Schools out….

… for the summer. Hopefully not forever! all 3 kids have gone back to school over the past 2 weeks and it was a success for all 3.

Did they love wearing masks all day? Nope. Did they feel it was worth it to be able to see their teachers and friends? Absolutely. And while I’m not sure they social distanced properly 💯 the mental lift it provided our whole family was well worth it. I’m again so grateful to their amazing teachers who not only went above and beyond for distance learning, but who also were so incredibly enthusiastic about returning to school. To have that closure on the year was amazing, especially for our kids who have had so many changes… I’m terrified of having 2 months of summer. No BRYC, no visitors from home, no traveling. Right now, no friends and no where to go! Gulp. One day at a time.

Riding home from school on the MRT masks are mandatory and there’s also a no talking rule on public transit.

Avery and myself on the MRT. Most days we took a grab, but a few times we couldn’t get one. I took the MRT alone each day after dropping them off and to go pick them up. Wasn’t too crowded and didn’t feel too scary. Felt normal which felt good.

This week while the girls were in school, Liam was supposed to be doing work in packets from school. Which was a fail. But he and I did have some adventures. We took a big bike ride one day, we rode past each of his 2 best friends’s condos (they don’t live near each other) in a big loop. We also took a walk in the botanic gardens one day. Nice to spend some alone time with him.

Last weekend we rode out bikes down to the formula 1 track. We watched “formula 1, drive to survive” on Netflix so I actually knew who the drivers were. I hope Singapore can figure out how to have the race in September…

Ryan and I ventured to the wet market in Tiong Bahru on Saturday to get our fruits and veggies. First time there since March. Nice to be back, not too crowded. flower stalls weren’t open yet which was sad…

Eggs galore! I can’t get on board with unpasteurized eggs yet. Next level…

All this is happening against the backdrop of the pandemic and the protests in the US. Many days it feels surreal to us. Ryan and I have been talking about how our experience of this pandemic is now so radically different than that of our family and friends in the US that it really isn’t comparable. While there are many things here that I HATE about our lockdown and the painfully slow reopening. What I do appreciate is the level of communication the government provides and the feeling of “we are all in this together and if we each do our part, we will succeed” (though I do hate when they “threaten” to relockdown if cases go up. It feels like, “if you’re bad, we will send you back to your room”. See, my Americanness just keeps bubbling up).

I’ve actually written a few unpublished blog posts about George Floyd’s murder and the subsequent protests. Nothing I write seems to be enough. Which is also why I didn’t ever post anything on social media. It just feels hollow. Again, we can only experience this from a distance. I’m just so incredibly sad that in the US our African American community is treated so badly. And we all knew and chose to look the other way. But now we can’t and shouldn’t look away. Our Declaration of Independence states: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”. We need to make sure that this is true for ALL American. Not just white Americans. And if a few institutions need to be remade to achieve this, maybe it’s time..

I have one other observation about the protests. It is a magnificent thing to have the right to freely protest. It might look a little “messy” to outsiders, but it is a clear way for the people’s voices to be heard. This is not a right in all countries (in Singapore, you need government approval to protest so really, what’s the point?!?). So hold your signs proudly. I’m holding my “Black Lives Matter” sign in my heart from 9,500 miles away.

Selamat Hari Raya!

Monday is another holiday in Singapore. Nope, it’s not the US’s Memorial Day (though that will apply to us). It’s Hari Raya Adilfitri which marks the end of The month of Ramadan. In other parts of the world, it’s called Eid al-Fitri. During the month of Ramadan, Muslims fast everyday from sunrise to sunset. On Hari Raya they usually eat a big celebratory meal with family and friends. The Malay area in Singapore is usually decked out in lights (I just read they did put up the lights and turned them on. They will leave them up until after the lockdown) But, not this year. Still in lockdown. Another celebration via zoom. No one can say this pandemic is targeting one religious group more than the others. Everyone here in Singapore’s taken a hit. Next year I hope we can head down to Kampong Glam, see the lights and grab some beef rendang. Dare to dream.

Funny anecdote. The other day Liam said, “mom, why is Faisal writing ‘happy Hari Raya?’” To which I replied, well Liam, Faisal is Muslim, so he celebrates. I know Liam knew in theory that Faisal was Muslim (they are from Saudi Arabia) but I don’t think he connected it to them celebrating ‘other’ holidays. It’s the best when you can connect another culture or religion with a friend. I’m so happy Liam has Faisal for this.

