Sunsets over Borneo

A Trip to the Singapore Post Office

A couple of days ago, we received a note under our door that there was a piece of registered mail from StarHub (our cable company) that we had to pick up from the post office. After seeing it, we spent the first ten minutes discussing how much we missed having a doorman who would collect all of our mail and dry cleaning, open the door for us, and make sure we had it on our way home from work, whatever time that might be.

This morning, we set out to find the post office, figure out what in the world our cable company could be sending us by registered mail, and buying stamps (well, that was more of an Erin mission than a we mission).

the good news is, the post office is only a block from our house. The bad news is it took us at least 5 blocks of walking to find it. Finally, we did, and I must say they make the US Post Offices look bad. It was not crowded, we did not have to wait in line, the Air con was blasting and the place was pretty clean.

So, we present our slip to collect our registered letter, somewhat confused and somewhat hoping it was something good. I immediately rip it open and what did we get?

$40 in McDonalds gift certificates.

Wait for it....

no, thats it, just McDonald's gift certificates. What the hell are we supposed to do with $40 in McDonald's gift certificates?

Tea Party in the Singapore Harbour

So this really isn't the kind of blog that strives to discuss matters of social importance. In fact, we mainly strive to blog about things our Mommies want to hear about, post pictures of cool things which attempt to justify why we left our fabulous friends and family in the USA  and occasionally blog out of pure boredom (we are hoping there will be a correlation between increases in friends and decreases in free time to blog- yet to be seen).

BUT- at least this once we shall briefly discuss a topic of political importance. Taxes.

If you know me, you know I hate taxes. Hate them. A little piece of my spirit died every time I saw my pay stub and realized how much money I paid to the government. Living abroad has only made me hate taxes EVEN more. Why? Because despite the fact that I live in Singapore, use their public services and pay their taxes- I still have to share a percentage of my pay check to Uncle Sam. This has become a particular issue in our lives recently because in Singapore there is no income with holding done by employers. None- not a penny. So the task of figuring out how much you owe the government (make that 2 governments) became our problem. Awesome. And having to figure out how many thousands and thousands of dollars I will send to a country that I no longer live in has been a little more than irritating.

And today, in the best newspaper in the world, there was an article on this very problem!!!!!!

New York Times- More Expatriates Give Up Citizenship

Sometimes is like the Times is reading my mind. For those of you who will not be taking the time to read the article- the gist is that expats, not unlike ourselves, are sick and tired of paying boatloads of taxes to a country that they do not live in and do not receive proportional benefits from while also paying taxes to the country they do live in. The only solution for this- renounce your citizenship.

Now before our Moms get all worried- we are not giving up our citizenship. Ever. Ev-er. We both like being US citizens more than we hate taxes. But it is interesting to think that the US is practically the only country in the world that feels entitled to money earned outside of their borders... Seems like there should be a better solution than forcing hard working American citizens to give up their citizenship to avoid taxation with out representation. I would send a note to Obama to suggest this, but it seems like he has his hands full already spreading socialism to the masses. I kid, I kid...(sort of.)

OK- now we will resume with your regularly scheduled blogging about our occasionally interesting lives in Singapore. We are headed to Borneo this weekend- so hopefully as our Starwood hotels tour of Asia continues we can entertain you with stories of monkeys and jungles and beaches, oh my!

Can you hear me now?

One of the few beautiful things about leaving the US was telling Verizon and their crappy overpriced services to stuff it. It was a painful process that involved multiple phone calls, some tears of frustration, possibly some expletives and occasionally yelling things like "I CANNOT BELIEVE THAT THE PEOPLE WHO WORK HERE CAN BE THIS STUPID." But finally, it was over- we were free. Or so we thought.

This month, after not having Verizon cell phones or cable for over a month (woo hoo!), we both received bills. Impossible you say! Impossible! But no, those thirsty vicious bloodsuckers figured out malicious ways to continue to rob us of our hard earned money even after we left the country. (Now this is NOT unlike the US Federal Government- but that is my next post). So the theme of tonight has been "Let's Skype Verizon Night."

Its gone something like this:

Erin: I live in Singapore, I cancelled my phone in March.
Verizon Rep 1: Says here ya owe us 300 dollars.
Erin: That would be difficult considering I dropped your service over a month ago.
Verizon Rep 1: Why did you do that?
Erin: You missed the part about moving to Singapore?

David: We live in Singapore
Verizon Rep 2: Can you spell that?

