Cyclone to Singapore

We were supposed to get a train from Varkala to Chennai to take our flight out of India to Singapore and then on to Bali. It should have been a 15 hour overnight affair getting us into the city in time for a quick look about before our flight. But after a marathon train journey a few weeks earlier we'd checked the domestic flight prices, caved and bought tickets. We had no idea how lucky we'd been.

The night we would have been travelling towards Chennai by train a cyclone hit South India. In particular it hit Chennai. At the time that we took our cheat flight, trains were being held outside the city and the roads were flooded. It turned out that there was only one way to make our flight to Singapore and we were on it.

This knowledge did sort of make the 7 hour wait for the flight in the cockroach ridden, overpriced filthy airport sweeter but it was tough going.

Many hours later we arrived in Singapore in time for New Years Eve morning. There couldn't have been a bigger contrast. From above Singapore looks liked a city built by Lego. After sliding through the pristine airport and out on to the metro system I couldn't believe how clean everything was. I started to wonder what the people of Singapore were so worried would happen if something got dirty.

Fortunately for my sanity we had managed to pick the red light district to stay for the night and things here were sufficiently grubby (though really not very grubby) for me to feel at ease.

Singapore has been described as “The only shopping centre with a seat at the UN”. It sure does have a lot of shopping centres. We visited a few and then went back to snatch a few hours before the fireworks and our flight to the Indonesian Island of Bali.