It's time to travel!

Well, I just passed the 1-month mark in Singapore, and it’s about time I get outta here. Next week I’ll leave Singapore on my first trip – this time heading up to Thailand. I’ll be heading up to Chiang Mai, which is in the Northern part of the country; up in the Mountains. I’ve never been there, so I’m very excited to see a new part of that wonderful country. I’ll be meeting up with my friends ReAnn & Jon (they’re in Thailand on their honeymoon), as well as my friends Pooklook & Brian (they live there). Pooklook used to work with me in MN, but she & her husband moved back to Chiang Mai with his work.

We’ll be heading out for a 2 night trek in Chiang Mai. I’m not sure what that all entails but it could very well involve an elephant ride (I hope it does), and seeing some beautiful landscape. I’ve heard many great things about Chiang Mai. We’ll also be going to the Night Bazaar there, and doing some other things around the city. I can’t wait!

After Chiang Mai, I’m flying back to Bangkok & then getting a ride up to Korat for work. I’ll be up there for 2-3 weeks, working & hanging out with my good friends. I’m very excited to see them again. On the weekends, I’ll head back to Bangkok to enjoy the big city & hang out with other friends there. (and I’ll have a cell phone this time!!! :-) ). I’m really lucky that my vacation to Chiang Mai happened to coincide with a business trip. Makes it a lot more cost-effective for me. :-)

It’s about time I start making my other travel plans for the year. There are so many places that I want to see. I probably won’t make it to them all, but here’s my wish list:

• Chiang Mai
• Bangkok - for Songkran (The annual water festival. Picture a nation-wide water fight) in April
• Koh Samui – an island in Thailand, with some great diving (that’s where Robert De Niro was trying to send his daughter in Meet the Parents)
• Angkor Wat – huge Buddhist temple in Cambodia.
• India
• Maldives – tiny islands south of India with picturesque waters. Only a few feet above sea level. Great diving!
• Similan Islands – islands off the west coast of Thailand and Myanmar
• Australia (again) – either Darwin or Perth
• Hong Kong
• Beijing / The Great Wall

I stumbled upon a fun activity for the weekend. I was upstairs today, talking with one of the admins, when she told me that there was a volleyball tournament down at the beach this weekend. Turns out, her team is short one player & I told her I love to play. So, I’ll be playing volleyball on the beach on Saturday. Should be about a million degrees with no shade. I’ll have to bring lots of water & sunscreen.

I also had 2 orientation sessions with the relocation company that I’ve been dealing with. They took me around Singapore, and showed me some fun places to hang out & fun things to do. I’m definitely going to take windsurfing lessons, but it will have to wait until I get back from Thailand. I also plan to do some kayaking (start out in one of the reservoirs, and then move on to sea kayaking – I have to be skilled to avoid the cargo ships). There’s also places to do wakeboarding, but it’s kind of expensive to hire a boat. So, I’ll start off with cable-skiing. As soon as I can do jumps, then I’ll hire a boat.

This weekend I’m going to go on the ‘Treetop Walk’ at the Bukit Timah nature reserve. Hopefully my camera won’t fog up (from the inside) like it did the last time I was at there, a few years ago. That was a humid day!

Incidentally, the temperature here has not been nearly as hot as I expected it to be. It’s been in the 80s to mid-90s since I’ve been here. Not too bad. But the humidity can be really bad – it’s usually 80-90%!

My new toy

The last time I was in Singapore, I got stuck over on the East Coast for about an hour because I wasn’t able to flag down a cab. Every one of them was ‘on call’. Finally, I had to have a stranger call for one for me on his cell phone.

The last time I was in Bangkok, I waited at a shopping mall for an hour to meet up with my friend DP. She was stuck in traffic, but I had no way of knowing. I borrowed a Thai girl’s cell phone to call DP, after this girl’s friend translated my request to her (one of the first Thai people that I’ve met that spoke almost no English)

So… I decided that when I got to Singapore, one of the first things I would buy is a cell phone. I wanted to get one that I could bring back to the US (my current cell phone was 5+ years old, and 2 of the buttons weren’t working very well). The phones here are pretty cool – they’re ahead of the US as far as cell phone technology, but I don’t think as far as they used to be. Still, I wanted to find something that I couldn’t get at home.

So, after quite a bit of shopping, I finally got my new toy – a Nokia N80. It’s way more phone than I need, but when in Singapore… It’s a 3G phone (3^rd Generation), which means I can do video teleconferencing with it (just need to find someone to video-conference with). It’s got 2 cameras – a 3 megapixel one on the back, and a small one on the front for teleconferencing & self-portraits. The main reason I got the phone was because of the camera – I wanted to have something to take some decent resolution pictures with, in case I was out somewhere without my camera.

It’s funny, but I’m only talking on the phone about ½ the time I’m using it. Text messaging (called SMS here) is huge! People SMS each other way more than they do voice calls.

On Friday, the 11^th, I made the move to my new apartment. I’m now at a place called Leonie View. It’s just about as far from Orchard road as the last place, but on the other side. They’re going to be tearing down the other apartment in December, and I didn’t want to pack up & move again in 5 months. But, Leonie wasn’t ready when I got here, so I had to live at the other place temporarily. It’s nice to finally get settled into my permanent home & get everything unpacked.

So, now I’m completely settled in. I’ve got my permanent address, and my home & cell phone numbers. A couple of you have asked for my snail mail address. If you want it, just send me an email & I’ll give it to you. I also will give my phone numbers out, if you want. Singapore can be called very cheaply (2 cents/minute) using Skype.

I found a web site with a few facts about Singapore. Just for fun.
Singapore – Did you know?

