Sore Feet.....

Hey everyone!

Its been a pretty good week. Thursday afternoon I went looking for scrapbooking shops. Found a couple, but they haven't got any of the supplies that I use. I may have to get them online. And I saw that "Made with Love" didn't have a coffee shop! Bad info from the internet! I had a good look around Plaza Singapura, found another bookshop, then headed back to look at the clothing shop. I couldn't find the shop! I walked up to Andrew's work and decided to wait for him and the iPad. I'd been there for about 5-10min when I got a message from Andrew saying he went to Sim Lim with the guys from work! Argh! So I walked back down to where I thought the shop was, still couldn't find it! I rang up Andrew and got him to check the address. Got the address, found the shop, went into the shop, only to be told that all the clothes in my size won't be ready til next week! Argh again!

Friday was a bit slower, decided that I'd relax in the morning and walk around in the afternoon. Went househunting with our agent, didn't really like any of them (too much money and a bit gaudy). Met up with Andrew at Clarke Quay and then we went and found some dinner.

Saturday morning Andrew went back down to the Ministry of Manpower to pick up his pass. I got a phonecall from him asking me to bring down his paperwork that he'd left behind. I walked it down to him, then we hopped on the train to Little India. Had a good look around, a lot of nice handicraft centres and tailors. Andrew wants to go back and get a suit made. We continued on to Sim Lim and I bought a mouse for my MacBook. Sim Lim is a shopping centre of about 7 levels with nothing but phones, computers and camera's, plus all the affiliated equipment required. Kept walking onwards and found ourselves in Bugis, and went to the Bugis Street Market. Its apparently the biggest street market in this part of Asia, and it probably had half of the population crammed into it! Its like a tight compacted market, similar to Paddy's in Sydney or Queen Victoria in Melbourne, but really long and very hot from all the people packed in. Had a look at the local plaza, bought a comic book....I mean "graphic novel".....then came back to the hotel and had a nap. Went and had a swim, then had dinner at the hawker centre.

Sunday morning we slept in, due to our sore feet from the day before. We went out for a walk at about lunch time, had lunch, then hopped on a train and got off at a random station, just to see what was there. The station we got off at was Paya Lebar, and there was an oldish mall that we explored, and a little street market. We hopped back on the train and got off again, this time at Lavender. Nothing really there but office blocks. Then we went to City Hall station and had a look at Raffles City SC. Andrew got 1kg bag of Peanut Butter M&Ms for work. Then we headed back home and I made char siu pork rice and sweet chilli chicken stirfry.

Andrew and Bunny at Paya Lebar

Andrew with ?Emperor? at Marina Square

Today I went to Funan Digitalife Mall and had a bit of a look. Its a bit like Sim Lim, but a bit nicer, a bit more expensive and not as many people. Then I went and had lunch with Andrew. Came back to the hotel and did the laundry. We just came back from dinner, and we had Indian from a restaurant under the  hotel, followed by an ice-cream in bread on Clarke Quay.

Talk to you soon,
Mandi

M.o.M.

Hey everyone!

We've had a good couple of days this week. On Tuesday, I walked with Andrew to the Ministry of Manpower at Collyer Quay so he could organise his employment pass. The place has a great name right? Andrew and I were making a lot of Jamie Durie jokes lol. They're kinda like Centrelink, only faster! After that, I walked Andrew to work then started looking around at the shops. I found another Cold Storage supermarket nearby. After that I came back to the hotel to escape the midday heat, which hits at about 1pm. Andrew had drinks after work with his colleagues, and I got some dumplings and butterfly buns from the hawker market for dinner.
Wednesday was a slower day. I walked with Andrew to work, then came back to the hotel and started tinkering on the computer. I'm going househunting with our agent tomorrow, so I talked to the agent and organised it. I also joined an expat forum to meet other expat girls to hang out with. I cooked char siu and sweet chilli chicken wings with brown jasmine rice and marinated onion for dinner. Lately, whenever I've been cooking, I only use 3 sauces: soy, char siu and sweet chilli, but I use them in different concentrations for different flavours. And there's one thing I can't find in the local supermarkets: minced garlic in the jar. I used to use it all the time in Australia, and I haven't been able to find it! I might request it in our first care package lol.
This afternoon I'm going to a plus size clothing shop near Collyer Quay called "Big and Beautiful". Its one of the most popular shops for larger ladies, and its very reasonably priced. Most pieces are under $40, over that if you want evening wear. It reopens tonight, so hopefully I'll find some nice pieces. I also want to go to a scrapbooking shop in Orchard Rd called "Made with Love". After having a look on the net, they seem to be the most well stocked, and they have classes, groups and a coffee shop!

