Monday January 19th 2008
Keith: Two weeks gone, 76 to go. Not that I'm counting, you understand. Every day's an eye-opener. Every evening's a bottle-opener.
It would be an exaggeration to say that our senses have been bombarded with new sights, smells, sounds and touches in Singapore - particularly the touches, given the preventive measures I'm taking against SARS, bird flu and Hepatitis B. But there have been a lot of surprises. Here are our Top Ten.
1. It's not as hot or humid as we expected. In fact, I sweated more in New York last summer. On the other hand, this is what passes for winter.
2. I haven't died yet. No sign at all of Dengue Fever, Hepatitis A/B/C, cholera, malaria or typhoid. In fact, it appears I can't even get the last three in Singapore. Even the water's safe to drink.
3. They deliver McDonalds to your home. We met the delivery guy in the elevator yesterday. Can you imagine, as much lard as you want without having to stretch down to put your shoes on or do that long walk from the parking lot to the fast-food counter. What a country.
4. Despite (3) above, most Asians do not have large arses.
5. You can get American and European brands just as cheap as at home - like Laughing Cow cheese, Skippy peanut butter and Ariel non-biological washing powder for sensitive skin (leaves behind a pleasant sensation of almond milk and honey freshness).
6. The bread oxymoron. On the one hand, the bread tastes like shite because they pump it full of preservatives. On the other, it goes mouldy within two days. That's a national tragedy.
7. Alcohol is eye-poppingly expensive. My first pint out cost S$15 - about US$10 or GBP7. Last time I paid that much for a beer I got a free lapdance.
8. Every new apartment has a bomb shelter. Is there something they didn't tell us?
9. When you buy a 40" TV at S$200 off the list price, they throw a S$600 home entertainment system in free of charge. But you still have to pay S$20 for delivery and S$6 for the cables.
10. Spurs are just as crap here as they were when I watched them in San Francisco. Yet whenever I go to London they win the Carling Cup. How does that work?
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Saturday, January 17, 2009
The commuter lifestyle
9pm, Saturday, January 17, 2009
Courtney: Guess what I miss the least about life in SF? My clock radio issuing gentle hits of the 80s (or, from Thanksgiving onward, Christmas muzak) at 6:15am to rouse me for the trudge down 101. Guess what's entertained me most this week (apart from reading Keith's blogposts)? The commuting idiosyncracies of our new island hosts.
(First, insert applause/back-pats here for my valiant efforts to go local and get a pre-paid commuter pass for the trains AND then actually use it most mornings and evenings this week. When taxis to the office are less than US$5 and I really want to wear high heels and long clothing that protects me from the Arctic temperatures in the generously AC-ed office, it's reeeeeally tempting to skip the warm 10 minute walk to the MRT (subway) and head straight for the taxi stand.)
The commute is probably most notable for what it lacks in comparison to commutes I've experienced in New York, London, and San Francisco.
Courtney: Guess what I miss the least about life in SF? My clock radio issuing gentle hits of the 80s (or, from Thanksgiving onward, Christmas muzak) at 6:15am to rouse me for the trudge down 101. Guess what's entertained me most this week (apart from reading Keith's blogposts)? The commuting idiosyncracies of our new island hosts.
(First, insert applause/back-pats here for my valiant efforts to go local and get a pre-paid commuter pass for the trains AND then actually use it most mornings and evenings this week. When taxis to the office are less than US$5 and I really want to wear high heels and long clothing that protects me from the Arctic temperatures in the generously AC-ed office, it's reeeeeally tempting to skip the warm 10 minute walk to the MRT (subway) and head straight for the taxi stand.)
The commute is probably most notable for what it lacks in comparison to commutes I've experienced in New York, London, and San Francisco.
- No homeless guys!!! Absolutely no need to exercise my SF-honed skills for recognizing the breath-holding radius for avoiding various biological odors.
- No frantic dashes up or down staircases or tunnels in the event that you're JUST ABOUT TO MISS THE TRAIN even though you're still about half a mile away and couldn't really tell anyway. When the trains come every 2 minutes and you're sure to get on, there's really no point rushing. (Oh, and did we mention it's hot?)
- No noise. Seriously. In the stations, on the platforms, in the trains...just the gentle patter of feet.
- Any chaos of any description. People literally stand in orderly lines up and down the length of the train cars. The etiquette is to face the windows in the direction of the station platform (as opposed to the wall of the tunnel). I initially resisted this because it's just weird, but then Friday evening I discovered with some alarm that I had fallen into the pattern unthinkingly. So that's how it happens...wonder what else is going to happen to us that way...
- Cleanliness and air conditioning as far as the eye can see!
- Station attendants who guide us along the platform so the trains will be evenly distributed with passengers.
- Painted lines/arrows on the platforms in front of each set of subway car doors showing where you should allow passengers to exit. People really do line up where they're supposed to!
10 minutes later I was hungry again
9pm, Saturday, January 17, 2009
Keith: The last twelve days have proved what everyone told me before we arrived - it's quite possible to live in Singapore and not eat a bite of Asian food.
