Monthly Archives: October 2007

Singapore is hardly the most fashionable or stylish place on earth, but have to give it full marks for trying.

Last week a CD-like package arrived in my mailbox (the physical one out the front of my house that is).  It was a slickly produced pocket of information about … would you believe it … the new KPE Expressway that is to open in a few days time.

The ‘CD’ that arrived in the mail

Promoting itself as “Sounds on the Underground” it contained the lyrics for a series of songs commissioned by, that doyen of cool, the Land Transport Authority.  Performed by what are presumably Singapore’s hottest young artists, titles of the songs include “Look at the Signs”, “Turn on Your Headlights” and “Don’t Change That Tyre”. (Hilarious given the poverty of driving skills here – but that is food for another post).

A visit to the website (http://www.kpeunderground.sg/) demonstrated the same graphic sophistication and what sounded like pretty good mood electronica.

It seems so bizarrely Singaporean.  Here is another fantastic new infrastructure project for the island (as I write I am reminded of the horrors of arriving in Japan; James is still stuck in traffic, 2½ hours after landing in Tokyo).  And the promotional material is a combination of earnest civic-minded self-improvement with a desire to transform the image of Singa-bore into a modern, sophisticated urban metropolis.

Weird certainly, but it works for me. Like I said, full marks for trying …

If you can’t be in NY this is the next best thing – gives you insight into what New Yorkers really talk about – trust me some of the things I have herd on my subway rides and city strolls have stopped me in my tracks.  In a city where you are never really alone it is crazy what people will talk about…. careful though it can be addicting.

http://www.overheardinnewyork.com/

This was the view from my bedroom window this morning.

I have a good feeling about today.

I can’t believe she crashed into me again. It has to be at least twice today.

I love swimming at our local Toa Payoh Swimming pool. We tend to go on Saturday mornings as a family, James and I taking turns for a big long swim while the other plays with the kids in the shallower pools.

I love the fierce swim teachers barking to the kids in Mandarin or Singlish – “keep head down ok lah” or “both arm, both arm ay”. The school kids in their Disney character pajamas. Why the PJ’s? We have no idea, something to do with life saving perhaps. And the delicious corn in the styrofoam cups we all share after a big swim – half of which tends to end up on the none too clean table and then back in the cup for further consumption, but that’s kids for you isn’t it?

Corn and 100 Plus: the perfect post swim snack

It is dangerous though, very dangerous at times. The Singaporeans do not seem to share my keenly developed Australian sense of pool etiquette (keep in your lane, circle swimming, give way to faster swimmers etc). No it is pretty much a no-holes barred, swim wherever you like, jungle out there.

You splash along, constantly having to have your wits about you. Craning your neck looking for on coming traffic, or the odd granny in very dark goggles gliding diagonally in your peripheral view.

Worst of all are those teams of school kids in pajamas, swimming ACROSS the deep end of the pool perpendicular to everyone else. I feel a little like I’m in Frogger, moving in jerky, stop-start movements for the last 5m of the pool. Hardly easy when you are in over your head. Needless to say the odd one crashes in to me, and I’m left with an arm or leg that just won’t quite behave for the next lap or so, increasing my chances of being hit the next time around …

I have been in the US for ten years.  I came to get my MBA and stayed.  At least for a while.  I have roots here now - a husband, two small kids, and a small house on the westside of LA (a visiting family member once referred to it as a ‘lovely bungalow’), a job which I love.   Returning to live in Melbourne is always 2-3 years away – but it actually seems within striking distance now…maybe in 2-3 years…

I get excited when I think about returning to my family and don’t even get me started about the free baby-sitting.  I crave Melbourne coffee, empty beaches, bright stars, and decent mixed lollies.

But I tell you, there are things I would really miss about life in the US and LA.  Here are a few of them

1. You can pretty much get anything.  Picture this:  AFL Grand Final and the Cats are playing (I am a Geelong girl tried and true).  There’s a bar in Hollywood (a good hours drive on Friday night from Westside of LA) showing the game starting at 8pm.  We organize a sitter and plan to go.  I arrive home from work at 7pm and my 18 month old is sick and my sitter (an actress) is running late, really late.  So I do what any well-trained US consumer does…I call my satellite TV provider and ask how much I have to pay to get a feed of the game into my living room.  10 seconds and $25 dollars later (that’s it?), I am drinking a Mexican beer and eating a meat pie which my husband found at our local deli.

2. National Public Radio.  It’s the best.  “This American Life” (a weekly show) is perfect.

3. Mexican Food: From $1 tacos at my local Taqueria Sanchez, to gourmet street-food at Loteria Grill at the Farmer’s Market to the new high-end Mexican place a block from my house with a full-time 10 piece Mariachi Band, there’s nothing like good Mexican food.  Even ‘slop on a plate’ Mexican food tastes better in LA.

4. Mothering as a Sport: Now don’t get me wrong, there are highly committed mothers everywhere, but LA seems to have more than it’s fair share.  These are the ones that spend 2 years working on getting their kids into the ‘right’ pre-school, have birthday parties that are more elaborate than my wedding, create incredible baby scrapbooks, who run themselves ragged darting from music classes to Japanese classes and still look like a million dollars.  I don’t want to be one, but like any good sport, it’s really amazing to watch.  (and OK, so some days I do wish I looked like they do in jeans).

 There’s a lot more too, but this is a start.  And all this talk of Mexican food has made me hungry – I am going to get lunch.

It is that time of year again – the yearly trip home which always promts me to ask – where is home actually?

Never in a million years did I think America would be come my home when I first visited here at the age of 15 on a family vacation I thought it was too big, too noisy, too crowded, too dirty (I grew up on a farm far from anyone so anything seemed big I guess) and I vowed never to come back.

Three years later I was offered the chance to go on a cultural exchange – code word lots of Aussie Uni students getting into trouble with American College students, lets just say I liked it a lot better after that.

I went on the usual work / holiday UK experience but quickly found myself stateside again – young love can make you do strange things and I ended up with my greencard in the lottery – still always saying Australia is and always be my home this is just for fun and very temporary.

That was in 5 years ago and I have lived all over Tahoe, San Francisco, Vegas and now and most permanently New York City. I have moved back a couple of times but I end up back here my friends now laugh when I say it is just for a few months then I’ll be back. When I moved to NY 4 years ago I told my roomates to keep my room that I’d be back in three months – that was 4 years ago….

Work is the main reason for coming back – I am a theatrical producer so lets face it NYC is the place to be – but it is more than that I love this city, it’s people, it’s streets, it’s noise, it’s food, it’s culture so so much to love.

And so after a Summer of incredibly intense work (and play) I am heading home in ten days for a very unamerican whole two weeks off.

I can’t wait I always love going home friends, family, beach, sun, laid back attitude, peace and quiet, lots of trees, seeing stars again. It is so exciting but at the same time I start to think – where is home again? I used to leave Australia just to head over here for a month or so, now I just go home for two weeks. I have spent more time here in the past ten years then in Oz and as my very good friend who arrived to work with me just last week – time to face it this is your home now.

While logically it is and I really love New York and all it has to offer and this is where my furniture is – Australia will always be home and I can’t wait to go home if even just for a few weeks.