Homeward Bound

It seems like just yesterday we were on our flight to Singapore together for the big move and that our home leave trip in July was so far away. Apparently time flies and the next thing you know we were ordering a GoPro and necessities from Amazon.com to bring back from the U.S. (See this post and this one about shopping and prices in Singapore.) 

A trip back to the states brought us back to a familiar world. We were able to visit all the places we call home for business and/or to visit family and friends. It felt good and a little odd to be in our home in Phoenix which is really no longer our everyday house, but yet a familiar spot to lay our heads. We used our time wisely by stocking up on items for one of our next adventures in Mt. Fuji, made sure to get haircuts, eat Mexican food, drink Napa Valley wine and spend lots of time with friends.

Since friends and family being the most important part of our trip, we headed to Las Vegas to celebrate Papa B’s 60^th birthday. I had family coming in from Ohio, Florida and California and of course Mama and Papa S were there.

Since we had out of town guests we spent a few days playing tourist in Vegas. Nothing like a visit to the Neon Museum, Peppermill and the Mob Museum to showcase ‘Old Vegas.” If you haven’t been to any of these places, I highly suggest you add them to your itinerary for your next Vegas visit.

Neon Museum

There were multiple dinners with the biggest party happening on Saturday night at Aureole in Mandalay Bay Hotel & Casino. We had an amazing meal with 25 people who have and continue to have an impact on Papa B’s life.

 

We couldn't have asked for a better trip (maybe with a little more sleep.) Regardless we were very blessed to be in the country to celebrate birthdays, engagements, new homes and more. See you all in December when it’s nice and cold in the states (although it’ll still be hot and humid in Singapore!)

Happy Trails,

Amy & Raegen

G'day WA

The remarkable thing about living is Singapore is how close you are to some amazing places.  This ends up being a double edged sword. On the one hand there are amazing places with all sorts of unique and different experiences but you have to have some time (and money) to enjoy them!  The nice part is being so centrally located some can be done in a quick weekend, like a trip to Perth, Australia.  

Australia is a country about the size of the lower 48 States, AKA HUGE, but there are only about 23 million people in the whole country (about 10 million less people than the state of California).  Now compare that to the 75 million sheep that reside in the country as of 2013.  When most people think of Australia the first thing that comes to mind is the Sydney Opera house, the Harbour Bridge, a kangaroo, koala bear, and maybe even a bottle of wine.  Some of our more refined readers might have images of blooming onions, Outback steakhouse, throwing shrimp on the Barbie and Fosters beer.  

Before I tell you the story of our trip to Perth, let's talk about the booming metropolis of Perth. Unless you are in the mining industry or a sailing historian and remember the 1983 America's Cup you probably have never heard of Perth until recently.  Perth has been the home base of the reporters following the search effort for Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 as well as the point of embarkation for all of the search vessels and aircraft.  If that is not interesting enough for you then Perth is one of the most remote cities in the entire world!  While it is still in Australia, it is actually closer to Singapore than it is to Sydney.  This meant that we could hop down for the weekend and see some old friends who I studied with down under for a semester during college.

Beau and BoBo Riverton* were born in a small Australian town named Kalgoorlie but decided to move to the big city in search of love and opportunity.  They have been married for 5 years and have 2 wonderful daughters,  little Darth Vader* and little Ewok.* Over the years Beau and I have kept in touch and if I was in Singapore on business I would try to take the 4.5 hour flight directly south to see him and his family.

As we have gotten older and gained additional responsibilities,  the trips have moved away from late night outings, sports and video games to more family friendly activities. This is proof that yours truly can and is growing up!  During this trip we were able to get a great tour of Notre Dame Australia (where I spent a semester abroad), stop by for a pint at Little Creatures Brewery (I attended many “classes” there), as well as see the sites of Kings Park and a soggy Cottesloe Beach.  Saturday night we had a grown up outing and went to a charity event, Artitude, benefiting Telethon Speech & Hearing Centre for Children is a charitable organisation that teaches children with speech and language or hearing impairments to listen and speak.  The event forced me to dress up which is something that I am not keen on, but man did our dates look beautiful.

We hope that before our assignment ends we can head down south to Margaret River to try some of the best Western Australian wines.  For those people who are looking forward to some cooler weather Perth is a great place to pull that jacket out of its bin and remember what it like to be cold.

In closing, Amy and I want to thank the Riverton Family for an amazing trip to see a piece of the left side of Australia. We are so grateful for your wonderful hospitality- it was like being with family.  