In other updates, there really are none. We are still locked down (stupid “circuit breaker”). This week we were excited as they announced what phase 1 would look like (it will begin on June 2nd). Our outdoor dining, playing tennis, seeing (a) friend, swimming, going anywhere hopes were dashed. Basically, in phase 1, we can get our Air Con serviced. The other interesting, though not super exciting news for us is, kids are going back to school. Local kids will alternate 1 week in school, 1 week at home beginning on June 2nd. Since they don’t follow the northern hemisphere schedule (as we do) that’s great for them. We have not received official word from our school, other than seniors will go back this Tuesday. They are indicating our kids will also go back to school in some capacity on June 2nd. We will hear next week. While I would normally jump for joy at this news, it’s kinda a “meh” moment as their last day of school is June 11th. They didn’t modify our calendar in hopes expats could go home this summer. Since that’s not happening it’s going to be a long summer in the condo. The theory here is to enable people to go back to work, they have to safely be able to have kids in school. Makes sense, right? Hopefully it works.

Our phase 2 is scheduled to start at LEAST 4 weeks after the beginning of phase 1. So that’s July 1st at the earliest. Phase 2 will gradually add back outdoor recreation, restaurants and retail over multiple months. If our cases spike during that period, back to the beginning. Finally we will reach phase 3, which is “our new normal” how we live until a vaccine or effective therapeutic is discovered. No news on travel. They will open the airport on June 2nd for transits only. No one can enter still and if we leave, we cannot come back until the restriction is lifted. Many expat families are separated with no end in site. It’s so sad.

I’ve been struggling a lot emotionally this week with our continued lockdown news. I really worry that there will be long term damage to the kids with the lack of activity and all the tech. They seem pretty good mentally, but I can’t see how this constant inactivity and staring at screens can be good for them.

Some ASEAN nations are working toward creating “travel bubbles” to try to reopen tourism. This would be great, but we worry that our American passports might exclude us. It’s sadly a difficult time to be an American right now.

I’ll include a few pics from our lockdown life. Again, nothing too exciting here. Stay well my family and friends.

To enter anywhere, you have to scan in and out. The government probably says, Starbucks, again?!?

We explored Emerald Hill on one of our walks. Shop houses right off of Orchard Rd.

Liam’s taken to baking. This week it was croissants. Slightly more like pilsbury crescent rolls, but delicious none the less.

Dear pool, we miss you. Please don’t break while no one uses you. We hope to visit you soon.

We’re buying bikes. We bought this one as a tester. All of us except Avery (she’s too small for them) are getting folding bikes. We can’t wait to get out there!

This is really what our life looks like. The rest of the pics are highlights. She’s at least dressed and we brushed hair. winning

Happy Vesak Day!

Today is a public holiday in Singapore. Which is a little underwhelming during lockdown, but there it is… Singapore is a bit of a religious melting pot which means we have a lot of public holidays. I’m enjoying learning a little about each religion that’s tied to the holiday.

The Thursday holiday was also well timed as were all burnt out. Home based learning is exhausting and Ryan’s 24-7 work schedule is taking a toll. Hard to complain as we’re so very fortunate but everyone has their struggles.

Avery’s been having a more and more difficult time with home based learning. I find this extra frustrating as I have the time to spend with her to help her. My having the time doesn’t equal her wanting to do the work. I finally contacted her teacher yesterday who was wonderful. We agree that we don’t want the outcome of this to be that she hates school. Her teacher is also concerned that the transition to a new country/school then the pandemic right on the heels of that might be a little too much for our little nugget. I think she might be right. The school has a lot of psychological resources that I think we will be utilizing. I’m struggling right now to set aside the guilt I feel about this. In the mean time we’re going to do more reading together, play more games and bake and worry less about finishing every school task. It’s teacher approved…

I’m also worrying a lot about our physical health during this lockdown. We move less and less each day and are on tech more and more. I’m very much missing a yard and a driveway. I worry about what the long term repercussions will be from this. To that end, I tortured the family (yes we all went, violating the only one adult rule, we haven’t been caught yet) with a walk along the river to the Merlion. Probably about a 4 mile journey round trip. Liam and Avery took scooters. With the masks and the heat, this was an accomplishment. We’re happy to report it’s still there! Here are some pics from the walk.

Avery scootering along the Singapore River

Art.

