Orchids!

More Orchids than you can shake a stick at kids.

Courtney and I went to the Singapore National Orchid Center. This is the Singapore flower, the Vanda Miss Joaquim (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanda_Miss_Joaquim)

Here are assorted piccies from the garden.

The sun DOES shine in Singapore!

It's our last morning here before heading to Bangkok and after 5 days of rain and overcast skies, the sun is out. This picture is the view from our room - of Marina Bay and the Singapore skyline. All the little white dots in the water are round white buoys on which the new year wishes of 10,000 Singaporeans are written. There will be a huge New Year's celebration down at the water front tomorrow night.

We're heading to the Singapore Botanic Garden for a couple of hours before leaving for Thailand. Have a great weekend!

Sunny Singapore...not so much

Greetings...We've had a good four full days in Singapore and fly to Bangkok this afternoon. Pardon the posting gap, but the internet was virtually down after the earthquake in Taiwan and I was sick on Thursday (all better now thanks to the stash of Airborne we brought). The jetlag seems to have passed after four days, though we're obviously waking up pretty early.

Anyway, we've had several rainy days here which led to lots of time in electronics stores (Tony's happy ;) ) but not much site-seeing. Can't complain about the cramp in our travel given that many people have been impacted by terrible flooding nearby in Indonesia, Malaysia, and some here. Yesterday we lucked out and had a dry Friday. It was overcast but dry and we saw quite a lot.

In the morning we visited Tony's aunt - his father's eldest sister who moved back to Singapore in July after living in Canada for 25 years. She's quite a spunky 80-year old and warmly welcomed us into her beautiful home.

After our visit, we took a "memory lane" tour and drove by the home where Tony and Angie lived in junior high and highschool and saw where their school used to be. We also stopped by the MacRitchie Reservoir that was within walking distance of their old home and took some photos.
We also stopped at a favorite Lee family spot for Muslim Indian food and I saw them making fresh roti (flat bread) on a hot griddle. Delicious!

Then Tony, Angie, Glendon, and I spent time perusing the shops and stalls in Singapore's Chinatown. It was a great day for it and fun to see all of the wares. Tony and I wandered around Chinatown and even found a restaurant supply store. Check out Tony in wok section.

From there we walked around downtown to check out the view of the skyscrapers from Raffles Plaza, the Fullterton Hotel, and the Merlion fountain at the bay.

The evening took us all down to Boat Quay along the Singapore River for some famous chili crab along with other Chinese dishes. After dinner we took a cruise of the river in a "bumboat." It's a lovely city...no less so at night! Well, stay tuned for more from Bangkok.

Tropical Fruit of the Day 30 Dec 06

Today's tropical fruit of the day is....Rambutan! This fruit has a hairy exterior, a relatively thin, leathery skin, and a translucent flesh around a pit.

Courtney says that it would be a really good fruit if pieces of the pit didn't stick to the flesh when you eat it. I agree. My mother used to slice off pieces of the fruit because my sis and I wouldn't eat it otherwise. I'm sure they have a 'rambutan corer' gadget out there somewhere at Sur La Table Asia.

More at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rambutan

Tropical Fruit of the Day 29 Dec 06

Today's fruit of the day is...Chompu! Well, that's what it's called in Thailand. I'm not totally sure what the western name is. I've heard it called a rose apple.

They come in green or red or mixes in between. The flavor is similar to starfruit (which will probably be featured when we run out of exotic tropical fruits) but the texture is a cross between apple and celery.

We eat it with sugar and salt mixed together and in Thailand, they mix in chilli with all that, too.

More info at: http://thailandforvisitors.com/general/food/fruit/chompu.html

Sim Lim Square: Electronics Nirvana

Courtney said of this picture...something like once you see Tony here...you 'get him.' I loved Sim Lim Square when I lived in Singapore. Every imaginable electronic good is available here from laptops to servers to hard drives to cameras to little gadgets that make your life better.

