Things That Make You Go Hmmmm......Part 3

I would like to subtitle this post:

You Don't See That Everyday

As life here in Singapore becomes more normal, a girl still can't help but take pause at some of the oddities that present themselves here in SE Asia. I have had some fun chronicling them in Part 1 and Part 2 of Things That Make You Go Hmmmmm. A few weeks ago I realized that there is much about life in Texas that I just don't see here and so, Part 3 was born.

Some of these things you would expect. I never see cowboy boots or cowboy hats...unless it's some dude on the top of one of those tourist buses yelling "YeeHaw" as he rolls down Orchard Rd. taking loads of pictures of "all them Asian folks". It's times like that when I stifle the ya'lls in my speech and embrace a more Canadian venacular....eh?

I don't see enormous vehicles that can seat 37 people or pickups that can haul an entire house full of furniture. Bumper stickers are practically nonexistent here which makes sense when you are paying $100,000 for your Hyundai. I miss the days of pulling up behind someone and in the 2 minutes it takes for the light to turn green I know how many children they have, what sports they play, the names of their teams, whether they made the honor roll or beat up other kids that made the honor roll, how many pets they have, their political affiliation, and if they believe that a fish stuck on your car will make you drive in a more Christ-like fashion. In Singapore, everyone drives around in complete anonymity and it's no fun at all.

I recently took a very informal survey and 100% of the people surveyed (4 out of 4) told me that there are only 3 drive thrus in all of Singapore. All 3 are McDonalds. That's right....I live a life void of drive thrus but since I don't have a car, that seems to be the least of my issues. I did bribe a taxi driver once with promises of a Grande Latte if he pulled over and waited while I made a Starbucks run. That will work unless you get a cranky driver in which case you just close your eyes and pray you make it to your destination alive.

It is rare that you see a parking lot. Most parking is below the building you are visiting and you always have to pay for it. Everyone parks their cars by backing into a spot with your hazard lights blinking. I don't know why, but apparently that's the rule here and one thing folks are really good about doing.....following the rules. It probably has something to do with that whole caning thing.

There are no billboards lining the roads in Singapore. It stinks because you never know how many more exits until the next Buccees.

You never, ever, ever see people out shopping in their cute new pajama bottoms and Uggs. Never. In fact, the folks here refer to flip flops as slippers. Even shorts are frowned upon but that doesn't stop me from wearing them. The women are modest and it's a pleasant experience to go to the mall and not have to shield the eyes of my boys from teenagers, or 43 year old women, who feel the need to display their stuff. Many women wear loose, comfy dresses that look adorable when you're 90 pounds but when you're.....well....NOT 90 pounds, they make you look about 13 months pregnant. Which I'm not.

Viva la shorts!!

I haven't seen a tanning salon or a self tanner since living here. In fact, there will be entire aisles of whitening creams. The whiter your skin the more beautiful you are supposed to be. Women will wear long sleeves and high collared shirts when excercising, wear gloves when driving and walk with umbrellas to keep the sun off their skin. I recently went to a dermatologist here and while I was concerned about things like acne and suspicious spots on my skin, he couldn't get whitening cream in my hands fast enough for "the dark patches on your forehead". I didn't even know I had dark patches on my forehead. Thank you very much!! I now have something else to feel self-conscious about. Then again, not many people see my forehead so I'll let it go. I wonder what would happen if I used the cream on my teeth? Hmmmm.....

There is a distinct lack of facial hair here. And I don't mean pesky chin whiskers, I mean men with full beards or mustaches. In fact, I don't know that I've ever seen an Asian man with facial hair. Apparently, Asians are not very hairy. I know this because it wasn't that long ago that a friend of mine who is Asian was telling me a story about going to college and seeing girls shaving their armpits and being completely shocked at what they were doing. She was confused and scared by what she saw. I listened to her with my mouth hanging open....can you imagine?? How utterly and completely glorious that would be? Sometimes, life just isn't fair.

