Life in Singapore 1 (Eat Already?)

Eat already?                  

-No?                      

Let's talk about it!

-Yes?

Let's talk about it anyway!

What a long queue, it must be a good place... or maybe the stall is just really slow at serving? In any case, in Singapore a long line is seen as an indicator of quality food and is a form of advertising.

In Singapore food is a big thing. Nope, I'm understating the truth here; 

In Singapore, food is a massive thing.

Wait, what is this John? Are you writing a food blog? The body snatchers must have finally got to you... 
Wait, it's OK, below you will find no tedious descriptions of the hottest places to eat in town, no 'Top 15 Secret Foodie Heavens in SG' click-bait malarkey.  There are no painstakingly composed food portraits to drool over, or thinly veiled advertisements for the latest place from which I have managed to cadge a free lunch.

The reason I am starting my series of life in Singapore pieces with food is that it is the best (and least offensive, haha!) entry into studying the national psyche.  

I get the impression that many people here seem to think about food continuously, maybe because many of them seem to actually eat very little to remain fashionably thin, not that I'd know anything about that... Food quickly becomes the subject of any small-talk and every incidental conversation but it is also the fallback topic in any social interaction. 

Therefore, starting with 'what's there to eat?' in Singapore is like starting with 'talking about the weather' in the UK; it's a natural choice.

Exhibit A

Food is also being continuously photographed, shared, blogged about and discussed on social media, yes I know this is quite common elsewhere in the world, and yes I am fully aware that I may have been living on Mars the past few years, however, in Singapore the food obsession is notable by the sheer quantity of human effort that goes into it and that pretty much everywhere else people are sick of looking at what other people are having for dinner. The hunger (sorry) with which the Singaporean seeks out new and somewhat sensational dining experiences is highly notable, their free time being invested in the research, travel to and discussion of their meals. This is eating as leisure, pure and simple, then add everything that goes with that, and we may well have a taste (sorry again) of the future.
In my defence, it is my opinion that a preoccupation with food is a defining characteristic of Singaporean culture (or at least they have been told it is, which is interesting in another way). I find it fun to ask why and formulate some hypotheses as to why, which again may or may not just be my opinion, it depends on how offended you are, dear reader. 

To try to explain my observations to you, I am afraid I am going to have to give you a little history lesson....


According to various arcane sources, it is said that the food culture of Singapore lurched into being when Prince Seri Teri Buana of the kingdom of Sri Vijaya stopped off for a coconut at he coconut stand (see what i did there?) one stiflingly-hot Thursday afternoon in the 12-somethings before he cut up the coast, Malacca way. It was he it is said, who, out of the corner of his eye, inexplicably spotted a lion, thousands of miles from its nearest habitat, doing some lion stuff at the edge of the jungle near the coconut stall. In the face of all sorts of logic and the fact he was slap bang in the middle of tiger country, he decided to name the place Singa - lion Pura - city. 

The 'Merlion' on Sentosa, It's like a lion with added Mer, get it? Invented by the Singapore Tourism Board as a national mascot sometime in the 1970's, the original Merlion shoots a jet of water from its mouth giving rise to the local term 'to merlion' for projectile vomiting.

That is about all of the 'legendary' stuff I'm willing to relay or repeat, the national mythology makes way more of it however, it is like The British Museum having a display about how Brutus founded Britain, indeed, Singapore even has a stone. (fairly important note: on a recent visit to the Singapore National Museum, the exhibit I have alluded to here has been replaced by something decidedly less mythological).

Then many, many, many years later, in 1819, the history of modern Singapore began when a British East India Company man named Thomas Stamford Raffles cut a deal with the local aristocracy (spoiler- they got rather rich) by throwing British support behind a local prince who had been away from court when his father, the previous Shah, popped his cloggs and as a result of succession customs, had been usurped by his younger half-brother. The Prince became Hussein Shah of Johor and got some of his kingdom back. Raffles struck this deal in order to expand his company's influence in the Malay Archipelago by establishing a free port (technically an entrepôt) at the mouth of the Singapore River.

The statue of Raffles near the Singapore River where he is said to have come ashore. Dashing, what-what?

In doing so, he intentionally challenged the dominance of the Dutch East India Company by selecting just about the best location to control sea trade between south Asia and east Asia, especially the opium trade with China. The Dutch were edged out incrementally, eventually acknowledging British control of Malaysia, maritime trade had been cornered.

Unintentionally, Raffles established a set of circumstances (perhaps by just enabling the ones that were already in place) that, to a large extent, determined the direction of the city and republic. The racial composition of its people, their languages, their cultures and social conservatism, the love of the uniform, for order, laws and rules,  even the width of the pavements and of course the subject of this blog; its culinary culture.

Still very much the global shipping hub, assorted vessels in the straits off Singapore.

How? Singapore was founded a port city, traders have been passing through this area for a very long time bringing their cargo, cultures, religions and foods. The unique blend of peoples and the variety of food available today in Singapore are ultimately a result of where the city was placed within the geography of global trade. I shall stick with the 4 race classification of the Singapore government, Chinese (76.2%), Malay (15%), Indian (7.4%) and 'other' (presumably the rest, 1.4%), although the reality of each is more complex, it will do for now. These figures represent the current citizen population, it does not include permanent residents or guest workers such as myself for instance. 

Masjid Sultan on Bussorah Street at the heart of the old Malay district.

I will write about the Peoples of Singapore at greater length in the second blog in this series, for now I will mention that Malaysian ingredients, food and particularly its spices form the first part of the mix. The Malay people have a very long history in the area, being the cultural successors of peoples that have inhabited the area for thousands and thousands of years. 

Next into the mix came the Chinese, who have been trading in the region for a very long time. With the growth of trade came more money making opportunities and more Chinese settlement. An interesting early fusion cuisine was formed when the Chinese merchants married local Malay women and produced the Baba-Nyonya people (Baba the men, Nyonya the women). This mixture produced what is today known as Peranakan or Nyonya food.

Indian Influence to the food of Singapore is another part of the mix. Before the spread of Islam into the region, the Malay Peninsula was home to a series of cultures heavily influenced by Indian culture. Regional traders moved influences across the Bay of Bengal. Then later, during the colonial period, large numbers of workers and settlers came along with the influence of the British East India Company. 

I feel I must also mention another culinary fusion tradition, this time unique to the region. The union of early European settlers from Portugal and later Holland with the locals formed an evolving community in all of the Straits Settlements, originally known as the Kristang people, but after successive waves of other European mixing, are know as 'Eurasian' in Singapore today, or, most amusingly 'Other' in the 4 races government classification system.
All of the cultures brought together by the port influenced each other to produce their own unique local versions of their traditional cuisine, as well as a whole bunch of new dishes.

