So I'm staying here in a fully serviced apartment. In practical terms, that means I'm essentially in a hotel--complete with maid service and a fancy-pants pool and a shuttle bus which moves me to work and back. We're fairly close to the river and various assorted shopping complexes, so we can get all of our shopping and eating done. As far as I can tell, shopping and eating is all that people do here. Or, if you're an old chinese man with a pot belly, sitting outside on the concrete smoking and playing checkers is also an option. I haven't partaken of that option just yet--I'm mostly concentrating on the shopping; so much so, in fact, that the credit card company froze my account on security concerns. Apparently buying expensive things in four countries and two continents in a two-week stretch is considered suspicious. Go figure.   ¶ 3/30/2003 03:14:00 AM 0 comments links to this post

I had the Singapore Sling a couple nights ago. We went out to the tourist bar, packed with Brits and other assorted white people, and confidently ordered what in most bars would be labelled a girl drink, and the drinker, a gay man. Singapore   ¶ 3/28/2003 01:43:00 AM 0 comments links to this post

So I've been bad about updating my website on this front, but as fate would have it, I took up a job in Singapore and am currently looking out my window at a bunch of palm trees and skyscrapers. Parks and tall buildings. That's my main impression of the place so far. And fluent English, resounding off every radio, shopkeeper and waiter. Amazing how easy it is to navigate a place filled with English signs. I feel like Superman all of a sudden, I can do anything. Yesterday, I left a bag at the airport, and with two quick, fluent-english phone calls, had my bags delivered to my apartment two hours later. The same feat in Prague would easily have been a two-day affair. Aside from the English and the skyscrapers, the traditional rumors about the well-organized, spotlessly clean city are also true. However, despite rumors, apparently it's legal to chew gum here once again, and I haven't seen so many police with machines guns like the last time I was in Singapore on a layover.   ¶ 3/22/2003 01:14:00 AM 0 comments links to this post

In chaos theory, statistical probability suggests that, at least occasionally, order must spontaneously occur. This never happens in my apartment.  ¶ 3/14/2003 03:43:00 AM 0 comments links to this post

They should make a video game based on negotiating your way through a club or bar without spilling your drink. Or anyone else's for that matter. The levels could go from "local disco" on Monday to Rage Against the Machine concert on Saturday.  ¶ 3/07/2003 08:37:00 PM 0 comments links to this post