3 couples, 5 nationalities - First hand experience of Multi Cultural Singapore

Born off a keralite father who was first generation singaporean and a Philipino mother,he married a beautiful Thai lady whom he met at his workplace. His sister recently married a Sinhalese (Sri-Lankan).

The host, a Singaporean Chinese free thinker converted Christian, married a gorgeous Indonesian lady. They met while graduating in Australia.

We, belonging to the same country and state and religion and caste and sub-caste were introduced by our parents. Though we found our story quite mundane after hearing theirs, this part of the world was quite interested in understanding how the arranged marriages actually happen !
- Bio-data ! What do you write there ?
- Do you get to see each others photos ?
- Do you get to meet each other before marriage ?
- Do you have an option to say 'No' after meeting ?

Hope we were able to change the concept of arranged marriages more to be like western dating where your parents play the role of dating agencies ;-)

Scared wit !

In a flick of a second I have so many thoughts - I am losing it really, I am getting mechanical here, I should do some puzzles or sudoku to keep my brain working. How could it happen again !

I know that I have a tendency of boarding wrong trains or getting off at wrong stops but this time I had been very careful. Today, I remembered that I had to take the train in opposite side of my home..so I carefuly suppressed my involuntary movement towards the home bound train. Then I studied that of the two, which train should I board,decided on one, re-checked and boarded.

After a while I realized it was announcing (and even blinking on the map), the next station to be the homebound one !

It wasn't the fear of going in the wrong direction (it's no big deal ..I could have gotten down anywhere and taken the train from opposite platform !) but the fear of what could be wrong with me. I am aghast ! I cannot believe this was happening !

I got down as soon as the train stopped, saw around and suddenly - it was my moment of deja vu! I heaved a sigh of relief...It's not 'demnetia' after all ! I am exactly where I intended to be......glitches do happen here too ;-) (though it was the first one in my 8 months of extensive usage of public transport here)

Wait...could it be that the announcement was a figment of my imagination ! Did someone plant it in my mind ! Uhh....C'mon...I haven't even watched 'Inception' yet !

Being Vegetarian in Singapore

Eating is a passion in Singapore. If you meet someone who knows you are new here, sooner or later the question 'How do you find the food here?' is going to pop up.

Though, it was actually awkward for me because I am a vegetarian and cannot stand the numerous food courts here which smell of seafood, and I have to search for right words to mention that to a passionate Singaporean foodie ! 

Well...it's an island with no local agricultural produce..which does explain the eating habits ! 

Lunch time around office area looks like a carnival and you will be greeted with empty office chairs at the strike of 12:00 !!

If the family is small they find it more economical to eat out daily rather than cooking at home. In fact, I hear that some do not prefer renting their house to Indians 'cause they know that our likes will be doing extensive cooking (and rightly so !)

 

It isn't too easy to find vegetarian eateries anywhere and everywhere except for Little India which has all the indian vegetarian restaurants.

I remember in our first month in SG, we had gone shopping and as lunch time approached we roamed for 30 minutes through the mall trying to find something to eat for lunch. The very few places where we could find something vegetarian, cooked it in the same oil and with same cutlery that they used for non-vegetarian food...!

Finally, exhausted and possibly a little angry at everything in general and nothing in particular, we bought a few chips and juice from 7-11 and had our so called lunch at one of the benches in total silence :-) ..converting dollars to rupees and dreaming of Haldiram's ...!!!

That was then....we are better informed and know how to be better prepared now !

Nothing beats gathering knowledge from people's experience and that's how I found out (and have a long way to go, being still very new here) few good vegetarian places and chains which serve palpable veg food.

HungryGoWhere for Singapore and HappyCow for globetrotters can also come in handy at times when you cannot use your acquaintances as if they were food guides :-)

I might try to keep a track of some of them here for my reference and experience recall purpose !

Library System

You hardly get to see many hollywood movies in India unless you are the sort who will buy each and every expensive DVD for one time watch or you watch movies from internet (something that we did try but couldn't enjoy). Same goes with books to a large extent!

Something I really really miss in India is availability of good public libraries.

