singapore

So. We went to Singapore. And first I would like to offer a very heartfelt thank you to Todd and Don, who were generous enough to let us stay with them, even though they are very busy and were even out of town some of the time. As we all know, having a friend in a new town and having a home to stay in makes all the difference. Thanks, guys. Todd and Chris were A100 classmates. The Foreign Service sure is good at that networking thing.

Knowing how much I detest shopping, one might ask oneself if going to the Shopping Mecca of the Universe was actually a very wise vacation decision. Hell, I wondered the very same thing myself. Well you can stop worrying and allow me to allay your fears. Singapore is awesome.

Let's put that statement into perspective, shall we?

First of all, I live in Chennai. Now I'm not knocking Chennai, and you all know how much I love it here. I have met a lot of extremely wonderful people, I love the richness and diversity of the culture, the art is fantastic, and I love my yoga class. I am comfortable here, I feel grounded, and I really know my way around. But when I got to Singapore, after being in South India for one full year, something in me clicked. It was like . . . like . . . being in a CITY again!

I can't really say what I may have experienced coming straight from, say, New York, but it doesn't matter because that's not what happened. I came from Chennai.

Singapore is clean! Chennai is extremely filthy. Singapore has lots of different kinds of food! I'm so sick of every international restaurant in Chennai that I can't even go to them anymore, and though I can't survive without my South Indian breakfast of uttapam and chutney, I can't eat South Indian all day, every day. Singapore is polite and orderly and calm. Chennai is a complete freakin' free-for-all, all the time, every day. And while awareness of the underlying Big Brother government that runs Singapore can be appalling, you know what? It was just really nice to breathe clean air, walk on clean streets, and hell! Drink from the tap!

Really, the single nameable thing that was the most relaxing was just knowing that I was free to relax at all. Like very many places in the world that I have been to, one must ALWAYS be on one's guard. And always being on guard is very tiring. However, Chennai is the first place that I have actually LIVED where on must be on guard even within ones own home (Flux included!). Life here is built entirely on a structure of graft and systematic lying. Everything is difficult and nothing can be accomplished without the involvement of at least three extracurricular people. Miscommunication is constant and it is never clear if a person just misinterpreted your meaning or is straight ganking you for all you're worth. Buying a loaf of bread can, and often does, become an event worthy of writing home about. And that kind of constant vigil can really wear a person down.

We got into a nice, clean, Mercedes cab at the Singapore airport. Immediately, I was watching, preparing for battle. The meter wasn't on. I mentioned it, only to be politely shown the running meter, which was out of my line of site. We went straight to our destination, with no detours, and paid the exact fare. There is no tipping in Singapore. The driver knew where we were going and, if he didn't, had a GPS computer in the car to tell him. I thought that was a slightly better system than stopping every four blocks to ask napping rickshaw drivers by the side of the road if they could direct us toward where I'm trying to get to, which is how navigation works in Chennai.

And of course, as always, there are many layers of complicated narrative underlying these differences. Poverty, systematic disenfranchisement masquerading as democracy, the caste system, extreme sanctioned corruption, and a fractured modern history force cities like Chennai into a kill or be killed mentality. But you know what? In Singapore, I just didn't care! I ate actual cheese and drank fresh apple juice!

After realizing that nobody was going to lie to me or cheat me or try to hurt me, I was actually able to relax and breathe freely for a few days.

I bought only one thing, if you can believe it, and that was a Fossil watch that I have been lusting after for about two years but never got around to buying. And a camera for Rajendran. That's all we bought.

Here are our pictures and some stories for you.