p.o.w camp

Today we set to to learn a little about Singapore as a country, its economy, history etc. we started off the day with a trip to the NEWater visitor center. this explained how the country of Singapore creates potable water from waste water using various distillation and UV ray processes. it was all very technical you can tell Singapore is very advanced there was plenty of interactive games and 3D presentations to watch and we had to share the tour with a huge bunch of kids so it was the big kids v the little kids to play on all the games!

next we jumped back on the bus and visited the Jahore Battery. this was basically the "big gun" used to protect the coast from possible invasions from Japan. the ammunition that went in the gun was in a shell that was almost as big as myself and was more than the weight of 2 of of VRT officers! ;)

next we visited the p.o.w camp Changi chapel and museum. this in my own personal opinion was one of the highlights of the whole trip, i learnt so much about the history of Singapore and the Chinese, the chapel was a replica as the original was taken by Australian p.o.w's after the liberation. we sat in a replica cell that the prisoners were kept and tortured in for months and years and a tape recording was played of a re-creation of a prisoners thoughts. the museum told story's of the escapees and the Japanese soldiers, the British input and the Australian p.o.w's as well and the notes left by family members pinned up on the wall of the chapel were extremely poignant.

After a lunch box meal we headed into Arab street for a spot of shopping and to hear the Muslim prayers from the mosque. i bought a very cool Chinese hat - picture on the page!

next we visited little India which was basically a busy little collection of Bazaars with Indian trinkets for sale as good souvenirs. our tour guide then took us to the most amazing Buddhist temple explaining about all the different statues and cultures/traditions.

for the evening we had tickets for a night safari. it was completely amazing like nothing i've ever seen before! on a little tram we drove through a jungle in the dark looking at lions, tigers, Indian elephant, buffalo, hyena, bears, wolves, hippo, deer, weird rat thing, lots! the safari park also put on a night time show going on late into the night including the animals. there was a snake hidden in the audience, wolves on cliff ridge in the moonlight howling, bear cats climbing vines over the audience and ferrets dancing and otters that could recycle bottles into the right boxes, mind blowing!

was a late night didn't get to bed until the early hours so night everyone

Di