David is now engaged in a battle to the death with Verizon Fios. The current stats are as follows:

Number of minutes on call: 45.34 and counting
Number of Transfers: at least 5
Number of times forced to listen to hold music: 15
Number of Times he has given our account number: 1000
Number of Verizon employees it takes to screw in a light bulb: Unknown, must be over 500
Number of humans of normal intelligence spoken to: Still waiting for the first.

And the war rages on...


UPDATE


After a total of 1:06:35 on the phone with Fios- Dave successfully got all fees waived. All hail the victor!

A Thank You!

A very sincere (and late- sorry) thank you to two dear friends, Matthew and Michael, for sending me these beautiful flowers! You guys are the best- miss you a lot! Come visit!

East Coast Park Awesomeness

During the busy work week filled with subway rides and long periods of time sitting in florescent lighting its a little easy to forget that we live on a tropical island (minus the unrelenting heat- which is a regular reminder we are not  in NY anymore). So yesterday, thanks to our friend Toby, we were reminded that we live in a pretty cool place when we were invited out to the famed East Coast Park to watch some sail boat racing from the beach.

Dave on the walking path- looking for sailboats.

Toby had given us pretty specific instructions on how to get to the beach club, which was conveniently located next to a very famous hawker center- but, as is fairly typical, we had a misunderstanding with our cab driver, who dropped us of no where near where we wanted to be. After a few minutes of walking and seeing NO sailboats in the water (mainly just Asian men in Speedos) and realizing this East Coast park thing is BIG we decided to be resourceful and rented some bikes to help us find our destination.

The friendly bike rental shop. Promising "All Brand New Bikes"

The bikes were a great deal- S$8 for two hours! What was funny about this transaction, besides the lack of helmets, liability waivers and leaving of any monetary deposit- was that the very normal looking bikes you see here are listed at S$6 dollars an hour- but the price we paid for different- but still totally normal looking bikes was S$8 dollars an hour. So maybe the cheaper bikes are small Asians only bikes? Or we just looked like suckers? I don't know, but for less than $US2 it wasn't worth arguing about. So we happily hopped on our rented bikes and away we went in search of sailboats.

The bikes turned out to be an amazingly good idea- not only because we were located pretty far from the sailing, but also because the path along the beach is a great ride and there were lots of interesting things to see along the way. The funniest attraction on the path has to be armies of tiny Asian girls trying to roller blade- very very very unsuccessfully.  The obvious problem with this form of entertainment is there is more often than not someone taking an epic fall right in front of your bike, which happens to have limited breaking and steering abilities. A few near misses later we learned to give a wide berth to any group of adolescent girls on roller blades.  

One cool thing we saw is the Ski 360 park, which is Singapore's only cable operated water skiing park. Instead of being pulled behind boats, there is an elaborate system of cable tows, not unlike a T-Bar ski lift, that pulls the skiers and wake boarders around the lake. 

This is something that is being added to my "must try" list- looked like SO much fun and instead of having to start in the water and be pulled up by the boat (have had multiple fails with this method) you start out on a floating dock- which I hear makes it much easier. The one question I do have is that if you fall down way out in the far side of the lake and drop your cable tow- how do you get back to the doc to start over? 

After some more bike riding we eventually found the sailboats. 

Dave found the sailboats! 

As it turned out, it was less than ideal conditions for the racing of sail boats. But the lack of wind did make for some interesting attempts by the various sailors (mainly Toby) to use alternative methods to propel their boats.

This was our favorite method:

This is the motor boat method of sailing- when there is no wind, create your own power

We hear that officially this is cheating... but I think it deserves points for creativity and effort. Needless to say, although he crossed the finish line (the red buoy) he was disqualified for not actually being in his boat when it happened. 

After cheering on the sailors- we checked out the famous East Coast Park Hawker Stand- apparently home to some of the best sea food in the city. 

 

Little fresh coconut water to cool down. 

Followed by some delicious satay, made by this guy:

We had a fabulous time in the park and are looking forward to spending many more weekends there. We may even give the sailing thing a shot. 

The Three Phases in Expat Life (so far...)

