written and directed by Rob
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| Happy to have all her favorite toys :) |
It’s been a
big few weeks, as you can probably tell from this 10-page blog post. Right after I wrote last, we received our sea
shipment. This is the majority of our things that we had sent over from the US.
It took 7 weeks to get here, which is actually pretty quick. It was long enough
for us to forget much of what we sent…so it was sort of like Christmas when we
opened each box (too bad all the toys were for Avery). We sent a ton of food
and toiletries because we were scared of doing without. Just as we suspected,
we sent too much stuff here, but somehow we’ve been able to find ways to
creatively store it all (yes, all 8 jugs of peanut butter).
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| Oh no! Put it back in the box! |
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| Hmmm...not so bad. |
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| Happy birthday, mama! |
We
celebrated a couple of big holidays, most importantly Carly’s birthday!! We went
to Sentosa, which is a resort island in Singapore. There are activities on the
island for all interests and ages (even adults), and they even have a Universal
Studios. We rode a cable car over to the island, splashed it up in the water
park, swam in the ocean, ate lunch on the beach and still had time to feed
stingrays in the aquarium. For anybody visiting Singapore, I highly recommend
going to Sentosa (after visiting us, of course). The highlight of our day was
sitting at lunch as a family…looking out at the ocean…realizing we’re only 15
minutes from our house. Happy birthday, Carly
J
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| Cable cars from the future |
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| Sentosa from up high |
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| Merlion spotting |
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OK...maybe a bit overwhelming
for a 2 year old |
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Walking to the "southernmost
point of continental Asia" |
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Looks happy now, but if you could hear
the scream when the stingrays came to feed... |
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| Pinchy crab |
We also
celebrated a great Thanksgiving. It’s obviously not very popular out here since
it’s an American holiday, but most people do know that it’s happening (probably
because US business partners aren’t working, the US stock market is closed
and/or they see the giant parade on the news). Being a stay-at-home dad at the
time, my contact with the outside world was more limited, so I thought it was
actually on the 29
th until Carly let me know the day before!
Fortunately, we were invited to a big Thanksgiving dinner with our friend Russ
Dalby, his family and some of their neighbors. Even though it couldn’t replace
our family or 2 days off of work, we were very grateful to spend the holiday
with good friends and good food.
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| Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown |
We’re slowly
getting into the Christmas spirit here, too, even though it’s over 90 degrees
every day. One thing we did not pack in our sea shipment was a single Christmas
decoration. But I mentioned in a prior blog that Christmas is relatively big
here, so we didn’t have trouble finding some small decorations for our condo (that
can be easily stored after Christmas – thanks, IKEA J). We can’t say that this
Christmas will be like any before, but when is that ever the case? Avery is
already in the Christmas spirit singing Jingle Bells and We Wish You a Merry
Christmas.
In other
news, after 9 weeks off, I’m back at work as of Monday. All in all, it’s going really
well…but we’ll see after my duties are fully transitioned to me (sounds like
there’s a TON of complexity in the Asia Pacific region). Our biggest concern
from the beginning was Avery’s transition and Jennifer has been great these
past few days. As we suspected, she’s able to handle it all – Avery, Scout,
cleaning, shopping, cooking…we really lucked out! And here is something we’re
slowly getting used to - Carly and I work in the same building…on the same
floor…within 10 yards of each other.
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Get comfy in your booster seat...
fish feeding could take awhile |
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Avery singing "happy birthday"
to the giraffes |
An update on
Avery – she’s adjusting very well. Her swimming is getting better and better
every week. She’s at least in the pool 2x per week, if not more. She wears a
swim vest and moves her legs like she’s the engine of a Flintstone’s car. We
went to the zoo – Singapore has a great zoo. They don’t need to do much to make
the environment look tropical. The monkeys aren’t in enclosures and instead are
on islands surrounded by water (with huge fish). Some can often be found
swinging around trees throughout the park. Carly found out the hard way when
one started throwing leaves down at her from the tree. Avery also has taken a
liking to feeding the fish in the pond at our condo. They’re tiny fish, but we
think they’re the kind that will grow to be enormous. And it will all be
because of Avery feeding them…goldfish crackers of all things.
And finally,
we’ve been able to explore a little more with the food out here now that we can
go out without Avery. We had an exciting night in Dempsey Hill where we ate
Indian food, listened to live music at Ben & Jerry’s (yes, the same one)
and listened to a live band at a Taiwanese restaurant (they only played one
song in English - I Will Always Love You by Whitney Houston, of course). Now
that I’m working, I’m also able to eat at more local places for lunch. We also
went out with my friend from business school who moved out here and will be
living in our condominium. We’re excited to have some familiar friends to explore
some of Singapore with.
And here are
some random things I have found interesting here in Singapore:
- Rain or shine - it rains just about every day so you move forward with your plans regardless
of weather…unless you need a taxi or there’s lightning while you’re swimming
- Energy conservation – there are switches on
every outlet to turn on/off the electricity and there are also switches outside
of each bathroom and the kitchen to turn on/off the water heater. Electricity is expensive
- Napkin conservation – napkins are hard to come
by. People often bring travel packs of tissues to restaurants since some places
either don’t have them or charge you for them
- Clean vs. cleaned – there was an article in the local newspaper recently about how Singapore is actually
not a “clean” city, but is a “cleaned” city since, despite strict laws
about littering, the government needs to
spend significant resources to keep the city clean
- Cigarette pack labels – they’re gross. They all
have large, graphic pictures of cancerous tumors and other effects of tobacco
use. Be prepared if you’re a smoker and you come here.
- Good coffee is hard to come by – it’s usually
weak, most places don’t have liquid creamer or milk, and the grocery store mostly
sells instant coffee
- Singapore was recently named the most stoic
nation (Gallup) despite being the 3rd richest country (Forbes) and
ranked as one of the best countries to be born in.
- Translation
- Queue = Line
- Way Out = Exit, Way In = Entrance
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| Bye-bye for now |
