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Greetings from Borneo!
I realise I'm a bit behind with my Australia stories but I'm forgetful and won't remember the lastest stuff either if I focus on that, so here goes for Singapore and Borneo updates:
Singapore- I flew in to Singapore with Laura (though not sat together) on 23rd of January and had the most exciting flight ever- they gave us menus as we sat down and it became clear that the flight really was all about the food- I have no idea how long the flight was- I think about 7 hours, but in that time, we had 2 full meals, numerous snacks and drinks. I entertained myself watching my old friend Ryan Gosling in whatever film it was (irrelevant really!) and ate almost non-stop! Still, when we landed, it was about 10pm local time and 1am in our heads- we were pretty tired so we opted for taxis (Laura had booked into a hotel)- I arrived at my slightly shady looking hostel, instructing my very kind taxi driver to wait so I could make sure it was actually open for me to check in (pah! Check in? Not sure they had heard of that) etc... I found the door with the taped on A4 paper saying '98 SG' and firgured that was it- went up the first flight of stairs and was met with another bit of paper on door saying that I had to use the phone on the wall to call up and ask someone to come so I could check in. I did that, but I couldn't tell you what the response was- I'm fairly sure the lady attempted English, but I can't say which words... Needless to say, she didnt turn up for 15 mins so I tried again. And again. Finally, someone opened the door from the inside and asked if I was trying to check in- he said he didnt work there but could show me to a room while I waited as the manager liked to take her time to turn up! He showed me to my room and took a nice wad of my money .He said to 'chill out' while he waited for the manager to turn up, then he'd bring me a key to the room, he front door and my locker. I waited... I went downstairs to ask how much longer it'd be after about half an hour- was told another half an hour- and waited... and fell asleep. He woke me up with the keys at about 1.45am local time, 4.45am my time- he actually seemed surprised that I wasnt able to take his advice and just 'chill out' for that long! Anyway, I had a little look around- the 'kitchen' consisted of a hot water machine, a few cups and a washing machine, with lots of broken sliding shower doors coming off one wall- behind which were 2 toilet rooms- I use the word 'room' loosely- more like cupboards, with a toilet you had to stand on to shut the door and a shower attached to the wall that dripped on you whilst you were on the loo. Welcome to Singapore!
Anyway, so it was fair to say the hostel was a bit basic, but the room was OK, the door locksed and I was spitting distance from an MRT (train) stration- the MRT was sooooooooooo easy to use- a lot like to Underground- that I got a bit carried away and spent quite a bit going all over Singapore city and exploring as much as I had time to see! On the first day there, I went to the Harbourfront, walked around a bit, found a cheap foodcourt to eat in and walked along the public walkway to the Sentosa Island Resort (before realising they wanted me to pay to just go on the island and not actually do anything- I walked back to Singapore main island and back again along the normal pavement by the road, getting in for free- ka-ching!!!) I didnt explore the whole of Sentosa Island, just the resort, but did very much enjoy giggling at the fairly local tourists posing in hilarious manners in front of things like plastic caves, sky scrapers, blank walls and toilet signs- always looking pensive or pointing at something seriously unimpressive!
After lunch, I got back on the MRT and went to Chinatown- which I LOVED!!! I actually did a little skip of excitement as I left th station as everything was all beautifully decorated and colourful due to it being still Chinese New Year celebrations- I walked around quite happily, bought some Cath Kidson style chopsticks and took a few too many photos. I stumbled accorss a few temples- a buddhist one and a hindu one- and had a little look inside each. Really interesting to see, but I always get the impression that they are really just for tourists as you rarely see anyone actually using them...
I decided a good way to see the city would be to get on the cable car that went between Sentosa and Mt Faber, stopping at the Harbourfront in between (it was, according my many stolen maps, Singapore's number 1 tourist attraction!) so I had a little ride between the Harbourfront and Sentosa first- initially being put in a car on my own. I'm getting better with the heights things, but I'd be lying if I said I didnt think there was a chance I'd die as the high rise building I'd boarded in dropped away beneath me! I had dinner back at the Harbourfront at the foodcourt for very cheap and waited for it to start to get dark for my 2nd leg of cable car ness, so I could see it all in its lit up glory- I got to Mt Faber hoping to get out for a wander, but all the gates had been locked, so I had a glass of wine at the top instead, watching the view as the sun went down. A random, turkish guy came and sat with me and talked at me a lot (all I remember of what he actually said was 'I mean come on' repeatedly!) before paying for my drink (woo! It was quite expensive, I wasn't sorry to lose that cost!), buying a cable car ticket in order to follow me back down, and insisting that because he lived there, he should give me a quick night time tour of the water front by Raffles Place- I was very tired but agreed as I was only there for a few days- we walked along the river and watched belly dancers and turkish icecream sellers flinging icecreams in the air etc, before I insisted on going home to bed. Very strange evening! When I got back, an American guy I'd chatted to at breakfast was attempting to wait for the manager to return from wherever she hid (much as I had the night before) in order to be able to catch his flight at 4am (it was about 11.30pm and hed been waiting nearly an hour already apparently)- it's fair to say he was more than a bit stressed about it, so we went out (again) for a calm down beer (yes I drank beer... I dont love it, but I can stomach one these days) in one of the 'eateries' next to the hostel- basically a cafe with plastic chairs outside and a few of the hugest bottles of beer ever in the fridge.
