Singapore revisited

For my fini-TDY I got to go back to Singapore. It worked out well, too, because when we were in Little India my wife saw some little tables that she wanted, and we realized it would be impossible to take them home in taxis and on a commercial airliner, so I got sent back to pick them up :) 

 Little India--a feast for the senses

Henna 

 back in the exotic market 

 

I think those umbrellas are form over function

statues

and pictures. They discouraged picture taking of their wares, but as I was there buying the tables they let me

I even had time to do some clothes shopping. I got a dress for my daughter and a shirt for me

 I also got to walk over to Arab Street that we didn't have a chance to make it to on our vacation due to timing. It was not a bad walk. This is the Sultan Mosque.

appropriately named

 this was a beautiful little area

 it was unusual to see this stuff on this side of Asia

 everyone loves sea turtles

 

 documenting their travel from Oman to Singapore

 other side of the mosque

 restaurants and shops

even the project housing is bright and colorful in Singapore (at least on the outside)

 Octopus anyone? Delicious, just chewy.

 and this is the dress I got my daughter

now she can dress like an Indian for Thanksgiving ;)

Halloween (last party before the movers)

In the midst of our move to Oklahoma in a couple of weeks we have been a little busy. Even so, now that they are almost a month old, we wanted to share some Halloween pics.

 This was us. Our daughter was Princess Sofia the First, I was R from Warm Bodies and my wife was a mad scientist along with Spidey and a dragon.

 

 

 P Chang exchanged his head for the occasion.

 The youth had been begging for a party and my wife threw an amazing Halloween party for them.

Great games and our kids got to stay up with them, so they were ecstatic.

 P Chang is Pumpkin Head Harvey

 hats and glasses from Grandma

 oh yeah

spooooky

Clearly you've never been to Singapore

The famous Merlion Park with Marina Bay sands sky park in the background

 The first morning we went to the famous Singapore zoo for breakfast with the orangutans. The mama there has two babies, one hers and one adopted. They are amazing creatures. It was funny, though, that they wanted us to stay away from them here when we held them in Bali.

 Can you see all four in this picture?

fearless

 
 it was so hot! We love the animal encounters in this part of the world. And the breakfast had real pink guava juice (like in Venezuela, not the green guava that they had in Thailand) and it was excellent

In a large enclosure that we could walk through they set it up like the rain forest. This is a fresh water ray that I didn't know existed.

 There were flying foxes all over flying around

 the sun shining through the wings was a fun picture to take

 bats hang because they are not strong enough to stand up

 butterflies in there as well reminiscent of the park on Okinawa

 ring-tailed lemurs were walking around in there as well

 one of the best aspects of the park were the free roaming orangutans around the park

we were able to walk right under these guys

 there is the mama in the show, demonstrating how tough she is before she husked a coconut with her bear hands

 feeding the rhinos

 rhino breath was something else...

 they set up feedings such that you can go from pen to pen viewing all of the feedings

 Pumbaa

 Timon and family

 Simba

 making faces

feeding the giraffes

 then feeding the pair of white tigers

 I said a zoo wouldn't suffice after Thailand for tigers and that is true. I wish I could have pet them, but this was still impressive.

 the sun was so bright you can see the glare

 an a wild safari from the safety of the zoo

 
 the orangutans really were the highlight

 this guy got tired and just covered up in a burlap bag blanket

 while they had a komodo dragon exhibit, these monitor lizards are native to Singapore and were just walking down the road in the zoo

 it was like walking around in jungle book

the amount of animals are more than we can get in the blog, but the monkeys were really exotic

 golden monkeys

 

You couldn't tell if you were in a zoo or out in the jungle. That night we went to the night safari, but as you couldn't us flash (it would hurt the animals) none of those pictures turned out. The coolest animal there was a three foot long giant red flying squirrel from India and it flew right over my head.

The next day we went to Little India.

 It was a big party for Deepavali.

 what the pictures don't do is give you the incense and Indian food smells

 with the bright colors also was the excellent Indian music; my wife found some really nice little tables, but we didn't know how to get them home with the commercials flights so we didn't get them, but when I went back TDY the next week I was able to pick them up.

 a local temple

 very intricate

and an Indian Avatar :)

 I said I needed that outfit in the middle for Halloween, but it was a bit pricey

 then we headed over to Chinatown

 our youngest is definitely two

then we headed to Merlion park

 that is the Singapore flyer in the background

then it was off to the Gardens by the Bay

 where they have built these "super trees" that light up to music

 very beautiful

 and still very hot

waiting for a taxi in the hotel lobby

 then it was off to the River Safari with river creatures, and pandas

 a fresh water puffer fish

 a rare Chinese alligator

 and the super cute red pandas

 the branch went over the walkway so we were looking right up at this guy

 check out those claws

 Master Shifu

 then his larger cousins

This was the best panda enclosure and the most active I have ever seen them. The best part was that their building was air conditioned.

 munchin' on bamboo

 watching them move was almost like a guy in a suite; also, they have six fingers on each hand, "I know someone who is looking for you"

 and then he dazzled us with a bamboo flute solo...

my little pandas

 an anime interpretation of our friends Kai Kai and Jia Jia

 by the river

doesn't that look like it's out of a National Geographic?

 at the end of the River Safari they had a big tank full of manatees

they would walk on their flippers and the babies were surprisingly fast

 then we went to the bird park

 despite a little rain it was a good visit

 our daughter with her favorite birds

 my wife had us pose for this on the bridge when our youngest was melting down

 
 

then we fed the Lorikeets

 
 the bird whisperer

 

 after seeing his boat in Hong Kong we got to see Lord Shen in Singapore

 they had a cool bird show

 
 this pea fowl followed us around for 15 minutes

 
 the end of our Singapore adventure

time to fly home with their birds