable car back to World Trade Centre. We had to wait a while as we had the 'luxury' glass bottomed one. We crossed the sea once again and rode bus # 97 back to Little India and to our hotel. On the whole, it had been a full filled, if a little tiring day.

DAY-2: SINGAPORE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS AND NIGHT SAFARI:

The zoo in Singapore is considered one of the best in the world, and we decided to spend the major portion of the following day there, topped up by the night safari. (details on the night safari later on).

We had a late start after an early lunch (sounds contradictory?) and took a bus to the Ang Mo Kio bus station. I saw Singapore's LRT for the first time here, however, I could not hope to take a ride as it did not seem to suit any of our day's tours.

Bus # 138 runs from Ang Mo Kio to the zoo: it was a long-ish ride, which took more than half an hour.

Singapore zoo boasts of some really healthy animals and terrific landscaping. We took a ride till a greenhouse tunnel called Fragile Forest, which explains the delicate balance of nature. We were able to see several animals roaming freely inside, like mouse deer, ducks, other birds and lemurs.

A terrific treat for us was when the duck family decided to take a walk! Papa duck, mama duck and six chicks simply waddled across the road past us and then entered a nearby pool of water!

I was also taken aback when I came literally face to face with a group of lemurs. There were three in all, and though two were near railings etc. this one had the most natural and the most uncluttered background of them all.

Coming out, we came to the reptile house, where we were surprised when the fearsome comodo dragon suddenly made an appearnace. We had been hoping to see a creepy reptile all curled up and sleeping, but no, here he was, waddling at top speed.

We also saw the vile evil reptiles the king cobras as well as many other species of the ugly snakes. Also on display were crocodiles and alligators, which looked several times their size due to refraction in the water.

Here is a rundown of other animals we saw in the Singapore zoo:

Cheetah:

A very bored Mr.Lion. Lucky for us he yawned just as I was shooting him!

Ingenious dispay means that you have a second chance to see the animal, that too at very close quarters. We were bemoaning how far the lions actually were. One long round later, we were taken aback when we found ourselves at the other end of the lion enclosure, where the animals could be seen real close behind a glass partition!

We also saw a pelican: we were staring without batting an eyelid. This fellow did only that: he simply batted an eyelid to make sure we are not danger, and continued with his nap.

Another pelican. This chap was very, very still, almost like a statue. He did not bat anything: he was so much in a trance.

A racoon. A line of these animals was taking an evening walk, in single file. One of them suddenly stood up on his hindquarters to have a better look at us. Unfortunately, he was gone before the flash recharged and I could zoom in again. I got a far shot. Here is a closer one of the racoon before he stood up.

A California sea cow feeding on underwater plants.

One of the attractions of Singapore zoo is the prospect of seeing a polar bear swimming underwater. No such luck, both the beasts were on shore. Just as we were about to give up, one of them lowered himself half into the water. He then stayed there a while, so all we could see was his butt in the water. He then got up and walked away. Now we could not possibly picture his butt alone, so we took this picture instead:

There is a large lake inside the Singapore zoo. Plenty of water birds like storks and herons were feeding on its bank. I mistakenly thought them to be tame and approached fairly close. All of them flew off, never to return again. If only I'd realized that they are still wild! To add insult to injury, all of them settled down on the opposite bank.

Much later, I looked towards the lake again to see it completely empty, barring for one single crane feeding on its banks.

There were the usual tourist traps like photo opportunities with you posing with (putting your hand on or eating with) an orang utan, then the elephant rides etc. No one bothered about the orang utan photography ops, but people were seen queueing up for the elephant rides.

We also witnessed a reptile show where creepy evil snakes were put around the neck of a supposedly frightened guest who finally jumped into the pool nearby and emerged amongst the guests. It later turned out that he was a zoo employee who actually handles these snakes!

We later had a mini dinner of french fries and coffee in the KFC outlet inside the zoo.

NIGHT SAFARI: Adjacent to the zoo is Singapore's most brilliant innovation, the night safari. Its another zoo basically, meant to be viewed at night. The lanscaping is a tad different, and lighting is very, very subtle. It comprises of soft blue light atop tall masts, which gives the impression that you are witnessing the animals by moonlight.

