3 Nov 2014 – Have Yet To Give Thanksgiving A Thought…

Sat: unbelievable, Christmas decorations are up on Orchard Rd, but the light-up is not until mid-end Nov. Still it is way too early to see all these decorations when Halloween was just yesterday and there are 3+weeks before Thanksgiving!

Appreciations to Calvin for sharing his new stock of wine. Made Chicken Guacamole Beet Salad and did warn Chris about red pee! Glad to meet up with another younger charming man, Emerson. Hope that he and friends will be able to join the Iceland presentation at CC/51 Waterloo St Fri 28 Nov 1930hr, day after Thanksgiving.

Amy SG Lam is a avid hikier/walker who has been almost round the global exploring different places. This time, we are pleased to have her again for a presentation of a 9 Days Tour (1 to 9 Sep 2014) in the Best of South & West Iceland. This talk will Include the dormant Thrihnukagigur Volcano that erupted 4,000yrs ago and the ONLY volcano on earth that can be explored on the inside. Let’s get together and enjoy this joyous occasion !

https://www.facebook.com/events/1511571335768345/

While waiting for the bus, I spy these events at SMU,

and some of the outdoor displays at the National Museum.

Tkx Clement for dinner me to his pot-luck dinner. Good to see his ex-banker colleagues and a year does make a difference to their kids. Too busy watching TV with the kids that the camera was forgotten!

Audrey’s contribution, delicious beef soup and even to doggy-bag some home. Tkx Aud and also for the ride. Beef soup pix ix credits to Aud.

Sun: those who are in the areas of Fall Back (DayLight Saving Time), remember to turn your clock an hour back and enjoy that extra hour of sleep. Many moons ago when I was working with the airlines in MCO/FL, USA forgot about Fall Back and was the only one at the gate counter that early and dark morning…

Dinner at Glory and ice-cream at Marble Slab/I12, both within 10mins walk or 3 bus-stops. Chose the bus bc of the stupid haze. TKx Clem for dinner and company. Bad haze today – stayed indoors, nice to get out just for a short evening walk but the eyes were teary!

Mon: haze is still in – PSI readings, 100+ Rescheduled app to remain indoors in my own space and AC surroundings. No fan nor friends of the haze, otherwise the eyes and throat will be unhappy! Stirred-fried baby KaiLan in XO sauce garnished with celery and pumpkin puree to use up the veggies before they go to waste.

A movie from last week: The Rewrite***a romantic comedy. Keith is an Oscar-winning writer stuck in a slump and decides to leave Hollywood. He starts teaching screenwriting at a small college on the East coast,  and soon finds himself falling for a single mother who is one of the students taking his classes.

Feel good movie with Hugh Grant who plays Keith here…

The ironies of life…

1 Nov 2014 – Just Over A Month to Christmas

Wed: Happy Birthdays to Lock & Kiera. Needed to make sure that the muscle does not get knotted again. More sewing but making sure to not sitting in just one position. Got up and cleaned in between!

Thu: tkx Carmel for yummy lunch. First time tasting savoury scorns and salads with mangos and tangerines. Refreshing combination. Great to catch up with MeiLin and to meet her mom Irene. They are the only people I know who have lived on Christmas Island and seen the migrations of the crabs.

Thought Carmel would like a couple of the Shanagarry pottery bowls since she is from that area. She has the brown & whites collections. I still have one of their first mugs bought for a few pence in the late 1960s and they are the black & whites. Have been collecting them thru’ out 10yrs and some broke during the many moves.

http://www.stephenpearce.com/

Appreciations to Henry for a delightful performance of The Covent Garden Soloist Orchestra for the Charity Toyota Classics Concert at MC Theatres MBS featuring SIN-born Pamela Tan-Nicholson.

http://www.todayonline.com/entertainment/music/i-taught-sting-read-music-pamela-tan-Nicholson

Fri: Happy Birthdays to Mark and Adeline and Happy Halloween.