I was a member of the British Library in Delhi but that too did not have a good collection (collection was majorly British)  though the kids books and CD collection was great. It also did not have any facility for maintaining individual account, online. There being only one branch in central Delhi and the family membership costing 3500/- per year were big deterrents for most.

Earlier we had tried a site called cinesprite which was something like netflix of US and for some months we enjoyed good quality DVDs being delivered at our home...when suddenly the company closed down and we lost all our advance payment !

I first experienced the concept of  centralised public libraries in London. I could not make very good use of it though, as the library timings were something like 10 to 5 (Sunday closed !) and with hectic office life it wasn't very viable for me.

Singapore has even better setup. A foreigner can become member in any library by paying around 45 SGD a year (for PRs and citizens it is almost free). With this, one has access to all national, public and community  libraries. They are open till 9 or 10 in the night (even on Sundays), with many having 24 hour book drops. Even if you are not a member you can walk in and read inside the premises.
I recently reserved a book, at a nominal cost and got it delivered to the library of my choice. I was informed once the book was available and was given ample time frame to collect it.
You can maintain your library account online, can drop your personal used books in library, can participate in book exchange programmes, buy books at a bargain during library books sale or be a volunteer in library. I could go on....but these are not new or great ideas...just some practical things which any good library should have....but never experienced them even in the capital of India !

If someone in India thinks of it as an enterpreneur option or it is gov. led, there may be a good business case. I know a lot of people who will really be interested in being members of good and accessible library system even if it costs a little.
I remember, around 7 years back, there was a book wala in my neighbourhood who had a good collection of magazines and books available on rent. Not sure, but I think he charged something like 10 Rs per day for novels. I read the first 6 Harry Potter books from him...even if I finish them in 7 days each (though Harry Potter fans would know that they are unputdownable and you are bound to finish them in max 3-4 days)... I still spend 420 instead of 4800 (if 420 seems to be big amount for paying in rent ...see it relative to spending 4800 or not reading at all !)

On the other hand I also know people who do not like the idea of reading a book which has exchanged many hands. e-book reader might be a good option for them to some extent. Well...as for me.. I do like to buy books, but not all are collectibles and worth the money and space !
I am not well informed about the dynamics in India...but would be great to see a centralised library system coming up in India ! Till then, as Bertram Wooster would say - Right Ho !

Deep Purple

Happened ('Happened' here means - booked 4 months in advance !) to be at the Singapore indoor stadium to experience Deep Purple - the english rock band - Live !

The stage seemed great with smoky lights and all the instruments. The stadium was huge and the crowd big, ranging from teenagers to 60+

The decibels were deafening.
 I am no fan of rock music and had not heard any of deep purple songs before...no ..not even 'smoke on the rain' and the live experience did not help in enhancing my love for rock !
But, it was amazing to see the energy levels of the band members who were on an average 60+ ! They performed non stop for 2 hours.

Best part was the solo performances and the very cute dance steps of Ian Gillan.

Obviously, they ended with their most popular song - 'smoke on the rain' and as we came out it was actually drizzling and the night had a smoky feel !

We boarded the newly opened circle (yellow) line for the first time and changed the maximum number of times... yellow to red at Dhoby Ghaut, to green at Outram Park and finally to bus at Dover.

Will add photos later !

Sentosa - Underwater World

Just a few months after I joined my first job, I was asked to fly to Singapore in 2 days time. Not having any experience of work, not knowing what I was expected to do at the client location in SG and afraid that I will probably make a fool of myself, feeling 2 days was an extremely short time to plan for the first overseas trip, I refused to go.

Well ! My loss was somebody else's gain and later it seemed that the whole project team was going to Singapore. One and all talked about their trip to SENTOSA when they came back to India. I had heard the name so many times from team mates yet I hardly knew what the place was like except it being an island near Singapore.

Finally, after close to a decade, I visited Sentosa.

Sentosa is south of Singapore and from the Harbour Front station one may take a bus/rail/cable car to reach Sentosa. We decided to take a cab and I sunk in the back seat -relaxing and looking forward to a long beautiful journey into the island, when suddenly in 10 minutes time I realized that we had already reached Sentosa. I never knew it was so near! It is actually only half a kilometer from the southern tip of SG.

