Dear Friends, we are on the final full day of our holiday and having a wonderful time here in Raffles in Singapore. Wes is very keen that I get the full flavour of the World Cup Match, so I will try and tell you what it was like. When I last wrote, we were about to go to dinner at the Cricket Club of India, where Stacky had hit a century many moons ago. We duly arrived and it was a very traditional, colonial club, with the wonderful surprise of seeing groups of people seated around tables on the ground having pre-dinner drinks. We were shown to the main table in the dining-room, where we were offered a la carte (Indian curries) or Chinese. We opted to share a Chinese meal as that simplified ordering as there were 13 of us at dinner. The food was fine, nothing special, but the service was very good, although one of the younger waiters was unable to distinguish white wine from red and kept pouring red wine into Norma’s glass! It was a special honour to be allowed to dine at the Club and it was only because three of us were members of the MCC, that we were accorded the honour.
The next morning I suffered from a headache, so decided to sleep in and give breakfast a miss. Wes went down and came back to report on the amazing atmosphere – just like Grand Final morning, everyone was hopping from one foot to the other, on mobile phones checking on their tickets or trying to get tickets, meeting friends or organising meeting points. We sat quietly in the room listening to Collingwood easily account for North Melbourne, then getting progress scores on other games, before we joined our group to go to the ground. We couldn’t find our bus, so we set off walking together and followed Gill, one of our group, who knew where Gate 6 was! When we arrived near the gate, it was impossible to find out where the queue started as there were queues to 3 gates snaking around that side of the ground, so we joined in close to where we thought we should be. After a while we reached the railway pedestrian overpass and were within sight of the ground. It then took an hour to get to our gate. The temperature was 32° and the humidity almost unbearable and it stayed like that until the sun went down, when it became just bearable.
We went through at least 5 search points – at each point males and females were separated and we lost everyone else in our group except for Norma and Jenny. Wes stayed around waiting for us each time until we reached the top of the stairs, when Norma inadvertently followed him through the male check point and Jenny & I didn’t see them again until we found our seats. I waited each time for Jenny as she is 73 and finds stairs a trial. As you may remember, we were not allowed to bring anything much in with us, so I was carrying in my pockets – Kleenex, mobile phone, hotel room key, a comb, Ventolin spray & my ticket – all of which items were allowed through. After the 5 searches, we finally reached turnstiles and our tickets were scanned. At the bottom of the railway overpass stairs we turned to our aisle, but were forced through yet another search, this time, an electronic one. The previous 5 searches had been manual – women were taken one by one into a cubicle with a curtain and we were patted down and our pockets inspected. All along the way were soldiers with or without rifles and sundry officials blocking the way of the ticket-holders and making it very difficult to catch up to our male partners again.
Finally, I was passed OK and allowed to progress to the staircase to my seat – Gill had waited for Jenny and I left them looking for toilets and went up 2 flights of stairs to find half of our group in their seats, including Wes and Norma. We were seated in the back of 5 shortish rows in front of a ‘superbox’, with the loveliest official looking after us, as well as sundry policemen and women & security offers. Our official was so excited to have a row of ‘kangaroos’ to look after, that he took us under his wing – Wes responded well to his concern, so he treated Wes as our leader and when he thought we would be hungry, announced that we were entitled to dinner boxes and that we should give him our seat tickets and he would arrange it. In the meantime we were discovering that we could not buy bottles of water, only cups and if you weren’t careful, you ended up with cups of Pepsi, as happened to Norma! The ladies’ toilets were just at the back of our section, which was very convenient, but they were actually men’s loos, with ‘Ladies’ written in chalk on the door and the urinals scrubbed up to furnish us with hand-basins!
Our dinner boxes were full of pastries, bread rolls, cake, chocolates, curry and fruit juice, very little of which was edible and all of which was cold. Once our helpful official discovered Keith Stackpole was part of our group, his eyes filled with tears as he had been 4 years old when he saw Keith bat, so Warren introduced them and took a photo. About 20 minutes later, our official brought up the Commissioner of Police, who also met Keith and had his photo taken. After this we were offered more dinner boxes, chocolates and bottles of water that the water police did not take from us. We said no to the dinner boxes and gave the chocolates to Wes. We were also given lots of clappers and signs, which we gave to the children in front of us. These children had accompanied the players onto the ground and then took their seats in our area. We suspected that many of them were underprivileged or orphaned children; at least one was blind and another slow in his reactions to everything. I made friends with the boy in front of me and gave him my cap to wear. He tried to give it back, but I told him it was a present from Australia, so he wore it very happily.
In the meantime the match was playing out. Sri Lanka started too slowly, but finished with a good score of 274. The Indians strode out confidently, but when Sehwag went for a duck and Sachin made only 18, the Sri Lankans were cock-a-hoop. Sadly for them, they could not move Gambhir or M S Dhoni until too late and India won a memorable Final. Norma gave her cap to our official and he hugged her in delight. We left before the end as we were worried it would be bedlam getting out of the stadium, and arrived back at our hotel as the game finished.
