flights

For this weekend’s trip to Malaysia, I’ll be joined by a few of my colleagues and a couple of their girlfriends. That’s a story in itself.

I didn’t want to be linked up to some random stranger, so I asked my colleague, Betts, if he was interested in coming along as my dive buddy. He said he was interested but reminded me that his girlfriend would be arriving in Singapore in a few days, and so obviously he’d like to bring her along. Cool, but I still needed a dive buddy.

So I asked another colleague, Robb, if he was interested. He said he was, but told me that his girlfriend would also be arriving in Singapore in a few days, and he’d obviously like to bring her along. The more the merrier, but I still needed a dive buddy.

Right after I talked to Robb, who lives across the hall from me in Fraser Suites, I returned to my apartment with a plan to send out some calls for a female dive buddy, to make things…well…symetrical. I immediately thought of Sharon – a woman I met a few months ago who’s a big diver and once texted me to say provocatively “I’d love to get wet anytime.” (talking about diving, you dirty monkeys).

I also thought about Maiko, a beautiful Japanese woman I met recently. She’s in Singapore for a short time, scuba-certified, and seems like she would be open to an adventure.

But when I picked up my phone to make the first call, I saw that I’d missed a couple of calls while I was at Robb’s place. The first was from my colleague, Minh, our project manager.

Putting business first (when will I learn?), I called him back. He said, “hey, I want to go diving with you guys.”

He’s not pretty, but now he’s my dive buddy.

At the Mexican dinner on Saturday night, I spent some time playing catch with James, the five-year-old son of my colleague Judy. He asked me if I would hang out with him sometime and started to propose a slew of activities – the Fraser Suites playroom, miniature golf, ice cream…

Eventually, he said he’d make a list and call me at 10:30 the next morning. Too much, this kid.

And on Sunday morning, he actually called me.

Judy dropped him off at my place, and we started to chat about what we might do for the rest of the day. It turned out he actually did make a list (with his mom’s help), but he’d left it behind. So of course we had to go get it – after a quick breakfast of beans and rice.

Ad Judy’s place, we consulted his list:

- Breakfast
- Playroom
- Mini Golf
- Lunch
- Ice Cream

I managed to negotiate Mini Golf off the agenda until next week, and we headed to the playroom. We played some video games, built a fort, pretended to fix a car.

Next was lunch and ice cream, but before we headed for home, James wanted to stop at Bread Talk to buy a surprise for his mom and dad. We picked out a few sweets, including a sugar donut, and James gave me the following piece of advice…

If I were to buy a “sugary donut” like that, he said, I should give half of it to my “life”.

“My life?” I asked half innocently. “What do you mean?”

“Like my mom is my dad’s life,” he explained.

“Ah, I see. But what if I don’t have a life?”

“Well, then you should get one. Or else you’ll eat the whole donut and get a belly ache.”

My first meal in California after six months in Singapore was Mexican food. So was my next meal, and my next.

So, when I was getting ready to return to Singapore, I picked up something you absolutely cannot find here: handmade tortillas and real taqueria salsa. I brought these in quantity and hosted a big Mexican feast for my compadres on this project.

I spent Saturday morning shopping at the Tiong Bahru wet market, and I spent all afternoon making carnitas (slow roasted pork), black beans with chilis and lime, pinto beans, refried beans, mexican rice and guacamole.

I think it was appreciated. My friend Rebecca took one bite and said, “when I close my eyes, I can almost hear the drunk hippies in the Mission.”

It’s amazing how often I get comments here about my chopsticks technique, or the fact I don’t mind chili sauce. Even my Singaporean colleagues who’ve travelled quite a bit seem amazed to see an ang mo wielding chopsticks with any proficiency.

And women I meet in Southeast Asia are amused to no end that I can cook, and even more amused to learn that I actually enjoy cooking. In traditional circles, men don’t cook. In more modern circles, no one cooks. The rat race doesn’t leave much time for domestic pursuits.

That aside, when women find out I’m 36-years-old, unmarried, and cooking for myself no less, I become either a tragedy or a comedy to them. Probably a bit of both actually.

In the wet market Saturday morning, while shopping for dinner, a chinese auntie told me it’s “high time” I found myself a good wife.

But then I’d have to kiss my CLEO cachet goodbye.

A few months ago, my colleague Crystal declared that one of the first things she will do after she returns to the US is go into a public bathroom and “use about 500 paper towels”.

She was referring to the general scarcity of paper towels and napkins in Singapore. Public restrooms in Singapore tend to have hot air hand dryers. What this translates to is that people here (men anyway, I can’t speak for the women) tend not to wash their hands at all after doing their business. Often, though, you don’t have to touch anything, because many public restrooms have open doors or no doors at all.

At my current client’s offices, however, the bathroom doors have twist knobs, which is the worst case scenario for a bathroom door – especially considering there are no paper towels.

The result is that men who wash their hands leave the door knob all wet, and men who don’t wash… well… gross.

So in a country where so many things make so much sense, I find myself wanting something very basic. My kingdom for a paper towel dispenser OR a bathroom door I don’t have to touch. Both is surely too much to ask for, so I’ll gladly settle for one or the other.

I’m back in Singapore.

It’s good to see my incredibly hardworking colleagues, and it’s been nice to begin to reconnect with my Singapore friends.

