We woke up early today, even though I slept through the alarm and John shut it off when it rang and slept longer next to me. The point of the alarm was to be on time for the bank, which closed at one o'clock. Getting dressed and sun-creamed, we walked out in the cloudy day, which is just as suffocating as a sunny day or any other day for that matter.
When we arrived at the Buona Vista MRT station where the bank was we first could not find it. Asked for directions and eventually got there, an hour before closing time. There was a sign right by the door that said "corporate only". John walked up to the counter to ask where we could open a private account. I heard what they were saying, a weird mix of English and words that could have been English as well, but I was not sure. We left the cool air-conditioned bank and stepped out in the heat again. The information we got was that the bank for personal accounting is far from where we were. There was another bank right next to the one we had entered, but it did not have the name of the bank everyone here had recommended. We walked for a bit, trying to figure out what to do. Maybe a taxi could pick us up, so that we could ask him to take us to a bank where we could open an account. Problem is, this is a heavily trafficked area and one can't just stop a taxi by the street. Never the less, we tried.
After ten minutes of not getting a taxi we gave up. It would have been so good to have a bank account right now, but we can survive until Monday. Instead John wanted to show me where he works, so we start walking in that direction. Takes a few wrong turns, but eventually we get to a food court close to the workplace and we eat lunch. Rice and pork ribs with sweet and sour sauce for me and beef in pepper sauce for John. We buy two cups of juice after the meal, one kiwi and one lemon. Lemon was the only good one, no more kiwi for me. Water and mush.
We walked indoors for as long as we could but eventually we had to go out in the windy heat again. There are five large buildings in this area and we entered the one where he works. Amazing structure, John showed me some fine vantage-points. Not much else to do there, we go down to the MRT in another building and take the train to Rochor.
There is a huge IT-mall there called Sim Lim Square where everything under level four is shady and scammy (according to what we have heard). On the fourth floor we went around to three different PC stores and they helped us put together a theoretical computer out of a list of items. To be honest, I was not really paying attention. Each paper we brought with us home has some yellow lines over names that John likes. This was for later today when he researched online if he could get the prize even lower than the stores could.
Leaving Sim Lim Square we walked along one main road with lots of people. There was a market! So of course we went inside a huge store that reminds us of Åhléns. We strolled around, looking at stuff, but it was kind of expensive. John found a pair of swim trunks. We went out again and looked around this market, I find two dresses and we move on, one guy in a stand was making weird noises and clapped his hands randomly, which made me really uncomfortable.
We entered a crowded market area, full of people and small stalls. John said "if that market outside was Asian, this is really Asia". I agree with my knowledge of these markets from the movies. In here we found a lot more things to buy for me, so much we even had to go get some more cash. After a while we wanted to leave and move closer to the MRT station. There is a small plaza where an audition for "The Ultimate Voice 2016" is held. We took a seat at a Starbucks table and listened while we figured out our next move.
Dinner. We looked around to find somewhere to eat. Mookata, traditional thai barbecue. This is where we eventually sat down to eat some strange but yet tasty food. I was pretty scared before we got started, because there are only sticks as cutlery. The food arrived: a plate with meat, bacon, two meatballs, two fishballs, squid, prawns, crabfish, corn-pieces and weird orange sticks. On top of that: a basket with glass noodles, some vegetables, tofu and mushrooms. Of course there was rice in a bowl too.
This was the last thing we did. We travelled back home, we immediately went up to the pool to take an evening swim while there were maybe ten people barbecueing. We went down to our little home and are now relaxing as an end to this adventuring day.
Tomorrow another hopefully equally interesting day is waiting!
