Changi Chapel Museum

Yesterday we took advantage of my day off - due to Chinese New Year - to take a mini tour with some Singaporean friends from Nottingham who are here for a few months. There were a few places that we wanted to go, and that we wanted to scout out for operation 777, so first up was the Changi Chapel. We had intended to visit the Istana - the presidential palace - but the queues were eye watering, so we went ahead with plan B - Changi Chapel.

The museum and chapel is tucked away next to the main Changi Prison, still used as a penitentiary today. The museum was very well put together, with a lot of eyewitness accounts of the PoW camps and the events surrounding the fall of Singapore. What was most interesting was that there were plaques donated by the various battalions that served in Singapore, and the one that you can see to the left is that of the 5th Beds & Herts. It's sideways now, but I'll try and put it the right way round soon! What amazed me was the sheer diversity of regiments (India, USA, Australia, Malaya and so on), and the age of the men who were fighting. Many were younger than me, and that is something that hits home when you go to something like this.

The museum also includes a lot of information on the Burma/Thailand railway, and loads of artefacts, including a lot of things that were made by the men who worked on the railway. What astonished me is that in the Changi PoW camp, within 3 weeks they were putting on plays, and after a while were giving lectures at the "Changi University", on anything from Maths to Egyptology.

Chinese New Year Steamboat

One of the traditions of Chinese New Year is the reunion dinner, when the whole family gets together. Having had one for the maternal side of the family previously, last Saturday the paternal side of the family came over to our place for steamboat. Steamboat is often referred to as Chinese fondue, and that's about as accurate a description as I can think of. Generally, a pot of soup/stock is placed in the middle of the table, and surrounded by plates of meat, seafood, tofu, vegetables and s0 on, and you dip them in the soup to cook them. The bonus being that at the end of the evening you get a delicious soup to drink! As you can see, we had two tables up, and loads of food - with the highlights being a type of fishball that has other meat inside, and a chilli sauce that was fantastic!

Chinese New Year

This time of year Singapore (and a lot of Asia) is alight with festivities, as people get ready to welcome in the New Year - the year of the pig. Last year we were here for CNY, and had seen the heart of Chinatown clogged with people on New Year's Eve, so this year we went and had a look a week early.

You can see from the picture on the left that it was still packed with people doing some last minute shopping, much like we would do for Christmas. Visiting relatives is an important part of Chinese New Year, and people buy snacks that they can offer to people when they receive visitors. Much of the preparations are very similar to what we do for Christmas, with everyone dashing out at the last minute to stock up, and shops shutting on Chinese New Year's day itself, and the day after.

Some of the most interesting stores are the dried meat stores, that have all kinds of Chinese sausages, chicken, and other meats hanging up to be eaten during the holidays. Peanuts, sweets, barbequed pork, and other such things are crammed into shopping bags, ready to be distributed to guests. Apart from food and snacks, people buy decorations to hang around the house, fake firecrackers (real ones are banned), and generally come to walk around and enjoy the atmosphere.

Something else that people do is stock up on flowers at home, and we went down to the garden centre on Sunday night to do some stocking up ourselves. Unfortunately, so had everyone else. Here’s me with a tree - related to the kumquat tree, I think. These type of trees are very common at Chinese New Year, and businesses put them up in the lobbies and so on. The oranges signify luck, which we can all use from time to time! One thing that was pretty cool (forgive the pun) was a cold room that had roses and other flowers (lilies, tulips, eustomas, gladiolia, etc) that need a cooler climate. The room itself was a cold enough to give brass monkeys a shock, but the flowers were nice and it was almost like going round a garden centre back home.

Who's been a naughty boy...

Here's me coming out of the cake shop after more testing - more info on our wedding blog. See you there!

KL

My blog is starting to take on a Dr Who type of feel – I whizz around in time when I come across photos to post. Now, let me take you back to last year in my TARDIS…whoosh….

