It's Always Sunny in Singapore

In the spirit of keeping New year's resolutions alive, I'm finishing and posting this blog about a couple different weekends spent in Singapore; First in the 'Fall', and the second this last weekend. Apologies for the wacky timelines and irrelevancy ....

Oct-ish, 2014: With Tyler heading off to Spain for 10 days, a perfect combination of heightened jealousy, and a fabulous friend's school being on term break resulted in a quick trip to Singapore. I boarded the bus at midnight and was off for my first (although relatively minor) solo traveling venture. Having worked all day, I was in dreamland for the majority of the trip, only to be awoken at 4:30am by a Bahasa yelling bus driver telling me to jump off the slowly moving bus (I can only assume that was the message).  As the bus is not allowed to physically take passengers across the international boarder, we were all dumped on one side, herded through immigration and scurried to meet the still-moving bus on the other side (as they are also not allowed to park anywhere along the boarder). As there were about 100 blue buses blaring their horns and slowly creeping through the pickup area, I feel pretty lucky to have found my chariot on the other side! Still pretty dazed and confused, 10 minutes later, we were all told to again get off the bus. Totally disoriented, I tried to play it cool, and just stay on the heels of a woman I recognized from our bus.That strategy seemed to be working until we reached the lines separating Malaysians and 'Others'. I knew I was on my own if I didn't act fast. Tapping her on the shoulder I vaguely asked "What are we doing?" Puzzled, she looked at me and replied, "uhhh immigration...?" After a total Oprah 'Ah-ha' moment, I realized we were IN Singapore. Duh!
So classically, in the MaryTyler duo, I don't do my research. My dear ol' Ty does an amazing job filling in the blanks (quasi-importants such as visas, hotels, currency exchange, etc). After my foyer into 'doing it on my own' I learned two things; A simple Google search can provide a great heads-up, and when in doubt and if things don't make sense, just ask a stranger (or five)...just be wary of any grown-man still rocking the rat-tail.

After catching a few more winks at Amanda's and waking up to a beauty of a breakfast, we were prepped for a day at Universal Studios. So a little tidbit about Tyler and I's relationship; We were never taken by our respective families to Disney World, Universal Studios, etc. in Florida. A tragedy that is not lost on us, although time has continued to heal. Generally speaking, it's pretty common for Canadian families to make the trek down south at some point during the darkness of winter, however our families did not...or they went before our existence. Just one of the many ties that bind us ..until now. I would have felt badly about going without Tyler bbuutttt he was in Europe, so meh! Our day at the park was as expected; long-ish lines, over-the-top themed roller coasters and of course carnival food at its finest. Getting the impression from Amanda that the Singapore Universal Studios, although entertaining, is  perhaps not all a large-scale theme park could be, I'm still looking forward to catching my 'white whale' in terms of theme parks...with Tyler of course ;)

Being the fine host she is, Amanda was happy to accommodate any sight-seeing request after leaving Sentosa. I asked to head to 'The Gardens by the Bay' as Ty and I had not previously ventured that way. To my amusement, Amanda's effortless knack for stumbling upon ideal situations took the cake for an amazing night out! We walked along the river checking out the Chinese lantern festival, crossing over to enjoy the light show in 'The Gardens'. The Gardens are a series of tree-like frames made to look like the Umbrella Acacia tree (or a bunch of alien spaceships coming in for landing). Growing out of each of the frames are plants with awesome amounts of twinkly  lights creating the overall affect of a magical 'Midsummer's Night Dream-esque garden. We walked around for a long time, and headed up to the canopy walk for the light/music show. The cherry on top was the great vantage point we had when the fireworks started popping off! Closing out the night with some great butter chicken, Amanda sure knows how to treat a gal!

Fast forward 3 months: This past weekend I headed back to Singapore to attend a training course. Luckily (for my bank account) Amanda generously offered half of her double bed pro-bono. It was a real bonus to know that I was meeting Amanda each evening, who had great spots in mind for happy hour drinks and tasty food, making the most of the working-weekend. And in true Amanda form, we effortlessly stumbled upon Singapore's 50th birthday party; a giant street party down one of the city's main drags, Orchard Road. As always, I really enjoyed my time spent in Singapore. Although people often comment that Singapore is too organized, lacks culture and comes across as sterile, I can say with confidence that now again, I enjoy a little order, and good clean fun in my life (although the state of my closet would suggest otherwise).

