Stop! It's update time.

Clubbing on Friday night was amazingggg. Yong got all of us into Zirca (a fancy club on Clarke Quay) for free. We had two tables with couches, armchairs, etc. reserved upstairs, and then we had access both to Zirca and a connecting club. The dance floor was extremely crowded, but we all basically stuck together, so it was fun and I didn't feel too claustrophobic. In homage to Tina Fey, I did the robot and framed the face multiple times.

Saturday was our "home stay," which turned into "spend the day with a Singaporean" due to fears of swine flu. I was in a group with Aja and Nina. We spent the day with a woman named Lynn, who just got back from the US after spending 3 years at Johns Hopkins getting her bachelors in chemical engineering and 1 year at Duke getting a masters in engineering management. Apparently the Singaporean government funded her education on the condition that she come back and work for them for a certain number of years (education is the second largest part of the national budget after defense). We spent a lot of time just wandering around the city and chatting. We ate lunch at a fancy sushi restaurant in one of Singapore's numerous malls and then went to Liang Seah Street for traditional Chinese dessert. I got sticky rice balls (which were filled with either crushed peanuts or sesame paste) in hot ginger soup, which was delicious. After eating, we went to Lynn's family's house (most Singaporeans live in government housing, but people who are wealthy enough live in private residences) and played Guitar Hero rather badly while she looked up directions to some of the farms on the island. She ended up driving us to an ornamental fish farm, which was really interesting. There was one breed known as "dragon fish" that is supposed to bring good fortunate upon the owners. They cost up to several thousand dollars, of course, so you'd already have to be pretty fortunate to be able to afford one...


Liang Seah Street

On Sunday morning, Lynn picked us up from PGP and took us to her church on the eastern side of the island (the opposite side from NUS). I'm not quite sure what I was expecting when she invited us to come to church with her, but it certainly wasn't what I ended up experiencing. The congregation is so large that services are held in the Singapore Expo Center--basically a quintessential "mega-church." The other catchphrase that comes to mind is "contemporary worship." When we walked in, the church's own Christian rock group was on a stage performing (fancy light show and all) and there were thousands of people already in the crowd. There were several reverends, one of which reminded me of Pastor Skip from the movie Saved! They were all dressed rather casually, I guess to fit in with the rock music theme. The main sermon was given by a woman named Mary-Alice Isleib, who runs a ministry in Florida. It was certainly an intesting service. If any of you are curious, the website of the church is http://www.chc.org.sg/eng/index.php#

On Sunday night, Nadiah invited all of us over to her house for dinner. Her family lives on the eastern side of the island in government housing, so it was cool to get to see the inside of one of those flats. Her mom cooked tons of AMAZING food and we all hung out and talked while we ate.

Monday after class was devoted to preparing for Dr. Quek's in-class essay on Tuesday (we also had a take-home essay due on Tuesday). On Tuesday after class and lunch we all went to the Economic Development Board to see a presentation. The guy giving the presentation was really nice and seemed much more frank than some of the other government officials we've talked to. The EDB is on one of the upper floors of Raffles Tower, one of the fancy buildings downtown. On the MRT ride back to the dorms, Allison and I got to talk to a Singaporean woman who initiated conversation with us after recognizing us as American by our accents. She had just returned to Singapore after studying in Europe, and she was eager to hear what we thought of the island. She said that she thought Singapore was boring, which was certainly a surprise to us (she obviously didn't go to college in Chapel Hill!). Most of the rest of the day was spent finishing up the essay for Dr. Quek and a journal entry for Dr. Steiner, but to celebrate finishing all of our work Sean and I took a taxi to Holland Village (an area near our dorms that's pretty popular with expats) at around 10:30. We ended up going to Wala Wala (one of Yong's favorite bars) and ordered lychee martinis, which are actually quite tasty. It's an outdoor bar, so we just sat and chatted for a while before catching another cab back to the dorms.

Views from the windows of the EDB




Wednesday was Dr. Emmanuel's first day of teaching our history class (he's teaching us Malaysian history). He's a really cool guy, and I got to sit near him at the welcome dinner the first week we were here, so I already kind of know him. After class we saw a presentation from one of the people working with the local NGO Transient Workers Count 2 (TWC2). The organization works on behalf of migrant works in Singapore, trying to get some basic employment rights for them under the law. I bought a book co-authored by the guy who gave the presentation because it looks really interesting and I think it'll help with my group's presentation later in the program (we have to present on the rights of non-citizens in Singapore and Thailand).

After chilling in the air conditioned dorm for a while, Sean and I went downtown to just wander around in the afternoon. We both had an ice cream craving, so we (wonder of wonders) found a Swensen's and ate there. I ordered something called "Wham! Bam! Yam!" which consisted of yam (taro) ice cream, marshmallow topping, whipped cream, and fresh longans (which are like lychees). After eating dinner, we went back to the dorm to change because a large part of the group was planning on going clubbing (Wednesday is ladies' night, so all of us girls were going to get in free). We all met up at the Chocolate Bar in the Esplanade. I ordered a brownie with ice cream and chocolate sauce this time, which was awesome. I miss simple baked goods...I'll definitely be in a baking frenzy when I get back to the states.


The Sultan Mosque on Arab Street


the Wham! Bam! Yam!

We tried to go to The Butter Factory, which overlooks the water on Clarke Quay, but the line was obscenely long, so we decided to try Zirca instead. The line there was also long and extremely slow-moving, so I ended up just hanging out on a bridge on Clarke Quay with a few other people. There was a group of obnoxious, drunk French people having an impromptu dance party on the bridge, and watching them was kind of amusing.

Today we only had one class, so Allison, Mary, and I visited the Sustainability Office at NUS and talked to the director about Singaporean environmental policy and what the government/university was doing to try to promote sustainable energy use, construction, etc. On the walk over, we saw this mysterious bird and all took pictures:


(I trust someone will identify this guy for me? Please?)

We're about to head off to East Coast Park to bike and/or play soccer with some NUS students, so I should probably wrap this up. We leave for Malaysia tomorrow morning (!!!!!) at 7:00 and won't be back until some time Sunday, so don't be concerned if I don't respond to any messages you might send me. I'll try to update on Monday with Malaysia stories/pictures. Dr. Emmanuel is leading the trip to Malaysia, so we should learn a lot.

Hasta el lunes!


Sign warning us not to jump onto the tracks at the MRT station (in English, Chinese, Malay, and...Thai? or Tamil?)


Example of a goofy sign trying to dissuade the "kiasu" instinct to elbow your way onto the MRT before people have a chance to get off


ALSO: If anyone has any requests of things you want from Singapore, let me know ASAP...next week is my last full week here! I'm hoping to send some postcards soon...