I woke up one morning and realized that we had already been here over a month! In some ways that seems unbelievable- it was just yesterday I was packing up 1 Irving and doing last minute shopping in the US- but in other ways it feels like we have been here MUCH longer than a month. I think this is partially to blame for not only the various phases of culture shock that every expat experiences, but also because we can break down our time here in Singapore in three distinct phases based directly on our housing situation:

1) Oh My God- THIS is Corporate Housing? 
OK, so it wasn't a hostel, but it wasn't nice. I was admittedly reduced to tears when we walked in to our less-than-400sq ft-den of darkness upon arrival. It was tiny, it was dark, and hot. And there were no dressers, and no storage space, and the bed was a rock and the couch was too small for any two adults to enjoy and the internet situation sucked.... etc. We did enjoy our first few days as a tourist in a new town, but the utter hate of our corporate housing situation put us (OK- mainly me) in to a FRENZY to look at apartments and find an escape. So we took to apartment searching with gusto. Many viewings, multiple brokers and much stress later- we found our new home- and thus entered stage 2 of life so far.

2) YAY- our apartment ROCKS! 
Moving in to our new apartment was blissful. It was big and clean, had lots of windows, a pool, hot tubs, a gym- the list of amazingness goes on. We were in love. It was such a dramatic step up in life- we couldn't have been happier. Due to logistic problems with our shipment being on a boat in the middle of the ocean when we moved in we resulted to renting furniture until our stuff gets here. This was augmented by the arrival of our 500lbs of air shipment- so in one day we went from terrible corporate housing with the same clothes we had worn for 4 weeks- to a LOAD of our stuff, all new and exciting, and real furniture, and real TV and internet. I busily went about putting away our things, admiring our additional supplies of clothes and towels and pillows. It was happy times. But alas... those times have passed and we have entered in to the 3rd phase..

3) Where the HELL is our Boat????
So the rental-furniture inspired bliss was short lived. We quickly looked around at our sparse furnishings and thought, "wouldn't it be nice if we lived like normal people, with all of our stuff." Our first attempt to remedy these feelings of despair was a trip to the local Ikea. Thats right- there are Ikeas in Singapore- two to be precise. Thank god. So we eagerly (OK- mainly just me on the eager part, Dave was more begrudgingly because he knew he was going to have to build the complicated Swedish furniture) set off for Ikea and supplemented our basic rental furniture with a desk and bookshelves, shelves for the bombshelter and a dresser (which, btw, is still in the box- not that I am complaining...). "We" set off on building the new Ikea goods and for a brief period of time it was so exciting to have new things! It lasted.... oh a few days. Then the we were back in the world of "where is my stuff." We still love our apartment, the pools and hot tubs and the like are amazing- it is like living in a resort. But right now all I want is boxes and boxes of my things. I want to roll around in all of my clothes, and play with all of my kitchen toys, and have a refreshed supply of american toiletries and have a dresser instead of having my clothes in a pile in the floor. We want our couches and we really really really want our amazing King sized bed. Dave wants his TV and his playstation and his new MLB Baseball game that I didn't let him open before we left. (Note: this alone is motivation to get the new dresser built before the boat shows up and I lose my husband in a playstation-withdrawal-fueled marathon of video game playing to make up for all the time lost- aka: productivity in this house is probably going to hit an all time low)
It creeped up on us gradually. One of us would wistfully say "I really wish we had [insert item on boat]" then the next day one of us would say "I wonder where our boat is." Now the real rub is that the view from our living room is of the shipping yard. So all day we watch boats come in, laden with containers with other people's things in them and routinely ask each other "think that is our boat?" We got news from the shipping company that our boat is scheduled to arrive on the 5th of May... and then its in the hands of the Singapore customs agents to determine when we in fact receive our long-lost goods with open arms. So I suppose we sort of know where the hell our boat is... but it would be better if it was right outside our window and we were sitting on our own couches while I write this.

XOXO

Here is a quick picture of our office/guest room with our new Ikea desk- which we love. Still looking for a bed- but we promise that by the time someone comes to visit we will have one =)

English translation can, lah?

So the guidebooks warn you about a little problem called "Singlish." In our first weeks here we really didn't encounter too many problems understanding people and were delighted that it really was true that everyone speaks English. I think its only when you start to listen more closely, or say, have to listen more closely in a business meeting that you realize these people may *think* they speak English, but its a far cry from what you and I speak. Singlish is the result of the melding of cultures and languages in Singapore over the years- various Chinese dialects, Bahasa Malay and Indonesian, Indian dialects and colonial English- the result is mind boggling.

