O Behave!

The Aussie has been a bit lazy in updating his blog...so time for an update!

Well the year in Singapore has been a hectic one...so the Aussie is taking a 4.5 week holiday to the 'ole US of A for some good R and R! Anyway the most cost effective way to visit the west coast was to join a tour. Little did i know that the tour was run by Asians...for Asians. So the break i really wanted from Asia hasn't really worked out. And let me tell u, Asians on tour behave no differently from when they are at home.

Lemme give you a few examples:

Incident 1 - Disneyland.
What a colourful place! Amazing! Anyway the Aussie was one of the first to board a mammoth 'Pirate Ship' to navigate around Tom Sawyers Island. As he got on, he was pushed out of the way by a gangly Chinese tourist with camera in hand, racing for the front of the boat to get the best possie for his home video! Crazy asians with their cameras...

Incident 2 - Dodgy all u can eat buffet in LA.
So we arrive at this dodgy looking restaurant on some back streets in LA...which our tour guide professes is the cheapest and best in LA. Cheap it was indeed...Anyway we get into the place and our Aussie is busting for the loo so he dashes to the toilet where he is greeted by a group of older 55 plus year old men...who were snorting and coughing in the toilets like a bunch of buffalo being electrocuted who had eaten too much chilli. It was disgusting..it was like an orchestra of snot noise. YUCK!Anway i'm on a tour bus to San Francisco now and the bus driver only speaks Spanish and he's LOST! We've taken a wrong turn, overshot our destination and now we've taken another wrong turn so we've missed our lunch destination. And to top it off our tour guide speaks English and Mandarin but not Spanish! Everyone is tired, hungry and needs to pee!

Until next time...adios!

Too many cyclists

Just got back from cycling along the East Coast Parkway, which is a nice stretch of palm trees and beach the extends along the east coast of Singapore. What madness!

Trying to cycle here is like trying to navigate your way through the Chatuchak markets in Bangkok. Impossible. Kids were running all over the path, cyclists cycling in front, behind and cutting across your line, and worst of all, rollerbladers going left, right and centre.

Well its no wonder we prefer cycling at 10pm at night, cause there is no-one around!!!

I can't believe there were sooo many people there. It was like tent city all along the east coast. Every man and his dog had a tent. And to top it off, for every tent, there would have been at least 15 people.

Today is Singapore's National Day, and lucky me managed to score some tickets. So I'm looking forward to experiencing some Singapore nationalism later today. Its gonna be real interesting. Funny thing is, I don't even attend Australia Day events in Australia! But the worst thing about today is that you can't drink beer at the National Day!!!! Who ever heard of a National Day without beer? Absurd! That is one thing Singapore has to change if its serious about its National Day. No amount of parades and army firepower can overcome the fact that you cant't drink beer.

To National Day we go!

Paper harassment

Just a short update. I was standing at a street corner today, waiting for the pedestrian lights to give me the ok to cross in front of the crazy Singaporean drivers hooning around. Anyway there's some dude there handing out flyers advertising some hair and beauty thing (by the way, there are heaps of hair and beauty adverts everywhere which generally tell the ladies here to get slimmer or get their skinner whiter). Anyway this old fella was going crazy handing out flyers - he was just handing them out left right and centre. And if you didn't take one, he'd slam one into your hand so you had no choice but to take it! I call it paper harassment…. Obviously this guy is getting paid by how many flyers he distributes. The poor sod. Now if he was an Aussie, he would have put all the flyers in some public bin first thing in the morning, and he'd be at the beach by lunchtime, lapping up some waves!

Earning too much?

Just went to some Opthamology joint at a place called Cambden Medical Centre to get my stoopid eyes checked out. Apparently I have been overwearing my contacts so now my cornea is wearing out. Jeez medical technology sucks. Now I have to wear glasses for at least the next 6 months and look like a 4 eyed geak.

Anyway back to the gist of it - I get dropped off at this clinic, and a doorman opens up my taxi door for me to fast track my exit out of the taxi. Not bad service i think to myself. Then i realise that i'm not at a hotel, i'm at a Medical Centre!!! Anyway I head up the lift to see the optical clinic, and i felt like i was at the Ritz Carlton. Anyway I arrive in the foyer, and this place is HUGE!!!

