I'm settling in to the beautiful Singapore quite well and am of late rarely reminded of the fact that I am truly a foreigner here. Then, suddenly, I get a nice big slap in the face. Today, that came in the form of a mop.
A mop, you ask? Surely you must be kidding Stephanie - how can a silly little mop make you feel like a newbie all over again in your new home? Well, let me assure you that you heard it right - I did indeed say mop. And here's how it went down...
I got up early this gorgeous Saturday morning and instead of heading to the pool like my recent Saturdays, I decided I was going to do a thorough spring cleaning of my apartment. Sounds simple enough, right? So I head over to the little grocery store across the street, buy new cleaning supplies and a mop. I beebop my butt back home, turn on some jams and get to cleaning.
All started well. I have figured out what the Windex and Clorox cleaning equivalents are here, so no bumps in my cleaning routine so far. I'm bobbing my head to Black and Yellow (I do enjoy a good thug moment in my day) and suddenly - BAM - I'm confronted yet again by the fact that I am an American living in a completely different country. All because of my new mop.
Now, this mop looks like a normal mop. It's got the mop head, the squeezie arm thing and a long handle. Just like what I'm used to. Except this mop is very clearly not made for someone standing 5'9" in flip flops. I'm scrubbing my floor bent over like the hag in Hansel and Gretel, pissed and saying silly things like "Oh, my aching back" like I'm 80 years old. What the hell?? Then it hits me - I'm in Singapore. A country made up of 80% Asian people. And, in general, (just stating generalities here so don't get your panties in a wad) Asian people are shorter than Americans. So of course it makes sense that mops are shorter, chairs make me look like I'm 7 feet tall with 5 foot legs, and people wear 5 inch heels on a regular basis.
Right, I get that intellectually. I really do. But, I still feel like a silly, tall American trying to mop my floor with a kid's toy.
Hong Kong!
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Finding balance is the name of the game
Hello Dear Readers! I am sitting here on the 31st floor open terrace, watching the city lights, basking from the delicious head massage I just got and completely stressing about a presentation I have to give tomorrow to 100 reps. Pretty much the story of my life right now. I've come to realize that "work hard, play hard" is more than just a saying in my world at the moment, but probably how I will be living for a while.
So, what's going on? LOTS. It's been a busy, busy few weeks. Let's start with work - going very well so far, but DAMN am I busy! There is so much to do, so many things to accomplish that sometimes I find myself feeling overwhelmed to the point of being frozen. Then I shake myself, grab a Diet Dr. Pepper (reminds me of home!) and get back on track. Long hours, lots of meetings, huge projects - that's my day. Now, on the good side, I'm hitting quite the groove at work and am (hopefully) starting to make a real impact. People say hi everyday, I get invited to lunch now and my team is starting to ask my advice on issues that I'm not involved in, so progress is being made. I even heard that my name came up at a meeting with the big boss from Canada who was visiting last week - apparently I am going to "change the service culture" here. Not that there's any pressure or anything. ;) As I've mentioned to a few of you that I've had the chance to chat with, I'll either make or break my career here. Let's just hope on the make, shall we?
Now that the obligatory work update is behind us, let's get to the good stuff - the play hard part. My social/fun life is definitely starting to pick up! In fact, this past week I made two new friends!! First was Prachi, my new friend from work. She's a newbie too, completely cool and smart - we bonded over lots of delish drinks Friday. Dancing is on the agenda this coming weekend at the fantastic Clarke Quay, which is this huge area with tons of bars and clubs that you can just wonder around and in and out of places, then stumble into a cab at 4am to go home. Sounds perfect, right?? I'm sure I'll have new, slightly off-balance and potentially blurry pictures to share with you after this weekend. Then Saturday, I decided that I haven't done enough damage to my poor, pale skin here so I headed down to the pool for some sun and relaxation where I ran into an expat named George. Now, calm down friends - this is not a love match. In fact, he's quite in love with his girl still back in the states, but that doesn't matter to me because do you know what he likes to do?? Drink beer by the pool, play poker, go out dancing and in general talk to random people just like me. I invited him to a website launch party on Saturday night (I know, I'm really getting uber-cool, right?) and we took the place by storm, just chatting it up with random peeps while drinking free champagne. A guy that can hold his own with me on the social butterfly front? Definitely deserves a spot in the social group.