(Left: Me in Dunkin Donuts in KL.)

Some of you may remember that, last December, our friend from Nottingham came and visited us. Mona’s in China now, and popped over to Singapore for some warm weather and a quick break. We had tried to visit another country whilst she was here, but the looming Christmas holiday meant that everywhere was fully booked. It seems as though everyone in Singapore had the same idea – to make the most of the holidays that were next to weekends, and get away from a long break. KL it was, then.

There are three ways of getting to KL. You can take a bus, drive, or you can fly. The flight is around 45 mins, but can be quite expensive. The coach trip itself is not too bad, taking around 5 hours to get there. There is a stop along the way (much like a trip to Malacca), and the scenery can be quite stunning. The hotel we stayed at did a reasonable cooked breakfast buffet in the morning, including some rather tasty waffles.

(Left: the Petronas Towers.)

One of the best things about Malaysia is the food and, like true tourists, we spent most of our time eating. We sampled some Dunkin Donuts and KFC, the former of which you can’t get in Singapore anymore. It was a tough assingnment, but one we carried out purely in the name of research. Result? Yes, they were good.

We visited the Petronas Towers (alas, no Catherine or Sean), and spent some considerable time on the shopping centre underneath. Right now, there’s a guy sitting in a spa in KL rubbing his hands with disbelief that we all entered his shop. He’s retired since, and lives the life of a king.

We also took some time to go see the Merdeka Square in central KL, where independence from the Brits was proclaimed. There is a couple of notable buildings on the square, one of which is the Sultan Abdul Samad Building. Built at the tail end of the 19th Century, and originally known as "The New Government Offices", it now houses the Commercial Division of the High Court of Malaya.

KL is a very pretty town, and one of the key attractions is just walking around, and taking in the architecture. It can take a while (and requires a decent map), but is well worth the trip.

Gold! Always believe in your soul, you've got the power to know, you're indestructable...

As I have just posted, we've just retuned from Blighty. The land of fish & chips, gravy & chips (ooooh gravy), and online petitions to the PM.

The Prime Minster’s Open Petitions website has some commendable petitions (ensure that inheritance tax is scrapped in this year's Budget, for example), but others must be questioned. Tim Ireland and David Kitchen prove that the internet is truly a force for democratic good. More so, Tim Ireland’s signatories include "God, Creator of Worlds", which proves that broad-band access is really quite good these days.

I thought that the petition on parachute training was a joke as well, but apparently it's not. Which makes the cut in parachute training for the parachute regiment quite a joke, if it's true.

I'm feeling empowered today. Together, we might be able to change Britain. The question remains, tough; how many signatures do you need before Blair does what’s asked? 5000? 10,000? I challenge everyone who reads this to register at least one petition. Just let us know, and someone will sign it (perhaps). It could be for anything; scrap Arsenal and merge them with Spurs, for example. Let’s see if we can make Blighty a better place.

Back (again)...

So we’re back in Singapore now. After a short week (i.e. 6 days) back in Blighty, it was time to leave. Emirates did their best to delay us again, though. An hour on the runway on the way to the UK was bested by an hour and a half on the runway on the return leg; apparently there was a passenger who had not made the onwards sector of his flight, and his luggage was off-loaded, meaning we lost our slot for take-off. We finally got under way, and reached Singapore at around 9:30pm last night (Sunday).

The food was good, though, and the Thai Chicken Red Curry was well worth the trip. The in-flight entertainment system is working much better now on Emirates, and they are currently rolling out the ICE product. This is similar to that which Singapore Air has, where you can choose you movie from a catalogue and start, stop, and pause as you wish. It’s not on all aircraft yet, but will be soon.

For those interested in that kind of thing, we watched The Queen (excellent), Things to Do Before You're 30 (Dougray Scott, Brit-flick, also excellent), Stormbreaker (Ewan McGregor, fun), and I watched Wall Street (Sheen team, classic).