On Thursday morning, August 4, the children and I loaded the bus to return to Kansai airport. We checked in and went for noodles, of course! Yes, noodles are served any time, day or night. We boarded Singapore Airlines and started our journey to Singapore to meet Phillip. This airline, much like Thai Air, is just terrific, even for those of us in economy class. The flight attendants are polite. They serve you food, drinks, and help you with your TV monitor. The flight was pleasant, and we arrived in Singapore without issue. We got Singapore dollars from an ATM and headed out for a cab. We only had 2 big bags, but they would not fit in a regular cab. Bummer. Oh, actually, who cares? We had to take the Limosine taxi service! While Singapore is very expensive for many things, cabs are not one of them. It was only a few dollars more for the limo cab.
We arrived at the St. Regis hotel around 5:30pm. Wow! Phillip had left a key for us at registration so we headed on up to the room. Phillip joined us shortly after. We called the butler to bring hot chocolate and cookies for Jacob, Matthew, and Jessica, while Phillip and I went downstairs for the wine tasting with cheese and crackers. Nice! Then, we just walked around a little bit and grabbed pizza. Oh yes, I did say "butler"! We ordered hot chocolates, lattes, apples, and cookies every day. One night, we arrived to our room to find that the butler had already dropped off apples for the kids with a note! The service at the hotel was first class from the butler to the cleaning staff to the concierge...everyone...and no tips! Oh, and every bathtub should have a TV! This is by far my favorite hotel ever. Fortunately, Phillip was there for meetings, so we were able to stay in one room at a Corporate rate!
Phillip had to work on Friday. I had actually been suffering from an infection since Monday, and the antibiotics were not helping. The concierge told me about a doctor's clinic in the building right next to the hotel. The doctor changed my medicine and then I went back to hotel to take the kids to the pool. However, I just kept getting worse. I was in so much pain that I was in tears. So, I called the doctor. Ten minutes later, he called me back and had ordered a van to take me for an ultrasound. He was worried about kidney stones or some type of growth in bladder or kidney. The van took me over. I had the tests and waited for results. The van drove me back to the doctor's office, free of charge. The results looked normal, so the doctor put me on 2 antibiotics at the same time. I could not have asked for better care. While I was gone, the kids had walked to McDonalds for lunch and then back to hotel to play and watch TV. I called a couple of times to check on them. I truly had nothing to worry about. Singapore is such a safe country. The laws are very strict, so the crime rate is almost zero. Phillip made it home around 6:30pm, so we just walked to Tony Roma's for dinner. Matthew was especially thrilled about the ribs.
On Saturday, we went to Little India to meet one of Phillip's colleagues. We went to a 75,000 square foot store called Mustafa Centre. It had everything. Unbelievable. After lunch at an Indian restaurant (of course), we headed back to the hotel for a while before taking a cab to the Night Safari. This was simply awesome. We walked around for a while and then took half of the tram tour. We saw the Creatures of the Night show, and then decided to take the full tram tour. We are so glad we did as we saw some different animals, and the animals were actually doing different things this time. We were quite curious about why the adult female elephants were swaying by the sleeping baby elephant. Then, around the corner, we saw the adult male elephant swaying in the same way! We were also amazed by how close these animals came to the tram. At one point, Matthew leaned in on me because a mother tapier was right by his leg!
We woke up on Sunday to pouring rain, so we decided to enjoy the hotel for a while. We went to the fitness center and played tennis as a family. Then, after showers, the weather cleared up. We took a cab to One Raffles Place. We started at the sports bar on the 60th floor. The Maloneys can find a sports bar in any country! We played golf, watched soccer, and enjoyed the view. We headed up to the 62nd floor rooftop when it opened at 6pm. The view was spectacular. We just had a couple of drinks and walked around enjoying the view and conversation. Then, we had dinner and headed back to the hotel.
We spent the day Monday on Sentosa Island. We rode the segway, skylift, luge, and zip line. We also enjoyed the Butterfly Park & Insect Kingdom, as well as Underwater World and Dolphin Lagoon. This was so much fun. The bummer was that everything was an individual price, and for us, this is times 5 people. This adds up pretty quickly. However, this is a lovely place to spend the day.
Before dinner, we stopped at a fish reflexology place. This was wild! There were small, medium, and big fish. At first, it tickled so much that we all laughed out loud. This was a cool experience.
On Tuesday, we played at the hotel before heading out to the Singapore Zoo. The zoo is next door to the Night Safari. We are zoo people, and this one did not disappoint. I think our favorite animals were the orangutangs. They were so playful and fun to watch. We were again amazed at how close we were to all the animals. Matthew and Jessica enjoyed the water park at the zoo, and then we went back to enjoy the hotel pool one last time.
We ended our evening enjoying a Singapore Sling cocktail with dinner to celebrate the country's national holiday. We took a cab to the airport and hung out until our 1:20am flight. Matthew fell asleep in the waiting area and does not even remember walking on to the plane! We arrived at Kansai, caught the bus, and then entered our apartment about 11:30am on August 10... we were home as a family again at last.
What an exhausting and amazing summer!
Peace and Love,
Tina
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