Singapore - Day 3

So Much for the "Rainy Season"
They tell me this is the rainy season but every day I wake up, look out the window and see this. This is the view from the bedroom. Lows at night go down to about 75 degrees, highs around 90. All the windows are always open to allow a breeze through. Man, it is gonna be really tough to leave here and go back to winter.

Breakfast in the Old Neighborhood

Puff used to live in Queenstown, which is a neighborhood near the south of the island. You can see it on the map that follows if you look closely. We took the metro and then the bus and walked around a bit. Here are some streetscapes:

As always, the roads are plenty shaded by large trees.

We went to her favorite breakfast spot, a Malay open air coffee shop. There were no walls on the front of it and none necessary - it is always warm here.

I had Mee Rebus, a Malaysian dish of noodles in a potato-peanut sauce with dried prawn, bean paste, egg, bean sprouts and spring onion. It was very tasty though I find it strange to eat something like this for breakfast.

A Day in Sentosa

Sentosa is a small island off the southern tip of Singapore. We spent the day and one night there at a hotel. It is a beach resort, essentially. There are a lot of beaches, hotels, restaurants and other tourist attractions. The government is building a gigantic casino there, which is due to open in 2010. Interestingly, it will be free to enter the casino as a foreigner but will cost $200 for a Singaporean. Apparently, this is to dissuade locals from becoming addicted to gambling.

There are a variety of ways to get to Sentosa, we picked the most scenic, a glass-bottomed cable car. It goes right through the top of a skyscraper on its way.

Here is an shot to the east of downtown and the port. As you can see, we were pretty high up.

One of the things I appreciate is the respect they have here for trees. This is a restaurant on top of Mount Faber, which was part of our cable car ride. It was built within a copse of trees.

This is a look from Sentosa at downtown. The cranes in the foreground are part of the casino building site, then you see the port, which is one of the busiest in Asia.

For lunch we had lobster Laksa, which is noodles, lobster, egg, bean curd and chili in coconut milk. Nice and flavorful. As for Sentosa, no, not my cup of tea - way too touristy and fake for my tastes.