Well said Chantal although you missed out the level of beating I gave Tim on the pool table "far away" from you. :-)

I now also only have a few hours left of our trip and I was just putting my head down to get a couple of hours sleep when I saw my friend on tv talking about the attack on Glasgow Airport.  Don't know if I'm upset about the attack, upset that my friend was close enough (which was probably not that close) to be on tv or upset that my fear of flying, which I've been testing a lot this year, has been given a shot of Red Bull a couple of hours before I get in a plane but it has got me.

My farewell comment(s)...

Alaska.  Natasha. Fantastic effort!  Thanks to all for reading.

Au revoir

Allright, since I have 2.5 hours left in Singapore, this will be short-short, and not involve pix because I can't figure out my new camera.

This morning, Jonathan, Tim and I went to the wet market, which is essentially an outdoor market.  Similar in concept to the Marche Provencal, but waaay more raw, certainly more smelly, and definitely less expensive.  Once we'd finished the week's shopping, we sat at a stall and had a beer--the equivalent of the outdoor pub, I guess.

Then I met Gio in town and we had a leisurly lunch of sushi and 3 bottles of sake (they were small).  Then we went to a local esthetician to do a girly 'beauty run'.  While we were doing this, the boys were doing rum and pool in a pub a long way away from us.

Tonight, there's a barbecue going on in honor of the end of Tim's chemotherapy.  Everyone's having a good time, I'm off to go join...

Thanks for reading us, it's been a tremendous journey!!

:-)

Chantal

I guess this needs to be our last-ish post, since I fly back to Paris in a few hours, and Jonthan back to Australia tomorrow...

We've had a lovely and relaxing last few days.  Personally, I'm a bit saturated on the sightseeing, so I ended up focusing on spending time with Tim, Gio, the kids (Alastair and Desiree), and Jonathan rather than specifically seeing new things.

After Jonathan took me electronics shopping on Thursday, I took him shoe shopping on Friday (he didn't find anything).  We took our lone tourity photo:

After that, our paths split for the first time in 3 weeks:  Jonathan caught up with a few friends, and I went dress fitting with Gio.

This is a neat part of Sino-Singaporean culture that I've discovered.  Singaporian brides for the most part don't buy their wedding dress--they rent them.  So they'll rent them for the picture session (you need a different dress for the studio shots as for the outdoor shots--and even a third dress for the evening shots) and for the wedding itself.  Since Tim was ill, they did the ceremony quickly and before the pictures last december, so Gio asked me to go help her try on dresses for th photo sessions they're having on Monday.

Gio's 'official' wedding dress and the studio picture dress:

Gio's outdoor dress (first) and a few other candidates (rejected):

Gio's evening dress:

Everything will be tailored to fit her perfectly, of course.

Then, while Jonathan had dinner with some friends, Gio, Tim and I had dinner in a hawker's market (or something similarly named).  It was delicious and cheap, and we capped the evening off with a few drinks and an old-school vampire movie, The Lost Boys (remember Keiffer Sutherland when he was 18??)

Oi!  Chantal!  What are you doing?  You're supposed to be writing the blurb for today....

Oh well, in the absence of an awake Chantal, I'll tell you what we did today.  Not much.  We went into the city and wandered around.  Chantal bought a new camera on a (sort of) recommendation of Natasha (it better be good Tash!).  Although, I had more fun listening to the haggling of the woman beside us in the shop.  Chantal was too American and felt guilty and impolite about haggling.  Funny thing is though that after 20 minutes in the shop and agreeing a price for all the bits she bought, her credit card was rejected and she couldn't pay for it.  Now, there is a certain amount of etiquette involved in haggling.  Not being able to pay the agreed price is well outside the rules!

Actually, I was completely able to pay for it judging by my bank statements, but my card was maxed out.  Why?  On Jonathan's suggestion, I spent no cash in Australia, just plastic, which unfortunately today triggered my bank's security procedures.  But he made up for it by providing half the cash to pay for the camera, which I immediately reimbursed after a call to my bank! ;-)

After that, it was back to Tim and Gio's house to get ready for dinner.  Firstly, I had to play with the kids to tire them out.  They won that round but I will make sure I create two monsters for Tim and Gio before I leave on Sunday.

Dinner consisted of drunken prawns and chilli crab.  I had the venison if anyone is wondering.  The drunken prawns were good to watch; in a kind of mass murder sort of way.  For those who don't know what that is, they basically fish some live prawns out of a fish tank, stick them in a clear bowl filled with brandy, and the prawns basically drink themselves to a stupor.  Then some friendly volunteer (Gio, in our case), dunks the prawns into a boiling broth in the center of our table, and after cooking for a bit, you've got brandy-flavored shrimp soup.  It's delicious if a bit violent.

The best thing about today?  Well, the transport involved was bus, train and taxi.  Not one inch of driving!