Singapore 2010 #1
“What was the movie you liked?” W asks. Sorry, I can’t remember – I see ‘em one minute, forget ‘em the next.
Kara is the office manager of the Singapore college where we teach. Her son Jac picks us up Monday at 1am – the taxi whizzing us through somnolent streets and depositing us at the foot of our apartment building. Up up up, to the 13th floor (top), and into a beautiful 3-bdrm. condo http://www.singaporeexpats.com/singapore-property-pictures/condo/elias-green.htm. We’ll share it with our two kids (Kirsten and Jonathan), who plan to arrive at the same unearthly hour tomorrow, and another lecturer who will be here for a week or two later in the month.
We sleep through the night and wake refreshed. Jac left cereal and bread. One slice for me before I head to the pool around 9am. The pool is four touching circles of water. One sphere is a wading pool for kids, and there’s an annoying concrete island to avoid, but it’s big enough, shaded so there is no water glare, and warm. (My guess, judging from our home swim-spa, is that ambient temperature keeps it at 84oF. Nice!)
Kara picks us up at 11.30 for a Korean BBQ in a nearby mall. A round central grill is set into the tabletop, with a gas burner heating it from underneath. Water is poured into the steel bowl sitting directly above the burner. The boiling “soup” is flavored by everything tossed into it, prawns, fungus (mushroom strips), vegetables, and noodles. We dip our forks and chopsticks into the boil to catch food and to sanitize the utensils between eating and touching raw meats.
What’s for lunch? We select from trays of raw, marinated meats and seafood waiting to be cooked on our grill, dim sum, deep-fried fish and chicken, fruits and vegetables to be eaten raw or boiled in the table soup, and a variety of rice and noodles. I have enough with one plateful from the buffet. By the time I’m done “cooking” lunch, I’m stuffed. W and Kara go back for seconds.
“Do you like the fungus?” asks Kara. “Some foreigners object to the name.” Oh yes, they are delicious, those rubbery mushroomy strips with dark flavors that round out the soup.
Oh wait! There are two tables of Indonesian pastries and ice desserts (jellies and fruits poured over shaved ice). I sample a few bites, along with a sweet slice of watermelon.
We find out on the way home that it’s Kara’s day off, though she’s spending it with us. (I can’t believe the hospitality and kindness of Singaporeans.) W and I are dropped off for our siesta at 2pm. It feels good to lie down and rest our full tummies.
By 3, I’m up and reworking the class handouts that our home printer rejected when it “gave up the ghost” on Thursday. (Parts arriving this week, in Seattle. Sigh, stress I didn’t need.)
By 4, W is awake and out the door to buy coach tickets for our trip to KL, Malaysia, this weekend. I look at class notes and finish prep for tomorrow’s sessions. Only 3 hours a day this week; the church is having a fasting week for missions so the schedules are off. Next week we’ll be in class 7 hours a day to make up for lost time. I’ve planned a variety of class projects and they will presenting a lesson as well. That should keep them awake, believe me.
We’ve been asked to come back next year, maybe teaching here or at the branch campus in Malaysia. Negotiations are underway for sessions in other areas of the world, too. W is thinking of presenting a paper in Europe next year, so we’ll see. I’d appreciate being able to present the same class twice, rather than prepping another new course.
W returns at 7, and we head out to White Sands Mall. The shuttle from the complex to the local neighborhood malls runs every 20 minutes during the day. Regularly scheduled lunch and coffee breaks for the driver interrupt the timing, and after 7pm it runs on the hour. We need a few things for the flat, peanut butter for breakfasts in, a mirror to see the back of my head if I’ve slept a crease into my hair, an exercise mat to soften the ceramic tiles, shampoo, Kleenex, and Q-tips.
We buy two kinds of noodles from a vendor putting things away for the day: total $1.60S (or $1.00 US) for both of us. We decide against buying sauce from a neighboring vendor and amble over to the shuttle spot. It probably runs at 9.09pm, we think, since we arrived at 7.09. Instead, we see it parked and ready to go. The door closes as we near the back bumper of the shuttle, and it begins to pull away. Reflex kicks in and I whistle loudly. A few whistles actually, running toward the front door.
The driver, sitting streetside, can’t see us. Two security guards taking a break beside the stop exclaim at the racket, flinging their hands up, and the driver pulls to a stop. He opens the door so we can clamber on, relieved. When we get back to the flat, W checks the schedule. We caught the last shuttle of the day. Thank God.
“Way to go with the whistle, though we could have walked it (2 miles),” W says. We slowly wander across the complex to our flat. Families are having barbecues at the #2 Barbecue Pit beside the children’s playground. School-aged children play and run in the dark. They’ll be up at 7 to head for school in the morning.
Both of us are happy to let ourselves in the door just after 9pm. We eat about 1/3 each of the noodles and wrap the rest for the fridge. By the time we unpack, put things away, and do email, it’s closer to 10.30. W sets us our phones with a local SIM card and dials in the numbers for contacts at the college. First day is done. We love the climate and can’t wait to share Singapore with the kids!
