Strange things about Madeira, Volcanoes, Water, Waterfalls, the wet Westerlies, the world's islands and wet places

Problem
Where? Most people don't know of Madeira but don't where Madeira is. I had been there before but had forgotten the location. It's the fate of many islands, such as Singapore and Malta.

Black Volcanic Ash
The island is made of black volcanic ash. It was formed from a volcanic eruption. So were many islands. Think of: Hawaii.

Indonesia's Eruptions
Everybody has heard of Krakatowa. It was well documented by survivors.
Another of the Indonesians' islands was a greater disaster for local people and the whole world.  On Sumbawa an eruptions created the year of endless night, which reached as far as England and Europe in the early 1800s.

Red Earth
So the volanic eruptions leave black ash and black beaches. But Madeira also has red earth. Like Singapore and parts of Africa and Devon in England. I know. I spent a lot of time wiping Madeira's red dust from my shoes off the sills of the hire car. Then more time wiping the 'red' - or rather orange, stain off my white and turquoise trainers.

The World's Wet and Windy Places
Wet areas of Madeira and Singapore are on one side of the island. The winds blow one way because of the rotation of the earth. As the earth spins the air moves past. The air drops water vapour on the mountain tops so you get streams and waterfalls running down towards the sea at sea level.

The West and the West and the Westerlies
The west of Singapore, around places called Bukit, which is Malay for hill, gets more rainfall, more than the drier East near Changi airport.

Madeira Levadas - Water Channels
On Madeira the farmers built levadas or draining channels or waterways taking water to their land. The rainfall means green grass, bushes, trees.

Tropical Weather and Plants
Heat means tropical colourful flowers, and palm trees.

Madeira is south of England, hotter. Heat and wet means tropical plants, bananas, coconuts from coconut palms, cane for sugar and rum.


Useful Websites
lastminute.com
opodo.co.uk flight comparison website
tripadvisor.co.uk
tripadvisor.com
visitmadeira.com
Wikipedia.org Madeira
Wikitravel.org Madeira
Wikivoyage.org Madiera

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Remember Railway Station Names in Singapore

Singapore flag. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

How do you remember the railway station names?

Here's the new Downtown line in Singapore.

Bukit Panjang (long hill - the terminus)
Cashew (tree lined road up a hill; no longer cashew nut trees)
Hillview (Area with view of hills)
Beauty World
King Albert Park
Sixth Avenue
Tan Kah Kee: Mr Tan, donor to a uni in China; education is the key, thinks Tan Kah Kee.
Botanic Gardens
Stevens (possibly named after a police superintendent).
Newton (named after one of many from the pioneer days, building the new town of Singapore)

Bukit Panjang
The first station in the north, the terminus or terminal or last station, is Bukit Panjang. The station is nearest to Malaysia (formerly Malaya) in the north. Bukit is Malay language (Bahasa or language, Malay - which you will see on dictionaries). Bukit means hill.  Singapore was originally part of Malaysia, until the late 1900s.

Bukit - hill
Bukit appears in other names in Singapore. Bukit Merah. (Hill red or Red hill. There is also a Singapore station given the English name Redhill.)

P a n j a n g (Watch out for predictive text which turns this word into Panning.)
Long. It's a long word. Bukit P a n j a n g ..........!

Cashew
Cashew station is in Cashew Road and as you may have guessed it once had cashew nut trees.
The station is at the bottom of the hillside Cashew Road, on a busy motorway leading north, with lots of buses. (Get a bus map or photograph the bus stop and bus route poster so you can find your way back, and see the best bus and any alternatives which take the same route or get you half way there.

Hillview
This area has and had a view of the hill, which we already noticed was Bukit in the Malay language.

Hillview and HillV2
Above the station is the HillV2 shopping mall. You go up an escalator to the enclosed but outdoor plaza with the jumping fountain in the middle, coloured at night. HillV2 is small mall with upmarket shops, an upmarket supermarket, coffee shops and fine restaurants such as my favourite IO Italian Osteria which serves lunches and dinners and also sells deli items such as breads and bottled foods and delicious cakes to go (or as we say in England, take away.

Glossary
Bukit - hill (Malay)
Merah - red (autocorrect likes merry so I may have to spell it out as M e r a h)
P a n j a n g - long
timah - lead (the metal which was mined)

http://remembersingapore.org/2014/01/09/pioneer-names-in-singapore-streets/
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Singapore resident.