went for a hike.....

I'm about a 15 minute walk from Macritchie Park. It was built in 1868 and covers dozens of miles of rainforest. I like to see nature, but I really don't like to interact with nature. I would like to see a monkey, but I don't want that monkey jumping toward me. It makes me nervous to be really close to them, but they were everywhere! We walked up to the Treetop walk which is a suspension bridge that is literally at the top of the trees.

Across the bridge!

He's kinda scary.

Such a beautiful park. Amazing that it's so close. The entire hike took about 3 hours. Nothing is better than a nice swim with friends at the pool after that. Just like living in Egypt- er, wait no.

Speaking of adventures...

Here are the updated trips that I simply cannot wait for....

December-January- 3 1/2 weeks- Cambodia, Vietnam
February- week break- Krabi and Koh Phi Phi,Thailand
April- week break- Sri Lanka- renting a car to explore the country with friends!
May- long weekend- Hong Kong to see friends??
Summer....N.A. and Europe... details to be decided after Christmas....

Pictures to follow....

Life in the Tropics....

So what is it like living on the Equator? Well, predictable. Incredibly freakin' predictable. I know exactly what the weather will be like every day of the year. Right now it's the "Rainy Season". All that means is that it rains exactly at 4:00pm every day for 30-45 minutes. The sun rises exactly at 7:00 every morning of the year and sets at 7:00pm every night. No surprises. My wardrobe is the exact same all year. The weather fluctuates from lows of 76 to highs of 93. It's humid every day. Now you would think that this means the end of dry skin. Not even close. Because of the humidity, your skin and hair grows really fast. Therefore, you lose dead skin faster and have dry skin and hair. It's weird to use so much lotion and conditioner. Not that I can complain. Since living in the Sahara desert as well as a 3rd world country that had more chlorine in the tap water than the pool, my hair has improved sooo much! Really can't complains, it's an effing amazing city! I can't believe I leave for Cambodia in 10 days! Let the adventures begin!

November?

No one seems to believe that our weather actually never changes. It's incredibly predictable. Hot, humid, might rain for 5 minutes so bring an umbrella. The sun gets up at 7am, sets at 7pm every day of the year. Oh, life on the equator.

Happy Deepavali!!

The Hindu Festival of Lights will begin next week so we get a long weekend. After planning the trip to Borneo, then canceling, then rebooking- we are going! I can't wait! We are going to stay in Kuching in a 5 star hotel on the river. There's an orangutan national park nearby and some hiking. Super excited!


Here is the wikipedia article about Deepavali in case you're interested.

Mandela Desa

Tell me if this does not seem like the opening scene in a horror movie. On the way from the ferry to the hotel, our cab driver has to stop and ask for directions like 5 times. No one has ever heard of the Mandela Desa Estate. We go down crazy narrow roads and fewer and fewer people are seen. A lone six year old boy is smoking a cigarrette on the side of the road. As we get out of the taxi the entire staff is there to greet us, take our bags, and immediately show us to the room. How do they know we were arriving? They give us a welcome drink as we have a seat on the spacious porch looking out into acres of farmland. It appears that we are in the middle of nowhere in an old plantation house. We decide to go swimming in the pool. Towels have been laid out for us, no one is in sight. We don't see a single soul for the next 2 hours as we enjoy the pool and walk around the place. Cut to the storm in the middle of the night with the ax murderer outside the window.

We are about 20 minutes outside of Ubud. Incredibly quiet and peaceful but also very eerie. Ubud is NOT what I expected at all. It's full of shops, boutiques, restaurants, spas, etc. Thought this was supposed to be some quiet village in the mountains. Our hotel gives a free ride each night and picks us up whenever we want so we went into Ubud each night. Lots of shopping was done. It's a great place for girls to travel together because there's just so much cute stuff to buy and tons of spas that are really cheap. I would love to come back with some girlfriends for a long relaxing weekend. Loved the hotel, would come back here too. There are only like 8 rooms so you have the place to yourself. Each night they ask what you want for breakfast and 'where you would like to take the breakfast?' In your room? On the veranda? We hired a driver for the day. Ok, let me stop here and clarify. I sound like a colonial imperialist. We were going to go on a bike tour but the car was cheaper. And it's like $10 more for a driver for the day and he knows where to go. Anyways, we went all around Ubud. Hiked to a waterfall, had lunch overlooking a volcano, had coffee at a coffee farm, watched the artists painting at an art gallery/temple, wore a sarong(Owen too!) at a temple. Later we went to the Monkey Forest which might have been the most frightening time of my life. Monkeys everywhere.

this is what Bali used to be....

