An evening with Gary... Mabbutt

Saturday December 12 2009

Keith: It's been many years since I went for a drink on my own on a Saturday night, but with Courtney in San Francisco and every friend in Singapore mysteriously busy washing their hair, I found myself in a pub at Clarke Quay just before Christmas, alone aside from 100-odd members of the Singapore Spurs Supporters Club. We were there to meet the great Gary Mabbutt, former England centre half, Tottenham captain and the longest-serving Spurs player of his generation. Fresh from working on South Africa's 2010 World Cup bid (I know, I know, he's from Bristol - but his wife's South African) he was in town to promote a Spurs youth training program in Singapore - and also to watch a live feed of Spurs' home match against Wolves.

Super Gal walked into the bar to rapturous Spurs chants - which still sound a little odd delivered with a mild Chinese accent - and immediately shook hands with three Americans who'd pitched up for a quiet drink and had no clue who he was. To my surprise, he then turned to shake hands with me, at which point two decades of journalism experience kicked in and I uttered the most penetrating question I could think of ("Hi Gary, how are you?).

Gary proceeded to answer a bunch of questions, beginning with the short and pithy "Which knee was it, Gary?" a reference to the infamous own goal that lost us the 1987 Cup Final. There followed numerous anecdotes, including:

• He wouldn't name the worst player he'd turned out with, but did confirm what we all thought about Christian Gross as a manager. Apparently, Swiss-born Gross waltzed into the video room at the club early on in his (short) stint in charge and announced that no German team would let a lead slip the way Spurs had done on the previous match day. Result: the players marched out to the next training session whistling the Dambusters theme. (American readers - this refers to British heroics during World War Two when the RAF developed a 'bouncing bomb' and destroyed the Ruhr dams, shortly before the US single-handedly won the war and invented the concept of 'Freedom')
• Although he wouldn't name the worst player, he let slip how he was repeatedly kept out of the first team in his last season by Christian Gross's "love child" Ramon Vega...
• His favorite team-mates were Erik Thorstvedt, Jurgen Klinsmann and Gary Lineker
• Mysteriously, he doesn't think former Spurs center back Sol Campbell is a Judas b**tard who should be subsumed in the fires of eternal damnation for the way he deserted to the Ar*enal. Apparently Sol's also a good friend - still - and while Gary expected him to get stick for making the move, he didn't expect him to suffer the horrendous abuse he's endured from some fans since yadda yadda yadda
• He predicted Spurs would beat Wolves 3-1. Even at half-time, when we were 1-0 down. [Final score: 1-0 to Wolves]

The evening ended with a quiz, where I rightly shouted out the name of the Wimbledon player who fractured Gary's eye socket, but lost the prize to someone nearer the front who seemed to have a very fast Google connection on his mobile phone. But I did get Gary to sign my shirt afterwards.

As an aside, many of the questions were asked by a guy who turned out to be a presenter for an ESPN soccer show. I got chatting to him about Joe Morrisson, who presents the rival football channel on Singapore's Starhub cable service alongside expert soccer pundits such as, er, Carlton Palmer. Turns out Joe is actually based in Dubai, which did answer one question that's been bugging me all year - who the hell would pay Carlton Palmer to come all the way to Singapore to talk shite on TV? Now I'm just left trying to work out who the hell would pay Carlton Palmer to go all the way to Dubai to talk shite....

Hong Kong

Staying on the Spurs theme and plugging another hole in our not-so-comprehensive travel blog this year, here are some pics of the weekend Courtney and I flew to Hong Kong in August to join supporters from around Asia to watch Spurs' friendly match with South China, a top HK team. It was a great chance to spend time with Eric Mallia, an old friend from the Two Brewers pub near White Hart Lane, who helped arrange many of the festivities. Highlights included:

• Commandeering two trams, draping them in flags, and singing our way across Hong Kong city center on the Friday night. Turned out this enhanced Courtney's professional reputation no end: one of her HK work colleagues told her a few days later that she'd seen her on the top deck of a tram next to some gray-haired guy singing raucous songs and waving a beer can. I've told her to be more careful about the company she keeps
• Singing manically throughout the entire game, despite Spurs being shite, and much to the bemusement of the locals. The Sun (Britain's best-selling tabloid newspaper) caught us on camera - you can see me on the left of the picture about to pour a pint of beer over Courtney's head, with Eric on my right
• Sitting in the afternoon heat of the stadium, wondering why Hong Kong felt hotter than Singapore, and discovering afterwards it was 36/97 degrees. Courtney says it's the first time she's sat sweating through her shirt watching Spurs, which suggests she missed most of our relegation battles under Ramos
• Watching a warm-up game before the main fixture and booing a Thai team wearing the Ars*nal strip. A reasonable decision, as it happens - turns out they're a feeder club for the Gooners
• Spurs' manager Harry Redknapp waving at us and Jamie O'Hara coming over to clap us at the end of the game. Good to know the support is appreciated, given that supporters had flown in from all over Asia, as well as the UK. Sadly, Tom Huddlestone completely ignored us - maybe the ungrateful bastard was focusing all his attention on losing some weight.

