The Singapore Zoological Gardens, Rec Day, etc.

How the National University of Singapore (NUS) show off their pride right before the school year:





Every hall and faculty spend at least four months and pull several all-nighters in preparation for this annual event that occurs on the weekend before the school year starts. Essentially, your group or organization design an elaborate float with moving parts constructed entirely of recylable trash, whether it be aluminum cans, cardboard, colored paper or whatnot. The float is usually accompanied by a troupe of choreographed dancers wearing very bright, outlandish costumes.

While our hall did end up winning the prize for 'Most Cost Efficient' (or some other crap like that), some other hall won the more prestiguous Best Float award. I felt like I was in the Southeast Asian lovechild of the Rose Parade Float and a J-rock concert.

While we were waiting in a hot and sweaty crowd to hear the results, my EAP friend David asked my hall people jokingly, "So what do you think of Yumi?" A local named Jonas replied, "She is quite bubbly."

I believe that is the first time anyone has ever used that adjective on me.

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One interesting about Singapore is the different sounds of English that you hear on a daily basis. There is the rapid staccato-fire of Singlish spoken by the locals, which is essentially English spoken in a very heavy Chinese accent, with stresses on the last syllable and spiced up with 'lo', 'la' and 'meh' at the end of phrases and questions for emphasis. (Overheard while waiting in a line to board a tram: "Quick-ly, la!") Then there is the English spoken by the Chinese, Malaysian, Vietnamese and other Asian students whose English-language education has given them a more subdued British lilt to their pronunciations. And then of course, every now and then there is the brash American accent overheard on subways and in many popular tourist locations.

I realized today that I have subconsciously began mimicking the enunciations of the people around me. When I am around my hall people, I stress the last syllables of my words, I stretch out words in weird ways and my Southern Californian origins are no longer so horrendously apparent in everyday speech. I suppose this is all a part of living in another country.

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The Singapore Zoological Gardens







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Whenever I have spare pockets of time, such as when I am waiting in line to take the campus shuttle, I read The Best American Short Stories 2005. Reading this is like going to a good dim sum restaurant: little tidbits of different word snacks that keep your literary appetite very satisfied and entertained. I do like my short stories delicious.

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When I was waiting at the Southeast Asian department for a woman in the office to finish with my paperwork, another woman at the front desk noticed that I was waiting and offered me a cup of tea with sugar and cream. I must say, the academic bureaucracy at NUS are quite nice.

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Every other Saturday, I am going to try to go to the Communicable Disease Center (CDC) and help volunteers with the AIDS patients as a way to get off-campus and know the rest of the country on a more personal level. I went today for the first time and met three very cool locals, two of them who are or have studied at American universities and one of them who is a fourth-year student at NUS.

The AIDs patients at CDC usually get cramps and aches in their weakened legs, so it helps for them to get massages for their limbs. I sat with an older male patient with a sunken left eye and we talked about movies, music and politics while I massaged his thighs and feet with lemon-scented oils. I told him about the sights I've seen in Singapore while he disclosed his love for Harry Potter movies and house music, and how before his legs got weakened he would go to disco clubs and dance all night long.

"You don't look Japanese," he told me. "You look like a China doll."