At the start of December, we travelled to Singapore and Malaysia. I had a wedding to photograph in Malaysia, which was referred to me by a friend at Sam’s work. Yes there were lots of happy dances when this couple booked me! So grateful. We started our adventure in Singapore. When Sam was deciding on where to do his PHD, it was between Singapore and Melbourne! Funny to think that we were pretty close to living here. Thoughts on Singapore… unbelievably humid and hot! It’s a beautiful place, we loved exploring the gorgeous tropical gardens contrasted with the freezing air conditioned shopping malls. Singaporeans know how to do a shopping mall, and because it was so close to Christmas everything was bright, in your face, and completely over the top! We loved the food in Singapore, everything was so cheap, authentic and delicious! Eating hot soup in the non-airconditioned hawker food courts was an experience. I loved being able to taste such different food from what we are used to. I don’t think anyone in Singapore would think a sandwich is an adequate lunch! I loved how lush and tropical it was. Christmas, Singapore Mall style! Singapore did make me feel so grateful to live in a country with clean air. Not that it was too polluted, I think the humidity added to the feeling of ‘closeness’ in the air. Little India. Loved the colour here! Melaka. It’s about 2 hours from KL, and is a beautiful historic city. We loved strolling around here, taking in the amazing architecture. I’m going to say it again…it was hot! Melaka was a different world at night. We found a gorgeous little restaurant to eat after a hot day walking around, it was right by the river. Once the sun went down, the lights came on, it turned into a bit of a magical place. We were so fortunate to stay with one of Sam’s friends while we were in KL, this was probably the best part of our trip, being driven around by locals! We visited local restaurants, that we would never have a hope finding, let alone ordering anything at! The menus were all in Chinese. They took us to Batu Caves, which involving climbing a near vertical staircase up into the most spectacular caves in the mountains. There were cute monkeys everywhere, however we were told to not make eye contact with them because these Monkeys were fierce! Sam’s obviously breaking the rules below… I love this picture. The branches of the trees all woven together in the sky look like a beautiful lace pattern. Thank you for having us Singpore and Malaysia! What an interesting, eye opening, culture shocking, marveling, awe-inspiring and delicious time we had! xx