Finally had the space to take the cheesy drinking the Merlion water pic.

It was nice to see that there’s still a world out there. Also so many people were out walking and biking. Almost all people were wearing masks (they’re compulsory here) which is great but it’s sad not to see people’s smiles anymore. There’s a detachment now that’s sad. Hopefully it won’t be for forever.

Our lockdown is in place until June 1st. That feels so far away right now. But they are starting to lay out the plan of what opening up will look like which feels positive. No word on school yet. The last day of the school year is June 11th so they would only go back for a few days. The kids want to go back to see friends but I don’t really care either way. The whole summer looming ahead feels scary right now. We had planned for visitors and traveling. I’m mourning the loss of that. But we have our zoo membership, museum memberships, and cable car membership. Camp mom, here we come!

I’ll close with a few more pics from the last few weeks. Nothing exciting, but that’s true for all of us, right?

Virtual lessons have continued. Liam’s actually practicing a fair amount. Go figure…

We tried making a “classroom”. Plan was shortly abandoned.

I took a much needed solo walk to the Henderson wave. Almost no one there.

On our walks we found a quiet street for the kids to scooter. It has all “black and white” houses on it which are historical homes that the British officers lived in when Singapore was a colony. One of the few historical buildings that haven’t been demolished. #housegoals

Parked illegally outside our local mall where we grocery shop. Despite the cost, the cars we see here are unreal. There’s a house we walk by sometimes that has a fleet of Ferrari’s. Crazy.

This week they removed the restriction about “exercising” or “walking” on condo grounds. Kids are happy to be able to come down now for a quick jump or scooter. It’s the small things.

Despite the optimistic pics, this is how most of the time is spent.

Luckily we have beautiful skies that never get old. Stay well 💕

The 3 ring circus…

There’s not been much to share over the past few weeks. Like a majority of the world, on April 7th we went into a “lockdown”. Originally, this was planned to be until May 4th. This week, the prime minister spoke and extended the lockdown until June 1st with additional restrictions. Though this was expected, it was still heartbreaking. Lockdown in a city is tough. No backyard. No driveway, we cannot use the grounds, playground or pool in our condo complex. We are still allowed out for exercise, but only alone. The “rules” are very unclear if your children are allowed to accompany you. As penalties are stiff here (Monterey fines and the possibility of losing your employment pass are all possibilities) it doesn’t seem worth it. So mostly we stay in. Groceries and easy to get and plentiful. we are lucky. Ryan’s job is busier than ever, the kids home based learning has been excellent and our apartment is very comfortable. We also added Janeth, our “helper” (foreign domestic worker) to our family. Janeth is from the Philippines and has been a FDW for about 10 years. She has a grown daughter of her own. She has our condo super organized, clean and running like a top. She never uses the dishwasher and only infrequently uses the dryer. She’s also an amazing cook. She is appalled by my over stocked “American” pantry and freezer. She can make delicious food out of few ingredients. Needless to say, she is my new favorite person. If we hadn’t already hired her 6 weeks ago, would we still have? Probably not. But we have been very lucky that she has worked out so well so far. She has made me obsolete and since the whole reason to hire her was to give me more “freedom” away from the condo it seems silly now. Though it has made home learning for Avery (and sometimes Liam) much less stressful since I can focus on that. I’d like to say I’m using my time well by exercising and reading more, but that’s not always true. I’m trying to find a schedule and balance and not feel guilty that I’m not vacuuming and doing dishes anymore.

Here’s a few pictures from our lockdown life. I’m sure it looks both the same and a little different than back home in Fairfield. While we are missing having a separate office and extra space for video game playing, we are making do.

Avery does her school work in her bedroom (that desk she HAD to have is coming in handy now). Some days she’s super productive and finishes all her work easily. Other days she struggles. She requires my presence to get anything done. I have no idea how people who are also trying to work can get this done. I’m trying not to think about the future when she has to go back to school and we will be at square -1 with separation anxiety. I take heart that she’s learning and happy and I have this time to spend with her. Her class has only had one “live” class to date. It was ok, but crazy and at the end they were all pleading with the teacher to go back to school. It was heart wrenching. My guess is they won’t do that again soon… we have one on one meetings with her teacher a few times per week which are much more effective. The teachers record video lessons with activities. They also have to leave a lot of voice and video comments with their work. So far it seems to work.

