Beach Patrol

After endless squabbling about where to go for a holiday, Saffy, Amanda and I recently decided to take a staycation in Singapore. The Rasa Sentosa Resort, to be precise.

            “Hah?” said Sharyn with typical eloquence when she heard about it. “Why you go to Sentosa for holiday?”

            “For the same price as going to Bali, we can have two days by the beach,” Amanda told her.

            “And no hassle of airports and horrible airplanes filled with horrible tourists!” Saffy added.

            Sharyn frowned. “You go to resort hotel, also got fill with horrible tourist, what!”

            “You’re missing the point, Sharyn,” Saffy said, her formidable chest expanding.

            Sharyn stared at Saffy owlishly. “Which is what, ah?”

            Saffy paused, well aware that she had just stepped onto the top of a slippery slope. Finally, she resorted to a tried and tested response. “Oh, you won’t understand. You’re a mother!”

            For those of you out there who have never had a staycation before, I can’t recommend it highly enough. You just pack a light bag, call a cab, and barely half an hour later, you’re checking into a very nice room with views of the sea, coconut palms, beach and a sparkling blue pool.

            “I hope there are cute men down there,” Amanda murmured as we stood on the balcony of our adjoining rooms.

“Well, my room is off limits,” I said, as a precautionary strike. “I’m not being booted out of it and sharing with Saffy like the last time we went to Bali.”

Amanda ignored me. She peered over her Bulgari sunglasses down at the pool.

            “It’s a bit weird to be so close to all those tankers,” Saffy said, her chest straining against an unreasonably tight tee-shirt that said ‘Look but don’t touch!’. “It kind of spoils the illusion that we’ve just arrived in Phuket!”

            “I’m going to change and go lie by the pool for a bit,” Amanda told us.

            “I think I’ll go for a massage,” Saffy said.

            Which is how I found myself standing on the Rasa Sentosa’s powdery beach, staring up at the Megazip lines and wondering if it was to soon after breakfast to be hurled off a 50m tall tower. In the distance, three people came speeding down the lines, screaming at the top of their lungs.

            I turned on my heels, sending up a puff of sand, and walked back towards the pool to look for Amanda. I found her lounging provocatively on a chaise, clad in the latest season Dolce & Gabbana one-piece black swimsuit. She lifted her sunglasses at my approach.

            “Oh my God!” she hissed. “It’s all fat men with man-boobs dragging little children around!”

            “Well, it is a family resort!” I told her.

            “That’s no reason to let yourself go to fat!” Amanda said, her lips hardly moving. “Though I have to say those kids over there are just too adorable!” She moved her head towards a pair of four-year old twins who were wearing pink Hello Kitty arm-floats, and matching bunny ear headbands. Amanda sighed. This is apparently what happens to single women sitting by a beach pool – they look at a child and get all milky and maternal.

             Just then, Saffy floated up towards us, her face wreathed in dreamy bliss. “Gosh, I do love a massage!” she said, collapsing in the chair next to Amanda. “And did you see those hot Australian guys by the bar? They were…Hey, where are you going? You’re not leaving are you? But I just got here…”

            That evening, Saffy and I had dinner all by ourselves. We didn’t see Amanda again till it was time to check out. She glided up to us at the counter, pulling her Louis Vuitton trolley bag.

            “This has been the best holiday I’ve had in ages!” she told us, as she handed over her credit card.

            “I can’t believe you abandoned us!” Saffy said accusingly, though you could tell she was torn between her outrage and her desire to hear every single intimate detail of Amanda’s last 18 hours. “I had to play ping-pong with Jason!”

            “And we went paddling in the sea,” I said. “We also got foot massages by the pool. Then we ordered room service and watched a movie. And there was a big beach party so we went out danced all night on the sand!”

            Saffy hesitated. “Well, yes…We did all that, but…”

            “But you had fun!” Amanda said soothingly. “I honestly don’t know why we bother going anywhere else for our holidays. We should do these staycations more often! Especially if we get to meet hot Aussie men by the pool bar!”

            Saffy says there are moments when she misses being single. “Aiyoh, choy!” Sharyn told her.