We have moved into our
1,200 square foot apartment in the middle of a Singapore borough with a
population density of about 16,000 people per square kilometer. It’s called Ang
Mo Kio, which reportedly means “tomato” or “Red Haired Man’s Bridge,” depending
on who you ask. The words “ang mo” are supposedly very offensive to dudes who look like, well, me.
Our apartment complex has
an uber-Asian name: Grandeur 8.
What does that mean? What
does Grandeur 8 mean?
It means everything and
nothing at all, which is exactly why I love it. It sounds like we live in a
flat straight out of a Philip K. Dick novel. I feel like someone is going to
leave a small origami unicorn made from a tinfoil gum wrapper just outside of
our door. (Can anyone name the movie, please?)
Ang Mo Kio is about as
different from SE Aurora, Colorado as we could find. As I write this, I am sitting in my
6 x 6 foot office space looking out at about 100 towers and skyscrapers that
disappear towards the hazy horizon downtown. I can watch the metro trains on
the north/south line come and go far below. A steady stream of tiny Asian cars
loops through the Ang Mo Kio town center, just there. I’m still not used to
them driving on the left; each right turn across oncoming traffic gives me
vertigo.
The handover of the keys
to our new apartment was similar to what receiving the keys to, say, 10 Downing
Street or 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. might be like: thorough, intense, full of
scrutiny. Picture me and two other guys walking through the place with
spreadsheets of about 200 boxes to check and make notes about (i.e. “small
scrape on upper tile of bathroom wall”), and you kind of have the idea. Tedious. As. Hell.
New lifestyle feature for us
Americans: remote control air conditioner units. There’s a separate unit in
each room, and each unit has its own remote. I like the “swing” feature.
Similarly, there’s a water
heater that needs switching on and off before and after usage. I remember that
cultural difference from my last time in Asia. Many cold showers to come for
sleepy Americans used to 24-7 hot water.
* * *
Shopping at the Ang Mo Kio
Fair Price Market, I was treated to some of the best back-to-back-to-back in-store
music I’ve ever heard: “Still Lovin’ You” by Scorpions, “Smoke on the Water” by
Deep Purple, and (I kid you not) “Stairway to Heaven.” The volume was pretty
loud for supermarket music, which was integral. I was playing so much air drum
and air guitar that the family acted as if it did not know me, and the
Singaporeans stayed far away as well. I was in my element and did not care one
jot. Not a jot. Rockin’ to Zeppelin in the rice cake and seaweed aisle is where
I wanna always be, man.
* * *
Callie’s finally back with
us full-time. I am starting to notice that Singaporeans are terrified of dogs.
The sight of Callie has made several very normal-looking people scream. It is a
TOTAL disconnect from American culture, where we love our pooches. I am
completely amused by this, especially since Callie is The Greatest Dog on Earth
and is as about as aggressive as a manatee.
I keep asking Callie, “Are
you the best dog in Ang Mo Kio?” and she smiles and wags her tail. There are
dark brown, smallish squirrels here, and she loves to try to chase them (until
the end of the leash jerks her back to reality).
* * *
Because the climate is so
humid, drying clothes here is a trick. On the back patio space thingy on our
apartment, there are drying racks with bamboo poles that stretch across—maybe 5
foot long poles. You hang sheets and towels over said poles and then stretch
the poles across the racks. I am almost positive that we are doing it
incorrectly, but things are drying.
* * *
I am seeing more badminton
and table tennis during these Olympics than in all
previous Olympics combined. The passion! The drama! The weird sweat-flinging
thing they do! Zhang Jike of China is my new favorite athlete, I think. That
dude can play him some ping pong. Fearsome.
* * *
People here fly kites with
multicolored-LEDs attached at night. Eerie and beautiful. Alien.
Extra-terrestrial. Haunting and goofy at the same time. Funny and mesmerizing,
kind of like a firework explosion that’s been frozen in time and given a string.
We want to get one!
