Archive for 'Brittany'
Friday, November 20th, 2009
My mother always said it would happen one day. That one day, I would get off a plane, and among the mass of waiting drivers, I’d see someone standing there with my name.
Well, it happened, but it wasn’t a corporate sponsored limo in New York as I imagine she had envisioned. Instead, it was Yanik, a local artist doing a favor for his hostel owning friend, picking up two Texas kids on an adventure in Bali.
Jacob ’06 works for Mustang Engineering. Our fathers, both Aggies as well, met each other through work. When they found out both of their eldest children had moved out to Singapore about the same time, it was inevitable that we get hooked up. Meeting up several times in Singapore and keeping posted on the everyday happenings of each other’s lives has proven to be a unique experience. Also a Houston raised suburban kid, we know exactly where each of us has come from; sharing that culture and then continuing on to share this Southeast Asian one has helped us form an interesting friendship. As my dad likes to remind me, this is just another great manifestation of the Aggie Network in action! (more…)
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Friday, November 20th, 2009
It’s been a while since I’ve posted, but I’ve been far from lazy…
- My best friend from Paris, a Singaporean who now works in San Francisco, came back for two weeks to visit her family. It was so nice to catch up with everything happening in each other’s lives. Walking into her parent’s condo was exactly what I needed; a loving, safe environment… with AIR CONDITIONING! I spent many nights there, including one where the two of us were as sick as dogs. She couldn’t hear out of one ear, and I re-tasted the chili-crab I had eaten earlier that night… It was sad to see her go, but I think that our continued to connection, and ability to pick up like nothing had changed between the two of us is a real testament to friendship.
- I was not a tourist for very long in Singapore. I made local friends and got to know people who have lived here for a while. On one hand, this is a real advantage- you are brought to the hidden gems of the city, (including the world’s greatest burger, but I’ll get to that in a second) but on the other hand, you tend to skip all the fun tourist stuff. Making up for lost time, I headed to the Singapore Zoo. I went to the zoo with my Aussie friend Karen, making a special stop in the Australian Outback exhibit (she is really from the Outback- came from a small town and tells stories of her childhood without running water!) where she laughed at the tiny size of the Kangaroos! I think the pride of the zoo has to be their extensive elephant show and exhibit! You can purchase a painting made by an elephant. Apparently the elephants don’t speak singlish- the original trainer at the zoo was from Sri Lanka, so this tradition of training them in this native tongue has stuck. (more…)
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Friday, November 13th, 2009
You know when you just have those days when you don’t want to be in Singapore anymore?
Okay, if you have never been to Singapore for an extended period of time, I wouldn’t expect you to understand, but anybody who has can echo my sentiments. It is a very safe place, but mainly because there is a culture of following the rules for their own sake. Some call it island fever, but whatever it is, it makes you want to get out of town. FAST.
You could feel the elation as the plane took off, and the growing excitement when we landed in Yogyakarta, Indonesia (Pronounced Jogjakarta, called Jogja for short). In third grade, I did a project on Indonesia with my friend Leah because she was born there (her father worked in the oil industry). I have been slightly disappointed in myself for not having been to the country earlier, being this close, but c’est la vie. The landscape was instantly different; beautiful, tropical, and yet unplanned. Walking across the tarmac from the plane to the small airport, I looked at the latitude and longitude indicators; my first steps in the southern hemisphere.
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Sunday, October 25th, 2009
When you come to Southeast Asia, you will be impressed by the gastronomical variety of the local foods. The intense use of ALL parts of the animal, not cutting off the heads of chickens and ducks before they roast them, leaving the skin on the chicken of every dish it is served with, to the abundance and variety of ways to use coconut and curry and banana leaves and last but certainly not least pandan. Pandan and I have had an interesting relationship since I first arrived. I noticed it right away, not being able to escape the brightly green colored bread that almost looked artificial. But all of the bread or cakes or whatever appeared to be this color, under this pandan label, seemed to have an intoxicatingly sweet aroma that piqued my interest every time. I remember the first time I decided to go for it, and purchased the small loaf of this bright green pandan bread; I think I ate the whole thing in a matter of a couple days. Since then, there was no turning back. If the menu had a mention of pandan in it, I was in. Pandan chicken (bits of chicken, wrapped and fried in a pandan leaf) is one of my favorite hawker center go-tos (but then again, I have a lot of those…) (more…)
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Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
It’s about that time in the living abroad cycle. Maintaining a relationship can be hard work, especially when you are half a world apart. For those of us over here in relationships, the subject always comes up. It’s like an underlying current with all of us, and in some ways it brings us together for a short while, recognizing in someone else that big parts of our hearts and souls are not in Southeast Asia.
A lot of it is mixed emotion; you can’t believe it is already halfway over- it seems like we just got here! But then again, you realize how far you have to go. How long it has been since I have been held in Jon’s embrace, and how long it will be until I can look him in the eyes, and not by way of Skype on a computer screen.
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Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
“Wouldn’t that be awesome if we got taken to jail in Thailand!?”
No, no that would not be awesome, I thought to myself, but the reality of that situation wouldn’t have been too far off.