Day 2 and I decided to explore Marina Bay, which seemed to have most of the local architectural highlights- I had intended to just go there for an hour or 2 and ended up spending almost the whole day, as again there was new year decorations and things everywhere and it was generally just a nice relaxing place to be (and way too hot and humid to actually walk in the sun too much)- when I finally left and went to find the art museum, I relaised I'd only have about 20 minutes there before needing to get back on the MRT to find the night zoo pick up point, so I went to change my money and walked around looking at the 'outdoor art' instead. I left with plenty of time to get to what I thought was the nearest MRT station to the pick up point, thinking it was just a short walk (it looked short on the map) to the fancy hotel that Iwas definately NOT staying in and got there with half an hour to go. After 20 minutes of walking and no sign of the required road, I started to panic a bit and hailed a taxi at some traffic lights (which he told me was very dangerous, but they were red so...) and got there just in time, to find Laura ready and waiting, a bit more organised than me! The night safari was a shambles- very confusing to work out which bus was oursetc and generally a bit of a let down- we did the tram ride but didnt have time to do any of the walks and the free fire eating show was another opportunity for locals to take the mick out of tourists and pretend that they were doing someothing traditional... Not worth doing but hey!
Overall, I really liked Singapore and felt very safe there on my own, especially knowing how easily I could get anywhere on the MRT. Could have easily filled another day or 2 but still don't feel I really missed anything.
The next day I rushed to the botanical gardens (which took nearly an hour and left me with a whole 20 mins there! HAHA!) and braved the MRT with my bags and met Laura on the way to the airport for our flight to Borneo. The highlight of this was finding computers with free, working internet!!! woop!
We arrived in Borneo to be ripped off for a taxi (at least there were 2 of us) to our swanky new home, the Novotel- our room was HUGE and had a pretty big en suite with a phone by the loo, a bath (Laura was v excited about that!) a TV (which didnt work initially) a HAIRPRYER! (also had to have changed) and... wait for it... an actual doorbell... seriously! It was enough to make me cancel my hostel and opt back in for the hellish mountain climb just so I didnt miss out on the 3rd hotel night! We had a fairly early night and spent the next day looking around the 1Borneo mall, which we were basically in... and got the free bus into town. Kota Kinabalu town was... erm... I guess smelly is the word that somes to mind- we found the handicraft market and lasted all of about 15 minutes there before we both wanted to vomit from the stink of sewage and rotting fish, so we left to find somewhere further from the small to have lunch. (we failed- it still smelt and put us off our food pretty well)- walking around looking ill, our daybags on our fronts like pregnant bellies and raincoats attamepting to cover them, some locals found us absolutely hilarious and giggled a lot as we skidded about on the wet floor, looking totally cool! We did a bit of pre mountain shopping. We were directed to a supermarket by a man who looked very paniced and asked where my hands were- he looked like he was having an actual heart attack just because they were tucked into the sleeves of my jacket! He was very releaved when I showed him I did indeed have hands! We tried to find some sort of cereal bar, as recommended, much to the confusion of every single member of staff at the shop- they all asked someone else and we because a laughing stock once again! Eventually we had some cookies and bin bags (another tricky item apparently) in hand and we set off back to our fancy hotel. In the morning, packed and ready to climb a mountain I didnt think I wanted to climb, safe in the knowledge that every single local person had laughed and told us how mad we were and how much danger we'd be in attempting the climb, we were told that someone had died doing it shortly before... We had a bit of time so googled some pictures of our route, only to find that it involved climbing up metal ladders attached to vertical faces of rock near the top and scaling the edges of other crazily mental bits... I think its fair to say histerical was an understaement for what I became and nearly booked a premier room for myself at the hotel for 80 pounds just to make sure I lived! The driver who picked us up assured me I could skip the dangerous mental bits by not doing the 2am summit trek, so we went.
