Meeting up with my friends Fauzi and Siti, we sat at a streetside place in the Bugis area and caught up. Fauzi suggested a Chinese style soup containing seaweed, green vegetables, fried fish, tomato and milk. Add some red hot chilis and that thing was the business. Singapore has interesting combinations of food from the Chinese, Malay and Indian styles. A couple of large glasses of Hoegarten beer at a local pub finished off the evening. Sitting out at streetside tables is aprt of cultural life in SE Asia, Hong Kong included.
This morning the rain is still coming down, taxis hard to catch and people scurrying to drier places. My rendezous with my ‘agent’ happened around 9am after walking several blocks from the nearest MRT station. As I type I’m relying on body warmth to dry off. As soon as Target opens, at the Forum Galeria on Orchard Rd. I’m buying a cheap umbrella. Seemed like I was the only person in Singapore without one this morning.
When I pick up my passport at 4pm, its straight back to Harbour Front and onto the ferry to Indo. The cool think is I clear immigration there and don’t have to deal with the nonsense at Ngurah Rai, as I’ll be arriving at domestic. Am hoping to get a quick look at Batam, and renting a motorbike would be my prefered way to go, my driving licence and GPS unit already packed. The weather might not cooperate though so who knows, maybe I’ll explore the internet cafes instead.