All in all, a great weekend, only marginally impacted by the fact that South China scored more goals than we did.

A Little Bit of Culture, A Whole Lot of Malls

Courtney: When you live in a foreign country, it's important to get in the spirit of some of the local customs. There are some big cultural moments, like Chinese New Year, that have been an important part of our expat experience, but what really brings the place alive are the small serendipitous discoveries that bring a smile to your face (and your phone/camera out of your pocket).

The Hungry Ghosts Festival. Known to expats as that couple of weeks when you're likely to stumble upon metal barrels of billowing flames and smoke in the middle of the sidewalk. Known to the fire department as that couple of weeks when you say regular prayers that all fire extinguishers on the island have easy to understand Chinese language instructions on them.

The Chinese believe that every year, usually around September, the souls of the dead are freed from Hell and roam the earth. They put tables of food and sticks of incense out on the street and light fires to show their respect and ward off evil spirits. (Certain pockets of New Englanders have practiced something similar over the years as the Red Sox enter their usual fall death spiral, but this ritual was finally put to rest in 2004.)

This year I saw offerings ranging from bowls of Lucky Charms cereal to full feasts that would feed, well, a small island nation. On my walk home from work one day I was lucky enough to encounter this extravagance. You can't really see it well in this pic from my Blackberry, but that is a whole roast pig on the left hand side of the table. Should go nicely with the case of Australian Shiraz on the right.

The Opening of a New Mall. There's a buzz in the air as the opening date of a new real estate extravaganza approaches. This year it's for the new ION Mall on Orchard Road. Is it really true that the condos on top are going to sell for $1 million per square meter?? Is it really true that the grocery store on the 4th floor will sell truffle salt for $100 a jar? (I really miss my truffle salt - had to bequeath it to Aurelie when I left SF.) And most importantly, will Singapore finally break the global record for the largest number of Prada, Vuitton, and Cartier stores in 1 square mile?

Thanks to my time in Singapore I now know far more about clever mall design strategy than I ever dreamed possible. These malls are where most Singapore residents spend most of their free time and money, so they're a centerpiece of the economy and social life here. Let's take a look at the design of ION:

• There are 8 levels of shopping. You walk in off Orchard Road, past the water show with cool colored lasers, into an oasis of gorgeous marble floors, 30 foot ceilings, even an art gallery in there somewhere. But wait...not everyone gets the marble.
• 4 of the 8 shopping levels are below street level. They're for regular people and are therefore most easily accessible from the adjacent subway station. These look like any old American mall -- you half expect to see a JC Penney around the corner. Oh wait -- there's Dunkin Donuts!!!
• The mall's parking garage is located above the top 4 levels of super high end designer shopping, which forces people who are wealthy enough to own a car in Singapore (note that cars in Singapore cost 2x or more than the same models in the US, and that's before the high fees to put them on the road) to walk down to street level while being seduced by Marc Jacobs, Stella McCartney, Chloe, and more. Brilliant!!

Here's a shot of the velvet rope and bouncer outside of the new Vuitton store in ION to keep the rowdy folks in the queue under control. All in all, a casual visitor to Singapore strolling around malls on Orchard Road would conclude that 1) Singapore isn't nearly as congested as one would think for a tiny island housing nearly 5 million people and 2) everyone here dresses in high fashion labels because there doesn't seem to be anything else available.

Hint: take your closest escalator down and discover the hordes teeming beneath the streets. We're all eating donuts and wearing flip flops.