Until today, it's fair to say I've not been overly adventurous. Frosties/frosted flakes and a few cups of tea for breakfast. Ham sandwich and cheese for lunch. We've pushed the boat out a few times for dinner - pasta, pizza, steak sandwich, that sort of thing. But once I'd discovered a wine bar within 100m of the corporate apartment and an English/French all-day brunch five minutes along the river, I considered the food chapter of the trip complete.
Courtney seems to have other ideas, however, and when we met two new local friends for lunch today, we decided to go Chinese. To be fair to my hosts, I should probably have alerted them to my shellfish allergy before we chose dim sum. Or is it dum sim? Anyway, since one of its chief ingredients is shrimp, I was a bit stuffed - or not, as it turned out. Shrimp balls, shrimp fried rice, scallop (stuffed with shrimp), shrimp dumpling... And then some shrimp for dessert. Courtney ate it all and I'm told it was fantastic.
I had to make do with some beef noodles and a couple of cabbage leaves. I did have a brief foray into the coffee-flavored pork ribs, but quickly discovered they'd taken a very literalist approach to the 'rib' component, majoring on the bone and gristle while removing the actual meat. No doubt that turned up in someone's else's fabulous pork and shrimp specialty.
So if you happened to be passing the Archway shopping mall in Singapore late on Saturday afternoon and saw me devouring a chocolate eclair and a latte, you know why.
Incidentally, our hosts were incredibly friendly, treating us to lunch and then giving us a quick tour through Chinatown and Little India. Both Chinese, they also have a completely different perspective on geopolitics than the Brits and Americans. With its majority Chinese population, Singapore apparently offers a respite from the discrimination many Chinese suffer in Malaysia and elsewhere. Inevitably, this triggered a discussion about the role of China in global politics - followed by a short and somewhat alarming diversion into Israel and the Palestinians. I'm not quite sure of the link, but I sensed we were on different sides of the political divide. One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter, as they say: and one man's rocket is another man's excuse to bomb the crap out of his next-door neighbor, as I managed to avoid saying. Once we get to know them better I'm sure we'll be engaging in hearty debate - with any luck, over a nice French dinner.
Keith: The last twelve days have proved what everyone told me before we arrived - it's quite possible to live in Singapore and not eat a bite of Asian food.
Until today, it's fair to say I've not been overly adventurous. Frosties/frosted flakes and a few cups of tea for breakfast. Ham sandwich and cheese for lunch. We've pushed the boat out a few times for dinner - pasta, pizza, steak sandwich, that sort of thing. But once I'd discovered a wine bar within 100m of the corporate apartment and an English/French all-day brunch five minutes along the river, I considered the food chapter of the trip complete.
Courtney seems to have other ideas, however, and when we met two new local friends for lunch today, we decided to go Chinese. To be fair to my hosts, I should probably have alerted them to my shellfish allergy before we chose dim sum. Or is it dum sim? Anyway, since one of its chief ingredients is shrimp, I was a bit stuffed - or not, as it turned out. Shrimp balls, shrimp fried rice, scallop (stuffed with shrimp), shrimp dumpling... And then some shrimp for dessert. Courtney ate it all and I'm told it was fantastic.
I had to make do with some beef noodles and a couple of cabbage leaves. I did have a brief foray into the coffee-flavored pork ribs, but quickly discovered they'd taken a very literalist approach to the 'rib' component, majoring on the bone and gristle while removing the actual meat. No doubt that turned up in someone's else's fabulous pork and shrimp specialty.
So if you happened to be passing the Archway shopping mall in Singapore late on Saturday afternoon and saw me devouring a chocolate eclair and a latte, you know why.
Incidentally, our hosts were incredibly friendly, treating us to lunch and then giving us a quick tour through Chinatown and Little India. Both Chinese, they also have a completely different perspective on geopolitics than the Brits and Americans. With its majority Chinese population, Singapore apparently offers a respite from the discrimination many Chinese suffer in Malaysia and elsewhere. Inevitably, this triggered a discussion about the role of China in global politics - followed by a short and somewhat alarming diversion into Israel and the Palestinians. I'm not quite sure of the link, but I sensed we were on different sides of the political divide. One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter, as they say: and one man's rocket is another man's excuse to bomb the crap out of his next-door neighbor, as I managed to avoid saying. Once we get to know them better I'm sure we'll be engaging in hearty debate - with any luck, over a nice French dinner.
Apartments and supermarkets
3pm, Thursday January 8th 2009
Courtney: Third full day well under way now, and an interesting mix of discoveries.
Courtney: Third full day well under way now, and an interesting mix of discoveries.
First and most tragically, there is no crusty french bread available in singapore...too humid. Apparently you can try but during the 4 minute walk home it all goes mushy again. C'est la vie -- guess we'll have to eat naan.
We spent the last two days apartment hunting, and today we had a fantastic day -- we now have three on our short list, and one that we love love love. It's in the same hood as our current corporate apartment (Robertson Quay) and is walking distance to a great area of pubs and restaurants where they pull down tv screens and watch English football outside in the evenings. It also has a balcony that opens off the whole front of the living room with huge doors that open all the way so it feels like half our living room is in the open air. And there's even a tennis court! the condo website is here and has some great pictures.