Entire books have been published on Singlish and how the unassuming western English speaker can navigate the never ceasing ran of "lah" that everyone says. What is funniest about Singlish to me is that its not say exclusively working class people or young people or recent immigrants who speak this way, its everyone. Educated professionals routinely say "can, lah" in meetings which, depending on context either means "can you do it?" or "yes, I can do it."

Here is an except from my business meeting.

Erin: In paragraph 2, it should be the mall is ON the street, not IN the street.
Singapore Business Man 1: No, thats wrong
Erin: No, I am pretty sure that something is located ON a street, and IN an area. But here its a street
Singapore Business Man 1: No, mall IN street can lah.

A battle I fully lost.

Another situation that created great confusion until recently was purchasing food. They ask you, what I now understand to be "take-away or stay here lah" but until about two days ago sounded more like "tks#jsxhajshjsu%$#&*hhsdks&shsh%a,  lah" which would prompt me to repeat my order again, thinking they didn't get it. So it would go like this:

Erin: Large Almond Soya Milk please
Mr. Bean Worker: "takeawaycarrierneedlah?"
Erin: Umm, no? Large Almond Soya Milk
Mr. Bean Worker "youneedcarrierfordrink"
Erin: (baffled look, just wants milk)
Mr. Bean Worker: (shoves milk drink in bag and thrusts it and straw at confused american)

Now, while I still don't always understand, I just assume that the follow up question to my food order is going to be related to carrying away and related carrying away instruments (its an elaborate process really) so I avoid this whole conversation by adding, "take-away" to the end of every order, whether I really wanted to or not.

What I can say is that the average Singapore never ceases to amaze me by effortlessly switching between Chinese and English, or Tamil and English, or Bahasa... you get the idea. Practically everyone here is multilingual and use both or multiple languages in the same day or in a 10-minute span of time. My friendly (ok- not really friendly) Mr. Bean workers quickly take my order in English and then take the next order in Mandarin and the following order in Singlish. Its impressive.

The speaking of Singlish and attempts to stifle it are quite controversial here.  One blogger writes:
Singlish, Singapore’s brand of colloquial English, is accepted by some as an essential marker of Singaporean identity but deplored by others as a variety of English that puts Singapore and Singaporeans at a disadvantage because of its lack of international intelligibility.

In 2000, the Singapore government, started the "Speak Good English" campaign to encourage people to drop the use of the hard to understand language. As you can imagine, it wasn't met with enthusiasm... and as someone living here 10 years later I doubt it has made a difference.

So since Singlish is apparently here to stay, us westerners are just going to be forced to consult a good-old Singlish-English dictionary when in doubt.

Rugby and Guiness....in Dave's Words

Erin gave you some of the highlights from Saturday's Rugby-fest, but I thought I would add my two cents. First of all, not only was the Guiness flowing, but the finals was very good, close game. Despite the general lack of size of the players, Singapore managed to play with the Sri Lankan side for quite a while. In fact, the Sri Lankan side scored on the last play of the game to win.

More importantly, I still dont understand the game. There is a lot of running and tackling, and you can't throw the ball forward. It reminds me a lot of football, without the forward pass, and every play is a lot less organized. They only have so many tries before they have to either punt or kick the equivalent of a field goal. However, the best is the out of bounds play, where they have a soccer throw-in type play. The best part is that they lift each other in the air to try and win the throw in. Its like a cross between cheerleading soccer and football all at once.

Oh, and there are apparently a lot of Aussie guys in Singapore who used to be good enough to play professional rugby at home, but they blew out a knee. They can usually be found close to the Guiness tent while their kids are chucking a rugby ball around nearby.

Rugby and Guinness

So in our search to keep ourselves entertained in Singapore and find reasons to leave our apartment, we happened upon an advertisment in Time Out Magazine for a 4 nations tournament in Singapore (thank god for Time Out, by the way, its been an amazing guide in every country I have lived in) and decided that for the price of S$15 we should check out our first live Rugby experience. We recruited our only friend, Kenny, and took the redline of the MRT multiple stops father than we had previously been in pursuit of a good time. 