I reckon the practitioners in the place must earn a bomb. Marble floors everywhere, marble pillars everywhere, oak wood plastered all over the walls....and to top it off, plasma and LCD tv's were all over the place, as if they were going out of fashion! Unbelievable. Now usually hospitals etc are run down, low budget places, at least where i come from. Perhaps I should have chosen the career path of a medical practitioner, and practised in Singapore! This incident also reminds me of the time I walked past the Mt. Elizabeth Hospital carpark. Was more like a luxury car shop, as it was stacked with BMW's, Merc's, Audi's, Porche's, Lexus etc...if you were driving a Camry there i reckon you would have been asked to leave the carpark!

Well, such is the life of a medical professional!

Well Dressed Gentlemen

Well it’s been a while since of blogged. Been too busy moving house, working and eating. How sad. I don’t even have a few minutes to write…must be the Singapore lifestyle getting to me.

Anyway my last post was from Hong Kong, and I want to discuss something that has continued to stay in my mind.

Men in suits.

Now, typically in Singapore, the average office worker will arrive wearing pants (usually of the plain variety – pinstripes are a rarity), and either a short sleeve shirt (for those who are based in more ‘industrial’ type industries – I guess the short sleeves allow ventilation of the forearm) or a long sleeve shirt (normally of plain description, nothing too bright) and in some rare cases, you might find the odd “stylo milo” (Singaporean term for fashionable) wearing cufflinks. Now you ask...what about suits? Lets just say if you are 'caught' wearing a suit, Singaporeans will look at you as if you are a green alien. I should know. I wore one to my job interview.

Lets contrast this with the average Aussie office worker. Now, depending on season, the Aussie who works in Professional Services will typically wear a suit and tie, but nothing to “bling bling”. At most, you might find a pin-striped shirt underneath that plain coloured (usually navy, grey or black) pure wool suit. Cufflinks might be found on perhaps 5% of “suiters”. However again, the bulk of the population will generally wear just a shirt and tie, depending on season.

Coming back to Hong Kong. Now these guys really know how to dress. It’s as if they’ve all just been reading FHM Mens Collections and jumped out of some page in the magazine and onto the sidewalk. I have never seen sooo many guys in one city wearing qwwality suits, with sensational shirt fabrics, matched with the right contrast of tie and cufflinks. Truly wondrous. So it was no surprise to me than upon my visit to the tailor, I was presented with a sensational array of fabrics and colours. I was in metrosexual heaven. Well, apparently London is just the same. I’m sure I’ll verify this for myself one day, but for a city based in Asia (the land of shorts and t-shirts), it was certainly an eye ball opener.

Bonkers in Honkers?

Well this week our Aussie is off to Hong Kong, a place of good food and great shopping so I hear. There are 2 things that I'm looking forward to doing.

1. Eating roast goose. A delicacy that apparently goes beyond words and is the one item that I am told I must eat.
2. Get some tailor made shirts! Hong Kong is supposed to be the place to go for shopping, so I'm looking forward to picking out some stunning material...hopefully I'll be looking sharp again!

Singlish. Heard of the term "Blur"?

Well its only been 20mins since I started my blog and already I have come across a funny instance.Singaporeans have this term called "Blur". I guess "Blur" is defined as being stupid, or doing something out of the ordinary without knowing. You might use the term when referring to somebody about something. eg "Bob is so blur when it comes to ordering drinks". Meaning - Bob has absolutely no idea about which drinks most people enjoy ordering.

Anyway, back on topic.

I got into the office this morning and one of the girls was fussing around with a Projector. Apparently it wasn't working - the words appearing on the screen were all fuzzy. She proceeded to get help from other collegues, and called the IT Helpdesk - to know avail. By this time I'm starting to feel sorry for the poor thing. So I pull myself away from my desk to check out the situation. Turns out that the problem is solved by Mr Aussie himself in a nanosecond. She hadn't adjusted the "Focus", but was only playing with the "Zoom" function. Hence the presentation was appearing fuzzy. Well, there we go, for the record Blur Incident #1 goes down in the books.

Introduction

Well this is my first post. Been wanting to do this for a while now. I guess I should start with an introduction. I'm chinese, Australian born, and was born and bred in Australia. I've never lived overseas, up until 3 months ago when I moved to Singapore. And I must say, Singapore is a strange and wonderful place.I've come across many strange and peculiar nuances over here, and I intend to share them with others!So read on and enjoy my ride!