We’re taking a van across the border to JB this morning to catch a flight to Kuching.
Driving across the causeway which connects Singapore to Johor Bahru there were trucks lined up for miles heading over into Singapore. Semis as far as the eye could see. It takes them near on all day just to get over, drop their load and get back.
Going through immigration was interesting. You go through to get out of Singapore and then a couple of hundred metres down the road you go through to get into Malaysia. You never even get out of the car. The officers sit in little booths and you need to smile at them through the window of the car. It took all my self-control not to order a double cheeseburger and fries. 
They did have quite a few cars that they were checking thoroughly. Not sure what they try to smuggle into Malaysia. I’d think the problem would be larger going the other way. I heard that they had a big crackdown on people going over from Singapore, fueling up and heading back. They had just brought in that Singaporeans couldn’t get petrol within 50km or so of the border, so maybe they were checking the fuel tanks.
As you get into Malaysia you notice a swift decline in the quality of the buildings. It’s a stark contrast to Singapore where even the older areas are relatively clean. A lot of the buildings are dilapidated or run down and there were quite a few that had never completed construction. There was even a complete shopping complex on the coast that had been abandoned by the tenants and was completely empty. I heard that it had lasted about 12 months. This thing was huge. I think it was called the Waterfront City Shopping Mall. Apparently this is quite a common occurrence over here.
Once through immigration (which was completely hassle free) it was only a short trip to the airport. This was not very large, maybe 10 or 15 shops. Luckily, there was a coffee shop which was good because we were hanging out for a caffeine by this stage. There was also a little bread shop. These have recently become the go over here and they are everywhere. They sell a rather large variety of breads, pastries, cakes and the like. We grabbed a couple of chicken curry rolls (which were pretty good) and were told that a small, bright green, gelatinous rice sweet was the business so we got a couple of those as well. Not sure exactly what I was expecting it to be like but it tasted, well, gelatinous and ricey! It wasn’t bad though.Seeing as we had a bit of time to kill before the flight, the girls decided to treat themselves to a foot massage.
There was a crew at the side of the airport working on an extension. I was surprised to see a guy up on the frame welding and wearing a harness. I expected, from what I had heard, that work safety wouldn’t be a high priority. I might have been right. He didn’t actually have it clipped to anything.