Arriving at the "stadium" we quickly realized that this was going to be the best S$15 we had spent thus far in Singapore. There were probably 500 people in the stands in a stadium about 1/3rd the size of my High School football stadium. No matter- what the fans lacked in numbers they more than made up for in spirit. More important than the Asian rugby super fans (see photo below) was that Guinness had so kindly sponsored the event and the Irish brew was on sale for 2 pints for 10 dollars. This is probably a good deal in the US- but in Singapore- its a un-friggin-believably good deal. As Dave has bitterly commented on, beer here is expensive- really, really expensive. A local draft sets you back at least 10 dollars for the smallest glass you have ever seen. So 2 real beers for 10 is a goldmine. The best part is that they wouldn't sell you just 1- you had to have 2. Every time. For 3 hours. You can imagine how well double-fisting pints of Guinness turned out for everyone involved later in the evening... Not surprisingly the beer tents were also popular with the male middle aged Aussie and Brit "re-living the glory days of when I used to play" crowd- so we made some fun friends whilst waiting in line for more exceptionally priced beers. I even got recruited to play women's rugby- but little did this guy know that I am an only child who doesn't like to be hit and that most 3 year olds have better hand-eye coordination. Don't think I have much of a career ahead of me in women's rugby. 


Anyways, I am sure Dave will have some commentary on the sport that accompanied the cheap beer- but I am not ashamed to admit that the best parts of my evening had very little to do with the big (OK- its Asia- "big" maybe overstating it a little bit) men playing in the mud. 

What Rugby game would be complete with out teen-aged Malaysian boys playing the bagpipes? 

We sat in the Mah-lay-zian section. They really liked rugby. This guy was the resident Malaysian super fan. 

Dave at the Guinness tent. The first of many such trips. 

Two very happy AXP men with their beers. 

Yum- Dinner. Better than the concept of a cheese sausage, which, even after consuming one, is still a bit of a mystery, is that they were served not on buns, but speared on sticks and delivered in a baggie, as demonstrated by Kenny above. 

This is the only part of the actual game that I really enjoyed. What is there not to like about grown men lifting each other up in the air?

Aussie Rules Football

So consider this the first in a series of bloggings about the various new and exciting sports we get to watch here in Singapore. We get Aussie and European TV, there are Cricket and Polo clubs here, and we are going to try and see it all.

Last night, with Erin in Kuala Lumpur ("KL") on business, I had a nice quiet Friday night at home waiting for her return (eagerly, of course). As I get home, and watch Baseball Tonight on DVR, I flip through the TV Guide and find "Friday Night Football" on the Australia Network. I had already watched Robinson Cano's party at Yankee Stadium earlier in the day, so, of course, I ordered pizza and settled in for the game between the West Coast Eagles and the Essendon Bombers (a/k/a the Dons). First of all, while watching the first quarter, I had to read the full wikipedia article on the sport, because I had no idea what was going on. Part Rugby, part soccer, part American Football I guess is the best way to describe it.

First of all, they start the game, and every restart with a tip-off type start where the referee bounces the ball (the footy) as high as he can off the center of the field and 3 or 4 members of each team run to the middle and jump to secure control. More entertaining than any basketball tipoff you have ever seen. You can score either by kicking the footy through the uprights in the air, or getting the footy through the wider uprights by any means necessary. So the trick is to get the footy to one of your good kickers where they are close enough to get an open kick towards the uprights. To facilitate this, unlike in rugby, if you cleanly catch the footy off a teammates foot, you get a free-kick.

The West Coast Eagles have this player, who seems to be a rookie, who looks a lot like Adrian Peterson, and they would continually just give him the footy and let him run because no one could tackle him.

The other entertaining part is when you score a 6-point touch, the referree makes this very serious looking signal with both arms at a 90-degree angle pointing to the field with one finger. I am sure that Aussies think NFL referees look idiotic making a touchdown symbol too, but this is pretty entertaining.

In the end, the game wasnt all that close, the Eagles won 15.11.101 - 11.12.78. Thats 15 6-point touches, and 11 1-point scores equaling 101 points (why they break it down like that, I have no idea).

Next time...Asian 5 nations Rugby Finals, live and in-person from Singapore.

All in all, a pretty cool little Friday night.

Singapore's Boozin'

So, yesterday Erin posted her likes and dislikes from here in Singapore, I guess its probably my turn to do the same.

Likes

FOOD - the food is great, and cheap. If you are looking for a good, local-type meal all you have to do is find the nearest hawker stand and ask for something that looks good in pictures (I generally stay with the chicken or beef-type dishes, but you cold be much more adventurous if you wanted to be). There are hawker centers all over the place, a block from work, a block from home, and you can get great food for 5 sing dollars (that's about $3.50). If you are looking for the next step up there are mall food courts, and even Subway is cheap here.