WHEN IT COMES TO FOOD WE ARE ALL THE SAME

One notable trait of Singaporeans is the symbolism of food when it comes to the relationship between people of different races. People will speak about their food preferences to signal their status in and appreciation for their multicultural society. "I like x food, but I'm y race, so I'm all right with people x," or something like that. To my over-sensitised British ears, THIS SOUNDS RIDICULOUS, I can imagine the reaction people in the UK would get if they went around saying, "I'm alright by Indians because I love to eat curry," or something similar, (in fact, wasn't there a joke about this in East is East?) maybe we Westerners are just too sensitive these days?

However, here it actually works, people genuinely get the warm fuzzies when somebody  waxes lyrical about their love for nasi lemak, or the heartfelt patriotism stirred when someone states, "We all love chicken rice." Government ministers show they are 'just like you' by wolfing down plastic plates full of steaming sloppy stuff from hawker centres (after standing in line for 30 minutes of course, you know, because they're just like you).

Heck, even Singapore's own Olympic gold medalist, Joseph Schooling (famous for beating Michael Phelps to gold in the 2016 Olympics), had his food preferences used to affirm his Singaporiness when his nationality was doubted by some who suspected he was secretly 'ang moh' (meaning western, kinda, it means literally 'red head' in hokkien, or maybe tomato, perhaps referring to the red 'glow' northern europeans exhibit in the local climate) and not really Singaporean (i.e. Chinese). In fact, because this anecdote touches on the peculiar form of racism in Singapore, I will discuss it properly in blog 2, 'The Uniform Island'.

A typically crowded (and cheerful) lunchtime at a hawker centre

On to the culture of food.
The thing that strikes me about the food culture in Singapore is that Singaporeans seem to rarely eat at home. They love to eat out! For that matter, many seem to never go home, perhaps the city is a little overcrowded?

HDB flats

The style of food, both 'local' and 'foreign', that Singaporeans prefer determines this to some extent, recipes are often complex and require a very hot wok or some other specialised gas blowtorch-like equipment to prepare. The super hot flame often required is very hot, far too hot for many in the type of housing most common here- The government HDB flat. Strong cooking smells are understandably undesirable in such compact living spaces.Ovens and grills are culturally also very uncommon. The housing situation dictated by the population size, small land area and government strategy must surely determine the trend for eating out.


Worth a watch.

Eating out is also relatively cheap here due to the intense competition between (often small) businesses and low wages given to most involved in the industry. It is said by many that eating out is cheaper than cooking for yourself and certainly less difficult. I would happen to agree, I have found that cooking wholesome food with quality ingredients at home is considerably more expensive and harder work than eating hawker food. 

And.

That.

Is.

Precisely.

The.

Point.

Singaporeans don't seem to wonder why their hawker centre plastic platefuls are so cheap compared to buying fresh ingredients, it cannot be just the economy of scale, can it? There is surely a significant gap in ingredient quality and nutritional quantity. It is little wonder that A 2015 report revealed Singapore is now world number 2 for diabetes, and that cardiovascular disease is skyrocketing compared to other Asian countries. It is common knowledge that many local favourites are high in salt, cholesterol, added sugar, MSG and invariably fried in palm oil, sometimes of a prodigious vintage and having the appearance of motor oil. How could it go this wrong?

For answers why, we could try going back to a historical narrative, the immigrant population, especially the Chinese, was often a poor population who lived in simple, overcrowded and fire-prone accommodation. Their descendants today are much better off but have retained a cultural predilection for going out (or staying out after school or work)to eat some inexpensive 'street food', in effect, behaving like they still do not have cooking facilities. Even the very wealthy, although having access to air conditioned modern kitchens with all the mod-cons in their condominiums and even a domestic helper/maid or two to help with the more burdensome chores, still regularly go in search of their favourite 'soul food' dining experience. It could also explain partly why the big western fast-food chains are universally popular, in direct contrast to their image in the west, some, such as McDonald's, are seen by many as a healthy option!
There is no doubt many older people say that in the past, they would always eat at home, perhaps these people did not live in the crowded conditions that I referred to earlier. If not, then it must be down to the increased pace of modern living, which has undoubtedly grown more intense over Singapore's modern development, to the point that people simply do not have the time to prepare the food that they would like to eat. There are several related trends that correlate with this theory. The length of the working week has steadily grown over the past 20 years, the GDP per capita continues to rise and many families hire (or aspire to) domestic helpers/maids as they are presumably too busy to do the chores themselves. There is also a lot of anecdotal evidence from the parents of the children I teach and other adults, that their lifestyle is increasingly hectic and eating for the family as done more and more 'on the go'. It may well be a combination of the two.

McDonald's- cheap, family friendly and very popular!

The historical perspective lends itself quite well to explaining the style of 'eating establishments' unique to Singapore and its neighbours in South East Asia. If we ignore cooking at home, then the development of eateries follows a simple progression from small, unplanned and chaotic towards large, uniform and organised.

Street Hawkers 

Where does a hungry rickshaw puller go to get some carbohydrate for his hungry muscles, or a goods porter or day labourer for that matter? Being a constantly growing port city, Singapore has always been home to multitudes of newcomers, separated from their homes and families, living in some very basic accommodation. Therefore there has always been a niche for the street food hawker selling simple and cheap bowls of rice or noodle based sustenance. 

Street food 1957 style, Singapore River.

Sometimes just a guy carrying two baskets on the ends of a long stick, other times more substantial little stalls with cooking fires, awnings and a bunch of little stools to sit on, The hawker was omnipresent for much of the history of Singapore. They would cluster around popular places like cinemas and shopping streets, often cluttering the thoroughfare to the extent traffic found it really nearly impossible to pass. I suppose eating as a form as leisure started back then. However, eating out was nowhere near as common as it is today and was seen as a luxury by most.


Hawker Centres
All this hawker business was far to messy and unsanitary for the new independent Singapore. Hawkers created a lot of food waste and patrons invariably littered the floor with vermin-attracting rubbish. The government realised that to clean up the city, they needed to clear up the streets and their large, unregulated hawker population. So that's what they did.

The districts famous for their unofficial street food were first 'regulated', then later forcibly cleared from the mid-1960s to the 1980s, the people who ran these stalls had the option of moving to a stall in a coffee shop or one of the new hawker centres, the first being constructed in 1971, though for the life of me I cannot find its name.

A popular hawker centre stall, standard issue long line in evidence. 