We took a speedboat out to Lembongan Island. Apparently this is what Bali used to look like. We were only planning on staying 2 nights and then going to another part of Bali to meet up with friends. But how cany ou leave a place like this? We stayed in these huts. Well, they say call them huts. They seem much nicer than what I would call a hut. There were only 5 huts at our place so we pretty much had the place to ourselves. We rented a motor bike and cruised around the island until we got a flat tire on Day #4. This was quite a story unto it's self. Let's just say that I'm glad we had my blackberry and it can work anywhere in the world. I'll have to tell that story on another post b/c my pics from that day are on my other camera. I was also convinced to scuba dive which I've never really wanted to do. I mean, it's one of those things that looks really amazing, but when choice #1 is go get all this gear and get on a boat and maybe see some fish and choice #2 is stay on the beach reading my book. Well, it's easy to say no. To be certified you have to take a 4 day course. You are in a classroom for 2 days before you get in the water. Instead I took a 10 minute crash course from Wayan who was pretty difficult to understand. He basically told me he would never let me go and take care of stuff for me. Sweet. Surprisingly to everyone, I actually really enjoyed it and was "a natural" in the water. Wayan let go of me and we stayed down about an hour. It's such a surreal experience. We were about 10 meters down so when you look up the boats and people swimming seem pretty close. We saw some really beautiful fish and of course, Wayan found Nemo for me. I wish I knew what kind of stuff I was looking at. Maybe next time. Yes, there will be a next time. I plan on going through the certification in Thailand in January. En shallah. Anyways, I would really recommend scuba diving.

In front of the hut, there is this jug for washing your feet before you enter.

Lounge chairs out front.

Mushroom Beach. (our beach)

View from the porch. Yes, that's the ocean.

This was our hut. The top part is the room, downstairs is this lounging area for like yoga or something. It lets the air move under the hut to help cool the hut. The AC also worked very nicely in cooling the hut too.

YUM!!

Sunset Beach

Stopped for petrol where a lady poured some petrol from an old vegetable oil container into the motor bike.

View from the lounge chair. Boats come in every day from Bali with tons of tourist but then leave by 4pm.

Dream Beach. There was some property for sale on this cliff. Very tempting....

The statues around the temples are so creepy.

Outside a temple on the motorbike.

Really pretty flowers everywhere.

We came across a graveyard and each of the graves has a little shrine on top with the umbrellas that are everywhere. It rains a lot so maybe they need umbrellas too?

These are the offerings that they put out every morning. They are literally everywhere. Mostly in doorways and footpaths. They are made with a banana leaf and have flowers, rice, and incense burning in them. It really creates a nice atmosphere with incense burning everywhere. I'm now convinced that incense should only be used outdoors.

Nusa Dua, Bali

We began our trip to Bali at a quieter beach on the main island. The hotel was amazing and the pool was 100 meters long! The beach had a really low tide that would go out every evening and morning. So one evening we went walking across it.

There was a wedding on our second night there. Totally wanted to crash it, but seeing how only 15 people were invited I felt like we might stick out. It's a really pretty island to have a wedding. But a very popular place for Aussies to get married. It's like Hawaii for Aussies.

This kid was hoe-ing around. Har har.

We walked all the way out into the ocean, this is the view from the beach. Obviously the tide came in and we had to half swim back to shore.

The water is so clear!!

Each night we went to a little cafe for dinner. The other place we went to had a Balienese band playing Johnny Cash songs. The nights ended by watching fireworks from the balcony. Pretty awesome.

that's what fat people do.

Dear self,

That bag of kettle chips and pint of Ben and Jerry's was probably not part of your diet. Just saying.

Warm regards,
me

the gym experience.

So far, so good with the gym. I went to this class today called ABT. Yes, that's exactly what I need to work out. Abs, butts, thighs. The instructor was the littliest, happiest Asian man(think gay Jackie Chan). At the beginning of every class, they always ask who is new to the class. I couldn't understand a word he said. Just sounded like Whhco whaqhee zhoiechoa e? So I raised my hand. Then he laughed. Ha! Ha! Ha! Oh God, what did I just volunteer for... As the workout goes on, he sings to every single song(aka William Hung) and never once stops smiling as if he's auditioning for Glee while doing a Jane Fonda workout. I'm not going to lie, it was kinda awesome.

