Ready...Set... Go!

Marina Casino

I set off on this adventure with my best friend, Fara, by my side. I am so excited that she was able to come and kick off the first 2 weeks of this amazing adventure. We met up in Los Angeles and survived an 11 hour flight to Tokyo . When we arrived in Tokyo, we decided to walk and stretch our tired, numb bums. We were about 20 gates away when we heard an announcement that sounded like "Fara Wash and Michelle Heiter please report to gate 46 immediately." We looked at each other. No! The plane is leaving and we will miss our flight. We took off running for the gate. Yes, a full out sprint through the airport just like the Amazing Race. We ran and ran. Finally, we reached the gate and went to the desk. We handed the woman our tickets and passports. She looked at us and said "How may I help you?" We explained she had just called our names and we thought we were late for our flight. "No, I called Ms. Wong and Michelle Fadu Hater." Huh. Well, at least we got our blood pumping and a little exercise before the 7 hour flight to Singapore! We sat and laughed how we could never do the Amazing Race because the sprint through the airport about killed us!

We both decided to take some sleeping medications before the next flight. We had to be rested for the 14 hours in Singapore. We slept a little and were ready to hit the city at 3:30 AM. We had asked several people if there was a good location to watch the sunrise. Everyone said "No." Oh well. We waited for the metro station to open at 6AM and went off to explore the city.  It was clean and very westernized. Simple and easy to get around. We arrived at the city center and started walking and exploring the area. It was dark until 7:30 and there was no real sunrise. It just got lighter and then the sun came out. Guess that was why everyone said not to bother trying to see a sunrise.  We checked out the Marina Casino, St Andrew's Cathedral, the park and harbor front. Then we were off to Chinatown for a food tour.

Chinatown

                                                                       
We had a great walking tour of the Chinatown complex where the guide explained the Chinese influence and the history of the street hawkers in Singapore. He showed us the daily fruit and vegetable market and the wet market. We should have realized that we wanted to skip the wet market when he asked if any of us were animal rights activists and explained that there were live animals in the wet market. I am not sure if it was the lack of sleep our just stupidity that we did not put it together. As we watched the fish mongers clean and prepare the fish, one of the men slipped his hand in and grabbed a frog. He banged it on a stool to kill it. "AHHH!" Fara screamed and looked at me. "That man just beat a frog to death!" Yes, and the guy behind me was beating a fish with a baseball bat. Yes, I would be a 100% vegetarian if I had to butcher an animal myself. It was definitely brutal and we were ready to move on.

     One of these poor little guys didn't survive our visit.

 Next stop was breakfast. We waited. Praying it was not frog. Luckily it was coffee and tea with butterfly pastry, Singapore donut stick and rice cakes with roasted vegetables. But, the best was saved for last. We ended the tour with shaved ice. Everyone wanted mango shaved ice but our tour guide insisted on also getting a toasted sesame and red bean shaved ice also. Both were delicious and a nice break from the heat of the day.

Yummy shaved ice! Mango (left) and Toasted Sesame with Red Beans (right).

Afterwards, we jumped on the metro back to Singapore airport and waited for our flight to Ho Chi Minh City. I was exhausted and needed to get a good stretch. So, I found an open space in the airport and did some yoga. Yes, I looked silly but it felt good and my body loved it! Then, back on a plane for a 2 hour flight to Vietnam. We both collapsed in our seats and slept the entire flight. Yippee! Only minutes away from exploring Ho Chi Minh City! Wrong! We got stuck in Visa on arrivals. We followed all the rules. Turned in our paperwork and waited for our passports to be stamped with the visa. Mine arrived in 15 minutes and then everything came to a halt. Two additional planes arrived and people swarmed the window. We waited and waited for 2 hours before Fara got her visa. We laughed as we realized that my Visa cost $65 and Fara's cost $95. She was too tired to argue at this point. Then, we had another 30 minute wait in passport control. This was killing us! We were tired and exhausted from traveling. We just wanted to get to a hotel and sleep....flat in a bed! By the time we got through passport control, we had to go on a hunt for our bags. We finally found them sitting between customs and the lost and found window. Yippeee! We eventually made it through customs and then had to find our hotel driver. No such luck. He had left so, we grabbed a taxi to the hotel. The traffic was crazy in Ho Chi Minh City. Motorcycles and cars honking and driving. We noticed immediately there were few traffic lights. I was very nervous we were going to hit a motorcycle and send a Vietnamese family flying through the air. Luckily, we arrived safely. When we finally arrived at our hotel, we were told "Just walk down that alley and it will be on your right." Ok. We did it and were happy to find a nice clean room with air conditioning waiting for us! Not bad for $10/night. We were excited we arrived but exhausted from 2 days of travel. A good nights sleep and we will be ready to explore Ho Chi Minh City in the morning.