Thrilled to receive #6 grandchild Halloween pix – #6 Olai pix today. His mother May CA/USA,1987 and both dressed as pumpkins!

And the other 5 with their friends: #1 Katy/fictional book character named Kate Witherol , #2 Ellie/Cleopatra, #3 John/dragon behind Cleopatra, #4 Sophie/Tinkerbell  and #5 James/grey-shark. Oh how I miss them all 6…

Thanks Ivy for lunch at Halia at Raffles***This is the 2nd visit and yes better than the 1st.

Had the small pates of beef, chicken, duck and tuna which was well presented. Our waiter was rather observant. After paying the bill, I completed a form and rated ‘good’ for all except for food where I rated ‘average’. Fir, our waiter asked how they could improved on the food. Explained that the beef and duck were good, the chicken on the dry side but the tune was not fresh which we did not finish…

Apologies were extended and the charges for the tuna was deducted from the bill. Now this is service and yes I would go back again and will request for Fir to serve me.

http://thehalia.com/raffles/raffles/restaurant/

Special Nov dates:

2 Happy Bdays WONG HongSze and John KERNAN

8 Happy Bday Beverly LIN

11 Happy Bday Audrey MOH

13 Happy Bday LEUNG Yee Fun

19 Happy Bday Yulis ADAM TEO

27 Happy Bday Daisy CHIA & Happy Thanksgiving

29 Happy 8th Bday to my grandson John Whitham HALL

30 Happy Bday LAM Kwok Chai

29 Oct 2014 – And Yet Another Coincident!!

Sat: welcome to planet Earth baby Taylor. Congratulations and welcome to parenthood Lisa and Adriane in HI/USA.

Was unfortunate that something was up  and could not attend their beautiful wedding Mar 2013. The very best and well wishes to the additional to their family.

Sun: tkx for nice lunch company Ting, CH and Hannah. Decided to give a twist for the condiments display, with Christmas in mind! Ting owns Urban Farm & Barn, and most of the herbs I use in the Nasi Ulum dish are available at her farm.

Good luck to Hannah for the orienteering race at Pulau Ubin, and hope that the compass will be of good use! Have been told that there is some woman there who makes excellent Nasi Ulum.

Mon: Happy 90th Birthday to L&Ms Norwegian paternal grandmother. The best grandmother to my 2 daughters and the best great-grandmother to my 6 grandchildren. Thank you, Ellen.

Stay indoors all day trying to sew an outfit for the Charity Ball. Somehow the creative juices are not working with me for The Enchanted Forest theme today. Only forest in mind at present is the ruins gate-pillar of #5, not a cheerful thought. Perhaps visiting Temenggong Rd was not such a good idea. To top it all, some thigh muscle got knotted and it is not comfortable!

Tue: met with Larry to say goodbye and was limping thru’ out the day. Visited Campers Corner and fortunately, Thomas from Anytime Fitness was there to try to un-knot me! Feeling better but will take a few days before the limp goes away. Tkx Thomas and will highly recommend you to anyone. Oh the tell-tale signs of aging!

Wed: received this magazine from my bro Les who is one of the best cardiologists in SE Asia. So proud of him and blessed to have him as my bro.

Drillings which I thought was some unit being renovated turns out to be on-going roof-work. What is worse, out and about in this heat or turn on the AC and radio with ear-phones?? In no position to complain. Thoughts of the workmen in this heat on the roof-top and the drilling is enough to shut me up.

Cheerful thoughts of the grandchildren seeing these every time I pass by the pre-school downstairs. Reminding me of how L&M used to like building with the smaller Legos and had a whole village built in the attic of our house. Now Olai also likes the bigger Legos and will probably like the smaller ones too when the time is right. Such fantastic timeless toys.

