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MALAYSIA

Mar
2004-09-14 16:33:03

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connects Singapore to the mainland. 'The Second Link' is a highway border crossing; the other crossing lies at Johor Bahru, 80km more to the east and is a 'normal road' crossing. The last kilometres in Malaysia we cycle over an almost empty highway and the Singaporean border officials look quite surprised when we ride in front of their counter. At the moment we want to fill in the arrival form a police officer takes us aside. She points out that we cannot continue this road into Singapore (which is only an island of 30 by 40km), but her officer is wiser and lets us off the hook if we take the first exit at the bottom of the hill. He tells us that it is a 'criminal offence' to cycle on a highway in Singapore (probably in Malaysia as well). This is how Singapore gets its nickname 'fine city' (a fine of S$500, - for throwing chewing gum or cigarette buts on the street). We head down the slope and turn off as instructed. For the third time today it starts raining and we are starting to get tired. We also find out it is very difficult to stay off a highway in the outskirts of Singapore (especially if you don't have a proper map). It looks like it is another 20km to the east side of the centre and we wait for an half an hour in a bus stop before we try to find the small roads to the centre. We just keep on following the sky train and in another one and half-hour we reach Ali's nest guesthouse. Raymond was here in 1998, but its much more quiet now (due to SARS?). In the evening it seems that Ali (who speaks Dutch) is running a second business that has more to do with short staying guests than guests that stay overnight.

From Singapore we want to take the ferry to Bintan (Indonesia) and from Bintan to boat (http://www.pelni.co.id) to Jakarta. The boat leaves at the 28th but takes 48hours instead of the normal 24hours, while the next boat (24hours) leaves at the 2nd of February. We don't want to spend 4 days at an industrial island like Bintan so we decide to fly with Kuwait airlines to Jakarta which costs the same as taking the boat ($75,-). Our visit to Singapore is short because the flight for the 29th till the 3rd are full so we fly at the 28th to Jakarta. On the other hand, it saves us a lot of money on guesthouses and beer because Singapore is even more expensive than Malaysia.

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