Sundays in Singapore

Monday September 14th 2009

Keith: Several people have asked just how different a typical weekend is in Singapore compared to San Francisco. This Sunday provided a few pointers:

Midnight Sat/Sun: Invite friends back home for drinks after dinner, and turn on TV to watch final 30 minutes of Arsenal losing to Manchester City. Suspect I may have erred with choice of entertainment when Shawn leaves abruptly at 00.10am in order to "spend more time with my new bathrobe"

00.15: Question wisdom of choice of full English Breakfast plus baked beans for dinner

00.31am: Celebrate when Spurs take unlikely lead against Manchester United. Spend next 89 minutes trying to refrain from deploying 'f' and 'c' words in polite company as United score three.

2.20am: Go to bed

8.00am: Use up entire backlog of 'f' and 'c' words after being woken by sound of hammering from Temple next door. Point out to everyone within 100-yard radius that if I wanted to get woken by construction every Sunday morning I'd have bought a f***ing tent and parked it on the f***ing Bay Bridge.

11am: Better rested, able to politely admire sound of drums, trumpets and song wafting in from second Temple on the other side of apartment

Noon: Finalize plans for my own non-denominational religious ceremony, beginning at 5am every morning with 15 cannons and an F-14 fly-past

1pm: Cater for newly-acquired love of salmon and tuna sushi, but remain suspicious of merits of accompanying shaves of ginger

4 - 4.30pm: Apply insect repellent and sunscreen; locate umbrella; change into synthetic clothing; hike 100 yards to Starbucks

8.00pm: Meet neighbor's smelly dog in elevator, hold breath for five floors

8.01-9.00pm: Enjoy impromptu sauna while losing to Courtney at tennis

9.30pm: Mourn the loss of Larry the baby Lizard, whose brief life comes to an untimely end after he hides next to the hinges on the inside of the bathroom door, failing to anticipate what will happen when the door closes. Muse on general lack of spatial awareness among inhabitants of Asia

9.31pm: Agree with Courtney that a squashed lizard stuck to the doorframe does indeed look disgusting

9.32pm: Point out to Courtney that since she shut the door - albeit unaware of Larry's presence - she should clear up the mess. Dig out 'trailing spouse' contract to reference absence of clauses relating to handling of reptile carcasses

9.40: Eat fabulous spaghetti meatballs, accompanied by surprisingly modest quantities of wine

12.30-2am: Watch US Open.

As you can see, it really is a unique tropical experience...

Glass three quarters full

Saturday June 20th, 2009

Keith: As everyone knows, God created the world in six days. On the seventh day, while taking a well-earned rest, no doubt He or She basked for a moment in the warm glow of satisfaction that comes from a job well done. And why not? Light, sea, earth, fruit-bearing trees, birds and fish and mammals, the tragically-flawed Adam and the comically over-credulous Eve - pretty bloody impressive stuff in anyone's book. Certainly a shit-load more than I've ever created in a week - although in fairness, I don't think He ever had to set aside time to deal with the Internal Revenue Service or Comcast.

I wonder though, whether there was also the odd regret on that first Sunday. Did He weigh up how he'd built the penguin and think - let's be honest, I got the aerodynamics arse about tit on that one? Did He look at the cockroach, the bed bug and those fancy little poodles with the shaved body and frizzed up heads and think - nope, they don't really add much value, do they? Did He ever actually taste Marmite? And did He have an inkling - just an inkling - that the French would turn out to be a wee bit difficult?

And what about the things He didn't create? I don't want to be critical, but if I was designing the human body today I'd make a few functionality adjustments. Body odor would be out, for starters. The knee could do with a complete redesign. And wouldn't it be great if you could wake up in the morning, tweak your left nipple and instantly cure a hangover? Small things, I know - but my point is that even great ideas can be improved.

And similar sentiments apply - albeit via a rather circuitous route - to Singapore. While it burst onto the scene in its present incarnation in slightly less spectacular fashion than, say, the creation of 50 million species and the Pacific Ocean, it nonetheless represents a pretty impressive achievement. It's the safest place to live in Asia. It's (arguably) the world's busiest port. It's got some of the best healthcare on the planet. Despite being in the tropics, it's virtually eradicated killer diseases such as malaria. It's got the widest choice of food in the region. It's been voted the best place in the world to do business. And it shows every single English Premiership game, the entire Twenty20 cricket championship and all the rugby internationals. You can even get chocolate digestives. What's not to like?

Well, a couple of things actually. Of course, it's not for us as guests of a country to talk about how we'd run things differently, but after my experiences over the last few days I have a few humble requests:

1. Introduce a minimum walking speed in shopping malls. If you've ever walked around in a hot Asian country you'll know phrases like 'high speed', 'sense of purpose', 'straight line' and 'respect for personal space' don't exactly pepper the conversation. Of course, it's perfectly reasonable to dawdle in the midday sun - but no-one seems to have worked out that you can touch speeds of 3-4 mph in aircon without breaking into a sweat. And better still, you get there quicker.

