Formula 1 - Singapore style

This year is only the second time that Singapore has hosted the F1, which is made more unusual as it's held at night (or so I'm reliably informed!). We managed to get walkabout tickets which allowed you to be deafened at the trackside whilst also wandering around all the other entertainment that was on offer. Lewis Hamilton won, much to the dismay of the German spectators standing near Matt but the highlight for me was perhaps the live performance of the BackStreet Boys on Sunday night :) No photos for this one as they are mostly blurs...

Happy Hari Raya to you too!

Click here for photos of Melaka

Sunday 20th September marks the end of Ramadan and is called 'Hari Raya'. It also happens to be a long weekend so what better way to spend your time than to take a bus to the Malaysian city of Melaka? However, if you haven't checked your facts properly then you will be totally unaware that this is the weekend that all Malaysians try to get back to Malaysia! After a slightly stressful hunt for transport we finally made it and spent 3 days in the UNESCO heritage city - their first job is to presumably get people to agree on how to spell the name of the place? Currently you can choose from Melaka or Malacca. I'm not entirely sure what criteria a place has to fulfill to be awarded UNESCO status...and I'm not sure we're much the wiser now! I'm sure the 'Museum of Enduring Beauty' and the bicycle rickshaws (trishaws) blaring out rave music helped in the selection. Check out our pictures on Flickr to see more!

Hungry Ghost Month

The seventh month in the Chinese calendar celebrates the 'Hungry Ghost Month' where (apparently!) the doors to the afterlife are opened and people's ancestors come back to visit. To appease the ghosts, relatives burn offerings of things they might need when they go back such as food and paper represenations of money and cars...after all, everyone needs to drive in Heaven right?! It also seems to involve live shows of karaoke - but so do most things in Singapore! A sign in our condo sternly reminds people to not set fire to things in the corridors, showing that management have seriously more clout than the ghosts!