I'll write back later,
Mandi

Down Time

Hey everyone!

We've had a slow couple of days this week. On Sunday, we decided to relax at the hotel for most of the day. We went down to the hawker market and got some lunch, then we went and bought me a cheap mobile phone. Came back to the hotel and watched some TV, then Andrew went to the hotel's gym and worked out for a bit. I made pork bolognese for dinner, and we ate that whilst watching "Black Butler". Afterwards, I went for a swim. Today was even slower. Andrew and I had breakfast, then he went to work and I went up to the room. I pretty much just did emailing and keeping cool today. The hotel maid came in and cleaned whilst I had my lunch. I emailed Andrew in the afternoon telling him that I'd meet him outside his work so we could have dinner out, but he didn't get it and I actually bumped into him on a side street near work, which was lucky. Andrew felt like seafood (gasp! lol), so we started to stroll down towards Clarke Quay. We bumped into some of Andrew's workmates and we stopped and had a few drinks. Then we went down to Jumbo Seafood for dinner. I ordered chilli crab and Andrew ordered yellow curry lobster. It was quite nice, but very messy. Then we had an ice-cream in bread on the way back to the hotel. I'm hoping to go back to Orchard Rd this week and to do some more house hunting, so I may have something more interesting to write about.

Cheers,
Mandi

House Hunting

Hola!

Andrew and I had a good day house hunting yesterday. We started off the day with breakfast at McD's and had a chicken sausage and egg muffin with a cold Milo. It wasn't bad, just a bit weird having chicken instead of beef. Then we went back to the hotel and waited for the real estate agent. He then took us around to a few apartment complexes. We found a place we like, and we're going to make further enquiries on it. After househunting, we went to Orchard Rd and had a look at the shops. We went to 2 different malls. Its just shops, shops, shops! We'll have to go back another day to see a bit more. We came back to the hotel and napped for a bit, then headed out to Chinatown for dinner. Chinese New Year festivities have started! We missed the fireworks and the lion dances because we were eating dinner, but we strolled through the night market and had a good time. And we saw a shop specially for my brother-in-law Alex, an entire shop devoted to Tintin!

Andrew's dinner: noodle soup, a coconut and steamed dumplings

Me enjoying my sweet and sour fish with rice

Andrew drinking his coconut

Robotic singing bunnies in Chinatown! 

The Tintin shop!

Andrew bought some magnetic stress balls at the market, then we went back to the hotel and had a late night swim in the pool. It was nice, not cold and we had the entire pool to ourselves. When we got out, it was midnight! But we slept really well after the swim.

Seeya,

Mandi

Home Day

Hello everyone!

Today was a relatively dull day. I went to the local supermarket to get a couple of things. It had a few differences to an Aussie supermarket, like the live seafood department and the self-serve meat section, but it was reasonably priced and popular. After shopping, I went back to the hotel and had a nap to get rid of my headache, which i now know to be a bit of dehydration. I've been drinking so much I've been feeling sloshy lol, but its obviously not enough. Talked to Mum and Dad for a little bit on Skype, then went to Chinatown and had chicken rice for lunch. After lunch I popped into another small supermarket and grabbed some veggies, and I saw these gigantic Pocky sticks called Chocky. Take a look:

Look at the size of it!

I can't believe its not Pocky!

Andrew tasting Chocky

Came back to the hotel, told the concierge my stove wasn't working, got said stove fixed, then started making dinner. I made a deconstructed hash brown with chilli char-siu chicken. Tomorrow night its pork pasta! We had a Chocky each for dessert, then sat back to watch the anime channel. We saw a great Victorian Era style anime called "Black Butler", which Andrew and I have decided to keep watching every Friday night.

I'm just about to hit the hay, goodnight everyone!

Mandi

Good Evening!

Howdy!

I hope everyone had a great afternoon. Mine was a bit slow. I stayed in the hotel and did some washing in the hotel laundromat. My internet decided to die, and I didn't get it fixed until about 3pm. Whilst i was waiting for the concierge to come up and fix the net, I did washing, got some pineapple rice from one of the shops underneath, wrote my grocery list, and started to read one of my new books. When the net came back on, I started househunting on the net and chatted to Naomi and Jenna on Facebook (Thanks Nomes for helping me hunt!). I went out and met up with Andrew outside his work, then we went and had drinks with his workmates at the BJ Bar along the Quay. After that, we walked along the Quay and saw some Chinese Lion Dancers competing in the 4th International Lion Dance Competition.

Lion Dance Masks

You can't see it, but they're dancing on pole platforms!

