On Leaving

So here it is: all good things must come to an end. Our time in Singapore is almost up, and soon we’ll be on to bigger and better things back in New Jersey. People have asked us how we feel about leaving: sad? excited? But truthfully, all we have time to feel is...busy. Two weeks from today, our cat leaves for his first journey across the world. (He’ll fly west, through Amsterdam.) Five days later, we’ll follow him (although we’ll fly east). We’ve taken this 19-hour flight before, but this time our tickets are one-way.

The company tells us movers will pack us, move us, and cause our stuff to appear magically on the other side—so what do we have to worry about? Clearly they don’t know what it’s like to undertake an international move. Sure, there’s the usual closing of accounts and sorting of stuff that accompanies any move. But running interference on logistics with two countries—while trying to say goodbye to our current “home” country, and hello to a home country that no longer feels exactly like home—we’re essentially living two lives at the same time. (Three, if you count our rapidly accelerating work life.)

This pressure cooker has gotten to us in various ways; Joey’s pulling regular all-nighters, and I’ve already had a nasty run-in with a parking pillar. (I swear, it moved.) To be sure, that last one was just waiting to happen, what with Singapore’s narrow and curvy basement car parks. But still.

Among the loose ends to tie up, what will happen to the blog? I’m not sure. If other expats’ reports are to be believed, once we return to the States, our time abroad is socially expected to become a hazy dream we remember only to each other. Once we’re back, we’ve heard, people in our home country won’t want to hear about the amazing people we met in Singapore or our trips to inspiring places. Instead, apparently, we’d do better to confine our conversation to our state, our hometown, preferably our neighborhood. Something everyday. Something “relatable.” Which makes sense, of course.

And yet, having spent the last two years fitting the whole world into our heads, how can we shut it out?

Harborside in Sydney

We went to Sydney at the height of the swine flu panic. I’d gotten the (regular) flu in Singapore, like everyone else, and though my raging fever had passed, I was still miserably clutching piles of Kleenex and mugs of hot tea. We called Qantas: surely with the flu scare, they’d allow us to cancel? But it seems that even with an international health crisis, nonrefundable tickets are nonrefundable tickets.

So we flew to Sydney, expecting that at any moment some nervous health official would take me off to quarantine, never to be seen again. But apparently I set off neither the infrared sensors in the airports nor the suspicions of the flight attendants (I did run them completely out of herbal tea), and we arrived without incident.

I have only hazy memories of our first day in Sydney, and I didn’t make it out into the streets until dinnertime. But I did sit up in bed and watch the day breaking over the harbor, with the iconic bridge and opera house slowly highlighted by the sun as it crossed the bracing blue sky.


After that I was well enough to do some exploring in the harborside neighborhoods, so we went out to immerse ourselves in life along the water. We wandered in the cobblestone laneways of The Rocks, once home to rowdy sailors’ taverns and now filled with quiet cafes. We took a ferry past marinas filled with huge white sailboats and gorgeous glass-walled lofts. We walked along the wharfs and ducked into the aquarium (where we greeted the dugongs). At the stunning maritime museum, we climbed aboard a replica of Captain Cook’s ship that still plies the same waters as Cook did in his original voyages.

One night we attended a magical performance of (appropriately enough) Debussy’s symphony The Sea at the opera house, which quietly glowed in the darkness. In the music we heard an echo of centuries of life on Sydney’s waterfronts: the longing for the sea, for exploration and adventure, the freedom of being out on the open ocean, and the satisfaction of returning to the safety of the harbor after a journey well sailed.

Second Time Around

Everything in Singapore is easy - if you’ve already done it once before. That’s how life is here. Like today, when I went to the industrial estate of Ubi to pick up a water filter for the fridge.

The first time I needed a water filter, sometime last year, I had no idea where to start. Rather than end up in a scary Alice-in-Wonderland environment (like that time I bought a sprinkler), I went to a few appliance stores to see if they had the part. But we have an American-brand fridge that’s far from common in Singapore. After several fruitless trips, I finally found a salesperson that would give me the address of a wholesale parts store. They sold only to contractors, she said, and they might or might not have my brand. But it was my only option, and that’s how I found myself heading to Ubi.

Still new to driving in Singapore, I felt like I’d reached the end of the earth. I dropped off the highway at a practically unknown exit, panicking as I glanced at the street directory and found I’d missed a turn. In the pouring rain, the gray buildings seemed hopelessly confusing, each looking exactly like the next. The workers seemed grim and dour, the security guards suspicious and unhelpful. I parked at a coupon lot a block or two away, still unsure if I was in a legal parking lot. Walking along the street, I felt utterly out of place. People stared at me curiously from under their umbrellas; what was an ang moh (and a tai tai, at that) doing here, in the blue-collar industrial park?

Today, though, I casually swung by Ubi on my way home from a pleasant lunch downtown. Now I easily recognized the exit as one of the ways to Joey’s workplace - not exactly the end of the earth! The sun shone in the blue sky as I entered what now seemed a cheerful, bustling neighborhood. Sure, I did miss the street on the first go-round, but in a matter of minutes, I’d found the right building, had a friendly chat with the grinning security guard, and parked my car right outside the door.

The dealer had the part in stock. Only cash accepted? No problem; I followed his directions to the mysterious
“canteen” where the ATM was. Last year, I might have felt out of place, but the Chinese and Malay faces were the type I’m used to seeing every day. A businessman helpfully showed me the canteen, where I’m sure I was the only ang moh for miles around. But all I thought was, “Hey, I should come back someday to try that new mee goreng stall!”