Walking distances here are very funny. Basically if it's over a 10 minute walk, it's not considered walking distance because you get too sweaty. 10 minutes is a long walk. People literally measure distances from subway stations and grocery stores in 1 minute increments - the difference in sweat between 5 and 7 minutes is substantial, especially if you're on your way to work. Oscar, one of the guys on my team who just arrived from California, told me that his 10 minute walk to the subway is the worst part of his day -- no hyperbole!! We're having a lucky stretch of weather so far...it's not too hot or overwhelmingly humid, but it's still pretty warm. You get to a point if you haven't had anything to drink in a couple of hours that you just get really crabby and yucky feeling.
On the food front, I'm astounded by the variety of American and British food available. We ate Buitoni refrigerated pasta (cheese ravioli) for dinner last night in our apartment, just like we do at home sometimes. Shockingly most of the American food is less expensive than the local grocery store in San Francisco, which makes me think these companies jack up the prices for us in expensive cities. So as a result I don't think it will be any more expensive for us to cook Western here than to cook at home in the US. and if Keith starts eating Asian food, we'll save loads of money...he has promised to eat one Asian meal a week. Today he even said he might be open to eating some beginner sushi!!!!
So tomorrow (Friday) we'll view our top 3 apartments one more time and I'll go into the office for the first time for a few hours of meetings. Hopefully we can get the keys to our new place in a couple of weeks so we can start getting all the TV and wireless and all that stuff set up soon and get out of the small and dark corporate apartment we're currently crammed into! (The main upside of our corp apt was that we were able to special order The Football Channel for the TV and now have 24 hour a day access to the Premier League, Carling Cup, and other footie joys.)
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Life 'n Seoul
6pm, January 5th 2009
Keith: If I'm honest, I was relieved and slightly surprised to land in Seoul after our 12-hour flight from San Francisco. Think how many potential wrong turns we could have taken en route with just a little lapse of concentration from the pilot - yet our guy got us not just to the right country, but to the right airport, the right runway and the right gate. Amazing. If he'd drifted just a fraction off course over China and put down in Pyongyang, we'd be writing this from the gulag and sporting Dear Leader haircuts.
Oddly, we had to go through security after landing in Seoul - you'd think they'd know there's a limit to how many weapons you can assemble on board an aircraft with an in-flight magazine, a pair of headphones and a slice of processed cheese. But it did give me my first experience of being wanded by a female Korean security official after my belt buckle set the metal detector pinging. And it's true - you really can't overstate the benefits of a good wanding after a long flight.
Our one hour stopover passed very quickly. Highlight for Courtney was a restroom break (she doesn't do aircraft toilets) and our 20-minute search for the Dunkin Donuts (we found it: it was shut). Highlight for me was my near-miss experience with the local water supply, just stopping a drop getting in my mouth while I freshened up and thereby heading off a certain dose of cholera. The ensuing anxiety-related meltdown was my second of the day, following a miserable display of grief prior to going through security at SFO when it dawned on me that the last thing I wanted to do that morning was emigrate to Singapore. Only the sheer embarrassment of giving up so early in the trip got me onto the plane - that and the thought that I'd have to repay everyone for the farewell drinks they bought us if I bailed out. Courtney was very patient. Quite right too - the whole thing's her fault.
Anyway, an hour after landing in Seoul we were reboarding for our six-hour flight to Singapore. One country done, nine to go. At this rate. we'll be home by Easter.
Keith: If I'm honest, I was relieved and slightly surprised to land in Seoul after our 12-hour flight from San Francisco. Think how many potential wrong turns we could have taken en route with just a little lapse of concentration from the pilot - yet our guy got us not just to the right country, but to the right airport, the right runway and the right gate. Amazing. If he'd drifted just a fraction off course over China and put down in Pyongyang, we'd be writing this from the gulag and sporting Dear Leader haircuts.
Oddly, we had to go through security after landing in Seoul - you'd think they'd know there's a limit to how many weapons you can assemble on board an aircraft with an in-flight magazine, a pair of headphones and a slice of processed cheese. But it did give me my first experience of being wanded by a female Korean security official after my belt buckle set the metal detector pinging. And it's true - you really can't overstate the benefits of a good wanding after a long flight.
Our one hour stopover passed very quickly. Highlight for Courtney was a restroom break (she doesn't do aircraft toilets) and our 20-minute search for the Dunkin Donuts (we found it: it was shut). Highlight for me was my near-miss experience with the local water supply, just stopping a drop getting in my mouth while I freshened up and thereby heading off a certain dose of cholera. The ensuing anxiety-related meltdown was my second of the day, following a miserable display of grief prior to going through security at SFO when it dawned on me that the last thing I wanted to do that morning was emigrate to Singapore. Only the sheer embarrassment of giving up so early in the trip got me onto the plane - that and the thought that I'd have to repay everyone for the farewell drinks they bought us if I bailed out. Courtney was very patient. Quite right too - the whole thing's her fault.
Anyway, an hour after landing in Seoul we were reboarding for our six-hour flight to Singapore. One country done, nine to go. At this rate. we'll be home by Easter.
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