after one and a half year looking at singapore from the other side of the tebrau straits, i finally crossed over on 26 February 2010. my new friends, umi and prisc (at my new place), had to sacrifice their time-to-rest on public holiday accompanying me. the two girls had been in singapore many times before to witness events like new year countdown, christmas day and chinese new year eve as well as just on random tour that this trip with me was like nothing to them. as for me, the trip reminded me of my once-upon-a-time life in the States...the feelings i had roaming at foreign places....
we went to arab street, bugis street, little india and at the part of the town which looked a lot like (as both have isetan being managed almost the same way) bukit bintang area in kuala lumpur, only much much much much cleaner. the etiqueete of the people impressed me...I saw no one throwing rubbish just anywhere, people queing to board buses and trains (they even qued to use the restrooms) and most important the restrooms were clean suggesting the users were of first-world mentality (BUT, being me i never like being in any public restrooms no matter how clean they look!!! ESPECIALLY when water is not the medium used for cleaning!!!!)....
before going i was worried a bit thinking about lunch and dinner...i am a bit particular about the kind of food i take...(it has to be 'halal')...but turned out there were many food outlets operated by muslim at the part of the town we were roaming at. we had moroccon food for lunch...and that was the best lunch i have had in three years (that long!) after dim-sum-lunch i have had had with my good friend shrfh in sime darby convention center ... (side-note: shrfh, i miss over-lunch catching-up hours (read as talking non-stop) with you)...
my small sister, dida, cynically remarked...'what? you bought a book in singapore!'...when i told her I had bought 'growing up bin laden' by jean sasson from 'borders'... yes, of all the things i could get, i bought this book at $49...the book patches the missing part of another book i bought and read last year 'the bin laden' by steve coll...
that's not all i have to tell about the trip but i have kept the post unpublished for one month hoping i would eventually pick up the lost momentum to write about the rest...procrastinating does not improve anything for me, in this case, and....ever....
ps:
after almost one and a half year i do not know whether to laugh or to cry every time i refer to my location as 'my new place' which is a bit too much as this place is no longer strange...
