Almost ready for my flight to Sydney tomorrow morning, I’ve got to be up about 6.30am so that kind of limits what I can do tonight; today I’ve just been wandering about the city mostly. Woke up and got myself down to my hostel’s kitchen and cooked myself a fry-up made myself some cereal. Left to find the train station and was approached by an Indian man trying to flog me a cheap suit. His opening line didn’t really sell it to me though: Hello sir! Are you a jockey? Took the MRT to Orchard Road which is where you’ll find all your Prada, D&G, Armani, Chanel etc shops (funny going in those with my rucksack, shorts and flip-flops: No thanks, I’m just looking.) The shops round this area are endless, never bring your girlfriend here for a weekend…
Then went over to the business district to oggle at all the high-rises, and took a photo of the Raffles Hotel where the Singapore Sling was invented. I then decided I wanted to get my hair cut, Le Grand Bouffan was getting out of control and I was starting to wonder if I’d need a seperate visa for it when I got to Australia. I found a little place called 10 Minute Cut, whereby you go in and put your 10 dollars (3.50GBP) in a machine and it gives you a ticket. When it’s your turn you give this to the hairdresser and they get to work. The name of the girl doing mine was Jessie Chan, more like Jackie Chan with the speed she was chopping away at. Weird thing was it was a glass shop front and people would gather at the window and watch your hair being cut. At one point I had half a dozen folk watching her trim round my ears. She did a pretty good job, anyway, and she even gave me a free comb to take away with me!
I’m now trying to find out the best way to get my mobile phone unlocked so I can buy an Australian PAYG sim card tomorrow. It was fine with my other phone (the one that got stolen) in Thailand, I just took it to some back-alley shop and they did it in half an hour for a few quid. Similar efforts to find somewhere here in Singapore haven’t got me very far at all so I may have to call Orange and see if they’ll do it for me over the phone.
I’ve had a good flying visit to Singapore, I certainly couldn’t have fitted Malaysia in as well, and I picked up my Rough Guide to Australia today so I’m all ready to go down under. More photos have been added.
Bon voyage roving traveller!