Singapore & Malaysia 2006-2007 - Singapore New Year's Eve

We spent New Year’s Eve at Clark Quay in Singapore. They had an area where they were pumping the tunes and had dancers grooving about. That’s here we stayed for the countdown. We tried to get into Ministry of Sound but we had sandals and shorts on (grrr….dress codes…). Instead we went into adjacent Hed Kandi which was nice since I have most of the music released under that label.

All in all, this was an awesome trip that ended too soon.

Happy New Year everyone!!!!

Singapore & Malaysia 2006-2007 – Random Cool Shots

Here are a few shots that I found interesting on our trip.

There were a few shakes/smoothies that we tried. Some were good like mango, guava or pineapple. Some were ok like avocado (too creamy). But some were downright wrong like durian (which literally tasted like someone blended spring rolls and onions), cactus or bitter gourd (we should have known better since the vendor gave us a weird look and asked us if we were really sure when we order).

On the boat tour around Pangkor Island, we skipped over to the island resort of Pangkor Laut. This is a really expensive place. Since I don’t have hundreds of dollars to spend a night there, I just took in the view of the shore.

In Singapore there were always random signs everywhere prohibiting various things. ‘No spitting in the elevator’…..D’uh!! The picture with the ‘no durian’ sign was especially funny following our ingestion of a horrid durian smoothie.

Singapore & Malaysia 2006-2007 – Malaysia – Pangkor Island – Maxin’ & Relaxin’

These are just a few shots of us relaxing or doing some chill things. I went snorkeling for the first time on this trip. It took me a while to get used to breathing through a tube.

One of the activities that I enjoyed the most was the boat trip we took around Pangkor. We got to see all the beaches and a few rocks that looked like various things (turtle, crocodile, feet…..).

Singapore & Malaysia 2006-2007 – Malaysia – Pangkor Island Beaches

We spent quite some time on the beaches of Pangkor Island. Our first night was at Nipah Beach. It was alright, a bit busy though. However, a short 5 minute walk away was Coral Beach which was so much better. It had great sand with very few people.

We also stayed at Pasir Bogak Beach. The first two nights we slept in tents on the beach….not the most comfortable, but everywhere we went was full or just charged too much. We eventually got a room on the third day at this beach.

We also took a day trip to a small unfrequented beach, Teluk Segadas. The taxis only went as far as the small village/town that was nearby. We walked for 15 minutes, got directions from some Malay kids then had a 10 minute trek through the woods to get to the beach.

Every beach we went to was nice. We were a bit surprised that there were so few tourists. We were expecting to be elbowing for room, but we always had loads of room, some times the whole beach to ourselves.

Singapore & Malaysia 2006-2007 – The Tourist Post

We did go to a few tourist spots on our vacation. We saw the famed Petronas Twin Towers and the KL Tower in Kuala Lumpur. What can you say; a tower is a tower, although the Petronas did look good at a distance.

We made it to the Raffles Hotel, which legends tell is the birthplace of the Singapore sling. Of course we headed to the Long Bar there and had a few.

We also strolled along the Clark Quay and Boat Quay in Singapore. There were plenty of good restaurants and clubs in this area.

Singapore & Malaysia 2006-2007 - Little India & Chinatown

Over the Christmas break I went to Singapore and Malaysia with Thom. The whole trip was awesome. We made sure to make complete use of our time off work. We got off at noon on December 21 and our flight left at 4pm that day. We arrived back at 6am on January 2 and had to be at work by 9am. It was great to get away from the stresses of work and living in Seoul.

Our intentions were not to be super touristy but rather to do as much nothing as possible. There was plenty of time spent relaxing on the beach and just lying about. Well that’s enough talk, on to the pics.

We spent a few days shopping in the Little India and Chinatown districts of Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. On the third last day of the trip, our bus driver drove off with our backpacks still under the bus. So we spent twice as much time shopping as we should have trying to replace the stuff we lost. (Nothing too important was gone, just cells, clothes and souvenirs).

Beijing – Random Interesting Shots – October 4-7, 2006

These are a few shots that I found interesting from my Beijing trip.

The first is from a fast food restaurant sign. I just though it looked like a KFC rip-off since the guy looks like a Chinese version of Colonel Sanders.

The second shot is of an older gentleman practicing his calligraphy writing in the park by the Temple of Heaven.

The third shot is just funny. I had never been to a ‘rated’ bathroom until China. It really does make you wonder what a five star or one star toilet would be like….

The fourth shot is from a tea house we visited. I ended up buying a lot of tea. They have ones that are made of flowers. It looks like a ball of dried leaves but when it’s put in hot water, it ‘blooms’ and an intact flower opens.

The last shot is of silk worm cocoons from a silk manufacturer we visited. It was interesting to see the full process of how silk is made.

The Temple of Heaven – October 7, 2006

We walked by a park on the way to the actually temple. The place was like Central Park. There were groups of Chinese people dancing and playing different games. We saw a few people practicing calligraphy with water on the stone ground. There were musicians playing and people singing. The actual temple was pretty cool. It was cylindrical and the paintings on it were really detailed. We were lucky as they had just recently painted the whole building.

Summer Palace – October 6, 2006

The Summer Palace was on top of a hill by the man-made lake inside the gates of the grounds. This was a nice scenic and relaxing part of the tour.

Tiananmen Square – October 6, 2006

This place was packed!!! There were people lined up to see an exhibit in one of the buildings and the line wrapped around the building. They had the 2008 Olypmpic mascots on some greenery. It was my first time seeing them. Not really much else to say about the place, after all, a square really is a square.