Ella also works in her room on a makeshift desk using our balcony table and chair. She has live classes daily from 8:30-3. She’s totally independent and actually seems to like online learning. She spends her free time chatting away with friends and playing games online. Ironically, she seems happier than ever…

Liam kinda works everywhere. He starts at the table but frequently spends time working in Avery’s room and in his room. He has live calls a few times a day. Both Avery and Liam have instructional videos followed by activities. In the beginning, Liam was finishing by 10:30/11 which was difficult as both girls school takes most of the day. After spring break they changed the “pacing” of his day with set times for specific tasks. It has helped immensely. While he’s doing great, he misses school and his friends the most. He gets frustrated and teary the easiest of the kids. Though he *can* do his work independently, we’ve discovered he needs “moral support” more than we initially thought. Right now I’m planning to reconfigure Avery’s room a little so he can work in there too.

They have gym (note Ryan’s “home office” in the background. He’s on calls all day while the kids play, jump rope, etc behind him. He never loses his temper and has really been a trooper).

Liam’s swim team has a daily group workout. Sometimes we join him. He’s been a trooper about doing it each day. They watch them and call them out if they’re slacking. He may be in better shape at the end of lockdown than he was in the beginning.

Masks are mandatory here now (violations can be reported by other citizens or by patrolling enforcement). It sounds strict, but it doesn’t feel that way. The government here is very good at explaining things clearly and rationally and explaining why something is good for you, your family and the community. The overall population here is very compliant. While they are very hot to wear, we are slowly getting used to them. If they are our long term ticket out of lockdown, we will happily wear them.

Ryan’s company sent us dinner a few nights ago. What a treat! Burgers, steak, fries, salad, and clam chowder. An American feast! So nice and it came on the day when we found out the lockdown was extended until June 1st. It definitely took the edge off…

A perk of the 20th floor. Beautiful skies. I love watching storms roll in. We get huge booming thunder and lightning storms. Nice to have time to appreciate them.

Balcony bubbles. We love to watch them float away and hope they make our neighbors smile.

I tried joining the ranks of sourdough bakers. Too much work for bad results and a lot of waste. Somethings are better when made by someone else. For me, Sourdough is in that camp.

The kids have been baking. Home ec. Liam made a wonderful lemon cake (like the Starbucks cake). So good…

What am i reading? I was trying to slog my way through my Asian studies book club book (Istanbul by Orhan Pamuk). I was majorly on the struggle bus with it so I’m taking a break. Reading this fascinating little book (an interview by an American journalist with the founding prime minister. His son is the current prime minister) I’m enjoying learning more about our adopted country and it’s leaders/philosophy. Truly fascinating. The chapter on his thoughts on American presidents during his tenure of worth the read alone. Not what you would expect. Planning to read his autobiography next. He is truly a complicated person…

Some final thoughts. It’s really hard to watch this pandemic playing out in the US from half a world away. We see all the news, no media is restricted here (except porn…). It’s hard not to compare how it’s being handled in Asia with how it is in the US. But the further into this we get, the more it seems apparent that the US cannot go down the same path as other nations. Will this possibly cost more American lives? Yep. Is that the price to pay to keep the US intact. Maybe… I don’t pretend to know any more than anyone else. I do believe in science (in fact, it seems crazy to even write that) and I believe there have to be experts. When we discount experts in anything we are saying that education doesn’t matter. I can’t live in that world.

The other thought we discuss regularly is are we glad we are here in Singapore instead of home in the US? The answer is still yes. Our extended family at home in the US is healthy so that hasn’t caused any stress (and hopefully won’t). In general we feel safe and happy here. We miss some things (the yard. The extra space..) but love our view and still feel our life here has future potential. Hopefully that won’t change.

Stay well everyone! 💕

A circuit breaker.

Starting tomorrow (Tuesday, April 7th) Singapore is implementing what they are calling “a circuit breaker”. Our cases have been increasing at an alarming rate and even the super stealthy contact tracers can’t find the source for all the cases. At this point there is concern (probably warranted) that we have community spread. This is a little heartbreaking as Singapore has been working so hard since January to keep the virus in check. It just shows how tricky it is. In the beginning of March, our numbers were really low. Then people began fleeing the rest of the world (looking at you US and UK) to come home to Singapore. This started happening before they completely shut down travel and issuing everyone coming in stay at home notices. It was probably only a few days before they were mandated to quarantine (they’re now put in a hotel for 14 days) but it was enough.