The new hawker centres moved the preparation, cooking and sale of food into neat uniform rows of three-walled units or 'stalls' inside a roofed building with the minimum basic hygiene standards provided, running water,a sink and a gas supply to end cooking over smoky coals. Cooking smells, smoke and suchlike are exhausted into the local atmosphere by extractor fans. 
Each unit's equipment can differ according to the type of food being prepared, but invariably, there is a glass and steel cabinet at the front so the customer can see a bit of what they are getting. Each stallholder has a standardised space above his/her stall for a signboard. The act of eating was moved off the little wooden seats on the street to communal 'free seating' around the food stalls. The furniture is standardised, utilitarian, laminated, wipe-clean and bolted to the floor in fixed arrangements catering to a variety of group sizes. 

A cleaner doing his job.

The building interior is clad in tiles so that the whole dining area can just be sluiced down at the end of business. Each centre commonly has a centralised dish-washing facility and a team of cleaners to collect the dirty dishes, wipe down the tables and wash up for the stalls. Waste is disposed of properly in a waste centre, the effect being a humongous leap in hygiene over the street hawker.

Now, Singapore is renowned for its cleanliness, random locals, foreigners and occasionally dewy-eyed home-counties florists will trot out the 'such a clean city' speech (you know the one, clean streets, low crime, efficient public transport, summer all the time etc).
This infers so much; that we are living in a clean and orderly society, replete with such good manners, law-abiding citizenry, polite. Ever so much better than its dirty, dangerous, corrupt neighbours, and in the case of home counties florists, undertones of 'why can't it be like that here (perhaps with a racist subtext)?' 

Like so many oft-said things about Singapore, this idea is incorrect, a misconception. Singapore is not a clean society, it is instead a cleaned society (I stole that).

Huge numbers of people are employed as cleaners in coffee shops, food courts, hawker centres and in some restaurants to free up waiters from clearing the tables. Often these workers are elderly and visibly have difficulty moving. A few seem that work in the food courts by their facial expressions, seem to be in a fair bit of pain when they go about their duties. A large proportion of customers, freed from the toil of cooking and from responsibility of tidying up after themselves, coat the tables (and sometimes the floor) in food waste, crustacean shells, bones and sodden tissues before swanning off leaving their trays and dished behind to be cleared. The cleaner is then expected to clear the mess up and wipe down the table with a (dirty old) cloth as the next wave of diners is often hovering.
The truth is that the table manners of the 'regular Singaporean' (whatever that is) shock me. It is only the employment of this sub-class of cleaners that keeps the place relatively clean, if just a little bit wet and sticky.

Coffee shops

A busy coffee shop or Kopitiam in the Bugis area. Cleaning lady to the left in orange.

Coffee shops fill an important niche between hawker and food court, mostly because they are found everywhere. Usually there will be a coffee shop a short distance from where you live or even at the ground floor of your block. They started out way back when, as the name suggests, serving beverages. Today Kopitiam (coffee shop in hokkien) offer a range of hawker-type foods at affordable prices. Most coffee shops can sell bottled beer (surprisingly fresh and cold) so some end up looking a bit like al-fresco pubs with a bunch of crusty old regulars who sit there for hours drinking beer and watching Chinese/Taiwanese soaps on a big TV. Other places are more food orientated and get very busy during peak times. The 'coffee shop' is usually the main tenant while the food stalls sub-let. They serve traditional hawker-type fayre with some interesting specialty foods here and there (frog porridge, anyone?) Some food stalls have become so successful in their own right that they 'make it big, get famous' and move to more luxurious surroundings of a shopping mall or even their own restaurant.   

Food Courts

The open air food courts and hawker centres are for too hot for some people, especially when they want to eat some steaming hot soupy contrivance with a little fire burning under it. The advent of the air-conditioned shopping mall presented an opportunity for cooler dining in the form of the food court.
The set-up is broadly similar to the coffee shop in that tenants rent individual stalls of standard size and them outfit them with specialised cooking equipment. The food is pretty much the same variety as the coffee shop/hawker centre. Especially as the food court business is dominated by a handful of big companies that tend to price out the small independent operators in favour of larger franchises.
As a consequence, on entering a food court you will see a the same kinds of food stalls shuffled in a slightly different order, a lot like the British high street shortly before its current final death-spiral.
There's the drink stall of course, a 'Western' food stall, Yong Tau Foo, wanton noodles, Mala/Fragrant hotpot, 'Japanese' cuisine, maybe 'Korean' too, handmade noodles in soup, Pepper Lunch Express, Indonesian barbecue, fish soup, bak kut teh, Chinese herbal soup, beef/pork noodles, maybe a Chinese-Buddhist vegetarian stall, a congee shop, maybe an Indian or Malay food stall, local favourites/Penang/char kway teow , Mini Wok, maybe Vietnamese, Rojack, claypot rice, Thunder Tea Rice, asian desserts stall and everybody's favourite (allegedly) chicken rice!
That's most of them I think.
As I can't stand that really fishy taste you get from shrimp paste or belacan, my options are somewhat limited making my eating experience somewhat limited in its variety. On the face of it, there is a lot of variety, problem is it's the same variety everywhere you go.

Pasar Malam

Do not despair friends! Not all food is being brought into the sanitised, air-conditioned control of big business,  as well as the coffee shop soldiering on in several niche areas such as Geylang, the Pasar Malam (night market) has preserved a great deal of hawker culture too. 
Scattered around the neighbourhoods of Singapore are little rough patches of grass that regularly have marquee tents erected upon them. Sometimes it is to mark a specific event, on others there seems to be no particular reason. There is often a little fairground, clothes stalls, plant stalls, furniture, electronics and household goods stalls and, or course, street food. 

Street food in the pasar malam, at lunchtime there is only a limited selection as the focus is on the late evening.

You can have anything you want, as long as it's fried.

Notable mention must be made of the love for western fast food in Singapore. In the west, Fast Food chains like McDonald's, KFC, Burger King etc are constantly on the back foot when it comes to public perception of nutrition, food quality and health scares. In Singapore the big franchises seem constantly on the up and up for some reason. Perhaps they fit better into the region's culture of food than they do where they originated. Certainly the customer demographic is different here, a fast food restaurant will be full of all ages and classes of people including a lot of families.

...and back to the question:
So what is it with the food obsession? I cannot pin down why it is so significant in the Singaporean people's interactions with each other, though I think I'm getting close with:

• We really do all have food in common, its part of the human experience. A varied and diverse population can easily converse easily about what they will be having for dinner while ignoring all their differences.
• Such a hard-working, serious people tend to just work, eat, sleep and consume entertainment. There you have 2/4 conversation topics. You can't talk about work in case the boss hears/reads it and gives you the sack. It's too easy here. 
• With such a choice available from many areas and cultures,each with its own slightly different versions everywhere, there is a lot to discuss.
• The weather is pretty constant, apart from the haze. Oh how I miss haze-related small talk.
• The love of novelty, everyone simply must try that new place. Posting food photos and restaurant reviews on social media causes this to 'snowball'.
• Considering the conversation topics among friends and co-workers in the UK would, in 95% of instances, offend someone, get you the sack or get you sued for slander/libel, food is a safe topic.
• There's not much else to talk about.