The night safari is built on the assumption that animals are most active by night. And indeed they are. You can see the difference: most animals are moving, or doing something, instead of just sleeping like they do during daytime.

Photography is allowed inside the night safari, but the use of flash is not permitted. In effect, this means that you cannot take any pictures as the light is far too dim to get anything on your film without the aperture opening wide or the shutter speed getting so slow. A couple of unscrupulous tourists were using flash anyway, but on the whole, better sense prevailed.

The Night safari is something to be experienced to be believed, so I shall not say anything further.

Here are wife and son posing at the very entrance to the night safari.

Many visitors combine the zoo and night safari like we did, so food becomes a problem. There is a large 'entrance plaza' at the very entrance, which houses a large number of multi cuisine restaurants, along with gift shops. All the restaurants were jam packed. Here again are wife and son near a gift shop in the entrance plaza:

We also saw a show on nocturnal animals in the night safari. It was rather unnerving when a giant python was pulled out from under the seats of the second row! So advice to those visiting: do not sit on the first five rows. The show ended with a terrific show of jumping by a puma. To visit the show, you need to exit the actual safari area, so you have to get your hand stamped. The stamp will be inspected on your way back in, after the show.

The Night safari is covered partly by tram (actually road trains: road vehicles with trailers) and partly on foot. Three clearly demarcated walking trails allow you to see three different areas of the night safari. To see elephants and other large animals at the far end, you have to take the tram. Here we are at the beginning of one of the walking trails. Barring the three walking trails, the rest of the night safari is not accessible on foot,and you need to take the trams. There is even a tram-restaurant, where you can dine while you go round: it was expensive, so we did not find anyone actually using it. It was very much there, though.

As I said earlier, flash photography is not allowed. That effectively renders photography impossible. I managed to catch this tiger with my Konica Point and Shoot in flash off mode. The pic is blurred due to non existant light, large aperture combined with slow shutter speed, and the fact that the tiger was sitting behing glass. This picture is only to give an idea as to how you can see the animals in the night safari.

We rode bus # 138 back to Ang Mo Kio, then another bus to our hotel on Serangoon Road. It was nearly 2300 hrs by the time we got home, there was no food, but our hotel very grudgingly fixed us a meal, although they made it very clear to us that they were doing us a favor, and that we were not welcome at that hour.

DAY-3: TIGER BALM GARDENS: The tour we were to have taken today did not exist at all: it had been taken off due to poor patronage, we were told. Hell. That meant we were on our own now.

We decided to visit the Mariyamman temple on the edge of Chinatown, and then take a bus to the Tiger Balm Gardens from there. The one in Hong Kong had reportedly closed.

So then, first halt was the Mariyamman temple. We took a taxi to Chinatown, where this temple is located.You can see two views here, one wife and son posing near the door,and another, a view of the temple tower.

We looked around the adjoining Chinatown area: similar to what we had seen in Hong Kong, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur. I was surprised to see dried sea horses among the dried fish on sale. I knew the Chinese ate unusual things like shark fin, but I didn't know they ate sea horses! I was so fascinated by the scene that I completely missed out photographing the display, something I still regret till this day.

No one in China Town knew how to get to Tiger Balm Gardens. We eventually asked the driver of one of the city buses which stopped by. He told us we need to get off at World Trade Centre and change from there. When we got off at the WTC, we were very much tempted to ride the cable car again into Sentosa to see the merlion which we could not visit the previous day due to time constraints, but we decided against it. We took another bus to the Tiger Balm Gardens.

The Tiger Balm Gardens were bit of a disappointment, as they appeared rather decreipt and run down. Colorful no doubt, but a tad unkempt.

It is a graphic and garish, and at times grisly and bizzare representation of various aspects of Chinese mythology, tradition and beliefs. Somewhere down the line is a locked building which is said to have been the residence of the two brothers who'd invented the famous Tiger Balm liniment.

This is the stately entrance to the Tiger Balm Gardens.

Looking up, you see this colorful scene. More on that dragon in a moment.

Various garishly painted statuettes made of plaster of paris set on equally garish settings like rock (again made of plaster of paris) depict various traditions and beliefs of the Chinese. That way, the Chinese are very much like the Indians. This statue of the Laughing Buddha is one of the less garish ones.

