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.

Thaipusam in Singapore - video

Thaipusam in Singapore! It's pretty extreme.....
See more of my videos of Singapore now on You Tube!

Bali - Part 1 of many!

After a very long night (and not in a good way), in an over priced hotel in Sanur we were picked up in the morning outside the hotel by a chap called Putu. Putu was to be our Villa manager, organiser, driver and tour guide for our stay in Bali. It was New Years Eve and after a sleepless night of crying kids and firecrackers (the latter causing the former), we were heading north, away from the south of the island which had been our brief, tourist haven home for the night. As we headed out of the suburbs and towards the country Bali started to come alive. Carved Hindu Gods started appearing on every street corner. Then soon enough along every road until there seemed to be little room for anything to fit, including the houses behind them. Carved from dense grey stone these physical incarnations of the Hindu Gods are one of the mainstays of the community's income and are big business with a thriving import/export business going on locally. Onwards into the mountains with our assured driver. A constant diatribe of tidbits coming from him as he amiably answers our questions (which I'm sure he has heard a thousand times before). Putu is a local, local to the villa that we'll be staying in that is, not just to the island. I am suddenly even happier with this arrangement as we start to climb into the mountains that we see shrouded in mist ahead. The potholes become more pronounced (by which I mean bigger and deeper), and more frequent. Now, I expect that we might find a kamikaze approach by the driver to be the norm, but on the contrary, Putu's speed was rarely above 40kph and he did his utmost to avoid these holes in the road. Soon we settled into happy a rhythm, trundling along the roads at a very sedate pace. Even the kids seemed to enjoy the ride. Just as well because, by the time we reached the summit of the mountain (about 3000m), the visibility was down to about five metres in places and the temperature had dropped to about 10C (from around 30C). People up here were obviously used to it wandering around in jumpers and hats. The first time I had seen that since moving to Singapore. From the top we could see the base of the nearest volcano to our villa. However, due to the inclement weather that was all we could see (much to my disappointment). And so we headed down the other side towards the north coast and our home for the next nine days. Well, the trip down was.... interesting..... no wait..... treacherous, yes that's what I meant! We at this point were in full praise of Putu's local knowledge, ability and lack of need for speed. It was steep, narrow and as you can imagine in a tropical country the roads were somewhat wet, well, river like really. This prompted a lot of shouts of "hold tight" from the kids who thought this was a great wheeze. T slightly less I suspected as she obeyed the kids' commands herself! As the rain began to ease a bit we started to come across the local people starting to celebrate New Year (it was about 4:30 at this point), massive speakers set up with a heavy baseline pumping through them and alcoholic beverages well underway. Putu pointed out that the rain had in fact probably worked in our favour as most of these guys would probably have been out driving on the mountain if the weather had been good. I watched one of the party goers trying to just stagger to his neighbours house and wondered if maybe we'd had a lucky escape. The Gods had been smiling on us after all.

Finally, after three and a half hours of travel, we arrived at the fabled villa. We are greeted by our staff members for the week (yes, I said staff members). Our cook (and as we were to find, cleaner, washer and part-time child-minder), Made pronounced Maday. Our gardener/pool cleaner Wayan and our very nice security guard Kadek. In Hindi tradition we are presented with garlands of flowers round our necks. The kids dion't want to know. They are far too interested in getting out of the car and running hell-for-leather in to their new house. And what a place! Absolutely enormous and really way too big for us but what can one do? D immediately finds a hosepipe in the garden and that's him done for the  next hour, day, week given half a chance. The rest of the family meanwhile took a turn around the grounds and then inspected the chambers. Yes, I was starting to feel like the landed gentry. Then the kids reminded me that we weren't by promptly demanding this that and the other as soon enough it was like we'd been there for ages. After grand plans for eating Beef Rendang to celebrate New Year, we were so late that it turned into Chicken and rice instead. However, due to Made's cooking this was of course delicious. About half an hour before we were going to put the kids to bed the rain started. And the thunder. And the lightning. And the Lightning! Wow, big, BIG sky filling lightning. The villa was practically on the beach and the lightning was lighting up what looked like the entire ocean between us and the next landfall, Borneo. The waves are crashing agaisnt the breakwater by this point and it is loud. Much louder than anything we'd experienced in Singapore. I love it! Unsurprisingly, the kids are a little scared but soon come round to the fact that even the minor blackouts (in the villa, not from New Year imbibing), we are experiencing are not that bad and they go to bed with no problems. Bless them. The bedroom D is staying in (along with me, the idea of him stumbling into the pool in the middle of the night is quite scary),  is partially open to the elements and yet for all the racket of weather outside he doesn't bat an eyelid. Remarkable. T and I celebrate New Year with a vodka and coke. T turns in for the night and I watch the storm outside in awe.
I think we're going to be happy here, I thought to myself, Bintang in hand.