If you find yourself there, check out the butterfly garden in Changi Airport!

Kuching, Borneo; The Cat's Meow

Tyler and I have pledged to see more of Malaysia. We figured that it would be a real shame not to have really explored our host-home for the past two years, previously having really only scratched the surface with rendez-vous to Langkawi (any-beach S.E Asia) and Sabah, East Malaysia. So now added to the hopefully ever-growing list of Malaysian cities explored is Kuching. Kuching is located in East Malaysia on the island of Borneo, in the state of Sarawak...as that means very little to me without a point of reference, check out the map.

Tyler and I were meeting an array of people in Kuching. The Chinese New Year crew included Amanda Juray, Hutchy, Danielle, Damian and two new Swiss friends, Johanna and Dino. We had a pretty spectacular welcome to Kuching as we landed at the stroke of midnight marking the beginning of Chinese New Year. Much like the Western New Year, midnight gave the green-light to thousands of fireworks being sent up into the sky. It was a pretty neat perspective to enjoy the show! Upon arrival we checked into our hotel,  The Pullman and chilled. (I would have highly recommended it up until the last night. That hotel is totally haunted...in a 'I don't think I believe in ghosts, but that just got real' kind of way.) Otherwise, The Pullman was host to lounge cocktails, poolside poker games and a whole lotta robe-wearing.

As it was Chinese New Year (Gong Xi Fa Chai!) most of the town was shut and things were pretty quiet. This did not stop us from hitting the parks. First up was the Orangutan Sanctuary. Last year Tyler and I had traveled and trekked in Sumatra, Indonesia to catch a glimpse of our distant cousins (we could probably marry them in some States). As we fell in love with them then (in a platonic way), and they only inhabit two islands in the world, AND we found ourselves on the second of the two islands, we had to go. It was a very easy trip, and we weren't disappointed as we saw 10ish orangutans just hanging, swinging and being generally awesome.

 The next day we hit up Bako National Park to try and catch a glimpse of the weird and well endowed Proboscis Monkey. These monkeys are a rare species with an usually large NOSE (perverts...), and can only be found in Borneo. In order to get to the park you need to catch a bus to Bako Village and hire a boat to the park. Not realizing that there needed to be high tide in order to leave the village, we spent some serious time lounging, pacing, playing charades and puzzling each other with useless trivia. A serious quality I look for when choosing friends is the ability to shoot the breeze; these guys have got it (...said the guy with two NOSES). Finally, we headed off down the crocodile infested river. Having examined the various killer characteristics of crocs during our wait on the pier, we figured we were headed the way of Captain Hook as the boats ran aground. With all hands in tact, we arrived at the park, spotting a big Bearded Pig straight away, and the illusive Proboscis Monkey not too long after. Trip satisfied. Otherwise we walked and climbed along a jungle trail for a an hour or so, then headed back to the boat. With the water levels much higher by this point, we were flying!

It's no Bay of Fundy, but we were appreciative of the rising tides!

Obviously not my picture, but check out that schnoz!

Otherwise, we wandered the lovely town of Kuching for a couple of days. It was awesome being in a Malaysian town that wasn't Kuala Lumpur. We spend 97% of our time in Malaysia in KL (a blind estimation) and as a result, have a pretty one-sided impression of the country. Although the good far outweighs the bad, the things that can grind my gears about KL (insane traffic, never-ending mall culture, obscene piles of trash) were by and far removed from Kuching.  I know things always look shinier and brighter while on vacation, void of work responsibilities, free to have a day-beer, but it really felt like the best parts of Malaysian culture were being highlighted in Kuching-- totally recharging my love for Malaysia.  Gotta love that!

