| Round 2 - Singapore! (2003-05-25 -> 2003-06-04) |
After spending a day and a half in Sweden, almost enough to get used to the timezone, I had to go away to
the next location - Singapore! If you know your history you know what was going on in Asia around this
time. If you don't I'll give you a hint - SARS! I wasn't the least bit worried since it seemed under control
for weeks, and I know the embassy wouldn't have allowed us to go had there been an issue.
So after taking a flight (that I would get very accustomed to) to Frankfurt I boarded a Lufthansa jumbojet that was nowhere near
half full! I got an entire 4 seats in a row all to myself! And this is the very first and only time I can remember
me eating on one of these flights - but that's only because they served a special extra spicy chicken and I had to try that :)
When we landed it was like walking into a wall of hot humid air! I never expected it to be this hot but it
was incredible! And right after we walk up the ramp from the airport is a temperature scanner that would
go off if you were feeling too hot which was the first symptom of SARS. After that we got a taxi to the very
nice Mandarin hotel in downtown Singapore, with temperature scanners everywhere, and since it was still afternoon me and Micke decided to go to the
embassy to check it out.
Our embassy in Singapore is located in an office building and wasn't anywhere near as nice as the one
in Guatemala. But they made up for that with the infrastructure and the very pleasant elevators that talked
to you! The staff at the embassy was very nice and the ambassador made us feel very welcommed. Unfortunately
they were very busy preparing for a dinner to be held on the Swedish national day but my parents got a mail
through to the ambassador that it was my birthday and he fixed a strawberry birthday cake and everything!
What surprised me the most was how incredibly clean the city was! They have very strict laws about littering
and they were very good at keeping things in great shape! I'm not sure what kinda of government they were running
but I gotta give them that. The people were very friendly and as opposed to Guatemala there was never any language
issues since english is the second language to everyone there.
On the saturday me and Micke went out shopping. Yeah, I know, I actually did some shopping! We visited a high tech
market and some other malls and stuff and we just kicked back and had fun. On the sunday I did something I would
come to regret afterwards and that was nothing. I stayed in the hotel room most of the day! I even called roomservice
for dinner, but that's ofcourse because I was busy watching the F1 race from Monaco. I didn't understand a word the commentators
were saying and didn't get that much from the subtitles but still not a problem following it!
The work went without any problems at all and on my last day there they took us out on a 5 course seafood dinner.
Unfortunately they didn't know I'm not a big fan of seafood but I did my best to enjoy myself and it was good. After
the dinner we walked around a bit and one of the guys said we had to go up to the Equinox bar. So up we went,
all the way up to the 110th floor (or something) to a bar that you could go all the way around and get a perfect 360
view of the town. I'm telling you, sitter up there having a beer (Tiger) was awesome!!
After doing last minute checks that everything was Ok at the embassy I checked out of the hotel at noon like
you're suppose to and took a cab to the airport. Problem was my plane wasn't suppose to leave until 10 so I had
around 9 hours to kill. And you know what? - that wasn't a problem! Singapores airport is so big and have so many
things to do I never got bored! They have a cinema, an arcade, tons of shops and restaurants and wireless internet,
it was just so easy to make those hours fly. Then it was time to get on the plane and go back home and enjoy 3 whole days
back in Sweden until it was time for round 3!
Click here for the image gallery!
|
|
|
| Complete Menu |
 |
 Diary / Blogg |
| > > 2010 |
| > > 2009 |
| > > 2008 |
| > > 2007 |
| > > 2006 |
| > > 2005 |
| > > 2004 |
| > > 2003 |
| > > 2002 |
| > > 2001 |
| Kris who? |
| Biography |
| My Pictures |
| Eden Memorial |
| Links |
| My Travels |
| > > London, UK |
| > > Milan, Italy |
| > > Scotland |
| > > Czech Republic |
| > > Silverstone, UK |
| > > Hague, Holland |
| > > Rome, Italy |
| > > Copenhagen, Denmark |
| > > Ankara, Turkey |
| > > Helsinki, Finland |
| > > Kinshasa, Congo |
| > > Glasgow, UK |
| > > Abuja, Nigeria |
| > > Brussels, Belgium |
| > > Gdansk, Poland |
| > > Buenos Aires, Argentina |
| > > Sofia, Bulgaria |
| > > Budapest, Hungary |
| > > Singapore |
| > > Guatemala |
|
| |
| Random "me" picture |
|
 |
|
|
