Are we there yet? Yep!

Hello from Singapore!
Yesterday morning (or, your Tuesday night), I finally arrived in Singapore, joining the clever and rather handsome Jacob Dalager, who has been learning his way around for the past 3 weeks - and doing a million things to get our life set up here! He learned to work the public transport, figured out cell phone plans, opened a bank account, started his job, moved us into our condo, found groceries and stores and hawker centers, and made friends. I'm so grateful for (and proud of) his hard work!

Stoked to be in Singapore - even at 6am!

In addition, Jacob planned a great first day for us together in Singapore. Which I will relate to you now!

On Monday afternoon, after 2 great weeks at home with my family and days of tough goodbyes, I boarded a 15-hour flight to Hong Kong (I had three seats to myself and guess what? Cathay Pacific serves wine!) and then took another 4 hour flight to Singapore, arriving at 4:50 in the morning on Wednesday. Immigration and customs were easy and quick, and by the time Jacob arrive at 6am, I'd changed my money and made my first purchase in Singapore Dollars (SG$) - coffee from Starbucks. [For those who are curious, the 1 SG$ = .80 US$, and my coffee cost about SG$3]

Of course, it was wonderful to be reunited with Jacob, and also surreal to realize that we were finally together, here, in Singapore after so many month of planning (and uncertainty). We took a taxi to our condo - which I will document at a later time - where we ate breakfast and met our 3 housemates. After a quick shower and a brief nap, I set off with Jacob to shadow him on a day of teaching. We hopped on the MRT (mass rapid transit - more on these later too!), followed by a bus, to the International Community School, where Jacob teaches group trumpet and trombone lessons on Mondays and the brass section of band on Wednesdays (same kids). They are all young kids - 4th or 5th grade - and mostly beginners. But they are getting the basics, and I enjoyed watching Jacob teach - and try to play trombone.


Next, we went to a nearby hawker center for lunch with Pablo, the woodwinds teacher. Hawker centers are big food courts with roofs and but no walls, often with several corridors of small food stalls offering different specialities. Jacob and Pablo have found a place that makes excellent duck, so we had duck and rice, along with a plate of vegetables from another stand, and 100 Plus, a grapefruity soda (a favorite of Jacob's) from yet another stall that serves only drinks. You grab a
table wherever you can find space and when

Eating curried rice and Kangkung, a spinach-y veggie

you're done, you leave your plates and they are bussed by workers. Hawkers from the drink stalls will even come over to you (if they see you don't have drinks yet) and take your order/try to sell you something, so it is almost like a mix of restaurant and foodcourt...and I like it! We found ourselves wondering why they don't really have places like this in the states...


 Next, we took a cab to one of Jacob's students houses. Normally he teaches at schools, but this student has autism and does better in his home environment, so Jacob goes to their house. It's a reeeally awesome home (holy cow - it should be on 'dream home' boards on Pinterest) and the family is very nice. His mother was eager to talk to us and made me tea and let me sit and read in their living room while Jacob taught - and then insisted I borrow the book I started. Afterwards, their driver (yep, they have a driver) was taking the daughter to swimming so he dropped us off at the Botanical Gardens on the way.

Giant Fern

Bonsai!

Monitor Lizard (we think)

We walked around the beautiful gardens - open to the public and really quiet spectacular. I don't believe I've mentioned it yet (!), but it is hot here (duh). And humid - today had a high of 88 and humidity around 70% and tonight it will only drop to 76 degrees. In terms of fauna, we saw turtles, swans, fish, and a monitor lizard, while the flora included ginger plants, banana trees, a bondai tree garden, ferns with GIANT leaves and probably a million other species. As in most tropical places, the plant leaves can grow to be just huge. We didn't go this time, but there is an orchid exhibit which is supposed to be great!

We took another taxi to the Singapore American School, where Jacob taught a few more lessons, and then we took the MRT home. And I didn't sleep the whole time! I did take a brief nap before dinner though. Jacob had arranged to meet his friends Freddie and Sophie for dinner at a Taiwanese dumpling restaurant in a mall one MRT stop away. I will mention I was blown away by the mall - it wasn't so much it size (though it was pretty huge) but how packed it was at 8pm on a Wednesday night! Craziness. The dumplings were fantastic and from where we sat, we could see the chefs preparing everything, including rolling out tiny circle of dough and stuffing and closing the dumplings. Too cool! We finished the meal with red bean and yam buns - which are desserts! Both had spongy outer dough layers and were filled with sweet pastes made from beans or yams. Yum.

The dumplings and buns are steamed in the wooden baskets.

We returned home and I was finally allowed to go to sleep! Great first day - and if the bed has springs that sort of stick out from the mattress, they were no match for my tiredness! (And actually, our landlord is working on fixing that...) So there you have it - and only about half of this post was about food! More to come later...