We said goodbye to Norma, Keith and Jenny, as we were leaving at 4.30am the next day and headed to bed, where we watched the scenes of joy all over India. We had packed before going to the ground and Wes had arranged a wake-up call in case our phones’ alarms didn’t go off. Our thanks to Jane Knox for footy scores during the cricket until she fell asleep and to Barbara for final scores – much appreciated.
We slept well until 3.30am, were in the lobby by 4.20am and enjoyed a pleasant drive to the airport in the hotel car. We drove through celebrating Indians in cars, some sitting in open boots, others hanging out of windows flying flags. Our flight to Singapore was very comfortable with wonderful service and we were met at the other end by a loquacious driver, who couldn’t have cared less about what we wanted to do in Singapore and told us what he thought of everything.
Then we were at Raffles and everything went up a notch or two – Martina, our Irish check-in person, expressed surprise that Australians were interested in cricket, so we set her straight and when we next saw her she asked us which team we had been supporting in the World Cup, having boned up on it in the meantime. We have a Palm Court suite in the oldest part of Raffles – a regular suite includes a parlour with dining table, which is where I am sitting, a spacious bedroom, a dressing room and bathroom, all beautifully appointed. We have our own butler who attends to whatever needs we might have.
We were too tired to do much on Sunday night other than have a G&T in the Long Bar, where each table has a big bowl of unshelled peanuts and it is etiquette to shell them and throw the husks on the floor. We were given someone else’s bill to sign, which started a good conversation going with that table and they were all envious we had been at the cricket. We had an Indian curry buffet in the Tiffin Room, where we were well looked after until Marie, our delightful French waitress, presented us with someone else’s bill for drinks from the Writer’s Bar. When we explained this was the second time it had happened, she promised to ‘put an end to it’ and we parted with a smile.
After a good sleep in yesterday, we went back to the Tiffin Room for breakfast, where I was delighted to find congee on the menu and the waiter and I agreed that Raffles made the best fish congee in the world. Wes had soft-boiled eggs, which were perfectly cooked and the array of fruits and juices was second to none. Last time we were here, probably 8-10 years ago, eggs were cooked by chefs in front of you, but this has changed and there is a menu of extras, which are brought to your table on order.
Sentosa Boardwalk
It was traditional English afternoon tea –three tiers of sweet things and scones, jam and cream. As well we were given a cake and Pink Champagne, and promptly put back all the weight we had lost by our big walk. Wes had found a good restaurant on Trip Advisor called Lei Garden – when we read a review by a Pom saying ‘beware, nothing you are used to eating at home is on this menu’ we knew we were on a winner! We tried to walk to it, but got lost and caught a taxi instead. Our driver did not know the building but assured us that he would find it no matter what and find it he did – what a delightful experience that was.
Dinner was sublime – we were met in the lobby and shown the lift to the 3rd floor, where we were greeted by name and shown into a beautifully appointed room, which was staffed completely by females. We chose steamed grouper fish, which was served on tofu so sublime that even Wes loved it, chilli prawns served whole and garlic broccoli, all accompanied by a Marlborough NZ Sauvignon Blanc. We finished up with rice balls stuffed with black sauce (me) and green tea mousse. When we arrived back here we decided to have crème de cassis on ice in the Writer’s Bar, where Jimmy, the ageing camp pianist was playing wonderfully on the piano. He and Wes had some witty exchanges, our butler came to check on us and make sure everything was OK and we went happily to bed.
This morning we were having another enjoyable breakfast – I had the Raffles omelette this time with chillies, coriander, onion & Emmental cheese and Wes made do with croissants after our fruit, when we were joined by Lesley, the Raffles Historian, who greeted us by name and asked if we were by any chance from Melbourne. Both his daughters had studied there – one at Melbourne Uni and the other at RMIT and he and his wife have visited 5 times and done just about everything there is to do in Victoria, except visit Daylesford. We had a wonderful chat, he was a mine of information and we did enjoy talking with someone who loves Melbourne so much.
Wes has been in the pool and steam room, while I have been talking to Viva, reading my emails and writing this lengthy Dispatch. We are heading off for a walk to Little India soon – perhaps we will have dim sum later on or save ourselves for another exciting dinner. We had planned to go the Imperial Herbal Restaurant, but it has moved to Vivo City, where we were yesterday, so we might look at the Chijmes complex across the road instead or eat outside here.
Lei Garden Restaurant
Thanks to everyone for your messages and emails – all much appreciated. Carol tells me that Channel 7 is showing the Collingwood/Carlton match live on Friday night, so I assume it is close to a sell-out – Wes has chosen not to go, so I have invited Danny and we are very excited about the unfurling of the flag as well as going to our first match of the new season.
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