We picked up a little microphone so we can Skype the US while we are in Asia. And Courtney now has a 1 GB SD card for her camera. She can now take 1000, yes, one thousand pictures on her camera before she needs to swap out her memory card.

Tropical Fruit of the Day 27 Dec 2006

And today's Tropical Fruit of the Day is...Longan!

This is the sibling of the lychee. It's very sweet and has a hard little pit on the inside. I think this fruit has been called a 'dragon's eye'.

They preserve these and make a tea out of it. And a bit about Asian 'hot and cold' foods. Chinese and other Asian cultures sometimes put foods into one of two camps. "Heaty" and "Cooling". If you eat too much of one kind of food, you're going to get sick. This is Chinese folklore at its best. Longans are notoriously "heaty" fruits...so don't eat too many of them in one sitting. I have gotten sick because of eating too many when I was a kid. Apples, on the other hand, are "cooling" fruits. So another way to do this is to eat tonnes of Longans but also eat tonnes of Apples. Beer, incidentally, is a 'cooling foods' where as red wine is 'heaty.' It's all about the ying and the yang.

More information at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longan

Little India Pictures

Let's see...

We went to a Hindu temple.

We went to a 'hawker center,' basically a food court but with Singaporean delicacies

We went to a fresh market. That's Courtney standing next to some dried seafood. Yup. Every single imaginable thing swimming in the sea can be dried and put in a plastic bag...and too bad this blog can't convey the smell. Very...distinctive.

Singapore Sling!

So, the Raffles Hotel, about 7 blocks away from our hotel, the Oriental, is the place where the Singapore Sling was invented. This concoction is pineapple juice, grenadine, cherry brandy and probably gin. Very refreshing. And very sneaky in how it affects you! Courtney and I really enjoyed the drink and would recommend the Singapore Sling at the Raffles Hotel Long Bar.

t

ps: it was raining cats and dogs. i obviously need a hair dryer. cheers!

Dragon Fruit

I had my first piece of dragon fruit this morning. It tastes like a mild apple or pear but the texture is very light and it's filled with seeds similar to a kiwi.

I guess they call it dragon fruit because it looks ferocious on the outside....

Tony says this is the beginning of a 'tropical fruit of the day' feature. ;)

We're here!

We have arrived and checked into our hotel. Mum and Pa picked us up at the Singapore Changi Airport. The weather is warm, humid and raining. Hope everyone is having a happy Christmas.

They are very festive here at our hotel. Here's a piccie of Courtney and Tony in front of the elevators. Thanks to Mum for taking the picture!

Ichiban!

And they have Ichiban, a chinese snack store in the Hong Kong airport. Actually, it's a Japanese snack store. but in Hong Kong, they sell chinese snacks. We didn't see anything good tonight. they will have it in Singapore and it's probably a better selection outside of an airport anyways.

I suppose I could have posted pictures of our flight over, Courtney sleeping, or her posting her blog just now...but we'll post plenty of piccies in the next three weeks.

love to all.

Merry Christmas...from Hong Kong!

Merry Christmas! I hope we'll be able to figure out this blog thing and share some of our trip with you.

We're in Hong Kong awaiting our flight to Singapore. It's 5:45 am EST and 6:45 pm in Hong Kong. We left home 24 hours ago and have another 5 until we arrive in Singapore. I was a bit worried about the 15 Chicago to Hong Kong flight having never been on a flight longer than 8 hours. And I was really worried when I woke up after what felt like many hours thinking we were probably halfway and found we were less than 4 hours in with more than 11 to go. In the end, thanks to our very comfortable accommodations in the upstairs business class section and to the fact that I slept for more than half of the flight, it wasn't too bad.

My super geek husband is well equipped for any and all electronic communications or entertainment needs or wants (yes, he's got the laptop bag strapped across his chest in the photo). So we're entertained and comfortable...and VERY excited to arrive in Singapore soon.