'Chope!'

Ooh, an empty table, wait, why look, those little packs are having a lunch date.

Now for a curious cultural adjunct somewhat related to the topic.
Choping (pronounced more like chopping or chop meaning to mark/stamp) is, depending on who you ask, a defining characteristic of the eating experience in Singapore. Some say it is necessary in the overcrowded communal areas of food centres, some insist it is a form of good/practical manners (I have no idea) while on the other hand some perceive it as the height of rudeness.

What is for certain is that this behaviour is here to stay until the government bans it (unlikely). How does it work? I'll explain.

A few diners enter a food centre or restaurant with free seating, instead of going straight to the self-service counters to order something, they spend some time walking around, scanning the area (with uncharacteristically sharp observation skills) for an empty table. When they find one that suits the size of their group, they stand for a while by it, just in case a better option presents itself. Having satisfied themselves that they have secured the best possible table (if there is more than one available, there may be a discussion what the relative value of the tables are determined according to a set of unknown variables), the diners then proceed to mark their territory with personal items. The classic item being the very Singaporean pack of pocket tissues, although other items are frequently used.
Business cards, id lanyards, umbrellas and bags are routinely left to designate the table as 'occupied' and I've heard stories of iPhones and laptops being left.

Seat''s taken.

The party then go their separate ways, in busy periods, like lunch in the central business district, they join the back of some very long queues. Meanwhile, the table goes unused. Mysteriously the little packs of pocket tissue work their powerful magic and scare off any potential interlopers. Even those carrying their food (which always seems to be extremely heavy and hot as mentioned earlier) already and looking for a place to sit. Eventually, after a period of time the diners return to their reserved table. 

The critical fact is that many people have observed that 'choped' tables that were empty when they sat down to eat remain empty for the duration of the meal and in many cases were still empty when they left.

As you can probably tell, I find this custom ridiculous and impractical. It is however fascinating.


Although comparisons can be drawn with the infamous 'towel wars' between British and German tourists, there are some specific differences that help to explain local culture.

As with the towel wars, choping functions in an environment of behavioural selection. Once the arms-race starts, individuals that have not adopted the habit begin to miss out. Those who choose not to play along are are a distinct disadvantage. Clearly being able to blame the other person for not playing the game as not to feel too much empathy for them is common to both situations, exacerbated in Europe where there are issues of 'cost-value' motivation (i.e. trying to get the most out of the holiday you saved all year for) and the people you are competing 'against' are foreign, the archetypal 'outsider'.

There are, however, some big differences. In Singapore this is an everyday event, the large groups of work colleagues who simply must sit together, the patrons of hawker centres are paying relatively little for their meal as supposed to a Mediterranean holiday and the 'competition' so to speak, are their own neighbours. Most worrying is the way the majority gleefully go along with this selfish behaviour. There's something in the psyche of these well-dressed, lanyard-toting office drones that thoroughly enjoys beating someone to something and smugly hogging it. Even if the person they beat is an elderly person who is searching in vain for a place to sit. Empathy is for losers.

Selfishness is becoming normalised.

In addition to this, comes the obsession for rules and their enforcement. Most patrons who would like to sweep the tissues and whatnot onto the floor do nothing for fear of causing a scene or getting into an argument. Chope-ing is enforced by bullying, peer pressure and the meekness of its victims.

There was a recent and well-publicised incident (here) where a couple was filmed enforcing their 'right' to reserve a seat. There was some discussion on the practice, but mostly as is usually the case a bit of a witch-hunt and discussion petered out after the convictions. Meanwhile, nothing has changed.


Some people blame colonialism, that could have some mileage especially when it comes to the normalisation of it being OK to put yourself above others- entitlement in other words. The problem with this is that Singapore has been self-governing since 1955 and ceased to be a British colony in 1963, a proportion of the population explosion since then has come from immigration, more in recent years as the birth rate has been well below replacement levels for some time. The proportion of residents whose family lived in colonial Singapore shrinks every year. How much of a cultural effect it has is highly debatable and receding every decade. Therefore, the colonial past is a factor, but not the only one.

Overcrowding undoubtedly is a big factor in the way that people think in Singapore, the number of people in the central areas going out for lunch is staggering. It's not just that, overcrowding is experienced by most ordinary residents throughout life. The effects of living so closely to so many strangers has a curious effect on human psychology and when combined with a social system that encourages competition in all levels, produces such behaviour.

Cultural heritage plays a part too, Kiasu or 'fear of losing out/over-competitiveness' seems ingrained in Chinese Singaporeans, some people will go to illogical lengths to get an advantage or get ahead. Even if doing so is counterproductive. More about this in a later post.

With a society of first, second and (etc, etc) third generation immigrants, it could be said that school is where citizens are formed. Having taught children in Singapore for more than three years, there is something terribly familiar about all this. Students turn up early to reserve the 'best' seats with their bags, even though there are usually enough to go around. The students police their classes, constantly telling each other to do this or that, not to run, not to use this or that colour ink, 'teacher, he did this', not to talk, to get in line. Hell, they love queues. Being first to class is something to boast about. As is being first in the queue to go home. When I sometimes dismiss the class  directly from their desks, I can see the angst and discontent in their eyes; they want to line up, after all, they could be first! 

I can see a similar mindset in adults, either the school system has infiltrated society or society is modeled after the school system, this could explain the love of uniforms. The Food Centre can be seen as merely an adult School Canteen, where it is so crowded that the only way you can sit with your friends is to reserve your table with your bags. Indeed, most school canteens are set up like a food court, separate stalls complete with ridiculously long queues to join for the absurdly short break times.
The question is, is this the result of intentional social engineering or behaviour modification? Could this be a foretaste of the future of human society given our own political leaders in the western democracies seem so keen to adopt practices from Asia?

This brings us off the topic of food in Singapore and brings me nicely onto the  subject of the next blog in this series: The Uniform Island.
If you have stuck with it through my rambling social observations, firstly I'm sorry and secondly congratulations are in order, well done. Here's a picture of some pigeons.

Life In Singapore

Lau Pa Sat 'Old Market' in he Singapore CBD

Hello!

Yes I am alive, and yes I am still out there somewhere.

John is living and working in Singapore at the moment, he is neither particularly lost nor travelling at the moment, although he still feels like he is. The weird thing is (apart from the awkward use of third person perspective) I had always dreamily considered going into some kind of classroom again after travelling for a while, of course in a not even-slightly-planned planned way, such is my style. Firstly to extend my time overseas and to fulfill the urge to stay somewhere different and interesting for longer than the usual few days that are the backpackers lot in life: Apart from the farms in New Zealand, my record in a particular location had been two weeks, three days. Secondly to refill my bank account after 18 months of travelling with no income.

