New Year's Eve - Chinese of course

Just a quick comment really. Had been out to Fairprice (our local supermarket), this morning and found a general excitement in the air. Of course it is Chinese New Year's Eve, I know, but I haven't been here to experience it before.
There seems to be a general levity in the air that I've not experienced since I've been here. People are happy, excited, smiling and everybody is chatting. Even the often maudlin shop staff are smiling!
So I decided to hop on my bike and take a little turn around some of the local neighbourhoods. First stop was Ghim Moh, our usual stop off for fresh meat, veg and fish.

Normally open all day, the market was practically closed by 11am when I turned up. It would seem that most people had taken to the hawker centre already and beers were already flowing. Again, the atmosphere was jovial and good natured. Many of the hawker stands were closed and the ones that were open had large queues forming for their wares even in the late morning. Most popular, noticeably, was the Chinese duck stand. Just on the fringes of the hawker was a temple which I've not seen before so obviously up especially for New Year.
People were coming and going leaving prayers and incense sticks. Good wishes and luck for an auspicious New Lunar Year I'm sure. Then on to Holland Rd HDB where the fires were burning for traditional offerings. I could smell the burning incense and fires way before I arrived.

Smoke and ash pouring from the braziers. Kids were out of school by now finishing early for the festivities. Massive excitement and lots of noise. Much more than usual, even from school kids. It will be interesting to see how the evening's events unfold. But at the moment it feels like it's brewing up for something special!

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Bali - Part 3 - School and mountains

Tuesday and back to Bukti today to visit the school in Putu's home village. The schools in Bali are private and parents must pay for their kids to get educated. Having spoken to the Villa gardener it's not that cheap but  most parents (as parents do), will find the money somehow as they realise how important it is. As we have littl'uns we went to the primary part of the school where the kids are aged between four and six years old. As soon as you arrive (for those of us with families) you get a very familiar feel to the place. Toys in the playground, bright colours and cartoons adorning the walls and cheeky kids everywhere. Well, not everywhere. The school was slightly emptier than usual owing to the fact that the village was celebrating Black Moon Day where the majority of the village stops to make flower offerings and gather in the temples to pay devotions to nature's energies. Those children that were in school were dressed in their traditional robes topped off with the 'peci' or hat. Also in evidence was the traditional Batik design (which is actually named after the technique used to make it), so famous in Indonesia.

I really like Batik, but I don't think it's something I could get away with wearing. It just doesn't suit me. I've seen many westerners that have tried it and not many pull it off!
A little reserved at first, it didn't take the kids long to come out of themselves. The girls gathering round D (how does he always do that?), while he ignored them coz he had scissors.
You'll notice that in my pictures on Flickr they are mainly of the boys being cheeky. I thought the girls were being reserved through some sort of cultural reason but the teacher told me that their 'gang' wasn't together today whereas the boys 'gang' was which gave them the confidence to show off. Same the world over, eh? The children sang some songs. A lot of which were exactly the same as songs they sing in the UK and Singapore (only with Indonesian words of course!). D even recognised some of them and thought about joining in. But not quite. He decided afterwards that he'd like to go to school, on his own. Which was nice, because he will be soon (nursery is on the agenda and then proper school in September)!
Back in the car and off to see a waterfall in the mountains. Was pleasantly surprised by the great quality of the roads a we ventured up the narrow tacks into the hills. One village was particularly large. It turned out that these were the well off guys in the area as the nature of the weather allowed them to harvest different types of fruit the whole year round. Just enough rain and just enough sun to grow most fruit, vegetables, spices and cocoa throughout the year. Parking up at a friend of Putu's house, we embark on the long, hot and humid walk to the 'falls. Putu immediately takes control of the buggy with Z in it and ploughs on up the hills with the aroma of the many clove trees hanging in the dense, humid air. The steep track through beautiful padi fields lead us up to the 'spice-man'.