However, the piece de resistance is this fearsome dragon.

Its mouth is entrance/exit to a long exhibition chamber which depicts in grisly and downright bizzare form the ten steps to hell. What happens to an individual once he enters hell. The exhibits start off mildly enough, like a sinner being made to keel before the Devil on Judgement day.

Things then get downright grisly and horrific like this scene showing people getting dismembered and cut to pieces for refusing to relent and repent. This was probably the worst. Sorry for the graphic nature of this, but I simply couldn't resist.

We left the place after picking up some souvenirs at a stall run by an old Chinese lady.

On the return, we got an over enthusiastic bus driver who wouldn't shut his trap. He spoke my language, and he kept going overboard in giving advice. Any counter question would go back to his earlier destination suggestion and then end up with 'from that you take bus # so and so'..OK, I do not want to go there. O, then you go to this place, from there you take bus # so and so. He had his head set on Suntec City, another theme park. He even suggested we carry our luggage there and then take bus # so and so, the only bus that runs upto the airport.

The poor chap probably meant well, but he had gone grossly overboard. He did not collect full fare, and said Aw, be my guest, but he set us down one stop earlier than where we want to go, insisting we take a LRT train from there to Suntec City! Despite his best intentions, the driver was actually quite a pain in the a--: he wouldn't let me sit on my seat, wouldn't answer any of my questions, and always kept going back to what he wanted to recommend.

We were looking for the place where Sir Raffles, the founder of Singapore had first landed. We went to the jetty, then eventually crossed the road to the Colonial Quarter. A statue of Sir Raffles stands near several British style buildings. We noticed the typically British Fullerton Hotel vying for space with the modern ugly monstrosities, the skyscrapers, which have overwhelmed it.

Telltale signs of British rule: this British manufacturer's plate on a small bridge just outside the Fullerton.

Nearby we spotted the Asian Civilizations Musuem, which my son wanted to visit, but we resisted as it was quite hot, and we had to rest a while before catching the flight back to Dubai later that evening.

It turned out that the Boat Quay where Sir Raffles had landed was actually on an inlet, which is the Singapore River. A plaque outlined the chain of events.

We had been offered a bumboat ride from the Jetty across the road, which we refused due to the high fares demanded. Here is one of the bumboats as it sails up the Singapore River. The Colonial Quarter itself can be seen on the other side of the river.

You can see a long line of British style villas along the river front. Many of these are restaurants, which are very active in the evening. The waterfront restaurants along the river bank are ideal to have a nice meal and photograph the emerging Singapore skyline behind. Although what you will see of this is behind me, this picture looks towards the other side: the emerging Singapore skyline behind the Colonial Quarter.

By this time it was already too hot, so we decided to call it a day. I nearly got arrested there as I entered one of the highrises looking for a place to pee, where a Chinese cleaning girl asked me to get to the 3rd floor. I took the stairs. High security meant all doors can be opened from outside only, so every door I tried was locked! I finally ended up in a parking lot, from where I took an elevator, when I landed right in front of a ferocious lady security guard. I had to sheepishly explain my predicament, to which she barked 'so?'. So I want to get back to my family who are in the entrance lobby, I told her. One look at my ruffled hair and SLR camera round my neck probably convinced here of my innocence, so 'OK Go' she barked. The female of the species is more ferocious, what? Humans are no exception!

In the afternoon we visited the famed Mohamed Mustafa shopping complex on Serangoon Road, near to our hotel, where we picked up some clothes and things. After a final meal at Komala Vilas, we got to the airport and were soon on our way to Dubai. A final shot at Singapore airport.

We had some last minute glitches though: first problems in getting a taxi. We finally got a Bangladeshi driver who had taken Singapore citizenship. Second, most of our shopping woudln't fit into our small-ish suitcases. We bundled everything into polybags, and rearranged the packing in the airport, only to be told to check in our luggage as the bags were too heave. Then, our flight was to have an one hour halt at Colombo.

We eventually arrived back in Dubai on the 14th Aug. at 0500 hrs.

To see my pics from the rest of the world, go here:

http://www.worldisround.com/home/shankie/index.html

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