Flight landed in SIN on time at 6am, made it to the hotel by 7:30am via MRT train ($3 only) - was packed with folks going to work - all kinds of people - Kannadigas (I heard yerdu), Malayalis, Malays, Chinese and the odd westerner. All important signs are posted in 4 languages - and it's funny how Tamil needs twice the space of the other 3 (English, Malay, Mandarin) to say the same thing! From the train, Singapore looks and feels exactly like Bombay, only cleaner and less crowded! The Beijing airport was very COLD - no heating/AC I guess, and temperatures dip to about 0-5C at night, though it may have been closer to 10C in the airport. All my China warm clothes were in the packed bag so I had to make do with what I had on - thankfully I had my warm cap with me! I guess I've been spoiled in the US with on demand HVAC everywhere you go. Had a very nice meal of warm curry beef and white rice (32 Yuan). Food on the flight was pretty repetitive: white rice with chicken, white rice with pork, and finally I ventured white rice with fish. They didn't serve tea or coffee which was strange. And in-flight entertainment was really sad. Could barely even see the TV from where I sat.
Have taken a few pics, will post soon. Looking forward to Singapore for now. The hotel looks nice - though it is a mess from the behind, which is where I came from since I took the train instead of the more common taxi drop off outside the grand lobby. I guess judge a hotel from it's rear. :-)