Crossing over from Kelantan, Malaysia to Southern Thailand is really just a short, five minute boat ride. It takes longer to go through customs than it takes to get there. And that’s what we accidentally almost did. Fortunately, we didn’t. But it was close.
Not to mention, going to this southern part of Thailand is not exactly safe. There have been disputes going on for so long that people cannot pinpoint why the terrorist bombings and attacks happen, but they do. And therefore the market that we shopped at is apparently now a quarter of the size it used to be. I love grocery shopping in different parts of the world, and in this part of the world, it means going to the market, to pick out your raw fish, fried fruit (friend bananas are and will continue to be my favorite, until death do us part, to my arteries or heart) and full chickens. While here, we hoped to check out some more Thai temples, but first had to rent out our sweet pimped out van!
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Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
I love sleeping on trains; they have just a enough noise and rocking to send you off into a sweet slumber, and when you wake, you find yourself in a whole other world. This weekend, that world was the north Malaysian state of Kelantan.
My professor for my Arts in Southeast Asia class is passionate about this area, having done his research for his Anthropology PhD here. He took us around to the Thai Buddhist temples (which we are currently learning about Thai classical art; I have been helping him out on a mural that has been in the works for 3 years, so I REALLY enjoyed seeing all of the nuances and motifs!) One was home to the largest Buddha statue in Asia (which I then assume means that it is the largest Buddha statue in the world, unless some obscure place like Des Moines, Iowa claims that title). But the Buddha statue has Chinese characteristics, but is in the Thai area of Kelantan, mainly to attract Chinese donations, however this caused quite a cultural stir if you can imagine. I have to say, going with our professor, who knows the area so well, academically and culturally, really made the exposure invigorating for the mind, body and soul. We visited with the Abbott who is the head Buddhist Monk for the entire region, at the temple grounds where our professor had attained his own status as a monk. It made the whole experience more personal when he shared with us his stories and his family’s ancestral grave. Half American, half Malay, born and raised in Singapore, and getting his PhD from Harvard in Boston, he is quite an interesting character, which a charismatic and knowledgeable and yet approachable presence that just makes being around him exciting. His willingness to share and my naturally inquisitive and curious spirit found me constantly at his side, asking questions and wanting to know more!
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Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
I’m a product of Aggie football. Without getting in to it, if you are really interested, you can check out some of my earliest blogs with Mays to fully comprehend. I think there are six.
That being said, I must acknowledge that this is my first football season (SINCE I WAS BORN… and even before then, if you count the gestation period) to NOT be present on Kyle Field for every game; crazy, I know.
But I have been handling it better than anyone would expect. I get the updates on the scores, and I listen to the game when possible. Friends with some of the coaches on facebook, I’ll send an encouraging message every once and a while, maybe an email or two to the ladies I worked with, and of course my parents email me articles and updates on everything, most importantly my little brother’s games as a Freshman football player at Austin College in Sherman, TX. And it doesn’t hurt that Jon’s main responsibility is with the football team. He’s actually really getting in to Aggie football (an unlikely characteristic for a New Englander…) I knew he was different when he said he was more anxious about the Aggie football game than the Red Sox game. I’m eating new foods, he’s enjoying college football… what is to become of us??
But after returning to Singapore after a little over a week in Malaysia, I woke up to listen to the UAB game. This was the first time I had ever really felt a tad bit homesick since I got here. (more…)
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Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
*note to reader: because the town is in fact not an English speaking town, Malacca/Melaka are used interchangeably. Both are correct, and I’m still not quite sure there seems to be such variety, but there is, so you are just going to have to accept that.
Arriving to the town at 5:00AM, I managed to get a taxi (without a voice) and pull up to the River View Guest House (which is FANTASTIC and a must stay for all those planning to visit Melaka) and although I have a booking for the upcoming evening (I hadn’t anticipated arriving this early) much to my dismay, the sign out front reads “full house”. With nowhere else to go, I ring the doorbell, wake up the kind couple who own the establishment, and they let me in, show me around, and I crash on the couch. Of course I call Jon as soon as I can get internet connection on my Skypephone, and hearing the concern in his voice just made me miss him even more intensely. But that is a whole other blog. (more…)
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Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
Heading out to dinner, the team took me to a Steamboat Restaurant. Steamboat is quite popular in Southeast Asia, as I have noticed. Basically, there is a fire pot in the middle of the table, one side with a clear broth and the other with an orange spicier one. Around the sides is a shelf for cooking, and buffet style, you fill your plate with all sorts of meats and vegetables and cook it yourself at the table!
What a fantastic experience, trying new foods with the guidance of my experienced comrades. I was taught how to open and eat this complicated crustacean (we never did figure out the bugger’s English name)
The highlight of the eating experience had to be… the octopus tentacle. Now, I have had a bite of octopus tentacle before, and while my exhilaration at having eaten all of these new things was nothing to write home about according to my friends who have been in Asia for a while (I called it ‘Asian eating for beginners’ or ‘Asia Lite’) but even my girl friends at the table said that this octopus tentacle was exceptionally large. I knew it would be gross, but I ate it anyway.
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