Hard evidence that I've had this episode subconsciously in my mind the whole time was discovered when was updating my CV  before applying for work, opening it to find the phrase; 'I would like to work somewhere hot and sticky.' as a place-filler. In fact, I've been not-so-much-looking-but-actually-looking for places to slow down for a while. I've discovered many wonderful places along the way, too many to choose from in fact. I suppose I've been looking for a reason to slow down rather than a place as I'd like to live everywhere.

When I met Wendy in the kitchen of a hostel at Franz Josef, I could never have imagined that our chance meeting would eventually result in me working in hot and sticky Singapore, mostly because I was well into my 5th glass of wine at the time and trying desperately to finish Shantaram. Also I thought she was Japanese. In any case, our life's path unfolds before us mysteriously and I have been here working as the 'foreign talent' in an English language enrichment centre for a little over a year.

At times, keeping a straight face is essential. 

My job is in no way the teaching that I know and (not love) left behind. instead I teach primary age children English, not as an additional language as such but in after school/weekend enrichment classes. My bread and butter work is teaching 4 year-olds to read. Most know the basics of the language well enough, but use the local 'Singlish' dialect and a lot of the work in later years is working to teach the vagaries of English grammar to children who are expected to pass an 11 plus style exam at the end of primary, a test that requires the children to speak and write in correct British English, whatever that is.

The class sizes are tiny compared to what I was used to at Fairfield, the children are tiny but  then again, so are the rooms making the maximum size of nine students feel like the room is 'full'.

The preparation and marking can all be taken care of in the normal working day due to the small class sizes. It's all a bit of a cruise really. Sometimes it all gets a bit repetitive and I feel as if I'm being paid for my time rather than my 'talents'. However, my contract is fixed at two years and I remind myself that this isn't forever and to have fun and take each day as it comes. 

I am quite busy with day to day things here. However, I have begun to write a series of pieces on life in Singapore. They started off as one piece as I have written for other countries along the way, the problem is I live here with my eyes open and have gone way beyond just scratching the surface, the content has since expanded and now I'm looking at a series of 4 or 5 blog entries that I will publish in the coming months.

So keep a look out.

On the Road in Australia: Part II

Brisbane from the top of Mt.Coot

After saying farewell to Paolo at the airport I drove the venerable little Toyota home, with Wendy in the passenger seat and time in Australia running out we headed to the little suburban house where we had rented a room. After indulging in a little retail therapy on the way (I bought a little purple pocket torch for $3 to replace the one that broke in Greece) we felt normal enough to go back to cooking, packing, laundry and doing dishes. 

With the car a little emptier, we embarked on a farewell circuit up the coast, then back south to its happy new owner in Coolangatta. I wasn't anywhere as attached to the car as my Mitsi in New Zealand, but losing your wheels in a country where every journey is ridiculously long distance and freedom is not found on a bus route, is just a little daunting.  

I collected the deposit for the room from the landlady and was pleasantly surprised she gave the whole sum back without really checking the place over. I half expected to have 100 bucks shaved off after the  discovery of an some old crack in the door or a concocted 'cleaning' charge. The drive up to Noosa was quite uneventful, apart from a stop at a fast food place where our fries were expertly snatched from the car roof by a pair of crows who carried the entire carton to a nearby rooftop and eyed us with contempt as they savoured the oily-potatoey-salty goodness. Little devils. Due to having lived for so long without a schedule, we dawdled there and arrived quite late in the day. This variety of tardiness takes patience, practice and most of all, dedication.
Our surroundings got more rural as we headed north, there was more bush on view and some spectacular wetlands passing on both the left and right sides. Then suddenly we began to pass some very fancy houses, private docks and all the trappings of what could be best described as rich people. Arrival in Noosa only confirmed my suspicions, this was a town for the moneyed of society. Wide leafy avenues spread parallel to the ocean and beach, lined with an array of shops all the way up to the 'fancy boutique' class. Middle aged white people in elegant holiday wear (think golf club attire) promenaded on polished stone paving. We decided to head for the hostel. 

Hello

Even the hostel was a bit dear, using its status as a relatively 'old' building (for Australia, heritage or something) to charge extra for frugal facilities in keeping with its 1950's feel while simultaneously having a fancy bar/restaurant attached and clearly being pitched to the folks down the hill with the dollars. While the hostel concept was flawed to me at least, the staff proved to be legendary; there was a new competition underway to win a trip to Fraser Island among other things. Wendy had been excitedly talking about Fraser for the last week, due to a complete lack of research I had never heard of it. After an internet search to assess our options, it looked like a trip to the island would be way beyond our budget due to the specialist nature of the transport required and tight regulations. In addition I was trying to make the money that I had left stretch further (as it happens I didn't find gainful employment for another five months) and was being especially tight. 
The competition was a kind of treasure hunt where we followed clues to find 'thongs' flip-flops, jandals, slippers, pluggers, slaps/slops, go-aheads or whatever you call them scattered throughout the two main shopping streets. We had to follow the simple clues and the obvious hints of the hostel staff, pop into some shops and say the required phrase and by the evening we had three sets of paper thongs apiece to enter into the prize draw. Up until that point I believed we were the only entrants! 

Noosa Heads beachscape

A few hours later we attended a very club 18-30 meet and greet to see the prize draw. There was a free glass of inexpensive wine for all as we sat around in the hotel bar and smiled at the other newly-arrived guests. They were the usual mob, a mixture of ages but mostly on the young side, a mixture of nationalities but mostly on the German side. After an enthusiastic talk on all the activities available to the new guests, how much fun it would all be and how easy it would be to book through the reception desk, it was time for the draw.

Something's going on here.

It turned out that some other guests had received the same brief as us and also entered their paper Jandals for the prize draw, the runner up prizes went to some of the other guests. When it came to the 1st prize draw Wendy had her sandal pulled. Now that's the power of positive thinking.

Looking the other way...

So our time at Noosa Heads was cut pleasantly short, the trip to Fraser Island began very early in the morning before even the hostel desk was opened, so we had to clear out, leave our bags in the car and poke the room key through what seemed to be the correct hole. We then waited in the little bus station down the tree-lined path and across the road from the hostel for our lift.
A very odd looking bus turned the corner into the bus station, it looked as if a giant shiny green cat carrier had been bolted to the back of a 7 ton truck. We began to board and selected our seats when it quickly became clear the other passengers didn't want us there. It turned out they were booked as a group and it was like we had crashed their horticultural club committee meeting. No wonder they looked so distressed. After being asked to leave we waited in the cool morning air until an identical truck-bus rolled up, we took our rightful places and were driven out of Noosa towards the Island.