As the town began to slowly open up after the holidays, we indulged in some great food (as always), putted around the river, breezed through the natural history museum with 10 minutes to closing (blowdarts, mutant jungle animals, and headhunters can really capture your attention) and marveled at cat memorabilia. Did I forget to mention Kuching means 'cat' in Bahasa? A truly puuuuuurrrfect fit for a feline fan! (Feel lucky I only managed to throw in one bad cat pun. The trip on the other-hand was riddled with cat gestures, props, puns and sightings).

Kuching is the cat's meow!

Into the Tickle Trunk

Ok, so this blog is being posted at least 2 months after it happen and was written. All I can say is that New Year's resolutions are in full-swing...one being to continue with this blog, finish and post an array of half-written posts. Now that I've written it down and put it out there on the internet....its gotta happen! Thanks for reading!

This year we were very excited to be in KL for Deepavali!  Deepavali is the festival of lights, celebrating the triumph of good over evil (there's a great animation on Youtube that explains the whole story https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d2ZJxNxFao)...or as I like to describe it, 'Indian Christmas'. The lead up to Deepavali was great; Malls were decorated, cards were being sent, snacks and cookies were magically appearing.  We really had much more a feel for the celebration this year, as we were invited to a co-workers family home for lunch.The day of Deepavali was a public holiday (again, thank you Malaysia) so we sat around and ate cookies and snacks, had a big ol' feast of homemade curries and lamb, drank beer and visited. Sound familiar? The only difference between Christmas and Deepavali (besides, you know, the cultural and religious aspects -_-) was that instead of everyone sitting around in their jammies sipping Bailey's, our friends were wearing the most beautiful saris and jewelery to match. Honestly, the ladies were stunning! It was a great gathering (and strangely enough, the first time we have been in a Malaysian home since being here..All new experiences to be thankful for!)

Similarly to Christmas, Deepavali is celebrated for many days...which really jived well with us. Each night (and oddly day) the city was lit up with fireworks, and we continued to celebrate through the weekend, including a school celebration all day on the Friday. Complete with my own sari, henna and bindi, among other activities, we had one of the funnest dance parties I've been to in a long time. Bollywood dancing (lead by the superstar Magesh) with 40 laughing, bouncing kids all banging on their own instruments was a riot. A noisy, noisy riot. Teaching can be ridiculously fun sometimes. Needless to say, a great way to finish the school day before a two-week holiday.

Topical, eh?

Because of our school holiday being a couple weeks later than last year's, we also spent Halloween in Kuala Lumpur. Knowing that Halloween is pretty frowned upon by particular religious groups, we weren't expecting the level of sugar-induced spookiness we can all appreciate from home. However, we headed to a house-party in our condo, which struck a strong resemblance to a party at home...except there was about 30 nationalities present and no one was wearing their snowsuit under their costume ;) Seriously though, Hutchy did a great job making sure the place was strewn with cobwebs and Danielle did not disappoint on candy duty. Thanks neighbors!

The next morning Tyler and I headed to Langkawi for a week of beach sitting on the duty-free island that serves as a cheap and quick getaway to the expats of KL. Throughout the week we had a brief cameo from the wonderful Amandajuray, and were eventually joined by the whole KL gang as the week progressed and people shrugged off their work (or otherwise) duties. Our first order of business was to buy a cooler, stock it with ice and 50 cent beers. After 4 days of lounging, reading and general sloth-like behaviour we peeled ourselves off the lounge chairs and scooted to a couple waterfalls on the island. When we last visited Langkawi the waterfalls had been dried up, but being as we were teetering on monsoon season, the falls runneth over! We visited both Seven Wells Falls and Langkawi Falls, swimming in the deep pools of cold fresh water (I hate to be a complainer...but sometimes the ocean and pools are just too warm..and what's the deal with salt-water!?). It was such a good day, we had no qualms about doing it again the next day with our friends. It's no secret we love a good roadtrip, and nothing makes a roadtrip sweeter than a convoy...so we were pretty content to zip around the island with our swimsuit clad gang. Otherwise, we celebrated Sasha's birthday on the beach, watched some killer sunsets and generally chilled the eff out.