Thunderstorms - One of my favorite things to do in Bradley is sit on the front (covered) porch and listen to the rain as a thunderstorm comes through. The storms here are spectacular! Last week, I was in a board room overlooking the famous IR for 2 days and watched with fascination as thunderstorms came in off the ocean and over the city, it was fantastic.

Our Apartment - We basically live in a resort. We have a fabulous pool, a great outdoor lounge floor with hot tubs and a gym, tennis courts, the works. Its a great place to relax after work. We are going to be so spoiled here its going to be tough to find a building back home with such great amenities.

Dislikes

First and foremost: the alcohol tax. See, its nice to have a drink after work, or have a beer by the pool on a Saturday afternoon. That is much less enjoyable when you are paying twice as much for your beer as you were in the US. While a lot is cheaper here, the price of booze is taking some getting used to.

The heat: I'm a big guy, and the heat is killer. The good news is that we are in the air conditioning 95% of the time. The bad news is that other 5% it is 98 degrees and humid like you wouldn't believe.

Driving: They drive like Brits... on the wrong side of the street.... silly Brits.

Oh, and did I mention the alcohol tax?

A View from Above

On the way home from my quick trip to KL last week we got to fly all the way around the island and had some amazing views of the city. When we first got here from the US, we arrived in the dark- so there wasn't much to see- but this time I basically got a free aerial tour of the whole country. Here are some of the best pictures.

This pretty much captures the whole country, and probably Malaysia in the distance. 

Downtown- to the left is Raffles Place, where we work- and to the right is the IR casino. 

The international waters outside of Singapore serve as the world's largest parking lot for empty boats. 

Boats, Boats, Empty boats everywhere. 

Just Your Average Sunday

Hello from sunny Singapore! We are having a lovely day relaxing by the Icon pool. 

Hope you are having a lovely Sunday in the states. 

Come visit us!!!

Kuala Lumpor, Malaysia

I had a quick trip to "KL" as they call it here this week and while most of it was spent in super fun meetings- I did get a chance to check out the famous twin Petronas twin towers- the highest twin towers in the world. I didn't go up in them- going up the Empire State Building once was enough tall buildings for a lifetime for me- but its pretty impressive from the outside!

Of course there is a mall underneath- what else would there be?

Singapore in Pictures

So, I have nothing too exciting to report. Its a rainy Saturday morning in Singapore and Dave is still sleeping off his hard week at work- so I thought I would post some pictures of the neighborhoods in Singapore that I haven't had a reason to post yet. The architecture here is astounding- its amazing to be that something so old and traditional, like the staircases on houses in Little India above meld seamlessly with the crazy modern towers downtown.

Laundry day at the public housing flats. 

Kindle Envy

Never once in my life have I been the person with the coolest new gadget- and I mean never. I never buy the newest "in" cell phone, I have never waited in line at the apple store to be the first to own anything, my computers are always run-of-the-mill, I even still own a VCR…. but here in Singapore- I am finally the cool kid with the fanciest toy anyone has ever seen. All thanks to my Kindle. It has been unbelievable the amount of attention that my Kindle draws in public. People strike up conversations with me on the subway, read over my shoulder while I am waiting in lines, even approach me while I am having lunch- all to ask about the book. Singaporeans pride themselves on being having the latest and greatest when it comes to technology- but amazingly eBooks haven't quite made it here- and Kindles in specific are not available here- so they are fascinated. You technically cannot even use your Kindle in Singapore, but we are currently exploiting a loophole in the system by keeping them registered in the US. Shhh- don't tell Amazon.

And while I am still totally in love with my Kindle, and it has improved my quality of life greatly since I received it as a gift last month (thanks again Linda!) it has become almost a hassle to use it in public places because people are so interested in it! I may need to come up with a disguise- or look less friendly. But I have to admit, it does *sort of* make me feel cool to tell my Kindle's adoring fans that, no, this baby is not available in the Sing.

Like/Dislike

It is inevitable when moving to a foreign place that there will be things that you find new and amazing, things that you find odd and things you find flat out infuriating. Our first weeks in Singapore were mainly full of the first two categories- "look at the funny building." "check out this amazing cheap food," "isn't it great that its always sunny here?"..... but, alas, the honeymoon is over and we now actually *live* in Singapore and some of the "isn't that so funny" moments have been replaced with "what the hell do these people think they are doing" moments. I thought I would share some of Singapore's most irritating attributes- but, since I live here now (at least for the next 1 year and 11 months) I will also do my best to also ponder the brighter side of living on the island.

