Alien Plans

My passport is ready to be picked up at the Embassy. This morning I said to myself that I could do it on Wednesday. Today felt like a relax and take another weekend day-day. Then I thought to myself would it not be a great way to start the week? I could get it over with. Instead of knowing I had to do it on Wednesday morning I could do it right away and get the day going. Embassy passport errands close at twelve so I had two hours to get ready and head over there. It only takes twenty minutes with the subway. I showered quickly, blow-dried my hair (and lost a fistful of it) and got dressed. My window of opportunity was closing so I put my old passport in the bag in case they needed it and looked up. There is one place in the bookshelf that is meant for my four cards. My ID, MRT-card, credit card and d'Leedon access card. Two were missing. I did not panic. I sighed. I knew exactly were my ID and MRT cards were. In John's wallet. John's wallet was in John's pocket. John himself was at work.

Wednesday it is. Today will be a weekend day-day. I will write on my book and I will eat the pasta with shrimps from yesterday's dinner. It was good, a bit spicy for me but John only used one small, tiny chilli. I am not weak, but my body is. Last night it took almost two hours to finish the meal. During that time we watched a movie called Arrival. It was a great movie. It had a good tempo and content, decent acting and brilliant CGI. The story was highly interesting and I do recommend watching it. John said it was like a homage to Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I watched that movie when I was just a kid but I remember it vividly. At the time I was scared, even though I knew it was made up, but it felt real. Aliens have always felt real to me. I do not believe they will visit us or that they are of any kind that is presented in the media these days. What I do believe is that there are planets out there where some kind of life-form is thriving.

Speaking of aliens - I saw Venus and Mars yesterday. Venus shines like a bright star and Mars can be seen as a small red dot slightly above it. I love watching the sky and imagining the discs around the sun. Seeing the planets makes me feel bigger opposite to smaller. I think that even though humans are small in comparison to the universe, we are pretty big for acknowledging and understanding the other planets in our solar system. We have huge minds for thinking metaphorically outside the box (the box being planet Earth). I am constantly keeping myself updated on the new photos of the planets, the information provided by various scientists. I could never do that myself and I am very grateful that they share this with everyone everywhere.

Bryan's Birthday

We were at a birthday party last night. Our friend Bryan turned twenty nine and he invited a bunch of people from the chat to his place. We met Ash and Steve at the Serangoon MRT station and bought soda and chips. A taxi took us to Bryan's home. It was a four story building and the stairs were scary slippery. I asked why they had no elevator. I could have used it, but no accident happened so it was all good.

We gathered on the roof. It was already dark and a full moon was slowly creeping up behind some trees. It was beautiful! A grill was burning, cooking food for anyone to eat. There was chicken, beef, salmon, varieties of vegetables and fruit, garlic bread and other things I probably missed. It was a casual party. The girls gathered up in a group and sat by themselves out of the way from the food supply. I was part of that group (since I am a girl) and for the first time since moving to Singapore I felt like I belonged. I have not had a group of girlfriends in four years. It felt familiar, like we all spoke a secret language and we all understood each other without having to fake who we truly are. Maybe it was just me, maybe I just felt this way because of my history, but if that is the case then I am grateful for these warm and kind women. We are all very different but I feel like I can be myself around them.

At one point during the evening one friend came up with a burning birthday cake. We all burst out singing happy birthday and the candles were blown out. Cake was served to everyone who wanted some. It was really good. Chocolate cake with cherry inside. Ash wrote happy birthday and all our names on a card in the last minute and handed it over. I think it was appreciated. He laughed about it being written while he cut up the cake.

Around eleven the birthday-boy and some others headed down to his room. Upstairs it started to rain. I was starting to feel tired and asked if it was time to leave. We thought we would share a cab with Ash and Steve back to the station, but after half an hour of consideration they wanted to stay longer than John and I. So the two of us thanked for the invite and said good bye to everyone. We called an UberPool and had company from a deadly quiet girl in the car. The driver sighed and honked the horn at so many cars. It took a surprising twenty or so minutes to get home and yet it felt like we were at the far of end of Singapore. No matter how far away we travel from our home it almost always takes around twenty to thirty minutes to get back. Singapore is not a big country. It feels smaller than it looks on Maps. I am surprised, but I like it here.

