Birthday Star Galactica

Andrew and his brother

(Andrew) Our flight landed in Singapore airport at 10:00 pm from Jakarta, Indonesia. It left the next day at 11:00 pm to Port Moresby, PNG. A full 24 hours in Singapore! As a compromise for having a longhouse birthday (see Reis’ post), Dad agreed to take us to Universal Studios Singapore, even though it was three days after our real birthday. I was so excited!

The lines to get in were huge but it would be worth it for the thrill of the rides. The themes of the park were Shrek, Madagascar, Jurassic Park, Ancient Egypt, Sci-Fi, New York and Hollywood. The three rides I was looking forward to were; the Jurassic Park Rapids Ride, the Revenge of the Mummy and, of course, Battlestar Galactica. When we got in, I raced through New York to get to Sci- Fi. There it was above me, the tallest dueling coaster on the planet. Its blue and red tracks twisted and looped and sent adrenaline pumping through my body. The red track was for the “Human” coaster, where your feet are touching the ground, and the blue track was for the “Cylon” coaster, where your feet dangle. We obviously chose the dangle-feet Cylon one. We bolted through the line and strapped ourselves in, my feelings were very mixed. When we started climbing the first hill slowly, my mind calmed. It relaxed too soon. We started going at a pace that seemed like the speed of light. At the top, we slowed down, lingered for 1 second, and then plummeted. It went downhill from there, literally. We sped around doing flips and turns and drops. On the last flip, at the apex, I felt weightless. It ended so soon. When we got out, I was dizzy, but I soon said, “CAN WE DO IT AGAIN?!?!” We did it the next time on the Human side. It was inferior to the Cylon side.

Next we did the Revenge of the Mummy. It was fun and scary. The ride was in complete darkness and went up, down, side to side, forwards and backwards. At some points, things popped up and scared us, which was breathtaking, really. The next ride was the Jurassic Park Rapids Ride. We waited in line for a half an hour then got into a raft. When we floated along, we saw electronic replicas of stegosauruses, parasarolophuses and velociraptors. We also “almost” got eaten by a Tyrannosaurus Rex. After our close escape from the dinosaur, we plunged down into the water. Everyone got soaked except for Reis and me. It was hilarious! Then we went to lunch in New York at a pizza place. The pizza was delicious, partly because we haven’t had a good slice in almost a year. In the middle of lunch, the song from Madagascar (I like to move it move it) suddenly came on. When we looked outside, people dressed as Alex the Lion, Gloria the Hippo, King Julian the Lemur and the Penguins were dancing on the steps of the fake New York Library. When they stopped, I was able to take a picture with the penguins. We went to a few more enjoyable attractions and left.

It was the best “birthday” ever!