But the real kicker this weekend was Little India on Sunday - I've added some new pics but it really doesn't even come close to doing it justice. I'm going to paint a little picture for you - imagine if you will that it's a nice, hot Sunday. You decide you're going to meet some people from work to go to a part of town you've never been before and check out a good tourist spot, maybe have a beer or two. You meet, walk around to some cute little stores, buy a kitschy item or two, drink a beer at a great little Aussie backpacker bar and prepare to head home. The BAM, you're in an ant farm. Literally, it's as close to a people-sizes ant farm as you can even imagine. Thousands of people EVERYWHERE - on the side of the street, talking on the phone, haggling with vendors, riding motorcycles, crossing streets in herds and chatting with friends. I have never in my life experienced anything like it. It was overwhelming to say the least. My friends decided to take me to this huge, 24-hour store that is in the heart of Little India for the experience, as everyone talks about this place. Imagine Walmart, the Dollar Store, Target and Home Depot all wrapped into one store, then topped with a little drop of acid. That's Mustafa's. Everything you have ever wanted is in this store and it's ridiculously cheap. But, you have to practically crawl over people to move and it's so randomly designed getting lost is a definite possibility. I left feeling utterly exhausted, but I did get some good stuff, so no complaints. It still makes me tired to even think about it.
Okay, so getting ready to jump off to prep for my big presentation but before I go I wanted to share a little Singaporean-ism. One thing I love about here is the clear directions, signage and instructions everywhere - I mean, there is no wondering where you are, what you should or shouldn't do or even where to stand here. So today, I see this great sign. No shopthefting, it says. Pretty clear, right? In America, we would say no shoplifting. But really, that's not so clear is it? If you didn't speak English, you may not know what that means. But shopthefting
So, what's going on? LOTS. It's been a busy, busy few weeks. Let's start with work - going very well so far, but DAMN am I busy! There is so much to do, so many things to accomplish that sometimes I find myself feeling overwhelmed to the point of being frozen. Then I shake myself, grab a Diet Dr. Pepper (reminds me of home!) and get back on track. Long hours, lots of meetings, huge projects - that's my day. Now, on the good side, I'm hitting quite the groove at work and am (hopefully) starting to make a real impact. People say hi everyday, I get invited to lunch now and my team is starting to ask my advice on issues that I'm not involved in, so progress is being made. I even heard that my name came up at a meeting with the big boss from Canada who was visiting last week - apparently I am going to "change the service culture" here. Not that there's any pressure or anything. ;) As I've mentioned to a few of you that I've had the chance to chat with, I'll either make or break my career here. Let's just hope on the make, shall we?
Now that the obligatory work update is behind us, let's get to the good stuff - the play hard part. My social/fun life is definitely starting to pick up! In fact, this past week I made two new friends!! First was Prachi, my new friend from work. She's a newbie too, completely cool and smart - we bonded over lots of delish drinks Friday. Dancing is on the agenda this coming weekend at the fantastic Clarke Quay, which is this huge area with tons of bars and clubs that you can just wonder around and in and out of places, then stumble into a cab at 4am to go home. Sounds perfect, right?? I'm sure I'll have new, slightly off-balance and potentially blurry pictures to share with you after this weekend. Then Saturday, I decided that I haven't done enough damage to my poor, pale skin here so I headed down to the pool for some sun and relaxation where I ran into an expat named George. Now, calm down friends - this is not a love match. In fact, he's quite in love with his girl still back in the states, but that doesn't matter to me because do you know what he likes to do?? Drink beer by the pool, play poker, go out dancing and in general talk to random people just like me. I invited him to a website launch party on Saturday night (I know, I'm really getting uber-cool, right?) and we took the place by storm, just chatting it up with random peeps while drinking free champagne. A guy that can hold his own with me on the social butterfly front? Definitely deserves a spot in the social group.
But the real kicker this weekend was Little India on Sunday - I've added some new pics but it really doesn't even come close to doing it justice. I'm going to paint a little picture for you - imagine if you will that it's a nice, hot Sunday. You decide you're going to meet some people from work to go to a part of town you've never been before and check out a good tourist spot, maybe have a beer or two. You meet, walk around to some cute little stores, buy a kitschy item or two, drink a beer at a great little Aussie backpacker bar and prepare to head home. The BAM, you're in an ant farm. Literally, it's as close to a people-sizes ant farm as you can even imagine. Thousands of people EVERYWHERE - on the side of the street, talking on the phone, haggling with vendors, riding motorcycles, crossing streets in herds and chatting with friends. I have never in my life experienced anything like it. It was overwhelming to say the least. My friends decided to take me to this huge, 24-hour store that is in the heart of Little India for the experience, as everyone talks about this place. Imagine Walmart, the Dollar Store, Target and Home Depot all wrapped into one store, then topped with a little drop of acid. That's Mustafa's. Everything you have ever wanted is in this store and it's ridiculously cheap. But, you have to practically crawl over people to move and it's so randomly designed getting lost is a definite possibility. I left feeling utterly exhausted, but I did get some good stuff, so no complaints. It still makes me tired to even think about it.
Okay, so getting ready to jump off to prep for my big presentation but before I go I wanted to share a little Singaporean-ism. One thing I love about here is the clear directions, signage and instructions everywhere - I mean, there is no wondering where you are, what you should or shouldn't do or even where to stand here. So today, I see this great sign. No shopthefting, it says. Pretty clear, right? In America, we would say no shoplifting. But really, that's not so clear is it? If you didn't speak English, you may not know what that means. But shopthefting
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