I would like to mention a few things that I do see here that I won't ever, ever see back home.

If any of you ever thought I had an over-inflated sense of self, the fact that I'm even posting this picture ought to dispel that notion.

I LOVE this thing and am pretty sure it was probably outlawed in the states years ago after setting someone's hair on fire. It's a shame because there's no massage, no facial, no nothing that is more wonderful and relaxing than having warm air blowing on you with enough noise to make conversation impossible. I even talked my hair lady into an extra 5 minutes the last time I was there. I. Love. It!! And clearly, I look my most fashionable while enjoying that thing!

And what about random sea creatures? Ok, glad you asked since I just so happen to have a couple of pics courtesy of a recent field trip to Underwater World.

My understanding is that these things are all over the place here. I have no idea if they exist back home, but just knowing that these are lurking around in the water is just about enough to make me swear off oceans forever.

And these little guys? They're just weird. Bless their hearts. Stuck in one place forever. The scary thing? There's a really good chance I've eaten one of these things since living here.

I just can't even think about it.

In exactly 102 hours I will be home where I know for sure when I bite into a fajita what I'm getting myself into. I can't wait!!

Make that 101 hours and 57 minutes.....

A little N & G

I have 16 minutes from right this second to get this post up and running to count for today! This last week has been full of activities and so here's a super quick peak at a few of them.

Nathan had Play Day last week which is Singaporean for Field Day. It was 2 hours of running around from game to game with absolutely zero structure, lots of water games, and no winners or losers.

The entire 4th grade...there's a lot of them!

Nathan and some of his buddies

Popsicle time!!

Today we got to visit Nathan's class for their Notables presentation. They were asked to choose a person that had some sort of historical impact and they wrote a research paper, designed a backdrop, dressed the part, created informational brochures to hand out and were available for Q and A today in full character.

Nathan chose James Rudder who apparently had something to do with WWII and Texas A&M. If you want to know more, you'll have to ask him yourself! I will say that I was amazed at the variety of historical folks represented and I loved walking around the room asking the kids all kinds of questions. Noone broke character and they were extremely articulate and brilliant with their answers. It was great!

Nathan looking very serious next to Mother Theresa

It is always a treat to go to the high school cafeteria and visit Subway

for lunch so off we went as our last hoorah before summer!!

This past weekend Garrett participated in Brass Explosion which is a Brass Symposium here in Singapore that has a student portion open to kids from the local schools. Tonight was the concert and the first time Garrett got to play in a bonafide music conservatory. The students were only a small portion of the evening and we thoroughly enjoyed the concert!

Garrett and his friend Patrick......and then the little

brothers joined in...

where apparently it is really, really....

difficult to take....

a normal picture.

If you look reeeaaaaalllllllyyyyy hard to the left

of the picture you can spot Garrett's sweet red head way

in the back with the other, well, less trained trumpet players.

You see him? Yep, it's a head only a mother could spot

a mile away.

Yikes!! 7 minutes late! No time for a quirky or clever wrap up sentence!

XOXO

Day Off

School is winding down. Homework is gloriously over. After school activities have ended.

That means the boys and I are splurging and having a movie night for the second night in a row.

On a weeknight.

I have a fresh key lime pie in the freezer right now and I'm not going to waste my time blogging.

In fact, I'm taking tomorrow night off too because I have a hot date with my husband who has been traveling the last 4 weeks. I have to soak up as much of him as I can because we will be separated for 7 weeks this summer and I'm going to miss him desperately.

One week left of this challenge and I can honestly say that I am getting really tired of me and I'm sure you are too!!

XOXO

Pure

I had the most amazing taxi ride the other day. I was in the taxi for about 30 minutes and my driver talked and laughed non-stop the entire time telling me story after story about his younger days. Because I have picked up some stealth like moves over the years, I pulled out my phone and proceeded to record one of his stories....until he busted me and refused to tell me anymore until I stopped "taking pictures" of him. I so badly want to post it here but have been battling the stupid video and my computer and complete ignorance of all things technological and can't figure out how to post it.