It was pretty exciting, and quite loud! Then we found a restaurant that specialised in satay sticks and had it for dinner. Afterwards we had an ice-cream sandwich with rainbow bread and wafers, which was really yummy. You get about 1/2lt of ice-cream for less than $2! Bargain!

Have a great night,

Mandi

Good Morning!

Good morning everyone! Today is another hot day here in Singapore! This morning I walked Andrew to work, since he got lost on the way home last night. The streets can be a bit tricky, with some streets changing names at every intersection. Andrew was a bit early to work, so we decided to get a cup of coffee from one of the arcade shops. We found a coffee shop called "Dimbulah: Fine Australian Coffee". It was quite nice and looked like one of the shops you'd see in Kew or Melbourne. My hot choc was nice, and Andrew said his latte was pretty good.

I didn't realise Dimboola was famous for coffee!

Andrew went to work, and I decided to browse around the shops for a bit. I went to Chinatown Point and got a funky denim handbag for SP$29. My trusty purple bag has decided to start breaking, good timing on its part.

I'll write again a bit later, think I may have a swim or a snooze. Ciao!

Front of One Raffles Place, a shopping centre near Andrew's work. At night, the rabbit's eyes glow red!

We're here!

Hey everyone! Andrew and I are in Singapore! Today is day 2, and we've had a good past 2 days. Yesterday we did a bit of exploring. We decided to walk to Andrew's new work to see his new boss and workmates. Its only about a 10min walk, but we got lost in Chinatown! lol. But we're glad we did, Chinatown looks awesome. A lot of the shops are decked out in cherry blossoms and bunnies for the Chinese New Year. And the smell......aaah! We were drooling as soon as we walked past the first shop. Can't wait to go back and explore further. We saw the beautiful Hindu Sri Mariamman Temple, also in Chinatown.

Sri Mariamman Temple

We eventually found our way to the Singapore Land Tower and met his workmates. They were all very nice and seem like a decent bunch of blokes. After that, we went to a local food court to have lunch. That was an experience. Think of the busiest shopping centre food court you've ever been to, then multiply it by 4. There were people everywhere! And so many cuisines! I'm probably going to be talking about food a lot in my blog, just because its everywhere. Andrew found us a table, which was almost impossible to find. I got us both Japanese BBQ sets and Diet Cokes, and we only spent about SP$14, roughly AU$11. BTW, soft drink is really cheap here. A can of coke at a hawker market costs about SP$1.20, and a 1.5lt at a supermarket costs about SP$2-2.50, so I'm in heaven! lol. Here is a photo Andrew took of lunch:

All this for only $5.50!

After lunch we strolled back to our hotel. Even though it was only about 28deg, the humidity had us sweating hard. Andrew and I had a look at the pool and courtyard, and just chilled out for the rest of the afternoon.

Pool and courtyard at hotel

We met up with Andrew's new boss Adrian, and he took us to the Lau Pa Sat Festival Market to have dinner. Its one of the oldest hawker markets, about 120 years old, and its essentially a giant rotunda with corridors running from the centre out, looking like big spokes. We had some really nice Indian food, and again, it was really cheap. After dinner, Adrian took us down to the quay. If you like seafood, you'll drool at some of the restaurants on the waterfront. I saw prawns at about 20cm long and about an inch thick! Its all cooked fresh, and it looks like dining at an aquarium, lol! Needless to say, I will be dragging my husband back along there soon.

View of the Singapore Flyer, the Lotus Flower and the new Casino

Night sky view of the city

Today was pretty good as well. Andrew went off to work, and I stayed at the hotel doing the housewifely chore of setting up house and unpacking suitcases. I walked across the road to the Peoples Park Centre and got some  very nice gyoza. Went back to the hotel and tried to keep cool, today was about 32deg. Went out this afternoon and found a bookshop opposite Andrew's work (didn't take me long!), which is really handy. Between the hotel and the shops, I got caught in a huge downpour and had to stand under a building's awning for about 20min. That'll teach me for going out without an umbrella lol. Tried to get sim cards for our phones, but got really confused and left it for Andrew to figure out. I went back to the hotel and waited for my husband to come home. I took him to Peoples Park for dinner, and we had some awesome chicken rice and chicken noodles. After dinner we went for a stroll, and found the local McD's and KFC! And Macca's delivers! Weird......lol. Checked out the mall, saw a lot of shoe shops, and fresh fish foot massage booth. Fresh fish? Don't worry, its not a tuna being rubbed against your tootsies. The fish actually nibble the dead skin cells off your feet, leaving them rejuvenated. Andrew got really excited, and I think he wants to go back another day. We came back to the hotel, and I began writing this blog. Hope you enjoyed hearing about our first days here! I'll try and write as often as I can.

Lotsa Luv,

Mandi