Another coincident and its weird like how I caught up with Leng in OSL a couple of years ago. This morning in the elevator getting away from the drilling and Evelyn was also doing the same. Have had short hellos with her in passing. Today she offered me a ride to Parkway and somehow thru’ the conversation, I discovered that she is a sister of Linda Lim who was at Alex with me in Dublin. Linda also married a Norwegian, but somehow we lost contact. App 5mil ppl in SIN, and Evelyn lives in the same block…

We are continually shaped by the forces of coincidence – Paul Auster

25 Oct 2014 – And A Forgotten Reservoir

Thu: excellent movie The Good Lie*****is an American drama film written by Margaret Nagle and directed by Philippe Falardeau. The film stars Reese Witherspoon, Corey Stoll, and Sarah Baker.

Based on real-life events, it features Witherspoon as a brash American woman assigned to help four young Sudanese refugees (known as Lost Boys of Sudan) who win a lottery for relocation to the US.

Seems to be some movie making in this Lim CheeGuan BakKwa****stall in Chinatown. Tkx for dinner Henry with Larry’s good company.

Fri: first sighting of blue sly since my return. Pleasant bus ride to the dentist at NCD passing thru’ CBD. The shortest building – the former General Post Office/GPO. I do so remember buying postage stamps over the counters there in the early 1960s. Now the 5* Fullerton Hotel is located by the SIN river’s mouth.

LauPaSat=Old Market is revamped again. Built in 1894, it is now a national monument and protected. Seating for 2,500diners with 54stalls and 14mini restaurants!! The former Asia Insurance building, now Ascott used to be the tallest buildings in SIN when completed in 1955. Fond memories from the 1950s of Sundays dim-sum on the upper-floors with the Kwoks and the Leungs.

Tkx to Les&Ivy for wine and dinner at Paragon’s DinTaiFung****Their foods have yet to disappoint me. There was enough food me for me to doggy-bag for another meal. Kiera really likes their internationally known xiaolongbao /小籠包

Remembered very well when Albert took me to the original DinTaiFung in Taipei/Taiwan in 1996.

Sat: Forgotten Reservoir Guided Walking Tour was an educational, hot and green walk. Tkx to our guide, Charles Goh who actually is a Paranormal Investigator and happened to stumble upon this reservoir when he was searching for a tomb!

http://www.straitstimes.com/news/singapore/more-singapore-stories/story/abandoned-reservoir-telok-blangah-road-discovered-201409

Edited 29Jul 2017 with above link.

Since I was in the area, decided to revisit Temenggong Rd.

It saddens me to see the fallen gates which once led to a stately house where I was born in 1950 and lived there until I was 15.

New  iron gates at the dead-end of Temenggong Rd, and also the 2 caves or rather 1 cave and the other was a big hole,  have been sealed and now a white-washed concrete wall.

The foot-path to Mt Faber is no more a dirt-path but that has been paved even from the last 2 visits!

Bay Hotel, address 50 Telok Blangah uses Temenggong Rd as their entrance; is the newest addition to the neighbourhood. Some people might mind about staying in a hotel next to the mosque and burial grounds. But of course this is no ordinary burial grounds…

http://bigdogdotcom.wordpress.com/2011/06/12/johor-pride-and-heritage-in-temasek/

The supervisor at Bay Hotel kindly let me into one of the unoccupied 10th floor rooms to take some pix.

B/W from 1950 and the colours from today

If #5 still existed, one would be able to see it from this view from one of the 10th floor rooms at Bay Hotel.

Ruins of the top gates at #5.

Bottom gates are now completely destroyed, the ruins were there at my other visits, but now completely gone.

View from #5 in the 1940-50s.

Today’s view is VivoCity, taken from the 10th floor of the Bay Hotel, which was the location of a petrol station in the 1950s.