Trips like these help to reinforce the fact that with technology and some effort one can have lifetime friendships with people on the other side of the world.  Amy and I are so appreciative of technology so that we can know what is going on with everyone’s lives, can FaceTime with people no matter where they are (minus in Wilson as the internet is too slow) and use Slingbox to get FoxNews and ESPN.  The best part is that we're getting to (or will see) many of you during our first home visit. While we have hit the ground running in the U.S. and we are both excited for time with family and friends! 

Until then,

Raegen & Amy

*All names have been changed to protect the innocent. 

Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

The week is here...we head back to the good 'ol US of A for our home leave. 

Since we moved we started keeping a list of things to pick up when we are in the States in July. As we used this list to put together our Amazon.com order, it got us thinking about some of the things that we missed about the States. 

Vitamin Water Zero 

The fact things don't open up until 10:30-11 am. 

It's hot, we should get this day going early! (Most office jobs don't start until 9 am as well.) 

American cable  

Target 

Hunting

Irish Spring soap 

(the one daily use product that does not exist here)

American sports on TV. 

(Oh how we both miss ESPN!)

Nachos, chicken wings, and burgers

The Today Show

Mexican food 

(contrary to popular belief curry flavored chicken does not equal fajitas) 

Coors Light 

American prices from wine, to electronics to clothing and everything in between 

Having two cars 

The Hasty Bake Smoker 

Cooking wild game meat 

A country music station in the car 

(but did we mention we have a cassette player in our car? For those of you who don't know what that is, it looks like this...)

La Grande Orange Restaurant in Phoenix

Opa and his friends 

Getting mail that's not a marketing flyer 

(although we do get awesome FedEx packages with our mail from home like the one below) 

Antacids that actually work. 

Everything out here is the strength of Tums which does you no good with curry chicken fajitas...

Our coffee machine

And of course all of our friends and family but we look forward to seeing you very soon!

Happy Trails,
Amy & Raegen

Why is Your Time More Important Than Mine?

In keeping with the theme of an educational blog we thought we’d give you an insight into a part of everyday life in Singapore. 

Many of you have asked about shopping here. We have more shopping malls than we have combined fingers and toes with Louis Vuitton and Hermes galore. Running your everyday errands is a whole other story. We don’t have a Target, Wal-Mart or even a glorified grocery store around here so running errands becomes a serious undertaking. Dictionary.com defines an errand as a short trip undertaken to perform a necessary task or commission. I guess I should actually change my word of choice because no errand here is short. 

It took me a few weeks to admit that everything takes at least 3-4 x longer than it does at home (including laundry- fun I know!) It was hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that I couldn’t get into my car and hit Target to grab the essentials. Then off to the grocery store where they had everything I need for a week’s worth of food while driving through Starbucks on my way home and then unload everything with a few trips into the house. That’s the American way!

Well first of all, we only have one car so I tend to run errands on foot or via public transportation. I finally had to break down and bought a “granny cart.” I suppose I should fondly name it Dorothy after my wonderful grandma who had the same cart.

While lots of stores have on-line ordering and delivery the challenge becomes the fact that you’re not picking your own produce, meats and the online selection can limited and websites aren’t very functional here. I have found a great site/app called RedMart that is great for non-perishables. It’s nice to have someone deliver your cases of water to your door when you have no car but beyond that, I haven’t been successful.

Gotta love having to carry everything from the D.I.Y store along with your home office printer all the way from the store, onto the train and home. 

Although all hope is not lost as we do have a store called Mustafa in Little India, which is the closest to a mega store that we’re going to get, not to mention it is open 24/7 and is supposed to have some great curry. The store is a city block long and stacked to the ceiling on five floors with items. The nice part is they carry a ton of brands as well as food, jewelry, electronics, non-perishables, sporting goods, cleaning supplies (allegedly...I still have yet to find these.) This store is so overwhelming that I regularly shop with my headphones on and peaceful music playing so I can avoid sensory overload. One of the other challenges with this store is that you have to go early before all of the helpers arrive after dropping the kids off at school (around 9 am) and before the local residents of that area get off of work. You also have to avoid weekends as I’ve been told it’s just chaos...no thank you!

Our home leave is coming up in less than two weeks and you’ll find us at Costco, Target and Amazon.com loading up on the essentials that we can’t find here (there are quite a few items on our list.)

Happy Trails,

Amy & Raegen