as we prepare to enter Singapore....

I'm looking very forward to reaching Singapore! It is such a beautiful, safe and wonderful city/country and I'm also looking forward to getting my teeth cleaned and my hair cut! Unfortunately, that means I won't have time to do some other things I'd like to do there, but some things must take priority. 

Singapore has a reputation for having very stringent laws. I remember the "caning" incident that took place in 1984 when an 18 year old American teenager was found guilty of vandalism there and the resulting crisis between Singapore and the US. After pleas from then President Clinton and the US, the young man only received 4 of the 6 lashings he had been sentenced to. 

I was thinking of that as we were filling out some of our entry documents. I'm cutting and pasting a few that we will be careful to adhere to. One might even need to wear a souvenir t-shirt to help remember the laws when visiting Singapore - a fine city!

Re: vaping - not only is it illegal in Singapore, it is also illegal in Surabaya.  

Common Fines and Prohibitions

• Chewing Gum: Selling or bringing in gum (except dental/medicinal) is prohibited; fines can exceed $500, with import fines up to $10,000.
• Smoking: Smoking in restricted areas (e.g., covered walkways, underpasses, restaurants) leads to hefty composition fines.
• Littering
  :
  First-time offenders can be fined up to $1,000, with subsequent offenses reaching higher amounts.
Public Transport: Eating, drinking, or smoking in trains (MRT) or stations leads to fines of $500+.
Vaping/E-cigarettes: Possession and use of vaporizers are illegal, leading to severe fines.
Jaywalking: Crossing the road outside designated areas can result in fines. 

Traffic and Parking Fines 

• Illegal Parking: Penalties are often $35 or higher depending on the violation type.
• Speeding/Red Lights: Fines vary based on speed/offense, often with demerit points (e.g., $200-$500+ and 6-12 demerit points).
• Mobile Phone Use: Using a mobile phone while driving can lead to a $1,000 fine for first-time offenders. 

Fine Payment Information
Fines can typically be paid via the following methods:

• Police Fines (Traffic): Pay via Singpass.
• Parking Fines (URA): Pay via AXS stations or the AXS m-Station app.
• Ministry of Manpower (MOM) Fines: Pay via MOM Workplace Safety and Health eServices. 

Serious Offenses

• Drugs: Harsh penalties, including the death penalty for trafficking.
• Vandalism: Punishable by fines, jail time, and caning.
• Public Disorder/Assault: Strict laws against disorderly behavior. 

Surabaya, Indonesia - pt 2

My last post was getting long, so I'll add a few more photos from yesterday's visit to Surabaya. As I've said before, my favorite genres of photography are travel and people. I love seeing how people in other countries live, and I love snapping photos of people going about their daily lives. 

Unfortunately, on these short visits, I get to spend very little if any time just walking around among them. So I'm constrained to taking most photos through a moving bus or car window. Most are blurry and will get deleted, but occasionally if travel slows I can grab a few window shots that aren't too bad. They wouldn't win any photo contest, but they hopefully they can provide a tiny glimpse of what life is like in other places.

So here are a few from yesterday in no particular order - just car window shots.

 

most everyone has something to sell

 

a family affair

take off your shoes and come on in 

barefoot shoe salesperson

fresh coconuts for sale

and baby makes 3

1,2,3,4

my view of traffic from the back seat

traffic slows down

electronics salesman

what are they carrying?

coconut shop

welcome, Vista!

guitars and ukuleles for sale

normal traffic

beautiful produce

on my way to somewhere

Surabaya, Indonesia - pt 1

This was our first time to visit Surabaya, the second largest city in Indonesia after Jakarta. We were greeted with another Gamelan orchestra, 2 male dancers in incredible costumes, female dancers and others. We had another private excursion today and were surprised to have not only one guide, but two! Firy (who spoke the best English) didn’t live there so a local guy drove while he did the talking. As in other parts of Indonesia, we found the people to be friendly and meet smiles with smiles. 

 

Our first stop was in the government building area where our guide Firy talked about the history of the city, all the way back to the 1300’s up through 1953. He also pointed out architecture from the different periods of the city’s history. He talked about the Dutch colonization, WWII and their battle for independence. He explained that Surabaya got it's name from the legend of a shark (suro) and a crocodile (boyo) fighting in a river to determine who was the strongest. They eventually created a pact that divided their territory. 

 

architecture - government building

1906

1815

   

Next we were taken to the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Its history dated back to the 1600’s, when a Catholic priest that came with the Dutch built a church. It later burned, but was then relocated and rebuilt. There was a school orchestra practicing for their upcoming 400 years of Jubilee celebration. The features that stood out to me was a big gong inside the sanctuary and the grotto in the courtyard that depicted all the stages of Jesus’ life, ending with His resurrection. However, Mary's shrine was the largest by probably 10 times.