I met Thavy and Shelly the other night at Brix for a little dancing and a lot of alcohol. A new band called Bliss(?)was playing – I believe it was their first-ever show there – but their repertoire was basically the same as the usual house band. Still, they were more than competent. One of the singers was a killer on the bongos, and the guest rapper/singer who manned the mic for their second or third set was really good.

We watched some joyously terrible expat dancing, and exchanged theories about a diminutive caucasian man we observed with a tall, broad-shouldered asian ladyboy on his arm.

Essentially we were wondering whether he’d gone out seeking a ladyboy, whether or not he knew he was with a man, whether he was too drunk to tell, or care.

I’ve been back in San Francisco for more than a week now. I’ve mainly been reconnecting with friends, eating a lot of Mexican food and trying to catch up on my sleep. And neglecting my blog.

The other day, I stepped into Urban Outfitters to browse t-shirts and jackets, and after six months in Singapore, I was completely unable to wrap my mind around the irony oozing from every shelf in the store. Between Jesus action figures, Everyone Poops and white-trash retro, everything was just a little too cool for itself.

Last night, I saw Maroon 5 at the HP Pavilion, along with throngs of teenage girls and their parents. There were a few small groups of people my own age. We were the people holding cups of beer.

Maroon 5 has one hit song, and I heard it every night I was in any club in Singapore. I mention the show because the music snobs amongst my friends will make fun of me, but I am immune to this now.

Singapore is a city without irony. It has other kinds of class systems, but you can’t be a cultural snob in Singapore.

After I’d been there a few months, I listened to one person after another, recently arrived from San Francisco (or New York, London, etc.) moan about fashion or architecture or music. I watched them roll their eyes as a cover band launched into the latest hit, and the joyful throng exploded onto the dance floor.

Before I went to Singapore, I’d been struggling to divest of my inner snob. I was hating the haters, if you will. I walk in several circles of friends, and I’d become so tired of hearing one circle judge the other because of its taste in music, television, clothes, cars…

For me, it was actually beautiful and sort of liberating to be in a place where a cultural snob can’t survive. He’d go blind from eye-rolling.

…before the last chord of Purple Rain fades, the band begins to play Hotel California, and the western mind implodes from the effort it takes to comprehend.

I’m leaving today.

I’ve packed up my humble home of six months, and I’m ready to board my flight back to San Francisco. I have so many feelings swirling around inside me that I can’t tell whether the balance is ultimately tipping towards happy or sad.

Only my Singapore colleagues will really appreciate this, but after six months, I still don’t have a pass to the offices of my client (a major airline). We filled out all the requisite forms months ago. Since then, we’ve waited. In the meantime, every day for the past six months we have stopped at the security gate, queued for 15 minutes and exhanged our passports for one-day visitor passes.

Yesterday, on my last day, after wrapping up a landmark meeting with the chairman and CEO of the company, I received word that our passes have been prepared and will be available Monday.

Six months and four days too late.

:-)

I woke up feeling a little under the weather today. I think it’s mainly a result of working too hard, sleeping too little and exercising not at all for about a month.

I went to get a haircut, and the place was full. They told me to come back in 10 minutes, and when I did, their power was out.

I also finally got through to Singapore Airlines to change my flight, but there are no business class seats available to either San Francisco or Los Angeles next Thursday, Friday, Saturday or Sunday. I’m confirmed for Monday the 18th, but I’m supposed to be back in the SF office that day, so I had them put me on the waitlist for all of Saturday’s flights.

Anyway, I’m off to Vietnam in a few hours, and I hope I can shake all this mildly bad luck out of my day before I go.

Every place has its rhythm.

The rhythm of a place is expressed in the pace and density of foot traffic. It’s expressed by the number of people who stand on escalators compared to the number who walk. It’s expressed in the amount of eye contact. It’s expressed through the presence or absence of a musical score – in buses, taxis, shops, alleys and pubs. It’s expressed in the negotiations between pedestrians and drivers – and between drivers and drivers. It’s expressed by the number of people who hurry to work compared to the number who hurry home.

It takes a while to understand the rhythm of a place, and even longer to feel it. You spend the first few weeks in a new city constantly stepping in and out of the way of other people. You walk into the street after failing to look to your right (or left) first, and you’re thankful for the honking car or the friendly tug on your collar from the person behind you. You step onto a bus and fumble around for your change, wondering why you didn’t have it ready like you always do at home. You hold doors for people who aren’t entering or exiting. You stand in the wrong queue and don’t find out until you’re at the front.

And then one day you realise you’re moving with the flow. Even after a couple of days, you find you’re better at navigating and negotiating a place.

I’ve been in Singapore long enough now to notice the newly-arrived. I still spend a certain amount of my time in people’s way, skipping and dodging, and recovering from near collisions, but I’m a little more graceful then I was a few months ago.

My inability to move to the local rhythm has resurfaced more intensely each time I’ve journeyed out from here – to Thailand, Vietnam, Shanghai. Especially Shanghai.

It’s a great experience to observe onesself fumbling around and then slowly starting to get it. Each time, I feel a little like Steve Martin’s character in The Jerk.

I just had my first real weekend in ages. I hardly worked at all and mainly enjoyed wandering somewhat aimlessly around the city for two whole days. I enjoyed feeling the rhythm of Singapore again.