Fraser Island ocean side beach.

The peculiar transport was necessary because there are no real roads on the island, most of the driving would be over various grades of very pure soft sand. As we headed to the little ferry, the driver remotely reduced the pressure in the massive tyres and slipped the vehicle into all-wheel drive. On the other side of the strait we headed north along the ocean beach. The sand was wet here and the going was easy. The truck got up to an impressive speed that our height above the sand disguised until the truck-bus struck a little cliff of sand that had been cut by one of the many small freshwater streams crossing the beach, then I understood the purpose of the sturdy seat belts.
Fraser Island is truly an astounding place. For a giant sand bar it is quite beautiful, the renowned purity of the sand seems to influence so much of the island from the roots up creating a unique habitat for all sorts of interesting plants and creatures. It is the size that I noticed first, the drive up the ocean-side beach went on for a long time and included a refreshment stop. The driver/guide, who must have done this exact same thing hundreds of times before, explained the history and geography of the island with enthusiasm and some very dry Aussie humour. 

Even though were were early, there were plenty of tyre tracks from 4x4 vehicles in the sand.

I have no idea what this jellyfish is called, but I do know that the blue things are its gonads.

Wendy looking a little excited to be there.

The stops, although seemingly forced and over-complicated by coffee, cake and biscuits, gave us a chance to stop, get down, smell the air without filters and air-con, look at some little details like the little blobs of floating pumice in the rivulets or the odd plants in the dunes. Also to appreciate how massive the scale of the place is.

If I had written this at the time, I could have written some interesting facts about this. Now all I have to say is this is a cool tree.

After a while the driver took us along a network of sandy tacks in the interior of the island, after a prolonged dry spell the sand was as a fine talc and the truck had trouble negotiating some slopes and curves. We passed through a belt of dense forest that had bounced back from intensive logging in the 20th century, though like the ancient Kauri forests of New Zealand's Northland, I suppose it will never be the same. I was surprised to learn that logging had only really been wrapped up around the time of my birth and other commercial activities like sand mining in the 1990's. This explained the preservation of some of the structures in the loggers camps and the existence of the road network.

Explanations

This tree is slowly being strangled. This picture isn't so beautiful now. 

We parked up at the site of an old settlement in the southern heart of the island and went for a little guided walk. 

A crystal-clear sandy-bottomed river, one of many than run through the bush.

The tour pressed on, there was so much left to do. Our one-day route only took us around the southern third of the island, hitting the best known landmarks along the way. It was perfect really, I don't think I could do this kind of tour for more than a day, being hurried from place to place like a gaggle of geese.
The next stop was the famous and very photogenic Lake McKenzie, a giant freshwater lake in the middle of the bush in the middle of a giant sandbar. Due to the unique geology of the island the lake is remarkably pure, so pure in fact that many plants, invertebrates and fishes cannot tolerate the water. Decomposing leaves have left the water slightly acidic which is not really that surprising considering the lake is basically distilled water. We had a little time to relax beside the lake before lunch was served, there were a few people there, mostly from the same tour company as us, crammed onto the narrow strip of sand between the stunningly clear water and the bush. I couldn't resist going for a swim, the water wasn't just clear, it was crystal clear so as I swam away from the shore and the noise on of the tourists began to fade away, the clear cold water column below me was completely transparent. I could see the lake bed easily several meters below my feet. It felt a lot like flying and as I looked downwards my stomach did that little turn that it does when I look over the railings of a high bridge.

The water was stunngly blue, and cold

The beach where we had a swim, it was quite busy but I seem to have successfully excluded everybody from the photograph.

The thing that bothers me about tours is always having to keep to the timetable, soon it was time to leave the lake and eat some barbecue. During the serving-up of the completely-on-schedule lunch, a fellow visitor looked away from his plate a little too long and a cheeky kookaburra swooped down from a nearby bough where it had been observing us closely and without touching the paper plate carried off a complete and quite large pork sausage.

Heading southwards along the Coral Sea beach on Frazer, the drivers would dart to the left and right to stay on the firm, moist sand where they could go fast while avoiding the surf and its corrosive salt spray and the risk of getting bogged down. This made for an exciting ride.

With the tide on the turn we had to board the truck again and head back to the ferry. The beach was mostly underwater by now meaning that the sand was firmer and the little cliffs were underwater. The other truck appeared and the two drivers weaved along the beach together. We still stopped when something interesting was spotted. Someone said they saw a whale way out to sea, then there was this dingo, trotting along, doing its dingo thing.

A dingo!

The day was over way too quickly, as I watched the ferry sailing back across the channel to pick us up I felt a yearning for more time to explore and experience what I had seen and to discover what I hadn't. I was glad that we had been lucky enough to see what we had, and the fact that it was free sweetened that familiar leaving feeling.

The ferry.

After Fraser we jumped into the car and headed along the coast to Maroochydore on the sunshine coast a little to the south. After a quick look around we found a room in a hostel that was occupied by mostly long term guests (French and German backpackers) working in local agriculture. The hostel, as I now realise is common in Aussie, was typical in its austerity, like someone had hidden all of the nice things. 
Our meals there would be correspondingly simple due to the basic kitchen equipment. It was a nice place had nice staff, you just couldn't say it had much atmosphere. we met up with one of Wendy's friends from Melbourne, so that checked the urge to go out and about and be social. 

Maroochydore street.

We spent a little time walking around the town and getting to know the layout of the place. It's something I always do, firstly out of boredom but occasionally you see things that give you a unique insight into a place and a people, completely by accident. On the way into town one evening to meet Hanna, we witnessed a ridiculously beautiful sunset ('oh god I can't take it' levels of colour) over the Maroochy river wetlands with thousands of raucous parakeets coming home to roost overhead to the dusky riverside gum trees. At the time I resented having to stop looking to take a few photographs, but now I am glad I did in order to show you. Here is the best one with absolutely no editing.  

Sunset over Maroochydore waterways

I had a feeling that life in the sunshine coast could be close to idyllic, if you get the arrangements right. However time was running out and the road was calling. We took the car on our last journey south, bypassing Brisbane and arriving in Coolangatta in the late afternoon. After some new electrical parts and a little tinkering by Paolo and myself the car was in fine working order and we could hand it over to Lacey with a clean-as-a-whistle conscience that it would run and run 'til the end of western civilisation and maybe afterwards too, after all, this was Mad Max country. Lacey agreed to drive us and our gear (still too much to hump about) back down to Byron Bay saving us loads of time, effort, sweat and perhaps blood on public transport, what a star she is. We checked in to the same hostel we had stayed in before (better the devil you know) and spent a week wondering if the grass was greener (or in our case the pans were nicer or the wifi free'er) in the other hostels. We managed to hold on to a nice double room for a week on an upper floor balcony that was much cooler and quieter than our first room on the ground floor. In the evening I liked to sit outside with some wine and watch the fruit bats going home to roost in the blue twilight of that big pacific Australian sky.