2. Ban building work on a Saturday. When it comes to its passion for construction, Singapore puts Donald Trump and the entire US fiscal stimulus package to shame. My ideal Saturday morning is a long lie-in after a hard week's work, with breakfast in bed and a copy of the New York Times - not getting woken up at 8am by a jack hammer as the guys next door start rebuilding their temple.

3. Finally - and a tall order this one - any chance you can do something about the humidity? There may well come a time in my old age when biological inadequacies force me to spend my entire life wringing out my underpants - I really don't see the need to start practising now.

Langkawi

Langkawi retrospective, June 11th

Keith: And finally, with the speed of a tortoise on Prozac, the elegance of a hippopotamus on roller blades, the single-mindedness of a goldfish with ADD and the heart-wrenching pointlessness of a skunk marketing roll-on deodorant, we present a selection of photos from our not-so-recent weekend in Langkawi. 

For those unfamiliar with the geography of South-East Asia - and frankly, I count myself among you - Langkawi is a small, beautiful tropical island off the coast of northern Malaysia/Southern Thailand, little more than an hour's flight from Singapore. After our city trips to Hong Kong, Tokyo, and in Courtney's case, Beijing, it was our first beach weekend away since we arrived in Asia. In fact, it marked many firsts in our seven years together:

• First time we've made weekend breakfast two mornings in a row
• First time we've sat in a hotel room at night hearing something hammering at the balcony doors, laughed at the thought that it might be a wild monkey, then gagged at the realization that it's a flying cockroach
• First time that my generalized anxiety about the sky falling on my head has mutated into a more specific fear about coconuts falling from palm trees

So the photo on the right shows the fabulous view from our hotel room - and below are a few more.

And a special bonus - here are Courtney's pics from the Singapore Jurong Bird Park, where we spent a splendid Sunday afternoon before I flew to San Francisco. Among the flamingoes, tropical rainforest inhabitants, owls, storks, cranes and American Bald Eagle, our favorite bit was the dinosaur descendants section. Best bird of the lot - the huge and comical cassowary. The shoebill crane is pretty wacky looking too.

We also got friendly with the emus.

More updates coming soon from San Francisco and Taipei...

Tropical Storms

April 2nd 2009

Keith: How many people in Singapore are made of rubber? I only ask after watching another lightning storm roll in earlier this week and seeing our neighbors carry on swimming with their kids, clearly oblivious to the fact that the two things you really don't want to see in a swimming pool are children peeing and electricity. 

It was a similar story when Courtney and I got caught in a spectacular storm over brunch at Dempsey Road two weeks ago. In an hour of deafening thunder, with sheets of rain bouncing off the street and a black sky lit by fork lightning from multiple directions, most people took cover - but one or two donned their rubber flipflops and took their lives into their hands.

Given that Singapore boasts one of the world's highest rates of lightning, with thunder 171 days each year, chances are reasonably high that we'll see someone getting fried while we're here. It's a potent mix: small island, densely populated, penchant for tropical storms, attracts the kinds of expats who see a python in the local park and decide to take their pet chihuahua for a closer look. So in the interests of public safety - and happy to try anything to ward off that unmistakeable stench of burning hair - I'm hoping the following might help: 

Tropical Storms: Six hints and tips

1. Avoid tall trees. Not only does lightning tend to hit the tallest thing first and fry everything around it, but you'll also get hit by falling debris. To survive a lightning strike but then be killed by a smack on the head from a coconut is going to make for some very conflicted eulogies at your memorial service. 

2. Being in water is a no-no. Bear in mind that swimming pool water tends to be flat, so anything sticking out of it - like your head - will be the tallest thing in the vicinity and a potential target. Water's also a good conductor of electricity - so even if the person next to you has a bigger head and gets fried first, you'll still get the side flash. 

3. Your flip-flops will not protect you. Trust me. This stuff's come a long way down and it's on a mission.

4. When you take cover indoors, try to stay away from anything plugged into external grids, including the electric power supply and telephone. The US National Weather Service tells the story of Cheryl, who was hit by lightning at home while calling her husband on a fixed line phone - to warn him about the coming storm. Aside from the seizures she's suffered ever since, what's particularly unfortunate is that being an American she has no grasp of irony and can't therefore appreciate the true beauty of her own story. 