This was what it looked like where Bay Hotel is now standing. B/W pix credits to my father LAM TinYue (1911-1996)

 http://amylamsg.com/2008/12/05/temenggong-road/

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again ― Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca

23 Oct 2014 – Followed By A Discovery Walk

Wed: Happy Diwali to my Indian friends and to those celebrating. To those who are not aware, Deepavali, Dipavali, Dewali, Deepawali or the Festival of Lights, marks the beginning of the Hindu New Year. Pix taken a week ago, and no I am not brave enough to be there now. Nice to have a public holiday mid-week

Wed: must have been 10+yrs ago since I last step into this 5* Four Season built in 1994 and renovated in 2008. Memory has failed me here as I hardly remember it. If I had a blog then, perhaps it  might have helped with the memory! Appreciations to niece Daisy who included me to their family lunch on this Diwali public holiday. Always good to catch up with family & friends, and with a family of my size, the fun is never-ending 🙂

Semi-buffet lunch at One Ninety**** was not your usual kind of buffet. The buffet-spread was the sides and dessert, actually more than enough as a meal. With an additional cost of S$10, one can also order a main to accompany what was on the buffet. I decided on the Wagyu beef/rare and it was an excellent choice for me!

Clement & I decided to walk this walk I have wanted to do for a long time. Tried to do it earlier this year but the stair-case leading to the Sheares Bridge from near the Sun-Tec side was barricaded. This time we started at

Gardens by the Bay: over-loaded with pix from the Garden Festival posting – http://amylamsg.com/2014/08/20/2014-garden-festivalsgf/

Well-maintained walkways towards the satay joint and other food stalls.  Stomach not ready to taste this place yet! Another time.

Marina Barrage: glad to see so many enjoying themselves and what beautiful kites! Observations for  the size of one of the kites tells me that there are some serious kite-flyers! Here is in memory to you,  Shakib Gunn who was the founder of the SIN Kite Assoc…

http://amylamsg.com/2009/03/01/memorial-service/

Sustainable Singapore Gallery: pleasantly surprised by this new gallery and a cool break from the humidity! Another variation to selfie there 🙂 🙂

Marina Golf Course

Sheares Bridge: discovered where the parade floats hide when not in used! At last got to finally walk this bridge, and we had to cross part of  dangerous roads due to barricades at the end of the staircase when we got down. Tkx to a dear nephew for being such a sport to accompany me on this 5hrs journey with many stops for new discoveries and pix credits to him for the two panoramic shots.

My doctor tells me to push myself and after 5+hrs walk from 2 days ago and then another 4hrs from yesterday, will that be considered to be pushing?? 🙂 🙂 🙂

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honah Lee,
Little Jackie paper loved that rascal puff,
And brought him strings and sealing wax and other fancy stuff.

Together they would travel on a boat with billowed sail
Jackie kept a lookout perched on puffs gigantic tail,
Noble kings and princes would bow whene’are they came,
Pirate ships would lower their flag when puff roared out his name.

Dragons live forever but not so little boys
Painted wings and giant strings make way for other toys.
One sad night it happened, Jackie Paper came no more
And Puff that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar.

His head was bent in sorrow, green scales fell like rain,
Puff no longer went to play along the cherry lane.
Without his life-long friend, puff could not be brave,
So puff that mighty dragon sadly slipped into his cave –  Leonard Lipton and Peter Yarrow

21 Oct 2014 – Welcome to SIN 15th Uncle

Sat: trying to clean and to do laundry but that takes time with a small washing machine and lack of space for hanging.

Welcome to SIN,15th uncle LAM TinCheong/Jimmy – father’s youngest full bro from Vancouver/Canada. Appreciations to Les&Ivy for seafood dinner. Yummy Black-Pepper Crabs, Bamboo Clams, Durian Pudding at Long Beach Seafood Dempsey Hill****

Sun: LAM family Heritage from Jiangmen 江門 in Guangdong province in southern China for15th uncle and his friend Carmen to view.  My personal family chart is way out of date and has to be updated but will take time. Any members of the family are welcome to take pix of all these items…

http://amylamsg.com/2009/05/10/happy-mothers-day/

http://amylamsg.com/2011/02/28/pearl-river/

Discovered over the years since my first visit to the ancestral village, May 2009 and second visit in Feb 2011 that chasing this illusion would have emptied what I have saved to live until 70yrs. Also that it will be a thankless job. Tkx to 15 uncle for lunch at Glory***