Also, I have to mention this because it is SO Singapore....and SO the opposite of Egypt. In the dance studio, there are mats that have a sign above them. "Sterilized Mats" and another pile on the other side of the room "Used Mats". I ALWAYS think about how gross it is that we use those things after someone else and they are probably never cleaned. LOVE it!!

why i'm excited about Bali.

I've been rereading the part on Bali. We are staying in the mountain town that is mentioned in the book. I want to see the movie before we go, but Owen refuses to acknowledge anything having to do with the book. It is a very American/naive view of the island from what my friends have said about Bali. Whatever, the book is still entertaining. We'll just have to have a girls night and go see the movie! When I first read the book, it made me want to go to Italy, India and Indonesia immediately. When I was in Italy I could totally relate to that part of the book where she eats everything in sight. The food/wine in Italy is so amazing. The part of India in the book, I couldn't relate to at all. Probably because I wasn't going through a divorce or mediating every day in an Ashram. Plus, I thought India was all about the food. We have several friends who will be in Bali at the same time so that should be fun. I'm excited about staying in Ubud, the mountain town, because it's known for it's unbelievable artwork. It's funny how that is barely mentioned in the book. We have to watch out for monkeys and stray dogs because most of them are rabid. Also not mentioned in the book, but that would take away from the romance. I liked the book because it was entertaining and about travelling. But I felt very little sympathy for her as she decides she wants a divorce and to travel the world at 35. Probably because she was married at 24 and never was really on her own. Her husband wanted to work it out, but she didn't want to try. Sorry, no sympathy for your crying fits, lady. She just seemed very selfish about the whole thing. Maybe that's why they had to have Julia Roberts play her character. Everyone loves a good Julia Roberts movie. Anyways, can't wait for BALI!!!!

Workin' on my Fitness

I went in to a gym yesterday with a 2 week free pass. I tried to remind myself to be strong, don't join the gym no matter what they try to talk you in to. Alas, I'm such a sucker. First of all, they start with a full body analysis. Excuse me, but I just want to work out. I'm quite aware of my NEED to work out. But before you can enjoy your free pass, you have to get this analysis done. Fine, whatever. I think it was supposed to make me depressed and get me to hire a personal trainer immediately. Instead, I was impressed by my weight. It's not so bad. I've already lost some weight from Egypt and wasn't trying. Well done, me. However, to reach my fitness goals. I need to lose 10kilos(about 20lbs) of fat and gain 2-3 kilos(about 5lbs) of muscle. Totally got suckered in to paying for a gym membership for an entire year. But I saved over $400! I said no to the personal training and plan on working out by myself at first and then later if I need some extra help, might employ a trainer. It's not very motivating when the personal trainer isn't super fit herself. If someone who had Madonna's arms was offering me personal training, then obviously I would immediately sign up.

Also, I decided on a way to motivate myself. Here is the break down of rewards:

work out 5-7 days/week: new piece of clothing
eat healthy all week: new jewelry
work out only 3 days: pedi/mani

I know this makes me seem like such a princess, but my gym is in the middle of the shopping mecca of southeast asia. Basically every store you have ever heard of is within walking distance. It's hard to not think about shopping. So there it is. Let's see how it actually works.

Project Get in Shape needed to start like yesterday.

I've been fighting the fact that I need to get in shape. Initially, I lost a few lbs when I first moved to Singapore, probably just from the increase of walking everywhere. I feel like I just need to suck it up and join a gym. There's a gym at my complex, but there's not much there. I always feel like I get more out of it when I go to the classes. There's a class at the gym near my school called ABT= Abs, butt, thighs. I think that class is calling my name!!
Ugh. I hate going to gyms sometimes. Think I might just get a week pass and see if I really go. I do like to go running, but the coolest time of the day to go run is at like 5am. And it's still 80 degrees! Maybe if I write about it on here, then I'll have some accountability. Comments? Snide remarks?

