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.