The mountain climb was just 6km to our dorm, but 6km of pure devil's staircase (tongariro) part 2- serious pain and tiredness set in and it took us 6 hours of climbing with no respite of downwards sections and barely anything vaguely flat. When we arrived, they told us a problem with our booking meant theyd have to put us in another dorm place higher up the mountain. We refused to go. Flat out refused. I would have slept in the chair I was sat in, but they magically found us a room! Going back down was less hard, but definately they jelly legs didnt help and 4 hours back down felt less bad, but was still pretty tough with legs that no longer felt like our own! Our guide Dennis helped by encouraging us and trying to teach me some Malay (which I forgot of course!). We were down at 12 midday on the dot and so happy to be done, BUT the buffet lunch involved going down a load of steps- I think an actual joke?! Then back up to find our bus! Today (the day after!) I cannot actually walk and basically fell down the 2 steps to reception because my legs would not let me do anymore of that sort of rubbish! Only time will tell if they'll ever fully work again (the danish pastries for breakkie may have helped a bit). :)
So, the hotel began to irritate me a little bit more (all night they'd had some engineer or someone on the walkie talkie, ringing the doorbell, moving furniture, vaccuming and generally creating fumes in the interconnecting room) by mking me go repeatedly up and down the stairs to reception as I went between the computer and the reception desk nearly 100 times (falling down the steps each time), trying to get my flight e-ticket printed. Eventually we managed to sort it and I got a taxi to take me to my hostel in town (there was no way I could carry 21kgs on my back through a busy mall in the hope that the free bus would not be full and then walk around town on a hostel hunt with my non-working legs!). I really did think I'd taken the easy option here... until the point where the taxi man tried to drop me off at every single place that had 'backpacker' in its name- he couldn't be convinced that it was like saying 'hotel' and that the other word was the specific one, that turning up at a different one than the one I'd booked and paid for wasn't really going to work. We stopped and I got out to ask in a different hostel if they could direct me- a very friendly English guy explained the way but said if he couldn't find it, get the taxi driver to bring me back and he'd walk me there. I felt fairly sure I understood the directions, but the taxi driver flat out refused to follow them, taking me in circles back to the wrong backpackers that he'd found earlier and then pointing out that we were just going in circles- genius huh? In the end, after numerous attempts at making him follow the road I actually needed, he dropped me back off at the initial wrong backpacker and I went in to ask the guy if he'd still help me find it. Luckily he was not busy and although I had to carry all m,y bags on the 15 minute walk with my gammy legs playing up, knees buckling every few steps and generally feeling the heat, he did take me directly to the right place- a huge relief! This ended when I opened the door to find that the recpeption area was up a tall flight of stairs- haha! About 10 minutes later, when I finally made it up the stairs, the feeling of relief and gratitude cam back as I was shown my room (really nice and really clean and nice and cool), given a locker key (straight away, not at 3am! Result!) and shown where the free internet (working, that is), free tea/ coffee/ hot chocolate machine and the ALL DAY FREE FOOD was. I spent the afternoon napping, reading and stretching out my legs whenever I thought I'd get away with doing so without looking a bit special! I ventured out for dinner later on, but could barely move and ended up settling for the nearest place I could find which, unfortunately, was KFC (urgh!) I'd been told by the guy who found my hostel for me that on my one full day I should go to visit at least one of the smaller islands as it was an easy boat ride away and much nicer than the town. I bumped into Peter, the hostel owner, in the evening and he very kindly offered to drive me to the jetty to show me where to go in the morning, giving me tips of which island to visit, where to change my money for Thailand, good places to eat, etc. I am always amazed to find people who are so willing to go out of their way to help you, even without being asked- so refreshing!
I woke up almost totally unable to bend my legs, so my plan of walking to the jetty fast went out the window and I got a taxi, bought my ticket and headed over to Mamutik island- basic tourist spot but a really pretty beach and warm (very salty), clear sea to swim in. I spent a lazy day lying on the sand before attempting to get changed in the toilets- which were flooding with what I hope was just water- for a good inch or so on the floor- and had no hooks to hang bags or clothes. Let me tell you, changing with one hand, a heavy ish bag in the other, not letting your clothes touch the floor is not easy! Whilst waiting for my return boat back to Kota Kinabalu, a local man started talking to me and within minutes, basically proposed (seems fairly standard in every non- English speaking country I go to!) and told me he'd wait for me to come back to Borneo for him... he then followed me back the mainland on my boat (I think he knew the driver) and I escaped pretty swiftly off the boat the second it docked! I walked back (yes, I know, it was tough- I'm still walking like I have no leg control at all) via the currency exchange place and the supermarket where they laughed at us lots a fews before (for sun cream and cashew nuts yummy :) ) and am not just preparing for a quick dinner outing and another evening of re-packing to go to Thailand!!! EEEEEE very exciting, though it would be nice to knwo I have some clean clothes to go with... never mind, I'll just have to go shopping! :)
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