Got back to stumble upon Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong/吴作栋 at ‘Marine Crescent Gardens Residents’ Chit Chat Session. Mr Goh was SIN PM from 1990-2004, and also MP to Marine Parade GRC since 1988. Living here in this MarineP GRC, we are lucky to have Mr Goh who does his job well and keeps me wanting to live in this area. Now that says a lot coming from me 🙂

Mon: someone must be renovating, a lot of drilling going on and now I know what it like for the neighbours when my renovation was going on in 1999! Decided to do some shopping at Plaza SIN to get ideas for an outfit for the upcoming charity ball with The Enchanted forest theme – maybe I should go as a troll 🙂 🙂

Watch The Judge***Hank Palmer is a successful lawyer who returns to his hometown to attend his mother’s funeral, but shocked when he finds out that his estranged father, Joseph, who is the town’s judge is suspected of murder. He sets out to investigate the truth and along the way, he reconnects with family he left behind years before.

Have always enjoyed the two Roberts’ acting.

I prefer rain -sometimes I feel sunlight will turn me to stone – perhaps I’m a Troll – John Geddes

Edited 22 Oct – appreciations to Lucy Tan for sharing the pix of Mr Goh & I where according to Cheng Chee Hoew – ‘Should’ve asked for a box‘. If a box was within reach, would have probably stood on it so that Mr Goh can hear me better… hahaha

Thank you also to Chee HongTat (Chief Executive to Energy Market Authority), a fine young gentleman to 4 children (SIN needs more people like him!) for listening to my babble and taking time to even visit my place. Too busy talking that forgot to take pix of HongTat (another time round HongTat 🙂 ). When Mr Goh retires, I will vote GongTat for Marine P next MP ie if HongTat goes into politics… LOL

Lucy Tan shared your photo.

Me: Thank you Lucy Tan for your kind words. Will vote for you if you ever go into politics but am seldom long enough in one place, especially during voting times… hahaha 🙂 🙂 🙂

18 Oct 2014 – For The Camera Person!

Someone with a camera said ‘CHEESE’, and look at the result – tkx to May and her friend Matt for this share of my adorable youngest grandchild. Keep these kind of pix coming in, L&M. Olai’s humour made my day 🙂

Mon: Happy Canadian Thanksgiving to family and friend in Canada and to all celebrating the day.

Tue: popped into H&H to say hi to ex co-workers and friends. Great to catch up with Lucy who was there for lunch with Peggy. Shaw Theatres Bugis has been revamp since my last visit!

Laggies****Great opening scene with a wedding in SEA/WA/USA with some of my favourite glass sculptures by Dale Chihuly. In the throes of a quarter-life crisis, Megan panics when her boyfriend proposes, then, taking an opportunity to escape for a week, hides out in the home of her new friend, 16-year-old Annika, who lives with her world-weary single dad…

Wed: early Bday celebrations for niece Patricia (I so remember baby-sitting her in Dublin!). Appreciations to Les&Ivy for delicious dinner and wines at Culina**** Those who know my bro will also know that he usually brings his own wines as most restaurant do not serve what he has is his own wine cellar!

Good to catch up with Lee and SunSun. Nice that Kiera had company at her level. Just difficult to stomach that Kiera will soon be in Pri 6 and SunSun in Pri 1.

Thu: Angelina & Kiefer are safe and sound in SIN on transit to KCH. Kiefer will be 3 and could finished nearly a bowl of congee! Must be tired after flying from BRU-HEL-SIN. Pleasure to meet Petrina and tkx for the yummy AppleStrudel.

Fri: saw Angelina & Kiefer off in the morning to catch their flight to KCH. Since I was up and about, decided to catch a movie at GV City Sq Mall, a new and unexplored territory! Discovered that this was the old New World’s location. Great, Happy and New Worlds were amusement parks in my childhood days!

The Food Republic has a theme of shop-houses and is rather colourful and decorative.

Today the setup for ‘Edible Art Movement’ in B1 was ongoing. Walking on egg-shells now gives me a complete different concept!