Dislikes:

1) Every day the weather forecast on weather.com is "scattered thunderstorms." And yes, it rains almost everyday. The rain itself is actually not that bad- its a bit like Florida- its sunny, it becomes cloudy, it rains, then its sunny again. And constantly having to tote an umbrella is a bit tiresome- but what really drives me nuts is that no weather source can provide accurate information on WHEN they expect it to rain. Forecasting that it is going to rain in Singapore is sort of like forecasting that the sun is indeed going to rise, everyday. Thanks for the brilliant insight. What would be helpful is to know whether its going to rain between the hours of 10am and 8pm (not going to effect my day in the least) or whether there will be a downpour as I am leaving work sans umbrella.

2) Casual dining establishments (read: food courts and the like) do not provide napkins. Obviously nice restaurants provide normal napkins, but in a culture that really thrives on getting quick and delicious bites to eat at hawker stands and food courts- its annoying to have to remember to bring your own napkins. Now if you think that this has anything to do with environmental concerns you would be greatly mistaken. The locals are not a particularly environmentally friendly bunch. They carry around their drinks in strange little disposable plastic bags, because holding it with your hand would be tacky or something. They are not a big fan of re-useable water bottles. There is no inherently obvious way to recycle in our new building.... the list goes on. You are simply expected to carry around a little pack of tissues with you to serve as napkins for a reason that escapes me.

3) Worse than the fact that you have to carry your own napkins is that the offensive little napkin packages are then used as place holders on tables to reserve seats in over crowded dining areas. The food court idea is a little foreign to begin with- but easy to accept when you realize how cheap and amazing the food is- but the idea of "saving a seat" in a communal area is totally ridiculous. This results in the unassuming and non-napkin carrying westerners getting their food then wandering around for what seems like hours unable to find a single place for two adults to sit in the aircon and eat lunch because every seat is magically marked with annoying tissue packages. Irritating.

4) Being judged, verbally, by members of the service industry is totally normal. For example, today the partner at work took the new "fee earners" (yep- that's me, a fee earner- also an irritating nomenclature) to lunch at a local Thai place on Boat Quay. While the partner was ordering various dishes to be shared, the waitress was judging his decisions and telling him he was wrong. And not in a helpful way- but in a rude, pushy, "none of your damn business that I want both rice AND pad Thai" sort of way. After being berated for our choice of not one but two starches in our meal, we were also told that we were ordering too much food. Now this is not only bad marketing tactic but also r-u-d-e. Luckily, the partner, who is a long time Sing resident, is used to being treated with such brazen rudeness and proceeded to order as many starches as he wanted and as many dishes as he felt necessary. But yes, lady who works in the dim sum cart downstairs, sometimes I want TWO sesame balls and I do not need a side of sass with that. And yes, tea lady, I prefer to drink my water straight from the bottle- no glass necessary, and I like my tea best when its tepid, stop judging.

Alright, enough whining for one day- here are some things that are actually pretty cool about living in the Sing.

1) As mentioned, it is always sunny (except when its raining). Living in perpetual summer has its upsides. Yeah, its pretty hot here. But really, we are in the aircon most of the day so its not really a big deal. Everyday is the right day to go to the pool and if we were less lazy, everyday would be the right day to go to the beach, if we were so inclined to leave the pool. We are going to go out on a limb and guess that we are both tanner than anyone in New York right now- and will probably remain that way for the next 1 year and 11 months. The endless good weather also allows such luxuries as an outdoor gym in our apartment complex, never-ending ability to sport flip flops, never needing to wear tights, and a consistent year-round sunrise at exactly 7am.

2) Another benefit of the perpetual summer is that there is always inexpensive fresh fruit. I heart watermelon and not only are they practically free, but as far as I can tell, they are also always in season. The variety of fruit is impressive- many varieties that I cannot identify but plan to try anyways. Singapore also has the good sense to sell fresh cut fruit in food courts and commercial areas- so a stick of pineapple is never far away. And while we may not be eating many raspberries and blueberries, we will have as much dragonfruit, papaya, mango, rambutan, assorted melons and bananas as we can eat.

3) It is SO clean here. Before we got here everyone told us how clean and orderly things are here- but its really something you have to see to believe. The streets are clean. The subway is meticulous. The office I work in is kept miraculously clean all day. The locker room at the gym is cleaner than any locker room I have ever been in. People throw away their trash instead of dropping it where they please. You have no problem eating at hawker stands and food courts because they too are spotless. Clean is IN.