Uncomfortably Confident

I am having trouble with my clothes. They do not feel like me. I have not found my style yet and I am ever so confused to what I enjoy wearing. I want something that makes me feel unstoppable instead of just comfortable. When I was in my teens I wore tunic and cosy sweaters over simple tank tops. I grew out of that style around fifteen years old.

Then I started wearing a lot more jeans and colourful shirts. I had heavier make up and collected more and more jewellery. I liked the looks - I fitted in with everybody else. I did not stand out but neither did I blend in. I felt like I had chosen the clothes that made me acceptable. Most of the times I did not feel comfortable. The jackets were small and the jeans too tight. The year 2011, when I was seventeen, I got pneumonia. Probably because I walked around in a thin shirt under a fake leather jacket in minus twenty degrees Celsius, but hey at least I looked good. I was sick for over a month, spent most of that time in bed and slept sitting up because I had trouble breathing.

After that illness I switched schools and made some new friends. I changed my style and tried to find something I enjoyed wearing. It was a mix of things. This time I started wearing cardigans underneath my leather jackets (at this point I also bought a real leather jacket which I loved). I started wearing a lot more colour, not just on my shirts but my jeans as well. I bought my lovely red woollen bowler hat and experimented a lot with different styles. It was a complicated year. I had a good friends and I enjoyed my strange outfits.

  

When I moved to Stockholm this look stuck around for a while. I wore colours and cosy sweaters, the I fit in style came back with the change of yet another school but this time I mixed it with the me style. Still I was not truly happy with my closet even though some clothes were favourites. I bought new things but nothing felt right.

I met John. I still had my strange style that changed from day to day. It was difficult to pinpoint what I was since it was this huge mix of all my previous styles. I even started wearing his clothes. He made me feel secure and eventually my style became relaxed. I wore large shirts and coloured jeans. I felt good about myself and comfortable in my clothes.

Then something happened. I think it was when my brain realised I had gone from young adult to an actual adult. My clothes did not match my age any longer. I felt like a woman trying to fit in with the teens. A lot of clothes were just hanging in the closet, others were put in a trunk. When we started cleansing our belongings before moving to Singapore we found a lot of clothes just laying there. Neither one of us knew what was actually in there. We gave it all away. We could only bring a small amount of clothes with us and so we packed all the summer clothes we owned. Many which still felt like my teen-style.

I bought a lot of new clothes here in Singapore. The old ones are tucked away at the top of the closet. They feel wrong. I try to buy clothes in a style I have never worn before. Recently I bought my first shirt with holes over the shoulders. Another shirt is my first to not stay on the shoulders at all but hang in a straight line across the chest. I do not buy a lot of things, just small things here and there. Yet I can not say that I have found my style. I have lost my interesting shirts with strange prints, I no longer have any bright coloured jeans, just the safe, desaturated ones. I have a black skirt I wear sometimes, but the other two skirts I own has never seen the light of day (or night since they look more to be evening outfits). I feel like the clothing industry has nothing to offer me. I can not find anything that truly says Ellie at age twenty two being at a good place in life. Not many things makes me feel like I am wearing what represents me. Some do, and those I like and wear a lot, but others just reminds me of someone I used to be. I have changed and so has my style, but I have very few clothes that can match my personality.

Sweaty Weather Either A

For once, I left the apartment before John went to work. I am one of those annoying morning people. I was wide awake before my alarm started ringing at ten minutes to eight and immediately rose from the bed. Ymir lied sleeping in the bathroom so I even woke up the cat. I fed the cat and I fed myself before anyone else started waking up.

Annika and I were attending one of SWEA's events that started nine at Sentosa Island. I had estimated that it would take us thirty minutes to get there with taxi (since the estimated time with subway and bus was over an hour). Unfortunately we left the apartment quarter to nine and so we were already destined to be late. When we finally arrived, after spending too much money getting there, there was no group waiting for us. We looked around for quite a while, asking people if they had seen a group of women walking past. They were not there, so we started walking with the sea on one side and amazing buildings on the other.

After a while we bumped into a group of women, speaking a language we recognised and asked them if they were SWEA. Yes, well of course they were. Most of them were dressed in gym-clothes but a few, just like Annika and I, wore regular clothes. There was no indication on the website that this was a power-walk, thus there seemed to be some confusion about the tempo. The group was between ten and fifteen women, but we only walked with four of them. Eventually they caught up and we met some of the others. Nobody was even close to my age. All of them were between thirty five and sixty. It is not that I can not hang out with people in that age since some of our friends here in Singapore are much older than we are, but my expectations had been where I thought I could at least meet one in my age and make a friend. One of them recommended a young woman living at d'Leedon and she could not be more than twenty five. Another gave me the number of her daughter who was apparently the same age as me (if not one year older or so).