5. The USNWS also recommends that you stay away from plumbing and water. I'm not entirely sure how lightning gets round the u-bend but this would imply that while you sit out the storm, you do need to make some sensible decisions about what it is you actually sit on.

6. Finally, if you find safe shelter and the storm lasts more than ten minutes, do not succumb to boredom and make a run for it under the cover of your golf umbrella. Sure, the odds of getting hit by lightning are small - but if you think about it, standing in open ground holding a metal rod above your head does raise the stakes somewhat. It's a bit like walking into a bar in Buenos Aires during Maradona's 'difficult' years and loudly declaring that he's a cheating little cokehead with bad hair and an ego twice the size of the Falkland Islands. It's quite possible that you won't get punched in the face - but why would you take the risk?

Next week: The benefits of keeping your eyes open while driving

Channeling Gordon Ramsay

Saturday, March 28, 2009

Courtney: During the cultural training course we attended before leaving the US, we were warned that our honeymoon period with our new home would end after about 2 months, leaving us desperate for fresh tomatoes, affordable French wine and fog.  At that point, we would, we were told, start being critical of everything about our new city and culture and comparing it ruthlessly and unfairly with everything back home.  Not us -- we were ruthless in our criticism and our feelings of superiority right from the start. 

What's the top universally expat-maddening thing in Singapore, you ask?  Customer service, especially at restaurants.  Admittedly, we hail from a foodie city, and we've been fortunate to dine at many of its best restaurants, where both the food and the service are world-class.  (Though we still haven't made it to the French Laundry, where they believe that "service should feel like a ballet," train their waiters in professional dance techniques to teach them grace and balance, and calculate the optimal distance to stand from a dining patron -- variable, of course, depending on the height of the server and the girth of the customer. Fortunately most American tourists in the Bay Area don't make it any further north than Fisherman's Wharf.)  But I like to think we're quite reasonable in our expectations of service, particularly when these places are clearly trying to attract expats who are married to people who don't like Asian food and happily charge top dollar for providing an alternative to hawker center fare.  

You'd think Gordon Ramsay would have shown up by now to try to make his next millions on restaurant makeovers here...but given that it's considered very unseemly to get loud or swear, he might not be the right cultural fit.  So let me channel him, F-bomb free, for this post, with advice for restaurant and cafe owners island-wide.  (Please note that this list has been extensively researched, aided by the fact that we were stuck in corporate housing for a month and had to eat out nearly every night.  Each recommendation is based on experiencing the problem at at least 3 different restaurants and confirming with at least 2 other expats that they have been similarly tormented.)

1. Don't teach your servers to earnestly repeat the customer's order out loud after taking it down...and then forget to reinforce the part of the lesson about actually getting the order right.

2.  Don't close the kitchen without asking us if we want dessert or coffee or both.  Keith tried to challenge this system one evening at one of Singapore's nicer Italian restaurants, standing on principle to demand a cheese plate after the kitchen staff were all at home asleep in bed.  The result was a platter of functional cheese -- a hunk of parmesan, a block of pecorino romano, and mound of something like ricotta -- that the waiter had desperately thrown together to prevent an encounter with the side of Keith's personality that's usually only on display when the homeless guys come in and start hassling the bartender chick at the Hyde Out.  

3. Don't hire 20 servers and think that this represents a visible commitment to providing excellent customer service.  Trust us -- we're way more likely to get annoyed when we see 20 20-something waiters gabbing together at the cash register than we are if there's only 2 supremely harried but generally well-meaning and hard-working servers.  

4. Don't offer "starters" and "main courses" if you're actually planning to deliver the plates to various people at the table at random moments throughout a 45 minute period.  Just call it tapas and embrace the fact that maybe timing isn't one of the core competencies of your kitchen staff.  

5. Don't avoid giving the customer disappointing news. (Note: this is tendency we've seen in much of our Asia travels, and you can imagine that in arenas other than food -- like, say, health care -- it might cause real problems.)  If you've run out of tomatoes for a BLT, please don't show up with a bacon and lettuce sandwich and then ask if we want more lettuce to make up for the fact that there's no tomatoes.  Or, in an all time classic, don't think you can, without telling us, substitute squid ink pasta for regular pasta in a pasta dish that's been ordered out of desperation/frustration/starvation because you've managed to screw up our steak three times.  It's not the same.  Really.  Just give us a cheese plate.