Letters from Drew Dawg

My boy Drew's going to be in Singapore for a couple of years. These are his letters.

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Singaporeans and Asians are brilliant at integrating the environment amongst the buildings and roads. My drive into work is like driving into the bat cave; there are huge banzai trees planted everywhere on each side of the road. The branches overhang the road creating a cave and at 56MPH you really cannot see the through to the other-side of the express way or buildings. It’s my piece of serenity as I drive into work, unless there is someone pruning the plants. What are they doing on the side of the road? There are no bright orange cones or advance warning. I think safety is left up to the employee rather than the employer.

I spent most of the week shopping for furniture. Aside from having someone to talk to, the most interesting part is that I haggled over everything; never pay sticker price. However, they continually try to sell you things that you are neither interested in nor need. “It’s a good deal, you have to buy it.” It’s like going to a strip club and the girl you’ve just rejected says, “Don’t you think I am pretty? You make up some lie why you don’t want the goods or service, just so the salesperson goes away. But they throw in the hungry kids at home. They make you feel like you owe her something because she took the time to try to sell you. Singapore isn’t the only market like this, India was the same way. Especially rugs; rugs that only your grandma can love. Anyway, I digress. So I managed to haggle for everything from furniture to electronics; ten to forty percent. After the first haggle, subsequent negotiations came easy. Sometimes I haggled to get the price down, sometimes just so I could talk to someone when I wasn’t at work. The only place I didn’t haggle is IKEA; did I mention that I went there like five times? No major furniture, but if you want dishes, shelves, hangers, etc., IKEA is the place to go.

Moved into the Apartment in the middle of the week; its difficult keeping the 15th floor cool enough to hangout. You have to moderate between coolness and utility bills. Electricity is expensive in Singapore. So expensive, they forgot to put outlets in the bathroom! In order to have hot water, you need to flick a switch and wait three minutes. Amazingly, the hot water tank is either well insulated or it is outside, because I can turn it on once every couple of days and the water is fine for showers and the dishes. Which brings me to my next point; there is no dishwasher. So I have to do my dishes by hand; where’s my mum?

Burnt up the power supply of the Xbox. In my zeal to start playing Halo 3, I simply plugged the US plug into the adapter and into the wall. Despite the fact that the Power Supply is the size of a mini-cooler, Microsoft in its infinite wisdom decided that the voltage should only go up to 120V without fuse protection; Singapore is 200V so spark, crack, pop and no Halo 3 for me. Good thing for eBay; 90 bucks later and a new Power Supply is coming from the U.K. Soon I will be sticking the great Ardattack. So the lesson here is to check the stickers of your electrical device to see whether you can just plug in an adapter or whether you will need an electrical transformer ($100) for your US devices.

On Saturday I went for a jog; to the left of my apartment building is a golf course and the sea. Unfortunately, the sea is littered with giant cargo ships like the ants in a line in a California kitchen sink. Nonetheless it is a good place to jog, ride bikes or roller blade as the paved path is under trees and some views of the water. On Sunday, I went for another jog except this time I went to the right; on that side is an inlet and bay. There was a rowing club made of young boys and girls; those coaches were really working them; it reminded me of the Myrmidons as they raced each other. It was like 30C, with the sun reflecting off the water, those kids must have been hurting. Serves em right for getting in my way at the market. Ha ha.

I also found out that I live next to the Singapore Indoor Stadium; I think its true when bands say “I am really big overseas” because there are interesting bands playing there; like Mega-death, Heaven and Hell (Black Sabbath reunited with Ronnie James Dio do you remember “What do you wanna do with your life? I WANNA ROCK!”) – you know you do. All the old hair bands play there and on the radio. Nonetheless, on the 22nd The Black Eyed Peas are playing so I am going to try to get a ticket. I also found a softball coach during the run, and he gave me a number to a baseball and softball league set up by the American Expats. Finally, some peeps to relate too; America, BBQ burgers, and Heineken bottled in the USA at US prices because we were on the US base. Had my first beer on Sunday; completely buzzed after a beer in a half. I detoxed for nearly two weeks after the debauchery of my going way party in Santa Monica.

For being a Service Oriented country, these people suck at it; there is no sense of urgency. Seriously, I called to schedule a cab and was on hold for ten minutes and when I finally got through the lady said can you hold while I find a cab? Five minutes later, and she comes back; she says, there are no cabs answering. What the hell? In a city where there are more cabs than personal cars (seriously) and I can’t schedule a cab? You have to call cabbies to get them to come? Can’t you just put it into the computer, lie to me and tell me that it will be there in 15 minutes and show up in 20?

Enough for now, stay tuned for week three - I am in Korea.

Andrew