Sentosa  means Peace and Tranquility in Malay. There is quite a history attached to it before it turned into the so called 'island resort' that it is today. It is interesting to know that the place has no residential establishment (except hotels) but has been developed solely for recreational purpose.

As soon as we entered the gates of Sentosa we could see the signature Orange buses plying here and there and a lot of construction was on for the upcoming Resorts World which features the Universal Studios theme park. Somehow, it felt like being in the Truman Show.

The Underwater world

We headed straight to the Underwater world and joined the queue for tickets. I suddenly saw a man with a big snake round his neck posing for a photo. A guy was renting snakes for $5 for photo and there was a small queue there too :-) Quite scary !

We watched with awe the amazingly colourful fishes...the clown fish seemed exactly like Nemo (remember 'Finding Nemo'!). There was a beautiful white fish with a small dash of yellow. Then there were extremely small deep purple ones which just found their way everywhere. At the same time it was quite disappointing to see so many fishes in a very small confined space.

We spent a long amount of time watching the jelly fishes...It seemed like watching a slow ballet. We waited there for the colour to change again and again ...I am at loss to describe it. Had to capture it in a video...but not able to upload here.

I spotted a travelator and hurried everyone on to it. We had spent a long time at the initial 2-3 attractions and I was worried that we will not have enough time for anything else. I was sure that this was just the tip of the iceberg. Kapil and I had been to the Scotland UW world or whatever it was called and it was so big that we could not see it fully as we had reached late.I also faintly remember the marine world of Mumbai which was huge as well.

So we jumped on the travelator, admired some more big and small fishes....some of them were sharks too but not as big as we were expecting, took a few photos and within no time we reached the end of travelator journey........ ummm so soon .... excuse me ......I am sure we are missing something.....I went up and down ...left and right to search for a turn that we had missed and which will lead us to more of the underwater world ! But there was none....I could not believe that this was all of it.

But wait ..there was the dolphin show and the sea lion show also included in the ticket. So we headed for the shows. They were not bad but not as good as the ones in the singapore zoo.


Overall, I felt it is quite a hyped attraction but may be good for someone who hasn't had a glimpse of the marine world before.

Next, we took the Sentosa bus for the next destination.........

The Singapore Zoo

Recently when we were trying to recollect some details of our itinerary etc from the past holiday trips....we could not recall as much as we would have liked to :-) So thought it might be a good idea to pen some thoughts on places visited so that we can refresh our memories later :-) But will keep it short and simple else will never be able to complete !

So starting with the Zoo !
Have never been too fond of zoos ! Somehow the word creates an image of sad looking lazy animals in confined and a little smelly spaces ! Having already visited the Delhi and Ahmadabad zoos (which we did enjoy to a certain extent but there was no deja vu feeling ! ) wasn't too keen on a trip to the Singapore zoo. But well, it is all so famous and then husband's company gave free passes and have a 4 year old so had no excuse for further delay !

So one fine Saturday (or was it sunday..see forgetting already :-) morning in Feb, we packed our lunch and camera and jumped into a cab and were inside the jungle in 20 minutes !

The stream of people there already created some excitement and Pranav wanted to sit on the cows statue at the entrance when we kept telling him there are some real animals inside.

To put it simply,I would have been a fool to miss this.We felt we were in a jungle. It was truly the zoological garden that all zoos should be. The animals seemed soooo near, you have to see it to believe it! it was as if they could jump out any time ! On a closer look there was enough security measures and planning like a transparent net and a deep valley separating the animals from us.

Though the spaces were confined, it was as if the animals were in their own habitat.The animals even seemed happy to pose for a photo :-)

We spent the whole day there and it is really difficult to pen what all I saw. Just mentioning few highlights.

Watching the Orangutans was amazing...the way they swing from one branch to other...Their hands are even longer than their body. Saw a happy family of three lovingly snuggling with each other. Would have liked to sit their and watch the activities for some time but had to move on!