This is the best picture I took of the bats. Imagine how bad the others are.

I think it was the second or third morning we were in Byron when something terrible happened. A lot of the guests and all of the long term workers were surfers and could be seen sitting and standing in small groups exhibiting the social signals of shock. Folded arms, palms over mouth, the extroverts talking too loudly, eyes looking this way and that, into each other. A man had been attacked by a large shark just off the main beach and died. The first media reports said he was a surfer, it later emerged he was just out there swimming. The beach was closed for days as the police searched with motor boats and helicopters for the shark responsible. A large specimen was spotted from the air but no other evidence for it being the culprit was found. Unfortunately this was not the last of the hostile shark activity in the region, further attacks have occurred in the area. This is a worrying trend for an area that enjoyed such a long period without serious trouble.

Moonlight strolls in Byron Bay, beach closed.

With the waters off limits I had fun exploring the little pleasures that this curious diminutive town had to offer. We went out and watched bands in a pub, looked at some art, took long walks through it's suburbs, drank too much and indulged in several late-night $5 Dominos pizzas (spicy pepperoni). Not having the lazy utility of a car had many advantages like we couldn't buy more booze and groceries than we could carry, we explored more on foot, starting to think of a way to get to Sydney while seeing a bit of the country along the way. Also there was no longer an enclosed space to be trapped in with a stereo playing Milky Chance on loop.

When the beach re-opened the sea was flat calm. I went body boarding one day in some little waves at the beach with limited success, so the week I planned to spend on my new favourite pastime; falling off a surfboard was destined never to happen. This added to other  disappointments such as failing to be in the same place at the same time to meet my cousin Clive, not having the time to drop in on my great uncle or having a look-see at the 'middle' of the country as I had always dreamed of doing. 

Byron Bay town in the dawn light, waiting for the bus.

Wendy suggested transfercar as an alternative to a single long bus journey, I had never heard of the site and couldn't believe that car hire companies would entrust one of their vehicles to some random. Then I discovered that you must make a large credit card payment on renting the vehicle which was immediately suspended and would be cancelled on the safe return on the vehicle (meaning in reality you paid nothing up front, but the company had access to A LOT of money if they chose to take it). I booked a small campervan that had to be driven from Brisbane to Sydney in three days including two overnight stops. Surprisingly I only had to pay for petrol and get the van to the allotted place by 5pm two days later. Although it seems like good value, practically you have to do a fair bit of driving each day in order to meet the allocated drop off time, the first day I covered over half the distance so we had a little bit of leeway in order to take it easy, but we were still on the road for a lot of the remaining time. I can recommend transfercar for getting from A to B, but it isn't really suitable for seeing the country as many people, including myself would like to.

The hostel scene in Australia is weird, because the population is dispersed over such large distances, and perhaps because they call their accommodation halls hostels, Australians frequently seem to use backpackers hostels as budget hotels and party palaces. Hostels in some countries that I've traveled in go as far as segregating locals from foreigners in case their establishment attracts people with the wrong idea, here the opposite seems to be the case. Many Australians, it seems, stay in hostels for a party weekend and to hook up with backpackers. As a result of loud wasted people and later lots of loud sex, slamming doors, talking in drunken whispers and tiptoeing around outside the room (we were in a row of private rooms) I didn't get much sleep before I had to rise super early for my bus to Brisbane. Still, the sunrise was nice.  

The van parked in the Italian heritage centre where we had stopped on the way north.

In Brisbane I had fun negotiating the local bus network that ran along weird concrete conduits on the major routes. I found the Van rental place with the help of the GPS on my trusty old smartphone, only getting slightly sweaty in the process. I was keen to get going but there were lots of complications, firstly there were two young German girls renting a larger van to go on a road trip and they had to watch the 30 minute how-to-campervan DVD, do all the paperwork and have the practical briefing on the subject of not setting fire to themselves. Their vehicle wasn't ready straight away so I had to wait. When it came to my turn, the rentals bloke in typical antipodean 'mysogyny' identified my status as a manly fella and half-asked-half-stated, 'you know what to do?' then gave me the keys.
The Mitsubishi van that I drove away had the most uncomfortable gas pedal positions I have ever experienced, but more worryingly, a block away on a busy main road I noticed that the speedo was stuck at 0kph. I turned into a less busy road, pulled the wheel over, executed a U-ey and headed back. The replacement second van was a little slow in coming as well, it had to have its windscreen stuck on.

The van, windscreen still on!

The windscreen stayed on all the way to Byron bay, by then I assumed the glue has set enough to slow down. Wendy had checked out and was waiting in the common room to start her adventure, I was knackered. 

Driving tired is dangerous, don't do it kids!

We headed to Coff's Harbour with a few lovely diversions through small town Australia along the way. The full tank (not exactly) of fuel that the van came with was long gone and I discovered the 2.4 litre petrol engine drank, no, guzzled fuel. However the idea of finding a place to stop for the night along the way was very exciting. The free van came not just with blankets and pillows to make up the bed, but a little seating area, camping gas cooker, pots and pans, utensils and even a little sink with a tank of water. Technically you can stop for the night anywhere if there is no local bylaw prohibiting the activity or no locals complain to the police. However, the sheer quantity of people renting campers and stopping overnight in all the same places has exhausted small town Australia's patience and most places we passed had a no camping zone in force. It was similar to New Zealand except there was much more space and a greater chance of back roads to stop for the night where, nobody would spot you and complain. Because our time was short we didn't spend our time driving around looking for a quiet place to sleep, also I quite fancied a shower so we stopped off at a holiday park that had parking spaces for vans, a kitchen to prepare our meals and hot showers. 

Spot the koala.

Coff's Harbour was fun, I had perhaps the longest conversation with a real Australian I have ever had in the camp kitchen block whilst preparing Spagbol. The area wasn't at all touristy and I had the joy of watching ordinary people going about enjoying their leisure time.

Attempted drive-by photo of the Big Banana.

The back of the van in day configuration, This became a nice bed at night time.

The journey to Sydney wash quite a rush, in spite of having a gorgeous beach five minutes away, I didn't get to swim in either place we camped. It was a great experience however, I would love to try it again for a week or longer, just to see what adventures are to be had.
We began the journey fairly early the next day as well, after a pit-stop for some 'Maccas' pancakes and coffee I felt a lot more human and really started to enjoy the journey.

Look, an idiot.