Watching the artist putting the Doritos together reminded me of a Gingerbread House KK made when visiting us in Norway/1970s. The house collapsed slowly over the days! Wondering if this will happen to the Doritos animal? The SIN map is befittingly made of different rice and noodles!

Finding Fanny***Bollywood’s lucky mascot, Deepika Padukone is also a part of this movie where five Goans set off on a road trip in search of an old postman’s childhood love Fanny, though nobody knows whether she’s alive or dead or just a figment of someone’s imagination. However, the friends get lost…

What happens to the hole when the cheese is gone? – Bertolt Brecht

14 Oct 2014 – Is Prevention Possible?

The first known outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD), was identified only after the fact, occurring between June and November 1976 in Nzara, South Sudan (then part of Sudan) and was caused by Sudan virus (SUDV), one of the ebolaviruses. A second outbreak of EVD caused by Ebola virus (formerly called Zaire ebolavirus) began in Yambuku, a small rural village in Mongala District in northern Democratic Republic of the Congo (then known as Zaire).

Virus strain samples isolated from both outbreaks were named as the ‘Ebola virus’ after the Ebola River, located near the originally identified viral outbreak site in Zaire. Perhaps since this was happening mainly in Africa then that the attention and awareness was not there. With the recent deaths outside Africa, the world now feels threatened.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-26835233

http://www.ibtimes.com/updated-ebola-outbreak-map-virus-spreads-out-africa-death-toll-tops-4000-1703162

Ebola virus disease (EVD), Ebola hemorrhagic fever (EHF) or simply Ebola is a disease of humans and other manuals caused by an ebolavirus. Symptoms start 2days – 3weeks after contracting the virus. No specific treatment for the disease is yet available. Can Ebola be prevented? First, do not visit the areas that have Ebola outbreaks and if one has to, take all the necessary precautions. Then by reporting if you or anyone are showing any of the symptoms.

Signs and symptoms typically begin abruptly within 5 – 10days of infection with Ebola or Marburg virus. Early signs and symptoms (seems similar to the flu symptoms! ):

• Fever
• Severe headache
• Joint and muscle aches
• Chills
• Weakness

Over time, symptoms become increasingly severe and may include:

• Nausea and vomiting
• Diarrhea (may be bloody)
• Red eyes
• Raised rash
• Chest pain and cough
• Stomach pain
• Severe weight loss
• Bleeding, usually from the eyes, and bruising (people near death may bleed from other orifices, such as ears, nose and rectum)
• Internal bleeding

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/ebola-virus/basics/symptoms/con-20031241

http://www.straitstimes.com/ebola-virus-2014

All info and pix on Ebola are downloaded from various sites. It is such a relief to receive news from Kitty who lived in Sierra Lonnie is now transit in Ghana and will be heading to live with her family in the US. Stay healthy and safe journeys to them.

I remember watching Outbreak (1995), and thought what if something like this really happens. Now with Ebola (thank goodness it is not airborne) on-going, I do recall some of the scenes vividly… ‘extreme measures are necessary to contain an epidemic of a deadly airborne virus. But how extreme, exactly?’ Do I want to re-watch this movie again to rate it today??

As the saying goes – prevention is better than cure but in this case, what happens when there is NO cure???

18 Oct – another death reported from Germany

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/abby-norman/im-a-hazmat-trained-hospi_b_5998486.html

30 Mar 2016 – WHO downgrades Ebola health risk

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-35921161

12 Oct 2014 – Fun With Family, Friends & Food

Thu: at the post office to discover that packages of laksa, curry and chicken rice paste are not permitted to be mailed. Such a bummer as these are excellent gifts for people from this part of the world who has immigrated overseas. Found a new brand named Happy Belly – cute name. Made totally in SIN and even has a pix postcard of somewhere in SIN. Oh well, there goes one of the gift ideas for mailing!

Fri: at the market early for breakfast and then grocery shopping for the weekend. Early Fri and Sat early are the days where shopping in the wet market is fun when the produce and fish are fresh. Have to be an early bird as I am picky and only buy small amount! My regular vendors are accommodating to me when there are no crowds! Where can you buy just a few wigs of mint leafs or just one stalk of celery but here at this wet market.