This chart shows the stay at home notices issued. right around when our cases began to climb.

Hopefully our month at home will put it back in check. As of last night we had 1309 cases and 6 deaths. Yesterday was the biggest day yet with 120 new cases. Everyone here who tests positive is hospitalized. They’re currently converting the Singapore expo to be a facility to house people who are positive, but mostly well. Happy to hear they will continue to hospitalize everyone.

I’m not 💯 sure what the circuit breaker will look like. We can still go out for exercise and food. We can get delivery and take away. All of our condo facilities are now closed (no pool 😢). The government is employing “safe distancing ambassadors” to make sure people are complying with the measures. We’re about to see how strict things get here. They’ve gone to distance learning for the local schools, which is Singapore’s pride and joy, so I would guess it will be pretty serious here for the next month to get things under control and the kids back to school ASAP. Not to mention the economy being decimated.

All that said, we’re still taking daily “forced mom marches”. Her are some pics from our more recent adventures.

Friday night we walked to pickup our “take away” from Nando’s (a chain of peri peri chicken, we love it!). We discovered this “cannonball” tree. Pretty crazy, right?

Friday morning we had a pretty good rainstorm. When it rains here. It rains! I tried to get a video to show….

Saturday the kids scootered and I jogged/walked along the Singapore river to fort canning park.

With a lot of Purell, I let them go down the awesome slides. Ella was a good girl and refused.

Sunday we all walked to our local community center to pick up our government issued cloth face masks. Daddy daughter chat time.

Awesome playground for the future. Too crowded for safe social distancing.

Another reflexology walk. I love these things!

Happy feet. The kids and I decided we want to build one in Fairfirld when we move home. what open space should we put it in?

What is this thing? We have a lot of botany homework..

Today’s forced mom march was the southern ridges. These are a series of 5 parks all connected. We had to take a grab to get there and back (we all wore our masks). I’m assuming we won’t be able to do that starting tomorrow, so we enjoyed our last adventure for a while.

In the wave with social distancing markings!

We saw 2 hornbill’s fly over here. Too busy watching to take pics.

Found a nature playground. Working on our raking skills.

Heading up to the canopy walk. Last stop. Very tired.

Heading out through an old growth rain forest to find our grab home. 10k in the books! Trooper kids!

That’s probably the last of our adventures not close to home for a while. Stay home and stay well everyone…

Distance learning

So it happened… last week we started distance learning. All my family and friends in the US who have been doing this for weeks already have my sympathy. It’s not for the faint of heart. In my children’s defense, both Ella and Liam are almost 💯 self sufficient. But for those in grade 2 and below. Wow. While Avery did a great job and was enthusiastic, she did require me to be with her the whole time. And her teacher really gave her a lot! She wrote an entire book on Thursday! My hat’s also off to both parents trying to work from home and quarterback distance learning. I’m not sure it’s possible.

All in all, the kids school did an amazing job with it. Ella alternates live class days (done via google hangouts) and homework days. Her live class days are pretty full 8:30-3 (with short breaks and An hour and a half lunch). her homework day was pretty short, she was pretty much finished by lunch. I would have loved for Liam to have had more work. He finished between 10:30 and 11:30 each day and then annoyed his sisters. Avery worked pretty solid all 3 days. I was so proud of her. We’re now on spring break until April 13th. Then more distance learning until at least may 5th.

Liam doing PE. I loved the PE classes. Avery asks to do them still!

First day she worked on her bed. Not comfortable…

We brought in our table from the balcony. Better…

We added a little home-ec into Liam’s schedule

More home-ec. Poor Ryan working from home. It’s a lot.

More gym…

3 exhausting days. Hopefully it will only be for 3 more weeks, but who knows….

Life skills…

Well, it happened. We are officially “remote learning”. For how long we don’t know. They have had a plan in place since January so now is go time. Today was a staff development day to tie up loose ends. Tomorrow is go time. We have school Tuesday-Thursday then Friday we are on spring break until April 13th. They have not made any announcements about where school will be then. As the Prime Minister said, Singapore has put up its dikes. We’re now seeing if there are any leaked. Crossing my fingers. We are still having a fair uptick in cases due to citizens returning from over seas. Here’s where we are at as of last night:

Discharged to isolation means they are still testing positive for Covid19 but no longer have any symptoms. Patients can’t be officially discharged until they test negative in 3 consecutive tests.