 

Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary

 

neo-Gothic style by Dutch architect

brass gong

    

He is Risen!

After leaving the church, we visited a museum that housed a very detailed presentation of Indonesia’s battle for Independence at Surabaya. We watched a video and made our way through the museum. My favorite part was the video because that room was air conditioned!

 

Museum 10 November - 1945 Battle of Surabaya

Heroes Monument

By this time we were all getting hungry, so our hosts took us to a very nice restaurant where we were served nasi goreng, fish, bok choy and a passion fruit fizzy drink (called squash). Either we were starving or the food was delicious! The fish was gurame, an Indonesian river fish. It was very mild and didn't taste "fishy" at all.

 

After lunch they had planned to take us to a Chinese temple, but we opted instead to look for a very specific battery for my make up mirror. So they took us to a large multi-story (dilapidated) building with shoulder-wide hallways lined with merchants down both sides of every hallway. There was every kind of electronic item you can possibly imagine. It was not air conditioned and Ronnie and I were sweating profusely. Firy, on the other hand, had on 2 shirts one of which had long sleeves, yet I never once noticed him sweating! We spent a long time there and our guides tried very hard to help us, but in the end we were unsuccessful. While they were upstairs waiting on someone to bring a battery they thought might work, I walked around downstairs and took photos of some fruit vendors and their produce.

 

they tried and tried...

cute kid

watermelons "to go" (on motorcycles) and papayas

soursop

wax apple

snake fruit

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our last stop was a pharmacy to pick up another antibiotic. We got 14 tablets of doxycycline at 85 cents a tablet. Hopefully they won’t be needed, but it sure beats what the ship doctor charges!!!

The places we were taken were interesting, but I much prefer taking pictures of people going about their every day life. I wish I had more of those to share, but it's hard to get decent ones from the back seat of a moving car. However, this is getting long so I'll share more photos in another post. Thanks for following along!

 

 

Lazy Day in Bali

On our second day in Bali we decided to just hang around the ship. Ronnie is so disciplined and he likes to keep somewhat of a routine when he can. He went to run and I went shopping around the port. I will say that if one enjoys shopping and loves finding bargains, Indonesia is absolutely the place to be.

For starters, the prices are cheap compared to US prices, even in the stores. Also the individual sellers expect you to bargain. And they can be quite aggressive when it comes to selling. They use all kinds of techniques to get you to buy. Every single one of them will try to draw you over to their table or booth, first by invitation but then by insistence. Often they will try to put merchandise in your hands to engage you.

They may tell you that you are their first sale of the day or that you are bringing them good luck. One lady today would give me a "sad sack" look if it didn't seem like I was going to make a purchase. I've learned to try not to even make eye contact unless I'm willing to receive some hard pressure to buy. If you reply with something like "that's pretty" or "that's nice" then you're just asking for it! Also, there are no prices on anything. They will always start out at a high price and then if you actually stop or act halfway interested, the price automatically begins to come down. And they will usually reduce it even more if you're willing to buy more than one. 

Today I was walking down a row of booths and virtually every person - EVERY single person begged me to look at their stuff. Both men and women will come toward you to try to get you to take a look at what they have. Much of their merchandise is similar to the next seller.

This morning a man approached me with some silver bracelets in a box. He held one out that I think is the "Tree of Life" pattern and told me it was $50. I said "no, thank you" and continued walking even though he continued trying to sell it to me. It was quite pretty, but I wasn't interested in buying a bracelet, especially not for $50.

 

After I made my way around all the booths and started back toward the ship, I decided to walk down the middle of the parking lot (away from the sellers) so that I wouldn't be hassled again. But that same bracelet guy started yelling at me. I pretended not to hear him. After a half dozen or so times, he yelled out that he would sell it to me for $10. Ok, I have to confess that did get my attention. So I walked back over to him and we talked for a couple of minutes. I told him I would give him $8 and we settled on $9. So if you're reading this and you get a Tree of Life bracelet for your birthday, you already know the story!

This morning our room attendant Jose told us he went out to get a magnet. The guy told him it was $7. Jose only had $3 so he told the guy that. The guy told him $4 but when he showed him that he only had $3, he happily took it. 

On the one hand I feel sorry for them that they sell their items so cheap, but I think they must mark them higher knowing that they will come down. Once when we lived in Bandung, I had a pair of Keens and a strap or something broke. Our driver took me to a street that had nothing but shoe repair booths lining the entire length of the street. He told me to wait in the car while he took my shoe up to get repaired. A few minutes later he returned with my shoe - it cost 50 cents to repair! They for sure don't have the income that many Americans have, but their cost of living is also very low compared to ours.

