Singapore sling

The 6 hour bus ride from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore turned out to be more like 8 but at least we got there. After a bit of faffing through customs we were dropped off at an innocuous looking building with shops and a taxi rank. For a huge 4 pounds 50 I think I'll let the lateness slide. Taxi it is then. Luckily the taxi drivers here all speak 3 languages and English is one of them, due to the old British rule days.
The streets are clean and the place seems very orderly. We'd heard about the amount of rules abound here and the massive fines in place if you break them. It didn't feel like a place living under a regime though. Our hostel was on a really flash housing estate above a 24 hour food court. What a total dive. The owner had clearly been using the grotty room himself for having showers and the such. Lovely sweaty humidity. We were shown around the 'facilities', an odd zombie-like Australian on a PC on a box turned his head but ignore our greetings. Okay. So what if there's ant crawling the walls, we'll make good of it. We headed straight out.
Luckily good food was just around the corner and we eventually settled in for the night. Next day was the only full day we had here and there's a fair bit to see.
First stop was the financial/city district, very flash it looked too. Lots of old colonial style buildings mixed in with sheer glass skyscrapers with immensely clean lines. We walked around the harbour and watched a boat race in the sunshine. This place is humid all year round, all day long. It's still a clean and friendly place to be despite the heat.
The British reign in Singapore sorted a lot of the infrastructure out, a good transport system, orderly road network and drinking tap water along with sewerage that actually works. Finally we're back to flushing toilet paper! Oh the joy of the little things.
Another by product of the British rule was the influx of British and Indian convicts. They were taxed to build some of the roads and the impressive bridges around the city. Good work boys!
The harbour is an impressive sight. The Music, theatre and arts venue being the best. A kind of double hedgehog shape that was 20 years in the making. A nice looking place from the inside. It seems Singapore's prominent ship trading position and the British rule really made this place what it is. We had to check out Raffles hotel while we were here. It's basically an old hotel used by the British to lord it over the locals. No it's mostly shops, cafes and boutiques but it's still partly a hotel. We originally got the place mixed up with a much grander building. The Park Hotel. This building looks like something from Batman or Ghostbusters. It stands out because it's built in the middle of a flat grassed public park and has a kind of evil look about it. Very flash inside but not for the likes of us paupers.
Once we saw Raffles after that we weren't impressed but it did kind of grow on us. This is where the cocktail the Singapore Sling was conceived. The famous Long Bar is in the middle courtyard surrounded by palm trees and accompanied by a smooth jazz backdrop. Money stopped me buying a Singapore Sling, and the fact that I looked like a tramp(I was now onto the 4th day with the same clothes in humid weather). There was a class and style about the place that I liked and the Indian staff still remain, dressed in full regalia. It felt like we'd been transported back in time when the wedding party attended, apart from the Subaru Impreza wedding car!
That evening we walked along the beach, as advised by a local bookshop owner, and watched a group of wake boarders(like water skiing but with a single board rather than two) zoom round the man made lake on a kind of pulley system. Pretty innovative. A stroll back along the posh avenue to the grot-hole where we were staying ended our Asia experience. All eyes were now fully turned to Australia. Singapore itself is worth a stop over of a couple of days but no more. I'd visit again on the way to somewhere else for sure.