Unsettlingly, there was a positive case confirmed in our condo complex today. Not in our direct building but still unsettling. We’ve really been trying to limit our time in the outside world. I haven’t been to an actual grocery store since early last week. Amazon prime now has been serving me well with a quick trip to the wet market last Thursday for produce. Ryan’s mostly working from home (he goes into the office once or twice a week for a few hours). We’re lucky he can walk. I haven’t taken the MRT in about 2 weeks and I only took the bus once last week. It’s sad that we are so confined but I’m not complaining since we’re still allowed out and about, with 1 meter distance!

Another interesting thing about living here is we get American news as well as Singaporean news (we read the straights times) and Asian news (read and watch CNA from time to time). It’s interesting to read the different perspectives. Singapore’s prime minister was on CNN this Sunday morning. It was an interesting interview if curious:

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/videos/tv/2020/03/29/exp-gps-0329-loong-on-what-us-can-learn-from-singapore.cnn

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/videos/tv/2020/03/29/exp-gps-0329-loong-on-covid-and-china.cnn

Otherwise, here’s some pics from our limited adventures.

Sitting on the steps of ION mall. This is normally packed with people basically day and night. I was completely alone on Friday at 9:30am. Surreal, especially as “Dance Monkey” was blaring from the speakers.

Over the weekend we were pretty quiet. Had “take away” for dinner Friday night instead of our usual meal out. Saturday we took a mom forced march. Back to the botanic gardens. A few pics…

Sunday we stayed home all day except for a swim in the pool. We cooked and baked and started a 2000 piece puzzle. We hope to finish before we move back to the US…

Making progress. I need my New Years buddies to come in and help me out though..

We’ve been getting a few geckos in the condo recently. Last week I woke up to this guy:

Luckily Liam will get rid of them for me. They are quick! This one was captured and released. One scooted under the fridge before we could get it. Last night there was one in our bedroom. It went under our dresser. Ryan tried to tell me it couldn’t climb up the bed. But it can climb up 20 stories of a condo building? 🤔 we also have a bird that’s visiting our wet kitchen frequently. My neighbor upstairs said one came all the way into the main kitchen. Might have to keep the door shut. Ahhh critters.

Today we went to Bukit Timah Nature Preserve for our outing. This is a little bit of a trek from our condo. We took a grab (like Uber) instead of the bus or MRT.

Climbed to the highest point in Singapore. Took about 20 minutes with lots of stops…

Some pretty steep stairs. We came down them and went up the longer, less steep way.

Next we took the cave trail. They believe these caves were built by the Japanese during the occupation to secretly store supplies. The were also some monkeys out in front doing some, ahem, “monkey business”.

View of the city. Looking down toward where we live.

Sounds of the Rain Forest. The high pitch squeal you here are the cicadas. So loud!!!

A taxidermy pangolin in the nature preserve center. There are a few wild pangolins left here in Singapore but sightings are very rare.

Taxidermy tiger. It’s hard to imagine these used to roam free in Singapore…

Zip line! They had to scare away a monitor lizard to ride.

Saw a caluga! It’s a difficult to see lump on the center tree a little over halfway up. Kids were excited.

On our grab ride home, our driver told us to make a mixture of coconut oil and garlic to ward off mosquitoes. He also eats raw garlic every day to ward off Covid19. You never know, maybe he’s onto something?

After our outing we came home and learned some life skills. Our condo here has 6 toilets. Mama needs some help!

Did our homework and made sure our online learning was ready to go! Liam also had a live dry land training with his swim team for 30 minutes. Worked great!

Ended the night with a beautiful Singapore sunset. Might be a crazy world, but it’s still beautiful…

Finally, like Fairfield is doing, tonight Singapore clapped at 8pm for all the medical workers, first responders, shop workers, delivery people and just general Singapore pride. The video was from a neighbors condo who lives lower than us. It was very fun and awesome to see people clapping not just from our complex but from all the complexes we could see. #SGUnited!

From our condo.

Stay well 💕💕💕

This, I believe…

You know the NPR show, “This, I Believe”? With social distancing, I’ve been doing a lot of solo walking (like 2-3 hours a day). This gives me a fair amount of thinking time. Scary. Moving to a foreign country coupled with a pandemic hitting at the same time has really allowed for a serious life reflection. So here it is, This, I Believe:

1. Every human is important to at least one other human. Even if you are 💯 alone in the world, you still at one point had a mother who loved you. Love is a constant no matter what nationality or race that you are. To someone, you are their whole world. No one is expendable. Anyone telling you otherwise is telling you a tale. Statistics are just that until they become personal.