This guy is about 1000m up the side of the mountain selling, amongst other things, refreshments for the weary tourist. And a very good trade he does too. As well as the refreshments he sells spices, lots of spices. And coffee beans. Notably the mongoose coffee bean. I won't go into detail but sufficed to say, Mongoose love to eat the coffee beans. They'll only eat the really good ones and they don't get digested so off course they come out the other end. This apparently starts of the fermentation process and gives it a 'particular' flavour. I'm sure it does, but not quite my cup of, er, tea. But it does sell very well and for quite a lot of money (surprisingly there aren't too many people practising mongoose poo coffee making), so he can't be wrong. What I wanted to know was who had discovered this process in the first place? He seemed unable to answer that question. D was quite fascinated by the mongoose though. Of course, we bought some spices, quite a lot of them. I think I probably paid over the odds, but hey, I'm gonna pay a whole lot more in Singapore and they aren't going to be freshly harvested from a Balinese mountainside! And then on to the waterfall itself. Spectacular certainly, and very tall. But on account of us not being able to get too close because of the kids and heat we didn't really see too much of it. As they say, sometimes it's the journey not the arrival and to be honest, really the revelation was the 'Poo Coffee'. I like finding things like that.

On the way back down I start to become aware of the amount of people who do actually live and work up here. The smell of fermenting cocoa beans and spices out in the sun greets us at almost every homestead we pass. The aroma is terrific and a world away from the busy land of Singapore. D is doing very well with walking up and down these tracks until half-way back he trips and sprawls over the track, bangs his knees and ends up on dad's shoulders. Can't say I blame him. It is very warm by now and the water is being drunk by the bottle. I have to say though that it would have been much more of a struggle without having been acclimatised first in Singapore. We met some Dutch tourists on the way looking very red and hot and needing a long sit down at the Spice Hut. Think they were slightly amazed at the way Z and D were going at it. Even with D on my shoulders we couldn't catch Putu who by now was off like a startled rabbit with Z in buggy. Great fun, with the most beautiful scenery and great weather. Not to mention seeing the biggest spider since our arrival. A good six inches across. What's not to like?

See more photos of our Bali trip on Flickr.

Cocoa beans fermenting in the sun

Hillside homstead

Chinese New Year, Weddings and Work

Yes, work. It used to be a four-letter word to me but now my time is up and I have been recruited in to the massed ranks of city workers in Singapore. It all happened very quickly (although I am still awaiting the contract, but I'm sure that will be sorted soon). One day I'm browsing LinkedIn, next thing I'm being offered a job (a week ago today in fact) that, in principal at least, is exceeding all my expectations. I say in principal because I don't officially start until Monday week. But I have already attended a (phone conference) tender meeting and held my first interview for staff. So you could say things are proceeding at speed. I'll blog more about it when I start but sufficed to say I'm excited, a little apprehensive, excited and quite excited!

The reason I'm starting next Monday (amongst other things) is that Thursday sees the celebration of Chinese (Lunar) New Year. Quite the biggest event on a calendar that is already pretty crowded with big events. Chinese New Year (CNY), this year is being celebrated on 3 and 4 February and will go on until about 15 February (the like to make it big!). I must admit I'm not sure what to expect as unlike with Western celebrations, CNY is also about reflection and spending time with friends and relatives. Indeed, I have already seen the grandparents and possibly even great-grandparents being shipped into our condo to come and spend time with their kids and grand-kids. I am also aware that the majority of shops (most being Chinese owned) will close over the period. With this in mind, T and I set off to Cold Storage to get the essentials in before this happens. It's amazing how many essentials one needs when confronted by possible closure of the shops for two whole days! Not to mention the fact that Mary will be off for three out of four days this week (what are we going to do without her?!). So we bought everything we need I(and mostly don't need), and trotted home.  Tomorrow night we'll see in CNY with some brand spanking new friends from Perth (Australia, not Scotland), who have been kind enough to invite us over for dinner (Chinese of course), and a few drinks. I'm not expecting too much noise, firecrackers etc, but I'm sure their will be some at some point. Just need to find out when and where. And definitely have to find some Dragon Dancing. One thing we are going to do, hopefully, is get the kids down to Marina Bay to see the River Hongbao and watch the firework display to see in The Year of the Rabbit.

