On the Road to Singapore

(Part five)

Wednesday, June 30, 1999

6:30pm (Singapore time)

I am sitting at a table in The Truck Shop food court, eating fish and chips for supper. Am hungry, first food except for three crackers and a Snickers bar for lunch. I was on a roll with my work and didn't want to interrupt my thoughts.

The food court is not very busy. I have just noticed that no one is wearing blue jeans. Now that I think about it, I have seen almost no blue jeans since my arrival. Ah, there is an Indian fellow wearing a pair. A lot of people wear loose sandals, mainly the older generation, or perhaps I should say the traditionalists. When walking on the street one always hears shuffling, caused by the looseness of that footwear. There are television sets hanging from overhead scattered throughout the food court, all with their volume turned up, but as each is tuned to a different channel the result is a cacophony of words and television show theme music. One near me is showing the evening news, in English, of course. The set behind me is showing a game show. I think it is a local version of Jeopardy, also in English. A couple sitting at a table near me have a young daughter, about four years old. Her black hair is tied in high pigtails. Her parents are Young Singaporean Professionals (YSPs?)

Watching the news program I am reminded that I used to feel out of touch with current events while traveling, always desperate to find a newspaper, but with the web I check the ABC / Reuters news feeds several times a day, and Comics.com at least once a day.

Thursday, July 1, 1999

10:30pm (Singapore time)

I am back at the apartment after an evening visiting The Hotel Raffles in downtown Singapore. I had hoped to do so the evening before but was just too tired, did my laundry instead (the heat and humidity causes one to go through clothes quickly). If my notes have become routine and filled only with the humdrum of daily life it is because I seem to be settling into this life quicker that I thought I might.

I feel quite at home in the apartment now. The cranky air conditioner and I have come to a mutual truce, I don't ask too much of it and it doesn't provide much. The bird that visits my window early in the morning feels free to caw as loudly as he likes and I try not to bother him. I find my ear is becoming acclimated to the sound of Chinese. I can hear the individual words and have started to recognize often-used phrases. Yesterday in a meeting I was startled to find myself following (in a vague way) a conversation between two engineers, helped of course, by all the English words they were using (Linux, server, gooey, world wide web). I know that my tongue will never be able to wrap itself around the words well enough to speak Chinese (heck, I stutter in French), but were I to spend more time here I believe I could learn to understand it.

So, this evening I took a cab to the Hotel Raffles. It is as one would expect it. The turn of the century British Empire look has been well preserved. Today, it serves two clientele; those who stay there at six hundred dollars (Singapore) a night, and those who visit it as a tourist attraction. It is a large rambling structure with three floors of shops. Beautiful silk dresses are displayed in many of those. I have decided I like silk. There is large shop with nothing but Hotel Raffles souvenirs. I thought about buying a polo shirt with their emblem or a hat. Boxes of chocolates, boxes of English tea, coffee mugs, the usual assortment at fiercely high prices. My Scottish ancestry prevailed however, though I consoled my varied other lineage with the promise that I could return on Saturday before my evening flight, should I have a change of heart.

There are several large outdoor courtyards within the grounds of the hotel. In one of them a trio (two violins and a flute) was playing. They had that pleasant, slight discordant sound one hears when Chinese play western music. The tune was familiar and it annoyed me that in spite of my time spent listening to classical music I couldn't place it. As I left the courtyard it came to me. It was the theme from Disney's Pocahontas.

There are two bars in the hotel I had heard of before, the Long Bar and the Writer's Bar. The former is where the Singapore Sling cocktail originated and my plan was to find a quick bite to eat, then try one. First though, I wanted to find the Writer's Bar. I pictured myself in a high wicker chair under slowly rotating ceiling fans, sipping whiskey and soda, casually jotting notes on paper that would in time become The Novel.

I spent about forty five minutes wandering the three levels and intricate floors of the Hotel Raffles before I found the Writer's Bar, just off the main lobby where I had begun my search. The bar consisted of about twenty square feet of floor space, and a half dozen chairs, all occupied by boisterous young women (Australian from the sound of it). But there was a sign for the Writer's Grill immediately next door so I decided to grab my bite there. I wasn't sure how much it might cost, but I had money in my pocket and have been eating so cheaply the past week I could spend quite a bit on one meal and still be ahead.

The matre'd escorted me to my table, his tuxedo and officious manner should have tipped me off. This is no grill; it is a super elegant restaurant of Old World style (and prices). Polished silver flatware and serving apparatus, mahogany furniture, ceiling fans hanging from thirty-foot ceiling, ornate chandeliers and a beautiful parquet floor. An older Asian woman dressed in a formal gown played a grand piano in the corner. She played mostly the old standards, but I did hear the theme from Titanic at one point during my meal. I suppose even the most staid institution adjusts to the times.

I ordered a salad and their roast beef dish and when the waiter asked if I wanted champagne, I said sure along with a glass of water. They brought a bottle of Evian. After allowing me a few minutes to munch on some very nice pieces of bread, they brought my salad. At first I thought it was a small head of lettuce. Bringing a fork to it, I found it was only the thinnest, crispiest, most choice leaves from the center of a head of lettuce, reassembled to look like a full head. The lettuce was on a bed of fresh baby spinach leaves and layered into the lettuce were paper thin, inch wide slivers of Parmesan cheese, each several inches long. Topping the salad were quarter-sized thin slices of something brown and nutty in flavor, but soft and crumbly in texture; truffles, of course.

I finished my salad at a slow, deliberate pace, trying to make it last. The plate was removed and soon after my entrée arrived. A very nice filet mignon with a rich dark sauce and a single mushroom cap on top. To the side were potatoes and two pearl onions. Imagine scalloped potatoes, browned in the oven, but each thin slice stacked neatly atop the other with their sauce layered in between.

I again forced myself to eat slowly, resisting the temptation to wolf it down and order seconds. I studied my fellow diners. Mostly business people, this must be a popular place to bring valued clients. To my right was a foursome, a middle-aged couple and an elderly couple, the parents of the former. Watching them I tried to figure out who was the child and who was the in law. I decided it was the daughter's parents from the way she watched them both. She had red hair cut super short in a boyish cut and the confidence to make it work. I noticed when it came time to serve them their meal, two waiters each brought two plates, one waited for his partner to arrive, then each carefully served the two women first.

Several couples walked by in elegant evening dress, obviously this is also the place to go for anniversaries and celebrations. The table nearest me was occupied by a man and woman, dinner after business from what I could gather. She sat with her back to me. He was American, in his forties, and wore steel rimmed glasses, with a broad face, reddish hair cut military style and a Texas accent. I heard him extolling the virtues of Reagan economics at great length to the woman. I didn't hear her speak. From her body language she seemed interested, perhaps she really was.

The serving staff consisted entirely of earnest young Asian men, all friendly, courteous, and extremely good at their job.

Finished with my main course I answered "Of course," when offered dessert. I chose a chocolate soufflé and coffee to drink and both were perfect. The pianist was playing "I only have eyes for you", followed by "Somewhere" from West Side Story, no better song with which to end a solitary meal.

Well, all good things must end and eventually my check arrived. It's a good thing I have been eating cheap, that meal pretty much wiped out anything I saved during the week. But even the Scot in me will admit that it was worth the price and one of the tastiest and enjoyable meals I have ever had.

And so I took a cab back home, never having entered the Long Bar. It is now midnight, time to wrap this up, sleep, and spend my last working day at the office before returning home to Fremont.