2. I truly know nothing of the world. This thought is simultaneously scary and liberating at the same time. And that’s the secret, right? The more you see of the world, the more you realize what’s out there and that you can never see it all or learn it all or understand it. And that’s ok. The flip side is it makes it easy, when you are living in your comfortable little corner of the world to think you do know everything. You’re “educated”, right? But that’s the thing, what makes sense for you, in the context of your life, might make no sense for someone else. At the end of the day all we can do is to try to listen more than we talk, to keep on learning and to be forgiving of both ourselves and others. We are all just trying to do our best on our journey.

Woah, I warned you, too much alone time. I’ll leave you with a few pics from my walking travels. I’ve also learned I can really walk almost everywhere in Singapore. With enough time and a good shower at the end!

There are little shrines all over Singapore. I discovered one in front of the condo right across the street from us. A child Buddha.

The Buddha reminded me. I had my first Asian studies book club this week (on zoom). We read “Nine Lives: In search of the sacred in modern India” by William Dalrymple. It was a beautifully written book made more interesting by the amazingly diverse group of women in my book club. Again, I know so little of the world. But, I can’t wait to keep learning.

We frequently walk down to the Singapore river and we always go to the left and walk in Robertson Quay and Clarke Quay. I kept wondering, what if I go right? So yesterday I went right! That part turns into a PCN trail (the Alexandra park connector) and snakes it’s way through more of the local areas in Singapore. This is what I really love about walking. What you see. On this path there were HDB condos, schools, exercise areas (Singaporeans are very good about exercising) and playgrounds. Such a lovely trail. We are so blessed to live somewhere that values natural spaces in the middle of a big city! Sometimes I even forget I’m one of 5.5 million!

The Alexandra Canal. This leads to the Singapore River.

It’s not always perfectly clean here. They have these areas in the river where they catch the sludge and garbage. How Singapore deals with water is truly an amazing feat of engineering. this river has a lot of runoff from the street water drains. I’m sure they have people that come and clean it out. Also, the turtles didn’t seem to mind… if you’re geeky like me, here’s a link to Singapore’s water process: https://www.pub.gov.sg/watersupply/watertreatment

Terrible selfies. Very sweaty but I love this tile wall…

Mangos!!! The bottom is an apple mango (named for its shape, not flavor) Middle is a Thai honey mango. Not sure what the top is. We’ll see! So many varieties! Have I mentioned I love mango? I eat one everyday…

The Singaporean bakery is still open! Yippee! The left are pineapple and coconut tarts. The upper right, I ate for lunch, the auntie that worked there told me to get it. It was sticky rich with a curry chicken in the middle. I should have bought 10… so good. The bottom is 1 kueh lapis (Liam’s wanted to try it) and 3 kueh dadar. We’ll see if the kids like them….

This week I realized I’m going to have to embrace cooking here. Secretly, I had planned to do little cooking as the food here is just so good (when others make it). But living a socially distanced life means more cooking. So this bad boy arrived last night. Already made tahini. Pesto is next. Hummus and smoothies are also coming. silver linings.

I’ll leave you with these cheery guys. Flower stall is also still open (as was the whole wet market). We’re in a weird slush period where we’re supposed to social distance, but all the shops, restaurants, schools and work are still open. still not sure where it will end, but I’m stocked with food and ready to hunker down. We will continue to follow the government directives as we have been since mid January. It’s been working so far. Just hoping I can keep my walks…

Island living

Singapore may be an island, but under normal circumstances it’s hyper connected to the outside world. As of tonight at 11:59pm we are disconnected. If you can get a flight out, you may leave but to come back you have to be a Singaporean or deemed “essential”. That coupled with the US raising the travel advisory to a level 4 really is a reminder that we are on an island here and that we are committing to riding this virus out here in Singapore. While we still feel good about this decision, it still feels big. There will most likely be no visitors this summer or travel for the foreseeable future. We are stuck on the island of Singapore. While it is a bit unsettling, at least all 5 of us are together. Many families here are split up all over the world. We have many things to be grateful for.