And, for all you Minnesotans out there – here’s a frame of reference to use. Singapore is a really small country. The entire island is just about the same size as the 494/694 loop. So, it doesn’t take much time to get anywhere here.

Man, in Singapore there sure are a lot of...

Really Expensive Cars – In the 12 days that I’ve been here, I’ve seen a couple Lamborghinis, several Ferraris, and BMWs (even the 7 series) are as common as Fords are in the US.

Fast road-workers – I was walking home last night, and they were tearing up the road in front of my apartment. This morning, I left & there was no sign that anything had been done! The asphalt was all back down, and the lane lines were re-painted. MNDOT needs to come over here for a seminar.

Luxury stores – Singaporeans love their shopping. Orchard Road is one of the premiere shopping areas here. In just a few blocks, you will find 2 Prada Stores, 2 Versace stores, 3 Gucci stores, etc… (I checked on the Internet, I haven’t been shopping for purses). :-P

Cars with little yellow signs in the windows… you know, the ‘baby on board signs’. Except, there are lots of different versions here. I thought they stopped making those about 20 years ago. My favorite was ‘This is a dumb yellow sign’.

Another thing that I thought went out of style 20 years ago – break dancing. I saw a bunch of kids doing it in one of the underpasses yesterday (They have tunnels under busy roads, connecting buildings, and around the subway stations. In fact, they have an entire underground mall near the hotel that we stay at when we come here on business).

I got a lot of questions about cable skiing. Yeah, it’s tough to describe. Next time I’m down there, I’ll take some pictures (or, hopefully someone will take pictures of me doing it!).
But, for now, here’s few links to the cable-ski web page. :-)

http://www.cable-ski.com

I have met a couple of people here. During my first week here, I went out to lunch with a couple of co-workers. We went to the University, which is pretty close to work, and ate at an outdoor café. This girl comes up & sits down with us, and my co-worker introduces her as his daughter. During the lunch I found out that they used to live in Minnesota, near Macalestar college! My co-worker’s wife is from Minnesota (he’s from China), and his daughter was born in Minneapolis. Small world.

Then next weekend, their family took me out to Dim Sum. The food was good, and it was fun to talk with them. Afterwards, Lish (that’s her name) & I went walking around Chinatown & then to the Singapore Botanical Gardens. Too bad she’s heading back to the US for college this Friday. Guess I have to make some more new friends. :-)

Yesterday was Singapore’s National Day (like the 4^th of July), so I didn’t have to work. So, I have 2 2-day weeks this week. I spent the afternoon wandering around - I walked over to Little India & back, taking pictures along the way (still haven’t got around to uploading those!).

In the evening, I went down to watch the ceremony. The actual ceremony takes place at their National Stadium, and I couldn’t get in (sold out). So, I went to the Esplanade – the Theater by the Bay. I heard that you could see it from there. So, when I got there, I went where the crowd was – on the bridge watching over the bay. You couldn’t see the stadium from there, but I figured the locals knew what they were doing. After an hour, the ceremony started. The helicopters flew past with huge Singapore flags hanging beneath them, and the fighter planes buzzed past. Then more waiting. Finally, the sky lit up with fireworks over the stadium – but we couldn’t see them. They were behind the building! What?!!?!?!? I thought the locals knew what they were doing? There were tens of thousands of them there! I left extremely disappointed.

Remember kids… it’s not always cool to follow the crowd. If your best friend was going to sit on a bridge & watch fireworks behind a building, does that mean you have to?

I guess I'll watch the re-broadcast on TV this weekend.

Too hot for ya?

I see that Minneapolis is going to be over 100F today, and the rest of the country is pretty much baking. Want to cool off a little? Come to Singapore! Yup, this tiny little country on the equator is actually cooler than it is there. It’s going to be in the 80s today.

For those of you who don’t know, I’ve changed positions in the company. I’m now a Program Manager, and I’ll be spending the next year living & working in Singapore. I’ll be the liaison between the Product Teams in the Minnesota, and the Science Park design center here. I’ll be working with all of the products that are designed here, and making sure both the US & Singapore are giving each other the info that the other needs. Or, maybe I’ll just be the whipping boy (yes, Singapore is the country where that kid got caned a few years back)

I flew over here on July 21 – from Minneapolis to Tokyo, and then Tokyo to Singapore. All in all, about 21 hours on a plane. I’m actually fairly used to the trip now. I arrived at about 2am, and was picked up & taken to my apartment. The place is pretty cool – it’s very close to Orchard Road, which is one of the most popular areas of Singapore. Lots of shopping, restaurants, and more shopping (I’m amazed at how many malls there are, and how much shopping people do). My place has 2 bedrooms, so if any of you want to come over to visit, you’ve got a place to stay (never mind the extremely expensive flight). I'll post some pics soon.

The first week here went pretty smoothly. I found a gym nearby & joined it. I found my way to work, and got settled in (I’m working with an entirely new group of people – I have never met any of them before), and went out with a few guys who are here from MN for the week.

Over the weekend, I explored a few areas around Singapore. On Saturday, I had lunch in Little India & went out to East Coast Parkway. It seems like this that's where I'll be spending a lot of time. You can windsurf there, cable ski (picture wakeboarding, but instead of being pulled behind a boat, you're pulled behind a cable that's run around pulleys that are about 1 story in the air), rollerblade, bike, and hang out near the water. And since Singapore's such a huge shipping hub, from the beach you get a glorious view of lots of ships that are sitting off-shore, waiting to come into port.

Well, not much to report yet. I'll be adding to this as time goes along. You can see that I'm not an incredibly captivating writer, but hopefully this will give you a glimpse into what I'm up to.

Talk to you soon.

CB