4) Singapore residents LOVE two things: eating and shopping (we like both too!)- and the two can be found, usually together, everywhere from plethora of malls to subway stations to the basement of every office building in town. Convenience is the name of the game here- so they put anything and everything you could need in close reach. In my office building, which is not particularly nice, there is a full food court, manicure salon, travel agent, doctors offices, clothing shops and more. In the nicer buildings there are all of those things and much and more. It’s a little strange at first to get used to mixed-commercial uses in what is primarily a professional office building- but as it turns out- its SO nice.
 
So this is life in a nutshell. In the average day I love and hate Singapore atleast 10 times. We are having a good time- don't worry- and we feel very luck to be here, we know its a special experience- but I wouldn't mind some good old napkins once in a while!
 
XoXo- Erin

The Sultan's Palace... and Being Unmanned with the Bamboo Knife

So, its been a busy week, but I had to write about this story we got out of our trip to Yogyakarta last week.  In the middle of the town is the Sultan's Palace, one of the sights on Erin's must-see list.  We get to the palace and hire a tour guide.  We were a bit excited for this one, palaces and such can be pretty cool.  We soon learn that the Sultan who lives here is only in charge of the Yogyakarta area, so its not really a big deal of a palace.

As we are walking around the palace, the tour guide is giving us stories of the traditions and ceremonies that happen in each of the spaces.  First there is the covered public ballroom type area that hosts the annual after Ramadan celebration.  Showing us this area somehow turned into the tour guide giving us just a little too much information about his family (his wife is catholic, so he celebrates Ramadan and Christmas in his house, just in case you were curious).

We continue through the palace to a display of some mannequins dressed in traditional Sultan-wear.  Including the princely outfit and the sultan's guard uniforms (Beefeaters these were not).

Ok, so you get the idea, we are on a tour of a palace, getting the run of the mill descriptions from the tour guide.  That is when we come to the part of the tour which focuses on the circumcision celebration.  There is a room in the palace just for this, and the tour guide gives us the rundown.  Apparently the circumcision of a prince is a public event held in the palace when the prince turns 14- but this hasn't happened in a while because the illustrious Sultan has 5 daughters. Sounds awkward for everyone involved. But it gets worse...  the bombshell, this tour guide guy decides to proudly tell us that he himself was circumcised when he was 10.... WITH A BAMBOO KNIFE.

I couldn't tell you what happened the rest of the tour, and I am now in pain again just reliving that moment.

Seriously.... A BAMBOO KNIFE?????

Here is our faithful tourguide. Doesn't Dave look thrilled to be learning about the colors of the pillar?

This is the hall of public circumcision. 

He really needed a cold Bintang after the experience. 

Lets Go Duke!

We got our cable installed JUST in time to watch the final four, and subscribed to a US sports network- so we are up at 8am on Easter morning to cheer on the blue devils! 

LETS GO DUKE!!!!!!!

10 Gopeng St.

We have had a busy, busy weekend getting moved out of corporate housing (one more load to go!) and in to our new apartment. We love it so far- its a convenient quick trip into work, the pool is great, we love the hot tubs on the 31st floor and we love love love our view of the harbour.

Here are the first pictures of the new place!

View of the pools looking down from our windows.

View of the harbour from the living room. 

More habourfront- you can see the outlaying islands out there in the distance. 

Living room- lovely rental furniture. 

Kitchen

This is our mini oven, will be interesting to see if all the american cookie trays will fit in there. But most apartments don't even have an oven! 

YAY- a washer and dryer! No dishwasher though....

View out of the kitchen to the dining room. The door in the back, with our lovely 5 dollar beach towels hung on it, is the "bomb shelter." No really, thats actually what it is. The story Dave heard is that when North Korea announced they had long range missile capability sufficient to reach Sing- the government decided to make all new construction have bomb shelters. The idea is that if the building were bombed- the rest might fall away but there would be all these lines of bombshelters still standing. Unfortunately for us, we live on the 34th foor, so this might be of limited utility. On the upside, its going to be an amazing storage closet. 

 Attention all future guests of Hotel Curtiss- Singapore- this is your future room. We will make every attempt to get a bed in there before someone comes to visit. 

Master bedroom closets. 

Master Bedroom (please overlook how messy it is- we underestimated the amount of dressers we might need for all of our clothes until ours arrive in May...so we are improvising)