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We finally made it to Changi airport in Singapore at 5am. When we booked the flight we figured we could combine traveling with sleeping and arrive raring to go. What we had forgotten was that the plane was going to be full of food and movies, so we Arrived shattered having not slept at all! A few hours kip at the airport sorted us out and we caught the MRT to our hotel to meet some frinds from our Fraiser island trip.
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Our hotel was right in the middle of the city, just down the road from raffles hotel. So the gilrs dragged the boys out for a day of walking and sightseeing, stopping every 10 mins to find and air- conditioned buliduing- yes it really was that hot!
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After a day touring Orchard Road, Botanical gardens, the lucky plaza hawker centre (rtecomminded by Grandad Gallop) we headed to China town for dinner. This turned out to be a crazy experience as we sat  at a table and people from 3 differetn stalls swarmed around us al thying to serve us completely different things. So mucgh confusion was caused that we juist ate whatever was put down infront of us!
After we wandered to Cark Quay at the harbourside for drinks and were amnazed by what we found. 100's of the trendiest bars, clubs and restaurants we'd ever seen all together surrounded by water fountainbs and bright lights. We absolutely loved it, it even made Darling Harbour in Sydney look boring!
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Next day was a public holiday , meaning Singapore's palace ( presidents house) was open for the public to view. It was built by the British and renamed Istana House when handed back over to Singapore when they established their own government. The grounds are very grand and spcetacualer but we couldn't handle too much history and grown up singht seeing for one day so headed off to the zoo!
We have never seen so many animals up clese roaming freely around the place, it did get a bit scary at some points as we had no idea what monleys, bats and large birds etc do with people around! We also did the night safari around the zoo next door specifically for nocturnal activity, consisting of a show, safari tram and 'jungle' walks. It's the best zoo weve been to by far.
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As Singapore has many tourist spots we jumped on a sight seeing bus to make sure we did it all, we did however notice that we were the only people under the age of 60 on board! The guided granny tour did the trick though and we explored Little India, the Merlion, China Town and the Tanglin Clib
Feeling our gae again we later heaqded out, dressed to the max, to raffles hotel for a Singapore Sling. Its traditional to get monkey nuts in the bar and throw the shells on the floor, and despite there being a huge bowl on the table, us scabby travelers manage to finish the lot?well they were free! Wanting to keep up the pretence that we were for once sophisticated we headed to Clark Quay for the bars. We would have loved to have tried every one of them but infortunately the alcohol in Singapore is definitely not priced for backpacker budgets!
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While in Singapore we did try to go to Sentosa, an entertainment island just a cable car ride away, but the weather had other ideas! After leaving the hotel in bright sunshine we arrived in the middle of what seemed like the China sea pouring out of the sky! When we realized we couldn't even see Sentosa which was less than 1km away we decided to give it a miss.
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When 5 days in Singapore was up and we had exhausted all the budget backpacker sights we decided to start our journey up north to Malaysia.
We knew we were in for a fun time when Kate got chatted up by the man checking her passport at the border control!
Melaka was stop no.1. On arrival Phil was chuffed to find one place in the world did exist where he would have looked cool in his proton as every other person was driving one!
We found a decent hostel and headed to China town for the evening. The food was so cheep Phil ate as much as he could and still didn't spend a pound, and Kate perfected her bartering skills by offering 15RM to someone who had just offered 10!
In amongst all the street venders and mnarekt atalls we found a street performer tha loved Phil so nuch he made him take part in the whole show and finally offered him his daughter! His main trick was to stick his bare finger through a coconut, after successfully doing this we went on to sell bottles of strange red liquid that he claimed ' made your fingers as strong as his', and people actually bought it!
We also found a large stage in the middle of it all especially for Kareoke. Randoms were happily taking centre stage to belt out a not-so-tuneful song while others ballroom danced to it behind. Trust me it looked as weird as it sounds!
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Melaka has a lot of history to it as it has been taken over by numerous countries, so we spent some time looking around the city's old Portuguese ruins, English churches and replicas ofhuge Sultans houses. We also found a wicked satay restaurant that had tables with massive satay vates in the middle for you to choose and cook what you wanted in them. The big gas burners sticking out from every table and the sewers running past the door nade us think the place maybe wasn't so hot on health and safety, but it all added to the fun!
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We love asian food but they really don't know how to do breakfasts, spicy noodles at 9am still does not sound appealing to us! Laura and Kate thought they had died and gone to heaven when we went to the bus stop to get to Kuala Lumpar and found a Tesco! Â We had gotten there early in plenty of time, and far too prepared to leave we actually felt proud of ourselves, until Phil remembered we had left all of our valuables in the safety deposit box back at the hostel, oops!
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We eventually made it to KL, not quite prepared for what we found. The place was crazy, people and cars everywhere! You could be walking down a street win what you think is a quiet, peaceful area, then turn the corner to find the next street is packed to the max with people, market and hawker stalls!
We absolutely loved China town. If you try to inmagine the most bizare place you can your still not close to it. 1000's of stalls selling everything you can think of all packed in so close together each one was about 3m sq and the walk ways barely big enough to let people pass. All 3 of us were in our element and all bought far too many bags (yes phil aswel!), batering was just too much fun! One guy was doing so well until he seriously asked Lau if Kate was her mother, safe to say there was no sale for him after that!
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Along with the mad areas KL also had many beautiful expensive ones. The Patronas towers are stunning, and Bitang Walk, where all the designer shops are, is a trendy hangout. Uncle Andy's flat is smack band in the middle of all this and its going to be so nice (we took lots of pici's of the building in pregress for you andy, we'l trade them for a holiday when its finished!)
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We also went to the Batu caves, a temple in 100m high caves with 273 steps leading uo to it, the Sky tower for panoramic views of the city, the lake gardens and were treated to a slap up dinner with family friends who live in KL.
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Back to bus stop again we ventured in land for a quick stop at the Cameron Highlands to see the tea plantations and scones. Then carried on up to Penang.
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1st day we went to see the Golden Sands hotel in Batu Ferangi, a paradise resort the girls stayed at 13 years ago. We felt very sorry for ourselves weh we had tp get the bus back to our own hostel that wasn't quite as nice! In need of cheering up we were sitting outside in the hotel gar when a taxt pulled u?.and 2 of Phils school mates got out! They already knew 2 guys staying in Penang, obe of which knew EVERYTHING there is to know about asia and turned out to be the perfect tourguide! The 7 of us spent the next few days in the bars, rarely without a beer in our hand!
The night life was aswome with everything open until around 4am , live bands, cheep drinks and 50p curries on the way home!
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We did manage to make it to a snake temple, full of snakes dosy from 'insense', were not so sure, where they did a snake show with a 7.3 m Boa Constrictor and kissed the most poinonous snake in the world on its mouth. We even bought a live mouse for 3RM (50p) to feed to a snake, but when the snake killed the mouse on the sot and swallowed it whole we thought maybe it hadn't been such a good idea!
Also we went to the biggext cheinese temple in Malaysia, wehre Kate became so overwhelmed she fell down the stairs (ir maybe te rain had something to do with it!)
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Eventaully it was time for us to catch the plane on the 15t May to Bangkok. We packed up and went to the airport after 3 hours sleep, again prepared with enough time, and went ot check in. when they told us we weren't on the system we thought al the 'strife' was happening all over again, so marched over to tge sales desk ready to argue our case, when they told us we were flying on the 15th may?and today was the 14th! Man did we feel stupid when we had to catch a taxi back to the hostel from the departure area of the airport, we had absoulutely no idea what day it was!
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Luckily 24 hours later we did actaully manage to get on the plane!
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