After we checked in to our hotel room and had a mild panic because the porter appeared to have lost our cases (well ? he shouldn?t have whisked them out of our hands before checking who we were..) we had a reviving cup of tea and on Mark and Lisa?s suggestion went out for a drink and some ?nibbles?.

The Meritus Mandarin Hotel is located on Orchard Road in Singapore. This road is the place for shopping with over 30 malls and numerous top fashion outlets, shiny stores with glittering signage selling extortionately priced clothing to stick thin ladies.

Just the place for two slightly dotty middle aged ladies to people watch?

But not this evening ? we walked just a little way down the road to a bar and sat at a table on the street edge to have a beer. The building opposite where we were sitting was so out of character with the glitzy edifices around us?.

It was old and beautifully preserved ? I asked Lisa about it and she told us it was part of a preservation scheme in Singapore, she said she would show me more during our trip, including Little India and China Town where some of the shop houses have been renovated in keeping with Singapore?s history. This was really what I wanted to see ? cultural stuff, not just the sights, but the food as well and Lisa was quite happy to show us.

She asked what else we would like to see while we were there.  Liz had our list which included a trip to Raffles Hotel, Singapore Zoo, Jurong Bird Park, Little India, China Town and Arab Street. Lisa was to be our tour guide for the following day as Mark was working so she said she would meet us in the morning and show us around.

They also said they had arranged a day trip to Malaysia for us and a day spent at their apartment area where Lisa had booked a pampering session for us at a local salon ? a manicure and pedicure!!! Very special!!!

A good nights sleep was in order to get us ready for a busy day sight-seeing so we went back to the hotel, unpacked and headed for bed.