After a week, I need to make my own food and it is good to be with my regular vendors who are kind and helpful as I do not know many of the local names and just show them pix of what I want. Organic fresh produce for S$8 bought and washed before sunrise! These are organic for sure – had to wash and remove the worm-eaten leafs…

Thanks for dropping by for lunch Gel. Glad to see you feeling and looking better. Stay strong and positive and know that you are in my thoughts to be 100% the Gel I knew. Hope that she will get to see the Aurora either next year or in the near future. Tkx to sis Jo for dinner.

Sat: Cape gooseberry, the Physalis fruit can be lovely for food presentation. Bought a punnet yesterday to discover that they were rotten. Brought it back to Parkway Cold Storage this morning and you will not believe what was said…

• Me: I need to return these rotten berries.
• Service person: you want new ones?
• Me: I checked and they are all rotten.
• Service person: so you no want this?
• Me: thinking, duh! but said: would you want to pay for rotten berries?
• Service person looking dumbfounded and said: OK return you money

No apologies, nothing. So wasted 2 trips to ‘Cold Storage – the Fresh Food People’ as they are known and NO comparison to the MT Market! The lesson learnt, if I ever buy Physalis again, I will open every berry to check or just stick to local produce in the wet market…

Either Cold Storage has no idea about the job of a customer service position or that our government has wasted our taxed money spent on courtesy campaign and probably both!

A day of food preparation for Larry/USA, Richard/NZ, Louis/S Africa. Thanks to Chesper for his chicken curry+popiah and to Clement for sashimi+salad. The organic ‘NasiUlum Bug Attack’ was my contribution. Chesper caught me ‘bugging’ 🙂 A lovely evening was enjoyed by all.

Sun: this haze is giving me such a headache that all I feel like doing is staying in my AC place and not go anywhere – have still to finish unpacking since my return! Difficult to even try scraping off paint in the bathroom!! Pix taken 1800hrs from the bus into town with a PSI reading of 100.

Dropped by Campers Corner/Waterloo St and Chris drove us to their the new location for Marmot at Novena. On the way in the van, was wondering why these Indians were walking barefoot from Little India and turns out that it is the Fire Walking Festival.

http://www.hindu-blog.com/…/singapore-fire-walking

9 Oct 2014 – In The Haze

Sun: appreciations to Henry for dinner company. Congee hit the spot at MT Market, so conveniently located just 5mins walk. Thanks for the cupcakes Henry, and good to see him getting healthy and stronger every time we meet.

Mon: public holiday and stayed indoors. Unhealthy PSI reading of 147. SIN is smothered annually in varying degrees by smog from forest fires in Indonesia, but seems like it is worse this year or maybe it is also that I am usually not in SIN this time of the year. Pix downloaded. Not about to be outdoors in the haze, and if I were to mask or deface the Merlion, will be canned and thrown into prison 🙂

Tue: at Mt E and watched a movie, not much to write home about but a good indoor activity like the bathroom scraping and painting project started before the travel and hopefully to complete before the year is over. Gone are the days when I could paint a whole house…

Café Waiting Love**Si-Ying getting a part-time job at the Cafe Waiting Love coffee shop. She falls for Ze Yu. Meanwhile, A-Tuo, comes to the shop and runs into Abusi, a tomboyish barista who is the reason for his breakup with his ex-girlfriend. A-Tuo’s friends tease him and when Si-Ying stands up for him, the two become good friends. A-Tuo develops feelings towards Si-Ying, who only sees him as a good friend until A-Tuo decides to leave Taiwan…

Wed: Mt E again and since I am out, another movie and some Christmas shopping at Mustafa so that I can put them out on surface/snail sea mail. This Is Where I Leave You****When their father passes away, four grown siblings are forced to return to their childhood home and live under the same roof together for a week, along with their over-sharing mother and an assortment of spouses, exes and might-have-beens.