Now that I am thoroughly frustrated, I am taking the easy way out on my post for tonight.

First of all, is it just me or is the print on this blog normally really small??? I don't know why it's that way but I'm kicking it up a notch because I refuse to admit that it could just be my age.

Secondly, I noticed that yesterday's post was post number 201. There was no fanfare...in fact, I almost feel bad about yesterday's totally random post in light of that very small and insignificant milestone. Maybe it is appropriate after all.

Just out of curiosity, I went back and started reading some posts from the early days and I was hit with a huge wave of nostalgia. Then I found a post I titled Pure. I wrote it just after New Years 2009 and I'm amazed how 2.5 years later the bulk of the post still rings true for me.

Consider this taking the easy way out......but I am posting Pure again because it is so where I am these days and I really, really needed to be reminded of what I want most out of life.

PURE

If you have any preconceived ideas that I make all the right decisions, think through everything before I act or speak, and am just an all around perfect woman, please don't read any further because you will be sorely disappointed.

I was having a conversation last week with one of my favorite people in the whole entire world, Lisa. She lives in Florida and is married to a pastor and she is real.......transparent, authentic, and refreshingly real. I miss her in a way that just hurts my heart.

We were talking about the things in our lives that we just can't stand about ourselves. You know what I'm talking about, the stuff that we try really hard to pretend doesn't exist so our appearance says something different from our reality.

Like working really hard on a comment to post on a very popular blog trying to get a shout out from the blog author.

Like checking an Evite invitation 45 times a day to see who is or is not coming to your party and why.

Like keeping the tags on a new shirt, wearing it to church for all your friends to see, and returning it to the store if no one complimented you on the cuteness factor of the shirt.

Like allowing yourself to be tortured over a broken relationship until you can think of nothing else but the pieces scattered all around you.

Like hearing other women talk about their weaknesses and having a moment of intense pride when your struggles are not the same.

We laughingly agreed that being open with each other about our yuck made us feel a little less bad about ourselves and wondering how many women have these same feelings, but never admit it to anyone.

I have never been a big New Years resolution kind of girl because I have horrible discipline and by the 1st week of January I will have broken every resolution. Why set myself up for failure?

I did enter this new year thinking about what I wanted out of 2009. The truth is, I want to be pure.

I want my intentions to be pure.

I want my pursuit of God to be pure.

I want my motivations in life to be pure.

I want my thoughts to be pure.

I want my ongoing, desperate need for approval to be met purely through my Savior.

Now, I know very well that I am riddled with fault and will have days where I fail miserably. I also know that God's promises and love for us are "new every morning" and I don't have to wait until 2010 to start over. Thank you God for that promise!

I hope your 2009 has gotten off to a great start. I pray that each of you finds a renewed sense of purpose in your walk with Christ. I pray you will have pure joy.

His mercy is new every morning and every single morning I take full advantage of that fact. I am far, far, far from perfect and am astounded at the ongoing gift of forgiveness offered to me. But I also know that on the other side of that forgiveness and mercy is Joy. It is something I have to choose for myself.

I choose pure Joy.

Bits and Pieces

So today is one of those random days where I have so much bouncing around in my head that I couldn't focus on one topic if I was paid to.

Which I'm not, so therefore I get to be as random as I like!

1. I had a nice chat today with one of Garrett's teachers. It wasn't a "random bumping into you" that led to a chat kind of chat. It was more of a "you need to come in for a scheduled chat" kind of chat. Our year has ended on a much higher note than it started but he still isn't up and running at his normal level. I'm ok with that because I need to be. I learned a long time ago that wrapping up my ego and security in the accomplishments of my kids is a dangerous ride. I'm tempted to jump on sometimes because it can be thrilling, but then I watch parents get off that ride - running for the nearest trash can to toss their cookies - and I regain my determination to stay off that roller coaster.

