Ta Da......

All fixed, so pretty, off to get a warrant today.

Silver Lining

For the second time in six months a male foreign national has run a stop sign and smashed in to my car. Well, to be exact, the first one drove through a red light and munted my brand new number plate. This current one went through a stop sign and damaged every panel on the passenger side of the car. I had managed to swerve, so avoided totally losing the car, even my panel beater commented that I was very lucky.

I of course had a wee verbal melt down on the side of the road, which included such phrases as, "fukkin males, the only panel you haven't damaged on my car is the roof!" I started to call the police, but the driver pleaded no. He admitted full responsibility and said he would pay for the repair. I told him he had 24 hours to pay up.

I took the car to the panel beater the next morning who gave a quote. I passed this information on to the culprit, and the next day the full sum was sitting in the bank. 

So the silver lining is that the bad driver was so desperate for me to not report the accident that he paid immediately. And, my panel beater is so keen on a cash job that he's going to paint the bonnet and bumper which I couldn't afford to do with the last repair. So, in a week or so my little Nana car will be back to one colour with no outlay from moi!

The German Goddess thinks I'm mad getting it fixed as all it really needs is an indicator light to pass a warrant, but I'm doing it to avoid rust, and so she will look all pretty again and not a clown car. To be continued.

Malaysian Adventures: Part 1

So the Malaysian adventure has been and gone now, sigh, and it's back to life, back to reality. I had a great time, sickness excluded, one pushing the envelope experience, and found a lovely city that I'd love to visit again. If you're not interested in travel story's, stop reading now.


Singapore
It's been over 20 years since my last visit, and much much more since I lived there. It is a stunning city, but very quickly came to feel like just a generic international city. I was hugely impressed with the metro. So clean, so efficient, and the masses and masses of stainless steel, granite and glass an indication of the affluence of this country. The no litter policy is so ingrained in the national psyche that there are no litter bins in the stations, because there is no litter. If you purchase a one trip ticket, you then take it back to a machine and get a $1.00 refund, very cool. 

We spent the first day wandering around Chinatown and visiting an old shopping mall from my youth, then, after the first in a continuing series of massages, we headed down towards the CBD for a wander. 

That night we ended up in Little India, where we had the first of another series, this time yukky food. The only saving grace was these, which I got quite fond of over the journey.

The next day after lunch with old friends and a bit more wandering round we decided to go to Orchard Road. I had been avoiding it, but the German Goddess was interested in finding a particular pair of D & G jeans, so off we went to visit the mecca of consumerism.

The metro drops you at level B4. After more than an hour of navigating a strangely laid out weirdly shaped shopping complex, we finally saw daylight and had found street level. By this stage we were tiring of the masses so decided to ignore the temples of consumerism and just wander and find a place to have a drink. It started to rain as we walked, so we did enter a mall to find a bar. Fortunately I looked at the prices before ordering. We had been paying $5 for a 640ml beer, this Orchard Road bar wanted $12 for a 330 ml. I said sod that, so we jumped back on the metro, popped up at Peoples Park again and consumed our usuals shown above. We also purchased three pairs of shoes while there, a very good beer stop!

The next day we checked out and started the Borneo adventure.

Miri

Miri is a moderate size town in northern Sarawak, East Malaysia on the island of Borneo.  We ended up there as an access point to Mulu National Park. Miri has a very large number of foot reflexology and massage shops. That is about all it has. It was interesting though to experience the contrast between highly sanitised Singapore and this town, and I did have an enjoyable feast of crabs the first night. We also had foot massages which was a first. 

After wandering around the "downtown" area we decided to visit a park we'd seen on the drive in so caught a bus out there, a slight contrast the shiny stainless steel of Singapore.

We got to the park to find we were the only people there, it was Very Odd. We wandered around briefly, but after walking the swing bridge there was not a lot to see or do, so it was off to find a bus back to town. I think the entire park visit lasted seven minutes.

The next place we wanted to see was Taman Selara, a beach where the Rough Guide had said was a "nice place to watch the sunset, have a beer and sample hawker food". Maybe we should have read the travel wiki instead where it says Miri beaches are nothing to shout about. Agreed. It was so ick that the only pictures I took were of crab patterns in the sand. 

That night we had another in the series of awful food, so the day ended up as the visiting the park that wasn't, and the beach that wasn't, followed by the dinner that wasn't. Sigh

The next morning we packed up and headed off to go visit the critters and caves in the rainforest, which will be coming up in part two.