F1

Had a really great time last night at the Formula One Racing. It's just a practice race but still very loud and tons of people out. Also, Missy Elliot performed. Singapore is not really known for being a really hyped up crowd. The cars go so fast, it's hard to actually see them. We found a place where they had to slow down on a curve so we were able to see them better. With that kind of stuff, I'm bored in like 15 minutes so I'm glad we had good friends there and loads of cheap beer. It's so weird to think I refer to $10/beers as cheap, but it is for Singapore. Before the race we went to this bar on the 70th floor. The elevator goes from the 4th floor straight up to the 70th so it's crazy fast. The boat building is my favorite. It's $20 just to go in it. There's an infinity pool that goes the entire length of the boat and there's a famous casino. A few weeks ago, a man sued the casino for letting him gamble away $3 million. He claimed the casino should have stopped him as he doesn't have that kind of money. Self control, buddy.

This is where the concert was.

View from the 70th floor bar.

upcoming trips

Because I'm excited about more travelling.

October- week break- Bali!!!!
November- long weekend- Borneo to see the Orangutans
December/January- 3 1/2 weeks- Cambodia, Vietnam
February- week break- Thailand
April- week break- ?? Trekking through Bhutan?
May- long weekend- Hong Kong to see kayla, darby, dan!
June-Trekking through Nepal?
July- looking into getting my master's in Prague - hoping to visit friends in Germany,Poland, and Italy at the end of July

A Different Sky

Finished this book about Singapore. It was really slow at first, but then got a lot better in the middle. It spans from 1920s-1950s with a focus on World War 2. I had no idea about Singapore's history especially the Japanese invasion and how everything changed from being run by the British. I liked how the places mentioned are places I go to and even the same grocery stores are around! It's about 3 different families and how their lives interconnect during those years. I really haven't made a lot of Singaporean friends as we tend to always stick to the expat community when living abroad. So I really know little about their culture. However, I'm learning a lot about New Zealand's culture. 4 of our close friends are from New Zealand so every time we hang out there are always new words and phrases that we learn from each other.
Here are some I learned last night:
jandels= flip flops
chilly bin= a cooler
Well, those are the only ones I remember. I learned so many other words, sometimes it's like learning another language. Of course we talked about the difference between marmite and veggiemite. It's funny when stereotypes are so true. The best question I've been asked is "Is living in the states just like the movies?" No, of course not. Wait, yes it is. Yes, we have a prom queen, king. Yes, we have prom and everyone dresses up and takes limos. Yes, there's a big graduation party for high school. Yes, in college you have keg parties. Yes, there are fraternities and sororities. Everything is just exaggerated, but yeah it's like the movies. The other thing I'm learning about is Rugby and Aussie Rules Football. Who knew there 2 Rugby leagues and different rules for each? One of our new friends is a former pro Rugby player who is famous enough to have a wikipedia article about him. So when we watch the games with him, he knows some of the players who are still playing. It's actually a pretty entertaining game to watch. After watching a Rugby match, it's painful to sit through a NFL game b/c it's soooo slow compared to Rugby. Can't wait to visit New Zealand.

lil weekend in indo.

On our first long weekend, we went to a little island that's a 45 minute ferry ride from Singapore. It's in Indonesia so you have to get a visa for Indonesia that takes up an entire page in your passport which is pretty annoying. It's such a pain when your passport is filled and you have to get more pages added. The whole weekend was super expensive with all these added taxes and fees. We've found in Singapore that everything has this ++ at the end of the price which means it has 2 types of taxes added. So something that might cost $40 would end up being $55 or sometimes more. You just never know how much tax will be. Alcohol is heavily taxed so a bottle of booze is 1/2 the price at duty free, but you can only get 1 bottle each time. Wine and beer in the stores is also a little expensive. It was a really nice weekend, but just overpriced. Being so close to Singapore, I guess they can charge whatever they want. It was nice though that we didn't even have to exchange money- everything is in Singaporean dollars. I'm really glad we don't have to worry about money or it might have broken the bank. I'm really glad our friends were there with us or it might have been a little boring.
It rained the first day we got there for awhile. Since we haven't really seen a lot of rain for the last 2 years living in a desert, we just sat and watched it.

The beach. It's okay. I feel like I'm such a beach snob now that we're a hour flight from Thailand. Thailand beaches are the most amazing in the world. Next time we'll just fly to Thailand.

These are the little huts that we stayed in. They're not really huts, but just hotel rooms that are set up like this so it's nice and private.

Teacher's Day

There's nothing quite like Teacher gifts. My favorite are always the cards.

HA! What??


The girl who gave me this said it was for my business cards. Hmmm...yes, thank you.

Ultimately, the best gift for Teacher's Day would be a day off....