2. There are some dangers in writing a blog. One of them is that sometimes people read it and after they read it, they call you out on things you write. Remember this post and all my blah, blah, blah about being stretched outside my comfort zone? Well apparently one of the gals that is in charge of decorating for VBS at our church here read that post and then decided to ask me to help. Not because I'm crafty or good with a paint brush or have amazing scissor skills.....oh no. It's because every time I start complaining about how decorating isn't my thing she can look at me and say, "Streeeeeetch". Then she takes pictures of me trying to trace something off a transparency onto paper taped on the wall so I can then paint it....which makes me very nervous.

That's it. From now on I am just going to write about how I love chocolate.

3. It didn't take long after moving here for me to notice stores and restaurants that would look like this.

At first, I wondered if someone had died there.....or was even being buried there. I mean, it wouldn't be the strangest thing that happens around here. I finally asked someone and found out that every single time a new store or restaurant opens, people send these funeral...I mean congratulatory....flower arrangements. It can even be a new KFC opening in the mall and it will be surrounded by flowers. I guess that helps offset the smell of strange chicken parts being deep fried.

4. I haven't been perfect with this whole blogging challenge. I missed one Friday because Blogger was out of commission for some reason. Then I missed last Friday because I just couldn't come up with anything to say and was too tired to care. I haven't been so great with my whole "I'm not going to eat sugar, flour, or dairy" thing I started either. One of the culprits has been a very yummy and easy key lime pie recipe that I have made three times in the last couple of weeks. So, if I'm going down.....you are too.

Get a pie crust. I used graham cracker but you can apparently make one out of vanilla wafers too.

Mix together:

1/2 can frozen limeade

1 can sweet and condensed milk

1/2 of a large container of Cool Whip...which may or may not be equal to one small container but if you can buy a big one why would you buy a small one?

Pour the concoction into the pie crust and freeze. It takes about 4 hours, 37 minutes, and 5 seconds to be ready....approximately.

I had such lofty weight loss goals and thanks to an increase in running, I am happy to report that I will be heading home a whopping three pounds smaller than when we moved here. On a girl with my height, you will notice.....well....zero difference.

Yeah for me!

5. I bought an eyelash curler this past weekend. Nathan happened to be with me and having to explain to him how an eyelash curler worked was one of the funniest conversations we've had. I stole a little of his innocence that day.

And on that note, I will wrap up this little bit of randomness. I'm going to see if I can dig up a piece of key lime pie and I might even eat it off one of my new Spode Turkey plates!!

Just because I can!

Egg Wash and Turkey Plates

As the school year winds down so do many of the responsibilities that keep a girl busy during the week. We have taken advantage of some free days to check a few things off the "must do" list......a list that seems to get more extensive the longer we are here.

It was a few months after moving here that Tiffany, Lisa, and I started hearing rumors of a plate factory in Malaysia that was a popular destination to buy nice plates for very little money.

Like Spode plates.

Which means nothing at all to me, but the Martha Stewart types seem to get really excited about these Spode plates.....especially the Christmas and Turkey ones.

Personally, I was just going along for the ride because I didn't want to miss out on anything but I could honestly care less about plates. Spode or otherwise.

We picked a day and began planning only like four women can. We could have been stranded in Malaysia for weeks with as many provisions as we brought along with us. Food, magazines, toilet paper......we were prepared!

It is a known fact that traveling in Malaysia is not always safe. Rumor has it that a popular scheme is to egg a tourist's windshield and when you attempt to use your windshield wipers to clear the egg off it smears causing you to have to pull over where you are then robbed.

Did this in any way stop us from going? Oh no. No threat of being egged was going to keep us from those darn Turkey Spode plates. We were packing. Not the I'm-a-girl-from-Texas-and-can-open-my-gun-safe-with-my-eyes-closed-in-three-seconds-or-less kind of packing. I mean we were packing an entire jug of egg wash.

