On the up: Chocolate treats in the middle of an anal city
On the down: The anal city

Next leg of the trip was to Singapore, which I was convinced Eleni would love just because it's all about cleanliness and Things Looking Pretty (even if it's in a fake kind of way).

Still, at some point in the few days were there, she said she still thought KL was nicer. YAY! Instant best best friend For Life whenever someone says that. She did still like the cleanliness thing though, but then even Malaysians like being able to pee in a clean dry toilet.

Man, I still can't get over how anal and Disneyland everything looks in Singapore. It's like the city developers had a chronic case of OCD and had to make sure everything was at right angles.

Yah yah it's quite pretty but only in a kind of Disneyland way where everything looks like a kind of Planned Pretty.

Despite that thought, I do quite like going down the river and through parts of the city, so we put on our walking shoes and walked all the way from Clarke Quay to Bugis Junction. And heck that is pretty damn bloody far in the heat okaaaaaaaaay.

And all the old colonial type buildings really are beautiful. You gotta give them that - the restoration work is ace.

I swear everytime I walk past this bridge some married couple is taking pictures on it. I stood on it to prove a point that you can be photo-worthy if you're single too!!!!

The Asian Civilisations museum along the river. This is probably the only part of Singapore that makes me not dislike it cos it' really is a gorgeous building (and it sort of looks like it's made entirely of icing)

Clarke Quay was a total tourist dump when I was at school there but now look what a coat of Mentos pastel paint can do to the whole place. Suddenly it's trendy again because it looks so damn fake (Singaporeans like order, I guess). It's cute but so damn sickeningly arranged like a mathematical equation. Where's the spontaneity.

The Merlion is the cutest thing in the whole of Singapore, mythical characters always are.

I stamped my foot and insisted we go shopping at Far East and Chinatown for tacky Ah Lian clothes. Again, I ended up buying heaps and Eleni didn't get anything (such strong will!). In line with the theme park theme of the trip, we had to pose for pictures against the Most Perfect Chinatown In The World. Seriously, have you ever seen a Chinatown this quiet, this clean, this ordered and this lacking in character?! Still, the sky looks pretty cool (and that's the only part that's natural!)

Of course, food in Singapore is never as good as back home (not that that needs to be repeated) so I decided I wouldn't even bother trying to intro Eleni to Singaporean food that is actually Malaysian food. So we pigged out on what Singapore does do well - posh nosh and evil desserts.

Max Brenner was a most necessary pit stop along our walk of the river.... and the reward for walking ages was super sweeeeeet! That chocolate shakey thing I had was the closest thing you could get to what we refer to as "undefiled elixir" in Buddhist prayers.

Among other random noteworthy things, we spotted these cute staircases which almost makes you want to live in a super old, narrow multi-multi-multi-storey house, just so you can traipse up and down pink spiral stairs.

Also, this:

which had Eleni laughing so hard she couldn't even take the photo, so I had to take it for her. The thing is, I didn't even find it that funny because I've seen it so much and don't even think twice about it anymore. But Eleni went into total hysterics, which was probably funnier than the picture itself.

It did make us both think though, who the hell pees like that?!!?! See, I knew Singaporeans weren't all as put-together as they portray themselves to be!