Spent some time just sitting and watching the polar bears (mommy and son) swim graciously without resting. Reading the information and photos displayed since the baby polar bear was born in the zoo and how it's birthdays were celebrated and how it has grown and how the whole staff loves him took us into a different world.

The Giraffes looked huge and we were there at their feeding time. So fed some carrots to them. Love the photo of this lonely Giraffe.

We watched all three shows: Elephants at work, splash safari and the rainforest fights back. We were just strolling lazily for the first show when we were taken aback by the amount of people already gathered for the show and all seats taken :-) Pranav laughed and laughed when the sea lion splashed water on the audience ! All the shows were weaved very nicely and were quite interactive though only 15-20 minutes long.

Saw such big a tortoise for the first time...looked centuries old..and looked as if he was smiling while eating away the leaves !

The comodo dragon looked deadly and all the information written about it was quite scary !

There was also a big space for all sorts of vegetable and spices plants and we loved it.

By evening, we were dead tired. A lot of walking coupled with the humid weather doesn't make it too easy. I would like to go again and spend more time just sitting and looking at the activities of animals and read the whole bunch of very interesting information at display again.

Well, it was quite nice and all but don't know how much it could impress Pranav because when we ask him about his favourite animal, he still answers 'DONKEY' with full confidence as earlier to the visit and is not ready to budge even after some coaxing! On asking why.. he says 'because I like his 'Dhen chu Dhen Chu'. Had no option but to leave it there with a smile...after all kids will be kids and it's amazing to see them happy in their own world !

Two's Crowd

I am in a cab, zooming on the almost empty road in Singapore. Suddenly, there are 6-7 cars ahead of us. The driver slows down a little before gaining speed again, he feels a little sorry as if it is his fault and asks me: 'Mam, is Delhi more crowded than this ?'

I feel I have gone dumb. I am suddenly transported. I can hear the honking, I can see the never ending queue, I can feel the wait, I can feel the pride in knowing how to balance the ABC (accelerator, break and clutch) at best of ability in first gear, I can feel the bumper to bumper drive, I can see cabs, cars, auto rickshaws, cycle rickshaws, scooters, bikes, cycles, pedestrians, trucks, cranes all side by side jostling to move ahead and I feel the exhiliriation of finally reaching home with only a little scratch on the car.

With a deep sigh, I reply - 'Yes'.

Shivering in Singapore

I had heard that Singapore has only three types of weather - hot , hot and hot ! Well, to be fair it does has some variation - It is amazing to experience bright sunshine, humidity, heavy rains with immense thundering and lightening and pleasant breeze in Singapore, all in the span of a single day.

But as I shivered inside the public transport, I realized that Singapore also has something for which I was not prepared. Yes, Singapore is notoriously cold if you happen to be in bus, malls, cinema or office. I thought probably something was wrong only with me until I read many complaints in the newspaper about it and came across a mention on this even in Lonely Planet.

No idea why everyone wants to keep the air cons as if they are expecting polar bears !

But I am happy that my Delhi stock of stoles and my son's stock of sweat shirts will not go waste after all :-)

Play of Words

Preloved - recently came through this usage as a polite way of saying second hand.

I really liked it and the play of words does make such a difference !!

The Notice !!

One fine evening, we find a notice slipped under our door. On first glance it seems like someone had parked the cycle somewhere it shouldn't have been......on a closer look the picture seems familiar..Yes !!!..Pranav has exactly the same cycle...Wow ! Closer look reveals that the shoe rack beside the cycle also look like ours.....now I am interested to read it fully !

 

Oops !!! the notice is actually directed to us meant to tell that we should not park the cycle outside our house so as to enable the maintenance person to do his cleaning job properly. Phew !!! a formal notice with photo..... for this !! Quite good use of the candid camera !! 

We are thanking our stars that they did not put this notice on the common notice board :-)

In India ..someone would have just pressed the doorbell (irrespective of the time of day and only if someone had bothered about having difficulty in cleaning !).....Here, we read the notice twice just to make sure that they were not levying any fine on us ...(By now we know that Singapore is a FINE place !! )

Well ! on one hand we were happy that the apartment is in good hands but we have also got suspicious whether they were cleaning the area outside our house for the first time in 2.5 months :-D (the cycle has been proudly parked at the same place since we shifted 2.5 months back !).
 