Besides the restriction of travel, there are more social distancing measures being put into place. All stores have markings where to stand to give space to other patrons. The international school community is in a little bit of flux. Some have shut down early for spring break, some are doing remote learning and some (like ours) are following the MOE guidelines and remaining open with increased social distancing. So far throughout this the SG government has provided clear and decisive guidance. We see no reason not to continue to follow their guidelines. So our kids continue to go to school. Their desks were placed a meter apart today. We’ll see if this works. It feels like Singapore is threading a needle right now. We’ve had an uptick of cases. Mostly Singaporeans fleeing home from elsewhere in the world. But there are a few cases each day that don’t have an immediate source. These are worrying… hopefully the amazing contact tracers keep working their magic so we can live a little bit of life (while appropriately distanced of course!).

Onto the pictures! Avery leaned how to say soup dumpling in Mandarin. It’s “Xiao long bao”. So on Sunday we had dim sum for lunch so she could have some. The soup dumplings were demolished immediately, but I did get a picture of the animal steam buns:

Don’t let the steam bun in front of her fool you, she refused to try it. I of course loved it. There was a sweet corn paste in the middle. Yum.

No more AWA walks. They’ve discontinued all activities for social distancing. So I took myself for a walk today. I went with the botanic gardens as I can walk there from home. I feel like I’m becoming a little of an amateur botanist since I’ve walked there so much. It’s always beautiful and I always see something new.

New orchid plantings are always essential!

The zoomba aunties are still at it. Socially distanced of course!

I found a reflexology walk! It felt awesome, I will be coming here often.

Prayer plants. Sending love and prayers to you all!

Ginger plants are everywhere here! Did you know a banana is in the ginger family? There are 1500 different ginger species.

The other plant we have in abundance here are palms. I never knew there were so many varieties or how HUGE they could grow. The palms here make the trees in Florida look tiny.

Finally my favorite tree here, the strangler fig. They are an invasive species that kills its host but makes a beautiful tree in the end.

Look in the middle of the V. It wouldn’t be a Botanic garden trip with out a clouded monitor!

Sorry for the repeat of travels but, like everyone, our world is getting smaller. Wash those haves and stay well!

An average Thursday.

Update on the Covid19 situation here in SG. Yesterday we had our highest number of cases to date, 47, putting Singapore at 313 cases. Of the 47, 33 of them were picked up at the airport temperature scanner and were residents trying to get home from Europe or the US. Now all entries into Singapore are under a mandatory 14 day quarantine. Since this was just implemented, it’s a little worrying to think there are people who entered prior to the mandatory quarantine that could be walking around. But there is a LOT of pressure socially and from the government to self quarantine so hopefully that’s happening.

The kids school had their first parent test positive yesterday. We all knew this would happen eventually. All we know is the students were asymptomatic and were in the middle school. If they were in your child’s class, they said you would be contacted separately. We didn’t receive any contact, so assuming they were not in Ella’s classes. Our kids are off school today and tomorrow anyway for conferences. A few of the other international schools closed early this week, ahead of their spring breaks. There’s a fair amount of parent pressure for our school to close. So far the school has been sticking with the Ministry of Health guidelines and they are still keeping schools open. We will see what Monday brings.

This morning we had our virtual parent-teacher-child conferences for Liam and Ella. The overall take away from them are they are doing great and have transitioned beautifully into the new school. It was nice to be able to speak with Ella’s teachers and hear how they think she’s doing. It was a big leap for her. Not just moving countries, but also moving to a different academic structure. We wanted her teachers to know we are also looking for any gaps of knowledge she may have. So far if there are any, she seems to have overcome them! So proud of her! Liam too. Not only is he rocking the academics, but his teacher said he has been integral in pulling a student who used to not have anyone to play with at recess into the group. That made my heart happy to hear. She also said he makes her happy to come to work each day. Way to go buddy!!!

This afternoon we walked to the botanic gardens To get some exercise. We are starting to try to limit our public space time a little. Trying not to overreact yet, but just be conscious.

Not sure how well you can see, but there are 2 giant water monitors in the mangroves. very cool.

Might have stopped for an ice cream float…. I had an avocado milk. Yum.

Yesterday I went for a walk with the AWA women at Fort Canning. Fort Canning was originally a Malaysian palace. Then when the British colonized, it was the site if their fort. I took the bus there as I thought it was further away. But I ended up walking home as it was so close. I will definitely take the kids back. Not only beautiful but lots of interesting history.