Sunday, September 28, 2008

Day 3: Kaladkarin's Adventures in Singapore

After a barrage of malls, we had an outdoor-sy agenda for this Saturday. Rhea, Mike, Ben, KE and I trooped to the outskirts of Bedok for a 'Forest Adventure'. You know you're in for an exciting day when (1), you have no idea of what the 'Forest Adventure' actually is (hiking, I presumed), and (2), you have no idea of how to go there. So out went the handy-dandy maps again as we navigated our way to the Bedok Reservoir.

Turns out the 'Forest Adventure' leaned heavily more on the 'adventure' part than a commune with nature. The 'forest' were actually the trees that dotted the Bedok Reservoir Park, and Forest Adventure was actually a facility for ziplining and 4 sites of rope bridges enough to whip up any ROTC-whiner into shape.

As we put on the harnesses and helmets, an instructor gave us a drill of how to use the carabiners and told us that the whole adventure course would take around 2 hours. In my head, I was going like, 'Wenk, 2 hours? Magsla-slide lang naman ako. How hard can that be?' As usual, I was dead wrong. Rope ladder pa lang, gegewang-gewang na kami. Ziplining over the reservoir trying not to have another crash landing was the easy part. Going head-to-head with the rope bridges was totally another story! We tarzan-ed, airsplit-ted, air-crawled and practically did every aerial acrobatics move possible (sans somersaulting & flying). The bridge aptly baptized as 'The Trapeze' was the most challenging one -- imagine a log suspended by two ropes (one at each side), resembling a swing. Now imagine crossing over a whole row of those, with nothing to grip on but the ropes and nothing to step on but the logs. I swear, by the last step of that section, we all practically jumped onto the platform hugging the tree branch at the end of the site. Effort! But as exhausting as it may be, there were no regrets (err, except maybe for not being brave enough to bring a camera up on the treetops. alas, all those missed photo ops! darn.)

Famished, we took the bus and the train ride over to Bugis for a food trip. I was already nursing cough and colds ever since I arrived in SG; the morning adventure cost me more energy so I dozed off for a while in the train. And surprise, surprise, kahit sa SG, I can't help being Ish. Yep, when I woke up and we got off at Bugis, I left my wallet on the train. Tsa-ran! We immediately went to the control booth and reported the lost wallet (which contained all my money, IDs, ATM cards, MRT cards... sigh). The troop tried to cheer me up and we went off for some (awesome!) chow at this Thai & Chinese resto. Around an hour later, my sister called us up, saying that someone called her and said that the wallet was found and returned at the MRT! WHEEE! Singapore, what a fine city you are! I was just so psyched to have the wallet back, that I didn't mind when Mike, Rhea, et.al. were taking pictures to document my reunion with my wallet-slash-bag. Whee!

The day must have really taken a toll, because I couldn't bring myself to go out again, even for some clubbing that night. At home, all it took was one plop on the bed and I was a goner. Good night. :)

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