I should also point out that while this selling behavior is very typical for individual sellers, the nicer stores (like the batik store we were in yesterday) do not expect you to bargain. A salesperson will still follow you around, and while they are eager for you to buy, they don't use the same aggressive sales techniques. 

I will also add that there is nothing wrong with the street sellers merchandise if they have what you're looking for. I bought a beautiful custom-made bird cage when we lived here for $35! However, it cost me several hundred to ship home - lesson learned!! 

While I love a bargain as much as the next person, and really enjoy visiting Indonesia, I would not want to live here. I remember the familiar smells and sounds - trash piles burning, the Muslim calls to prayer 5 x daily, incense burning, foods frying, fumes from the incredible number of scooters and cars on the road - not to mention the sweltering heat. Yes, the people are so very warm and friendly and it's fun to see and experience a little bit of their culture, but I'm still thankful that I get to live in the best nation on earth!

unframed prints

framed batik

buy these!

cruise port

 

Bali, Indonesia - pt 2

Our next stop was at a place deep in the jungle of Ubud called Swing Heaven. https://swingheavens.com/ We had never heard of this, so we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. As it turns out, "swinging" literally meant being swung out over a lush valley with a river rushing through it. Beautiful? Yes! Scary? YES! So NO. Even if they strap you in (?) I wasn’t interested in swinging out over the valley. If I had fallen into it, they might never find my body! Of course there was a waiver to sign just in case - even for only the picture taking part. Check out this website if you want to see what this place was like - it's a bit hard to describe here.

hook up for one swing - valley below

So we opted to just pay the entrance fee and get our photos made in some of their photo settings. That was enough for me. I failed to mention that if you wanted to swing, you could choose a long flowing dress to wear that would look pretty flying behind you in the photos. You could also choose between different settings and they would take your photo or make a video, depending on what package you purchased. From the pictures, you can see I wasn't too daring.

choose your flowy dresses/gowns and choice of packages

I have a little fear of heights, especially if there is nothing to prevent me from falling over the edge, so I'm afraid we only made it halfway to heaven in the picture below. ha! We did probably a half dozen settings but nothing too risky. It really was a gorgeous place though!

 

reflection in the water below

see what you're swinging out over!

such beautiful photo settings!

In Bali, 90% of the population in Bali are Hindu. All generations of the family live together. The property is not for sale; it just passes down through the generations. Even siblings families can live together. Ronnie asked our guide what the palm leaf decoration on the fronts of the cars was for. Yogi explained to us that twice a year they have a ceremony where they make offerings and pray for blessings on their cars. 

 

Twice a day, they pray for their cars and scooters. In the morning, they pray for blessings of safety on them, and in the evening they say prayers of thanksgiving. I read that Hindu's have 330 million dieties they pray to, so I guess they have one for their cars. However, Yogi did say there are a lot of car/scooter accidents. It would be miraculous if there weren’t because there are relatively few traffic lights. Mostly they just negotiate their way through intersections. Motorcycles are like water – they tend to just “flow” around cars that are stopped. Dogs get in the road and many of the roads are very narrow, especially for the amount of traffic they carry.

Re: offerings – there are tiny offerings to their "gods" and other objects of worship lying around pretty much everywhere - even in the streets. These are little square boxes made of palm leaves that hold flowers and sometimes even cigarettes or candies. I left my shoes in the photo of the one in the street to show size.

little altars

little offerings

Yogi also took us to a wood carving place. Again, the workers were sitting on the porch carving their designs. They use ebony, walnut, hibiscus, mahogany, teak and crocodile wood. They carve designs that have been handed down through the generations and they don't use any patterns. The finished carvings are shined with bees wax. They are very intricate but most of them are of their Hindu dieties or related. None were appealing to me, but I could appreciate the craftsmanship.

skilled wood carvers hard at work

sample products

Our last stop of the day was at Teba Sari, a local open air restaurant. Our table was on the side with a view of the rice paddies. We enjoyed a meal of nasi goreng (rice) and chicken satay. The Indonesian people love spicy foods, so one needs to be cautious with the small dishes of condiments.

sate and nasi goreng

 

Teba Sari Resto

our table view with rice fields beyond

At that point, we were still about 1.5 hours from the ship. Our last stop was at a pharmacy. Ronnie showed the pharmacist a bottle of Azithromycin and she sold us another round of it for $8 in Indonesian currency – no prescription necessary. Unfortunately, they didn’t accept American currency or credit card, but thankfully we were able to exchange $8 in Rupiah for US dollars. 

Since we were spending the night in Bali port, the ship had some local entertainers come in for our show last night. It was a long but enjoyable day.