The plan was if we got egged, my job was to lean out the window and pour our "egg wash" all over the windshield going 90km per hour down the freeway while the other girls held me by the ankles to keep me from becoming roadkill. And don't think I wouldn't have done it.

Mom......MOM!! Put your head between your knees and just breathe in and out...in and out.

When we arrived it was truly nothing more than a ton of folding tables set up under a corrugated tin roof. I get overwhelmed shopping for things like plates in nicely lit stores with air conditioning and songs by Air Supply softly playing overhead. This place was like nothing I had ever seen before. Plates, bowls, platters stacked everywhere....inside and out. It was filthy dirty and I came eye to eye with more than one creepy crawly that day.

Lisa and Tiffany were off and running grabbing stacks of plates...excitedly calling out to each other....squealing for joy when they saw that there were dozens and dozens of Spode Turkey plates to choose from. It was fun watching them while Vanessa and I were a little more "deer in the headlights" about the whole thing. It was enough to send us two girls scurrying for the corner to chug down a jug of egg wash.

Just kidding.

Kinda.

Tiffany's stash.....which cost her about $150 total. Most plates were

about $1 a piece. It was crazy!

After much consideration, Vanessa decided to go ahead and get a stack of Spode Turkey plates. I stood my ground in defiance of buying plates for a holiday where I don't typically even make a turkey. I was proud of my strength of character.....my ability to say no to peer pressure...my fiscal responsibility.

And then, it got ugly.

The taunting began. They pinpointed my weakness and went for blood. They were merciless and I was utterly defenseless against them.

They told me that one day.....one day.....my boys were going to marry girls and have grandbabies. And we all know who determines how much time the mother-in-law gets to spend with the grandbabies. The as yet undetermined wives of my boys. And why in the world would these sweet girls ever want to spend a Thanksgiving at my house with my grandbabies in tow if I didn't serve a turkey dinner? They wouldn't. BUT...if I not only served turkey dinner but had Spode Turkey plates to serve said dinner on then they would be more likely to visit because who's going to inherit those plates one day? That's right....my daughter in laws.

I am now the proud owner of 15 Spode turkey plates.

The End.

Sand and Plates

First of all, I would like to report that everyone is happy and smiling today. No visible scarring from my behavior last night. Thank you for all your sweet comments....sometimes it's just nice to know you aren't alone.

I am barely going to get this posted in time to count for Thursday's post so I'm going to make it quick!! Because I'm tired and feel like the few creative nuances that bounce around in my head have been sucked out tonight.

This is a quick post with a few pics.......

For Vesak Day we decided to go to the beach here in Singapore. I have lived here almost a year and have never been. It's crazy because it's a great beach......if you don't pay too much attention to the tankers docked just outside the cove area they have roped off.

Nathan was convinced that oil was spilling into the ocean as we sat there and ate chicken nuggets.

There were Slurpees....

And naps...... (I am so going to get in trouble for this pic)

And an attempt to dig a hole all the way to.......I don't know. What happens when you are already almost in China? You dig a hole to Wyoming?

I am definitely aware that it appears that this last week has been full of one adventure after another......if you can really call a Squatty Potty an adventure. I'm not sure if it's the fact that our commitments for the year are coming to an end and we've all had some free days or if it's panicking that time will go by too quickly without checking things off the long list of things to do in SE Asia.

Since arriving here I've heard over and over about shopping for dishes in Malaysia. There is a Spode factory there which meant nothing to me but made the Martha Stewart types super giddy....something about Christmas and Turkey plates. Today was the day we packed up and took a rode trip to Malaysia to check out the plate factory. Our adventure deserves a post all its own but for now I'll leave you with this picture.

I know....it's enough to make a girl who hates to shop want to hurl.

But I ended up with Turkey dishes and that's going to have to be a story for

another time.