As soon as Pranav and his Nani came home after playing downstairs, he hurried to get the cycle inside the house (having already seen the photo and being explained by Nani what the notice meant). We are still deciding on a place to park inside the house :-) Currently it is adding charm to the drawing room decor !

Holi 2010

We were invited to a week late Holi celebrations organized by Marwari mitra mandal in Singapore. 

Holi is generally celebrated in the neighbourhood with family and friends, so we felt a little awkward at the thought of formally going to a place to play holi with strangers. Still, we decided to go thinking at least Pranav will enjoy with his pichkari. When we reached the venue in Katong we were surprised to hear bollywood songs blaring and large crowd already immersed in colours.


As usual, Pranav cried whenever someone put colour on him but started to enjoy when everybody else was done. There were stalls with several Indian delights and we relished the Jalebis and dahi badas and samosas and aloo-poori (that too without onlion and garlic !)


Now....after being drenched in water and colours, we realized that we hadn't brought any change of clothes..oops !. We did not want everyone to stare at us in public transport so we tried stopping a cab, fearing that he might refuse to take us in....but thankfully he got us in and was quite interested in knowing about the festival, why it is celebrated ,what kind of colours were used , how these colours were made etc. Generally, the cab drivers are very friendly and often try to strike a conversation. 


At home, after having a wash we realized (too much of realizations today !) that the colours didn't come off fully and we all had to field questions in office/school the next day on why we were looking so 'pink'. Kapil still has pink toe nails and cannot step out of house without socks :-))


In all a great experience !!

No Brainer !

We recently got to know about a Painting hobby class in our neighborhood community center and thought of checking it out for Pranav. When we enquired at the reception he told us that a class is currently running and we can have a look. Expecting many children in there and with no intention of disturbing them, we opened the class door slowly.

Two small children and a teacher greeted us. We were little disappointed (seeing so less strength) and somewhat happy (that our child will get individual attention). Anyways, we talked to the teacher and assured her that Pranav will join in from next week (which Pranav out rightly rejected).

Back at the reception, this conversation follows:

Reception: Classes are run in 6 batches and we take full amount in advance. You have already missed 2 classes.

We:  So can we pay for 4 classes and join ?

R:  No

We: So can Pranav attend 4 classes now and 2 more classes afterwards ?

R: No

We: Well, then we would not like to pay for 6 classes and attend only 4.

R: OK

Wow....that was a No Brainer !!! Why were we even trying to rake our brains for options !

Innovative Advertising

Do you get the point ? Well, I did not at the first look. In fact when I saw several such papers stuck on one of the wall near the Clementi bus stop in Singapore, I was little surprised at the upheaval look of so many seemingly torn off papers !

If you take a closer look, it is an advertisement having strips of papers with the same contact number written on it. So, anyone interested can just pull off a strip on the go ! 

I found that quite an amazing and innovative idea !

Gong Xi Fa Cai

There is something about festivals. You can feel it in the air!

Having just shifted to Singapore a month and half back, I invariably found myself picking up a Red Tee to wear on the eve of Chinese New Year.

When numerous red lanterns, big and small pots laden with several dozen oranges, beautiful red and golden decorative and lion dances suddenly start springing from nowhere, you know that Chinese New Year is round the corner ! 

Not to forget lots of unwanted stuff being put away as part of spring cleaning. In fact, inspired, we also threw some of our unwanted stuff !

Relatives give money in little red packets to the unmarried in family called Ang Pao (Hong Bao in Mandarin). It was funny reading articles in local papers on ways to deal with relatives who keep pestering the marriageable aged while giving them their ang paos. There are also articles on many couples not wanting girl child to be born in the coming year, lest they will grow up to be very aggressive as this is the year of Tiger.

It's quite like our Diwali - decorations, exchange of gifts, de-cluttering and family reunions!

We headed to Kuala Lumpur to spend our CNY holidays this year and so missed the D-Day festivities, fireworks and lion dances. May be next year, till then - Gong Xi Fa Cai (roughly means Congratulations and be Prosperous)!