We arrived at Port Stephens with daylight to spare and took the time to find a nice place to stop, we ended up plumping for a spot just behind the dunes from Fingal Bay. The receptionist was incredibly friendly and recommended a couple of places to drive to before sunset. We saw some huge pelicans on the waterfront while looking for a quiet campsite and went for a look.

Pelicans!

The pelicans were feeding at a fisherman's fish-cleaning building where, telling by the smell, a large amount of fish scraps had just been consumed. The fisherman were long gone but the birds were still hanging around looking for anything else that was going or perhaps to digest. A young child or a dog startled the clumsy looking birds into motion and almost simultaneously the whole flock took to the air. With their big necks and ugly feet tucked in, the airbourne pelicans looked almost graceful as they floated in the last of the evening sea breeze, flapping their wings only once or twice a minute yet keeping their bulk perfectly suspended in the air above, like kites.

HMS Endeavour had dropped anchor in the bay. A little bit surreal.

At the top of the hill.

 We jumped back into the van and headed roughly in the direction of Gan Gan Lookout, the van made the steep climb and we parked up at the foot of two huge radio masts. All around the hilltop were these tall red flowered lily-type plants, in the evening light i found their colour almost luminous against the blue sea and the dark green plants on the surrounding hillsides. 

Gan Gan Point lilies.

 Apart from the odd human visitor, we were joined by a beautiful blue-eyed crow who was greedily rifling each flower head for something to eat, developing seeds perhaps, but in the process its head and neck became coloured with pollen. It must be used to gormless humans pointing their gadgets at it and cooing because it didn't bat an eyelid when I followed it around the viewing platform talking at it.

Mr Crow says hello.

 The sun began to set and reality dawned that we didn't know when the supermarket closed in Port Stephens, experience of retailers down under said probably earlier than you think, so we headed down.

Another amazing sunset.

Another glorious morning waking up in the enclosed space of the van, sour wine breath, it always seemed bigger in the dark. I was glad that it wasn't summer because with all the doors and windows buttoned up (except the ceiling vent) to deter a creepy crawly incursion, it was rather hot inside when we woke just before 8am. I was pretty good at switching the van from sleeping to travel mode by now, it's really just a matter of finding places to put things away when you don't need them and being able to get to them when you do. After a chilled out morning and yet another refueling stop in town we got going southwards. 

Stockton sands lay just to the south of where we had stopped for the night, the pictures I had seen show vast sand dunes stretching away into the distance, an image that a child might draw of a desert. Our first sight of the sands where through some hastily built, but very persistent world war two tank traps

As we walked down to the beach to take a look, I snapped a couple of pictures, luckily before my perception of the place had changed. By the time I had reached the bottom, I had realised that the place was really rather dirty. On the beach the usual plastics reigned supreme, but a little in land the effect of careless people could be seen with rubbish from decades of visitors emerging from the sands

A Kitesurfer was going at it all alone out there.

The dunes looked pristine from a distance, there was a tour truck, similar to the one at Fraser Island that would take us into the presumably less polluted yonder. However, we were on a schedule to get to Sydney, unload our things at the hostel and return the van to the depot near the airport. The sands are used for location filming frequently, including this infamous music video, I wonder if they were responsible for some of the 30-odd year old beer cans I saw?

The van drank at an even faster rate as I drove it to the speed limit in the effort to make Sydney in time. How much fuel do I have? How long will it last? Where is the nearest petrol station? How much do I need to put in, bearing in mind I'll be giving the vehicle back in a few hours? I always seem to get that difficult calculation wrong. That day was no exception.

I made Sydney with very little time to spare, luckily there was a parking space right next to the hostel so we could just unload the van and drive it down to the depot. I made it to the depot a little after 5pm, but nobody seemed to notice. The reception guy (German, working holiday visa) checked the exterior of the vehicle, signed the papers that would see the credit card charge removed and took the keys. He seemed like an OK guy.
Later that night, after I'd made it back to the hostel on public transport, I remembered that I had left Paolo's guitar (see the Nimbin picture) in the kitchen area of the van wedged between the sink and the wall where it couldn't move. The office at the returns depot was closed for the night so I called the early the next morning. To my extreme disappointment, when I called the next day the guitar had 'vanished' overnight. No one had seen it or handed it in for a few days, also no one 'remembered where they saw it' and brought it to the lost property room the next day. This made me more angry than it really should have, I guess there are more assholes walking among us than I allow myself to believe. 

Sydney is a fun place, I was getting chatted up by a male hotel manager before I even got back to the hostel! We were staying in the suburb of Glebe while we waited for the flight to Singapore, as well as stunning rooftop views and barbecue nights the place was quite close to a park to stroll in with amazing views of the harbour. The neighbourhood reminded me of my childhood home in Norwood. It was built on the ridge of a hill around the same time using the same materials and architectural styles.  The winter weather was very similar to London in the early summer with only a little chill at night. The big difference was the plants and animals, the trees were mostly local species and at late in the quiet of night, families of possums crashed around in the tree tops searching for things to eat

A Glorious sunset from Glebe rooftops.

...and another.

As I had passed through Sydney in a short time earlier in the trip, I took some time to explore the city. Public transport is patchy where we were staying, but we could catch a bus from a way along the high street or a light rail a way down the hill towards the CBD. The trip had formed a complete circle, even the photographs I took are basically the same.

Deja vous.

We took a long walk along the waterfront, checked out the harbour bridge (again), walked around the opera house where a bus terminal once stood and before that a coastal fort and then along to the botanical gardens. After spending a little time in the parklands we checked out a museum before heading slowly back through the central district with it's over-the-top shiny high rise buildings and people in suits hurrying about. That was all I needed in the way of sight seeing in Sydney, so I could settle back to exploring the little gems in the suburbs, like the micro-brewery below. We ended up there twice in fact, once by ourselves and once with Wendy's friends Mariella and Manuel. 

Beer, Beer, glorious Beer.

Another day we went to the Sydney fish market, there were more tourists there than locals and businesses buying fish, it did have a certain, erm, atmosphere. For some reason I lost my appetite that day. Here is Wendy enjoying her seafood platter, my choco-milk is out of shot.

After another long walk, we passed through part of the city centre once more, however after five days we could safely say we had done and seen much more than your average hostel-goer with the help of a little local knowledge from Manuel, Mariella and Wendy. I even had a couple of very fun days with some of the hostel people including an Australian fellow who had, guess what, checked into a hostel to party. We had the 'pleasure' of witnessing his decline from relatively pleasant and charming Aussie bro to incoherent, incapable and on the hunt for substances to render him insensible. Checked that box. I regret not seeing more of the country and I'm honest about the fact that my schedule didn't allow me to  visit the people that I intended to, in spite of vowing not to keep a schedule. I suppose I'll have to add Australia to the ever-growing 'must visit again soon' list.