Thaipusam in Singapore - Body and Soul

Yesterday was probably about the most dramatic day, visually and spiritually speaking, I have experienced. Not just here but almost anywhere I have been. Those who know me will know I'm not really given over to the use of superlatives and gushing about about experiences I've had. But this was both awesome (I rarely, if ever, use that word outside of sarcasm) and spectacular in the extreme.

Thaipusam is the Hindu Festival celebrated on the day of full moon during Thai, the Tamil month of January/February. It is celebrated in the main by Tamils and brings the whole community together. I could go on to tell you exactly what they are celebrating and why and how etc. But I am wholly unqualified and would just be copy and pasting from various websites which I believe is known as plagiarism (so I shan't be doing that). There are numerous links to find the information out there so you can find out yourselves what leads to this magnificent celebration of body and soul.
This is the official website of the two temples used to host this extraordinary event. I would say if you want a reliable source of information (especially surrounding the Singaporean festival) then this would be it. There was even an advert for it inside the Temple itself.
What I offer here is just reflection on what I saw, heard and smelt during the day. I should explain to the uninitiated (as I pretty much was), the day involves the men and women of the faith carrying 'Kavadi' over what turned out to be a pretty long walk between two temples. It is a sign of their devotion and what a sign it is. Having walked the course from start to finish it is a wonder anyone makes it, it is very long (and very hot, yesterday was sunny and easily in the 30s). But they all do. I didn't see one casualty the whole time. This is obviously down to their faith. But also a lot of help comes from the massive entourage that some of these guys have. Family and friends chanting, talking, singing and in some cases arguing with and shouting their charges to the finish. There are various forms of Kavadi and basically I think it is a case of 'more pain, more gain' (from God).
They can range from this.

To something like this.

Pulling one of these!

These guys are seriously devoted and the previous example was by no means the exception and most likely the rule. Probably the most well know image of the Thaipusam and certainly the one I had seen on various NatGeo programs was along the lines of this.

Again, by no means the exception. A truly amazing sight. Colourful, noisy, incense burning and the smell of food cooking on the side of the road through Little India and down the Serangoon Road. The ceremony was entirely public and these guys wanted everyone to see what they were doing. Possibly a little intimidating at first due to the nature of what they are doing to their bodies this turned out to be one of the friendliest festivals I've been to. I think as a Westerner with no clue about their faith my natural instinct is that anyone do this to themselves has to be working on testosterone and therefore they and there entourage should not be approached. Nothing could have been further from the truth. A very warm, friendly, family day from babies in buggies to elderly family members being wheeled down the road in their wheelchairs. The aroma of food, of course, hung in the air. Free food and water were handed out along the route to both participants and just the lazy commoners (like myself). I even felt guilty about accepting it. Very persuasive these Indians though, so it didn't last long (hey, it's food, what am I going to do??). And very nice (and needed) it was too.

The Kadavi apart from being huge, were also extremely ornate. I would imagine that either they are made by individuals (which would require some serious craftsmanship) or (more likely), someone is doing a raging business in ornaments and metal work for these creations.

Towards the end of the route you get to dividing area where in one direction you can go to the Temple and in the other you can go to a general area with (free) food and drink again being forced upon the unfortunate souls lucky enough to wander in that direction. We decided that obviously although it had been very friendly and all, that the kindly partcipants weere hardly likely to welcome us into their inner sanctum and refuge from the madness. Wrong! We proceeded to the temple following these huge Kadavis down the road along with all the dancing and singing.

The route soon became congested with all and sundry bustling to get into the temple and then all of a sudden through the drum banging, ushering and shouting we were in. And we were greeted by the extraordinary sight of one of the Kadavi bearers having finished his walk, dancing in front of everyone before being led away to be 'dismantled'!

Remarkable scenes all around of dancing, singing, clapping, praying and offering.

As is traditional many were shaven headed. Some of the children were also getting their hair shaved off (which I believe is a rites of passage) and then coated with yellow (good luck for Hindis I think). Much merriment and enjoyment being had by all but at the same time with a very sombre and deep meaningful backdrop.

And so to the 'dismantling' area where some very relieved and tired men were being 'serviced' by their entourage. Very quickly and effectively they set about removing and dismantling the Kavadis with surprisingly little blood-letting. I witnessed four men lifting off one of the contraptions and frankly struggling under the cumbersome weight. Amazing! So off come the screws, out come the pins and the metal to reveal a very ordinary tired looking man underneath. No applause or anything like that and today he's probably back at work like normal.

A very sober end to an unbelievably amazing day!