Again, not actually in Singapore as I write this...

The next day it was time to travel to Melaka - our final stop in Malaysia. As soon as we arrived were taken to another (Strange) foodcourt by our tour leader... Then we had just a few hours to explore the city. Melaka was much nicer than Penang. Set around a river, it was predominant Chinese in culture and architecture. We hopped straight on some brightly coloured rickshaws (ours adorned with Barbies!) to have a tour of the city. It was pretty and clean but felt quite empty and sprawling (this may have been due to the looming Chinese New Year though - a lot of stuff was closed).

Melaka was, I think, the McDonalds capital of Malaysia - literally every other shop was a Maccy D's and it was the only place anyone seemed to eat. All the adverts on Telly were for McD's and all the cars had 'M' stickers.... V. strange. That evening was the goodbye dinner (had it on our second last night due to expense of Singes) and then a boat ride down the river... nice enough.

That was it for our quick trip to Melaka and we boarded the bus to Singes and our Hotel Bencoolen. Singapore was, I thought, fascinating. From what I saw there was literally NO history. Every building looked like it had been built in the last 10 years - there was even a 'man made' island, 'sentosa' which felt like you were in Disney Land. We checked in then headed straight for the island for a look around. The whole city was pristine, with a state of the art transport system including metro swipe-cards that were hard plastic and you had to return to the machine once you had used it so as to be environmentally friendly (Bozza - TAKE NOTE.)

Once on Sentosa, a couple of us decided to try 'Tobogganing' down the hill. We were taken up by a ski-lift type thing and then sit in a little cart that let you zoom down the track - good fun. Word of warning though: when tobogganing, try to wear shorts/trousers... kind of difficult / embarrassing in a dress. Later, we watched this lazer show thing (a 'must see' in Singapore), where they sprayed water and made 3D characters appear in it. Pretty cool.

As it was Chinese New Year's eve we had a quick dinner then headed to China Town. Not really what I expected. Rather than the thousands of screaming people and fireworks you'd find in central London on December 31st, there was a long, decorated street with a big stage in the middle where two Malaysian men were having an 'orange peeling competition'... Definitely innteresstinng.

And that takes us to the 14th - a swift lunch in Singes before it was a bus ride to the airport and boarding a plane to Melbourne.

All in all a pretty good two-week Asian experience I'd say.

Hope you're all well, miss you lots xx