January 24 2009 Singapore

Singapore 1/16-1/20

Singapore is like a familiar old friend. On my third visit to this country, so Asian and yet so different from Hong Kong, I'm not very interested in sightseeing. Lee and I just want to relax and enjoy the warmth and sunshine.

This is the cooler season in Singapore. Cooler means slightly lower humidity, lovely breezes, highs in the low 80s, Hawaii weather. I got here Friday evening and as soon as Lee got off work we head to East Coast Seafood to have chili crab.

Chilli crab  does not disappoint. It is as delicious as always. My pile of wipes grows as I dig in with my fingers, cracking shells with pliers and occasionally my teeth. I was right; Hong Kong’s version is a meager imitation.

The next day I go running. Just 40 minutes, but myomy my acclimation to the heat is gone. I return to the hotel red-faced and sweaty, taking a good 45 minutes to cool down.

We decide to visit a boat show on Sentosa Island, Singapore's Disney-like resort area. The boats are impressive - swift, flat racing hulls resting in Singapore on the 3rd leg of an around the world race. But Sentosa is so hokey and artificial. That's the hard part about Singapore. There's this sense that everything is carefully orchestrated. Clean, safe, sunny. The contrast with the chaos of Hong Kong is almost comical.

I find myself thinking about what it would be like to live here. Most westerners really like it. It’s very easy. But I think at least at first I would have a hard time not comparing it to Hong Kong, with Singapore coming out the loser.

Last night we went over to Frank and Cyndi's for drinks, and then out 4 dinner. Before we got there however, I had a fight with a taxi driver. We get in a cab at our hotel, tell the driver the address and off we go. Only he has no idea where it is or how to get there. He calls some friends, but they don’t know where it is either. I try to call Cyndi but she doesn't answer and we don't have their home number or Frank's mobile with us. Apparently they don't have a dispatcher they can call for directions and this driver doesn't have a GPS or a map. We tell him to take us back to the hotel.

We get back to the hotel and I tell Lee "we're not paying this guy for driving us around the block". Hating a bad scene, Lee scoots out of the cab and says he'll go up to our hotel room to get Frank's number.  We get out of the cab and go back into the lobby. The doorman comes after me anxiously. "He has a charge on his meter" he says to me. I go back outside. "We're not paying you for driving us around the block" I inform him.  He protests angrily, speaking the crazy English they speak here known as Singlish. I lose my infamous temper. "Listen. It’s YOUR job to know this city and to be able to figure out how to take your passengers where they want to go," I yell. “YOU'RE the driver, not me! I’m not paying you!" He drove off in a cloud of muttered imprecations, leaving me red-faced and triumphant.

When Lee came back down to the lobby he had Frank's number and I had gotten directions from Cyndi and was starting to calm down.  It took me a couple of minutes though!

A strange and a little disturbing thing happened while we were at dinner. We were seated outside, at an Italian restaurant in an area filled with restaurants. In come soldiers in full regalia, walking down the street, their AK-47s (or whatever they were) at the ready. They kind of made a circle right by our restaurant, scanning the crowds and looking fierce. Frank and Cyndi said things like this happen all the time and they never know why. Cyndi said it made her feel very secure; it made me nervous, but most people didn’t seem to even notice the soldiers. Cyndi talked a bit about the safeness of Singapore and how she feels the shift whenever they go back to the states; how suddenly after they land they are telling their children to stay right there with them and not go to the bathroom by themselves, etc. I have the same sense when I return to the US from Hong Kong. I feel much safer in Hong Kong, both in my apartment and on the street, any time of day or night. It’s something I’ll miss. But in Hong Kong you almost never see soldiers, except occasionally in the airport. You do see policemen, usually on foot, but sometimes on motorcycles or in vehicles. Foot police are much more effective in our crowded city. It’s kind of ridiculous when you see ambulances in Hong Kong, since they are usually stuck in traffic just like everyone else, only they have their sirens blaring.

The last day I ran one more time, five miles in the heat. It’s really amazing how much it slowed me down. All summer and fall I ran in the hot humid weather in Hong Kong and pooh-poohed Jeff Galloway’s warnings about running in the heat. But now I realize I was simply acclimated and that yes it does slow you down and can be dangerous. We went to the Maxwell hawker stand for lunch and I decided to go stand in one of the long lines and try one of the “very famous” stands. I had something called "Bee Hoon fish soup" that was just incredible. That’s the thing about Singapore, the food is SO GOOD! We even had good Mexican food that night, when we went out to dinner with another one of our Singapore friends. That’s got to be a first in Asia!