The group came back to the point where they had started. Some left to go home and others wanted a fika. We decided to go to Joe & the Juice which I think is overpriced for small portions. Annika bought us each a juice and shared an avocado chicken sandwich. We sat down amongst our fellow countrymen and talked about things. The woman to my left talked about SWEA and tried to show me where dengue-cases had appeared in Singapore. She also tried to invite me to a group on Facebook but claimed that there was more information on the computer. I bit my tongue to not be rude and explain a thing or two. The woman to my right talked about moving to Singapore recently with her husband. She told me I looked like her sister's daughter (or something) and I had trouble understanding if that was something I could answer to. Our conversation was short. The two women then leaned over my chair to talked to each other about a family situation where left-woman's dad had gotten diagnosed with cancer. I felt like I could not interrupt and not join the conversation. It felt awkward and I felt in the way. Eventually I had enough and asked if the left-woman wanted to switch places so that I could talk to Annika. I asked if we could leave.

Annika and I explored the small east side of Sentosa Island. Lots of huge villas, most looking seemingly alike, not many looked like someone was living there. At the end of the island we saw the marina and the skyscrapers. To the left we saw a green area, possibly a golf course even though I failed to see any flags. There we saw a bird. It looked like a black pelican with shorter beak. Its wings were half folded and it had something sticky in its beak. It did not look well. We decided to go back the way we had come and find someone to tell. Annika explained the situation to a guard sitting in a little booth in the middle of the road. He said he would call and reached for his phone as we left, but when I looked back he was not on the phone. I did not trust him. It started to rain and we found shelter on a floating platform with a group of Indian workers. We stayed a little while for the rain to calm down and in the meantime we decided where to eat. Annika asked for the direction to the bus that would take us to the bridge over to HarbourFront.

On our way to the bus stop we walked to this door that I had noticed at our arrival that morning. It said Rangers and so we knocked to let them know about the bird. At first no one answered the door, but when we turned our backs two rangers opened it behind us. They seemed confused. I stammered an explanation, having been talking Swedish the whole day my English had not been warmed up, until Annika helped and made the errand quick. The ranger took my name and number. It felt like they cared and would go look for the bird. Unfortunately I never received any calls about this so I have no idea what happened to it.

At the bus Annika found four Danish women and indulged in a casual conversation. They told us where to get off and we followed them. I recognised where we were and said we should go the other way, but Annika wanted to follow the Danes since they seemed to know where they were going. For ten minutes we walked on a small walkway next to a busy highway. It stopped quite suddenly in the middle of the road with three lanes of traffic on either side of us. One of the Danes ran across to one side but there was no way out over there. We followed them to the right instead, where we could see a staircase, and thus walked swiftly across the street. I skipped ahead. I felt angry since I had been right about the way we should have gone and the stupid Danes led us to the middle of a road. Never trust Danes.

We made it to HarbourFront intact but I had gotten two large spots on my shirt right where it folded into my armpits. I had to get a new shirt. I hurried to Cotton:On and brought a bunch of shirts to the dressing-room. I picked two, two for twenty, bought them hastily and met Annika outside. We bought drinks and took the subway towards Chinatown. It was five minutes away so it went fast.

Of course we went back to our new favourite restaurant. It was Annika's last day here with us so we went to Genki Sushi. Please read this to understand what this restaurant means to us. It was a late lunch. I bought a package of their green tea and have to say it was the first tea I ever bought for myself. Then we split. Annika went to get massage somewhere and I headed home. I was really tired from an early morning and an active day. I declined going out again to have dinner with John and Annika and left them to eat dumplings in Holland Village by themselves. I regret not getting those delicious buns. My dinner was a sad bowl of yogurt and cereal.

A Most Laughable Lunch

Next station: Genki Sushi!

Annika and I ate lunch at this restaurant yesterday. It lied on the fourth floor at Orchard Central, but has three more locations in Singapore. We were placed at the next to last table in the first row from the entrance. A small plate above the table says Kitakami. We asked our waiter what it means and he explained that it is a train-station in Japan.