 If the Chinese can't put on a good display then who can, huh? The kids will be getting their hong bao (little red envelopes with token money inside for good luck and prosperity), but don't tell them, it's a surprise. Even 'Uncle' who they've befriended will be getting a card. It's a big ol' celebration here.
Saturday sees us off to a wedding in Little India. We were kindly invited by web-presence guru Prakash who owns Yolk (he's gotta get a plug after the invite). The ceremony is to be held at the Sri Srinivasa Perumal Temple in Singapore and should be great fun. Interestingly, it was the starting point of the Thaipusam festival from two weeks ago. The temple is spectacular from the outside but I didn't go in which I was disappointed about on the day. This should more than make up for it. It will be (unsurprisingly), my first Hindu wedding and frankly I'm pretty excited. Definitely expect some big photos from that one!

Anyway, until next time,

Gong Xi Fa Cai - Happy New Year! - 新年快樂

Floods returning to Singapore

I'm pretty sure Australians, Brazilians, Sri Lankans, Pakistanis etc would be pretty dismissive of this! If you follow the Twitter feeds some people think it amounts to a flood, other to 'just a big puddle'. Make your minds up! It's wet, but it ain't that wet!

Floods returning to Singapore

Bali - Part 2 New Years Day

OK rain, you can stop now. It was impressive but now I'm done. The storm carried on all night and raged into the next day. At first light (about 530 on the north coast), I could see that the sea had turned brown and muddy from the earth being pushed off the mountains by the heavy rain. Later that day Made said that it was unusually heavy rain, even for the rainy season and some of her friends up the coast had been flooded out. We were worrying about a bit of water getting in to the living room! Finally a break in the weather and we hit the pool with the kids. Afterwards D remembers the kite he was given for Christmas and desperately wants to fly it on the beach. Incredibly with all the rain theer is barely any wind and our attempts are fairly futile although the site of D running up and down the beach dragging a kite behind him was quite cute. And boy, he didn't give up either. He eventually got it into the air for a few seconds and was as pleased as punch with himself! Then the intrepid boys (me and D) 'discovered' a coconut on the shore. Fascinated, D was desperate to take it back to the villa. I was less enthused but caved in eventually. Out came the trusty old Leatherman and I hacked away at the husk until a little voice next to me said "daddy, what's that smell". The smell was of putrid old coconut sullied by seawater and now, frankly, making me want to vomit! As I hoiked it seawards the little voice turned into tears, "my coconut!". Ah, bless him.
Then the rain came back and the rest of the day was spent inside mainly watching Polar Express. Thank goodness for the massive amount of not entirely legal DVDs that were in the house. We sat through a fair few that day.Can't get the kids down to sleep on account of them having too many hours sleep during the day (entirely our own making then). Finally when peace was restored we had that Beef Rendang we'd been dreaming about since last night. Superb!
Happily it didn't rain all night so we were up at 630 (a veritable lie in) with a spring in our step. So it started raining again just to put us in our place! It finally stopped long enough for D to have another go at kite flying, this time with more success even though there was still no wind. The technique must be improving. Rain back again. The kids get showered outside in the rain (seems a bit pointless but they enjoy it). More daytime sleep and mum and dad have fresh made spring rolls and Rose wine for lunch. Loverly!

Next day (Monday), there is no rain! In fact there is blue sky, sun even. We are in the tropics after all! As arranged the previous day, Putu picks us up and takes us to Bukti, his home village, where he has lived since he was born. Literally a five minute drive and the kids, as well as us, are very happy to be out of the house. It's warm by now and we walk up towards Putu's family's homestead, a fruit farm.

They supply the village (of a few hundred people) and also take some to market. A very simple and effective way to live. His family are lovely and dad is very smiley. I think they are happy that there son is making a success of himself (even though he won't be taking on the farm later in life). D at this point is bored and only perks up when it's suggested we feed the cows. Can't drag him away. Z wants to have a go too but is little apprehensive (understandably)! They very kindly give us papaya and pineapple to take home with us. Made later makes scrumptious sweet and sour using some of the pineapple. The rest is scoffed whilst hanging out at the pool. A much more pleasant experience now that the rain has ceased!
The evening brings an explosion of lace-wings that go nuts for the lighting. The fly around the lights in an insect cloud for about half an hour and then just as quickly as they appeared, they disappear. We, of course are inside watching this natural phenomenon, drinking some of the various spirits that have travelled with us from duty free. Rum and pineapple, mmmmmmmm.