Minutes later, paid-for part in hand, I began to navigate my way out of Ubi. Only one thing hadn’t changed since my previous visit: the cars with a giant L on the back and the painted line, “Please be patient and let me learn!” In Singapore, only certified instructors can give driving lessons, and one of the major driving schools is right in the heart of Ubi. If there’s a worse place to learn to drive, I’d like to see it; parked cars on the side of the road reduce two lanes to one and a half, and orange cones and construction barriers block the rest. The L drivers wobble hesitantly around corners, hoping against hope there’s not a giant bulldozer blocking the path.

But as a driver in Singapore myself, I sympathize. I learned to drive from my dad, in mostly empty parking lots and broad, quiet streets. That’s how it is the US. In Singapore, though, for driving or navigating or finding the part you need, you’re thrown in the deep end. As I said, everything here is easy - except the first time.

Paradise

We went to the Maldives back in February, but we never got around to posting about it. Why? It’s the sort of place that defies words. And even pictures can’t quite capture this tiny paradise in the middle of the Indian Ocean. We figured it was a once-in-a-lifetime vacation, especially since we’re about 19 hours closer than if we were to fly there from the US. But now all I want to do is go back someday. It was the colors that hooked me. Have you ever seen so many shades of blue?

(Visitors) Trying Singapore

We love having visitors - though it happens all too infrequently - so we were thrilled when my parents finally announced that they’d racked up enough frequent-flyer miles to make their first trip to this side of the world in March. Nine utterly packed days (and one sick day) ensued. Some highlights:

• the first glimpse of our little guest-house in Bali along the river gorge - and the air-conditioned, intricately carved rooms at $50 per night
  


• the surreal kecak chanting during an evening Ramayana dance, followed by an other-worldly trance dance through burning coals (bonus: the realization that, yes, you are on the other side of the world)
  


• the bird’s-eye views, from breezy East Coast Park and the Singapore harbor, of the huge container ships and the complex operations of one of the busiest ports in the world
  


• the memorable first moment my dad gingerly stuck his feet into the tank of very hungry (and very ticklish) fish at the fish spa
  


• the best description of durian’s flavor, courtesy of my mom: “like a cross between peaches...and sardines”
  


• the experience of haggling in the hot, crowded markets of Chinatown - and discovering the cooling powers of lime juice
  


• the massive flying squirrel (“wing” span probably at least four feet) that swooped gracefully right in front of us at the Night Safari
  


• the expressions of utter bafflement at the sheer variety in the carnival-like stalls of the hawker centers
  


• the expressions of utter contentment after a wonderful meal at our favorite Thai place (and our favorite Peranakan place, and our favorite Eurasian place, and...)

For us, having visitors also highlighted how we’ve grown to love our little island home, with its greenery and cleanliness and variety and spectacular weather (now that we’ve acclimated to the heat and humidity). We’re proud that we can now drive on the left side of the road and maneuver a large-ish car backward into the tiniest parking spaces. We’re happy that we’ve learned to navigate a complicated world city and find the hidden treasures in its varied cultural enclaves. It seems normal to us now to live in a city that is very Western in some ways and, in other ways, anything but. And while our visitors do get to experience a quick taste of all that Singapore has to offer, we feel lucky to have stayed here long enough to actually find our niche in this place on the other side of the world.

More on "6 Things I Hate About Singapore"

Usually, posts on this blog generate maybe five comments, tops, within the week or so they’re posted. Then we never hear about them again. This is why it’s so surprising that this post, from back in April 2007, keeps right on going: we’re up to 19 comments so far - not counting a few unprintable anonymous ones we’ve deleted.

A recent comment finally provided the explanation for such popularity: apparently, if you type “hate Singapore” into Google, our little posting is the very first site on the list. (Don’t all go and test it out, now; you’ll only keep it at the top!)

Why this post “hates Singapore” more than any other website, I can’t imagine. The six reasons listed are simple difficulties we had in making the transition to life in Singapore. And anyone who bothered to read the rest of the blog would find it obvious, I think, that we’re fascinated (in a positive way) with the place we now live as expats. In fact, one reason I chose to write the post in the first place was that I feared the blog was becoming a little rose-tinted in its lush descriptions of the cultural and tropical wonders we saw around us every day.

Joey and I can only hope that people who drop by any entry on the blog will read a few more, for context. No single post could explain the complex, baffling, fun, and fascinating experience of trying Singapore.

New Year's, Take 2

It was our third Chinese New Year in Singapore, and oh, how we’ve adapted. Last year we tossed yu sheng a number of times, watched the Chingay parade, and immersed ourselves in the colors and crowds and noise of Chinatown at night. This year, apparently, we’ve become so blasé about it that, aside from a leisurely daytime stroll through the Chinatown stalls, we hardly did any outside celebrating at all.
It wasn’t entirely our fault.
We scheduled our vacation around the neighborhood CNY potluck, only to have them change the date at the last minute; and our traditional steamboat (huo guo) celebration with close friends was cancelled when the hostess got the flu. (None of this got us off the hook with our friends’ children, though - they all got their hong bao anyway!)

But as it happened, we did most of our celebrating at home, where we finally succumbed to our friends’ pleas to put more decorations up. With just a short few weeks between Christmas and CNY this year, we went straight from the Christmas tree to the “CNY tree” – a vase full of long pussy-willow branches, decorated with a couple of hanging goldfish ornaments. We bought a cute little kumquat tree, too, which reminded us of the oranges people like to exchange this time of year. And we put a couple of lanterns with the fu character (“blessing, good fortune”) out front.

We took down the lanterns at the official close of the holiday two weeks later, and we threw out the pussy-willow branches when (appropriately enough) the cat got interested in the puffy white blossoms. But we’ve still got our kumquat tree to remind us of the golden glow of the Chinese New Year.