There were three tracks on the wall underneath the table's name-tag. A big menu displayed all the options available. Suddenly a train drove by and we burst out laughing. It carried three small plates and a few seconds later went by the other way empty. I followed it with my eyes when it returned through the wall to the kitchen. I brought down the tablet, placed in a holder next to the table number, and put it on the table. Each train had a maximum of four slots before an order had to be made. We started with green tea and Coke, Norwegian salmon nigiri and cream cheese premium shrimp. The drinks came with a waiter, but the two sushis came with the train. When it stopped at our table it made a pleasant ping to announce its arrival. Efficient instructions told us to take our plates and press one of the three buttons to return the train. It was so much fun! It felt good to take our own food and not be bothered by a stranger while eating. Also, it was so much fun when the train arrived!

We sent away four orders and had five trains delivering our food. We ordered way too much for two people but at least we were full when we were done! The quality was really good and everything (I ate) was delicious. It was difficult to know what was in the sushi, for example I ordered a dragon roll but noticed when it arrived that it contained eel. I do not eat eel. I thought dragon rolls were made with salmon. Annika told me that she had a similar experience at a sushi restaurant in Sweden. The owner had explained that a real dragon roll does not contain salmon, but eel. This was not clear in the menu but I feel like that was my fault of being uneducated in the original dragon roll etiquette.

 

We shared a small bottle of coke and were given a small bowl of green tea powder. I was confused as to how we would consume this tea without it being brewed, but the waiter explained once we asked. There was a tap under the train-tracks that poured burning hot water. Annika put two or three small spoons of the powder into the given mug and held it under the tap. I screwed and the tea brewed. Then we stirred with our sticks and drank with joy. It was good. I liked it! It did not have that watery taste or the intense smell that I dislike so much in teabag-tea. I wonder if I can buy this sort of tea somewhere, I would really like to have it at home. It is the first tea (but I have had it on several occasions on other Japanese restaurants) that I honestly like.

Genki Sushi gave us much joy. We laughed throughout the meal, were more than satisfied with the quality of the food and thought that the delivery of food by train was a wonderful idea. We paid by the cashier while asking ourselves when we could eat here again. Thank you so much Genki for a memorable experience.

Feelgood Friday

Yesterday was a great day! Annika and I were very efficient and laughed a lot. She asked me sometime during the afternoon why the weather is always too hot and perfect for a day by the pool when you have decided to spend a lot of hours in town walking down streets. I had no explanation but simply answered Singapore. The weather likes to mess up your plans. When I decide to take a day by the pool it starts to rain just as I am about to leave and it does not clear up until the evening.

Dinner Trade

Annika likes to leave books at our place, so since last time she stayed here we have had two copies of a book called Ensam i Berlin (Alone in Berlin). It is in Swedish and even though she went back to Sweden, she left it here with the advise to "switch books at a hotel when you are abroad next time". It is a great advise since that was exactly what we did when she and I were in Thailand last year. She left books she did not like and we took new books. Unfortunately neither John nor I have had any abroad trips since then so the book has been stable in the shelf. Until we thought about our Singaporean friend who lived in England but had a Swedish boyfriend and therefore speaks Swedish. Although she is shy I think she speaks fluently and it sounds great!

The other day our friend said she had some Chinese New Years candy for us. Of course we could not pass up on this opportunity to get some snacks. We set a date and discussed restaurant. John and I met at Buona Vista and went off at Outram Park, a station we rarely use. It lies near the restaurant of choice called Muchachos. We have been there once before with Ash and Steve. We arrived as soon as the rain started. Our date had not yet made it, but that did not matter because it was crowded and we had to wait a few minutes to get a table. The restaurant is small and where the tables are the ceiling is really low. The noise level gets really high. We had just ordered when Dawn arrived. It was kind of hard to hear each other over dinner, but at least the food was good. I had the California burrito that had french fries with gravy and steak. It was amazing. John was kind to buy nachos with guacamole just because I really wanted guacamole. There was a campaign on beer so we each had one. It was a long time ago I drank Corona so it was really nice to have some!

All in all, it was a good dinner and great Chinese candy. The flower shaped ones reminded me of the Swedish rosettes so I truly enjoyed those. The others are interesting, a bit dry perhaps but I still eat them. Hopefully there will still be some left when John gets home. On the other hand, he took all of the bakkwa to work so I will never get to see them. Hm, maybe I will have some more of those cookies after all...