That’s when good neighbours become good friends

I don’t know my neighbours here. I say one yesterday and we exchanged hellos. I didn’t want to be too friendly as I think they are the neighbours with the yappy dog and I want to shoot it, so I didn’t want to be two faced.

The neighbour I am of course talking about is Karen Next Door. The reason for the post dedicated to her is that she sent me mail. I was on the point of announcing the 2nd Write to Tina awards as I have been here just about a month and nothing, nada, zippo, zilch from anyone, anywhere. I thought your patience had run out for mail games and the like so I decided to wait and see who would take the iniative. And the iniative taker was Miss Kaztastic herself.


And what a piece of mail it was, a 4 side letter and kid sweets, my favourite! Shame half of them are gone already.

Thanks Karen!

What a mistaka to maka

I went to the gym tonight. As always I had the three important items - gym card, water and towel. I did not bring my phone or camera.

Disaster. There was a man there wearing sandals! This made me laugh no end on the treadmill, but that could have been the lack of oxygen.

It sounds like a Russian princess

Today was the second holiday for Chinese New Year. I knew 1 billion Chinese (and 5 million Scots) couldn't be wrong, New Year is worth celebrating twice.

On certain holidays they open up the President's Palace, Istana (not Anastasia's sister). It was well worth going to see. It cost S$1 (30p) for the grounds but we decided to go all out and go inside as well for the extra S$2. I'd like to say that it was because of the state rooms and the display of Presidental gifts but it was all for the air con. Definitely a price worth paying.

Today has also finalised the grading of sweating, like terrorist threat levels:

Level 1 - Sweaty Betty, a mild sweat on face

Level 2 - Sweaty Beast, much worse sweat affecting greater surface area

Level 3 - Sweat Ball, total and all out sweat. In fact solid form has ceased to exist and you are now liquid.

This was just after the trip inside to the air con, so the level was back down to 1.

Wasting a day

No one can waste away a day like me. I am the queen of dossing. Seriously, I brought home all sorts of files and books on Friday afternoon so I could do all the work I needed to do. I have done nothing, absolutely nothing. That leaves me with one day to do it in. And yet somehow I think that I will be going back to school without the half of it done.

So it was a waste of a day in terms of work, but I did talk to Graham and Abe TOM on Skype! I heart Skype. You need to get on it and talk to me! Although the mooning is not necessary.

Right, think I'll go to bed now, tomorrow is 'butt in gear day', no tomorrow has to be 'butt in gear day'.

Night night.

Didn’t we already do New Year?

Sorry for the break, twas a bit crazy towards the end of last week. I’ll tell you all about it.

Thursday
Thursday was the last day of classes before the Chinese New Year festivities on Friday. As is traditional at Chinese New Year and according to the old Chinese proverb 'get your hair cut and coloured', I got my hair cut and coloured. Ok not really, but I hadn’t got it cut since late August in Hicksville.

My appointment was for 4.00pm, right after school finished so I said goodbye to my last class and was straight out the door. Later, we were going to go down to Chinatown to see the decorations and all that but it being the slowest salon in the world, I was late. I know I am usually late, but seriously, it took four hours in the place. Seven people worked on my hair and all of them asked if I was a swimmer. I am thinking about getting cards laminated with this advice for all future hair cuts.

1. I do not swim. My hair is dry and gets into a tatty bird’s nest at the mere sight of water.
2. It is best not to deep cleanse my hair with your hands as this only makes it worse.
3. Never try to untangle my hair with a comb. A mess that big needs more than one line of attack.
4. I truly do not mind brushing through my hair to speed up the process.
5. I have grey hair. I know this, now leave it alone.

I have never had a haircut that took so long in all my life. But it seems there was a breakdown in communication when it came to the colour. I got whole head highlights rather than just the top layer. As I don’t get my hair coloured very often I am sure that’ll look great in a few months as my natural non-colour starts to shine through. Maybe I should start swimming to wash out the colour a bit. Maybe not, it'll probably turn green or something.

So because of the longest hair cut in the world, we were slightly late getting down to Chinatown, but when we did it was great! We walked round the stalls, looked at the tat made in China and went for a drink.


Red is the colour. Apparently it symbolises new life.



Mannequins are more exciting stupid looking here.

Friday
Chinese New Year Festivities Day in school culminated with the announcement of the classroom decoration awards. I couldn’t help but feel my class were at a bit of a disadvantage having me, someone who knew nothing about Chinese New Year, to lead them through.

But they did a good job, they came to class to make decorations during break, lunch and after school the last few weeks. The judge that came to see the room was the Principal but they talked to him, leading him through the room as if it was no big deal. I was a like a proud parent!


More red, lots of lanterns, pineapples and oranges, oh and a fluorescent pig.


The front view. The things around the noticeboards and whiteboard are fish which in Chinese means the same as 'surplus'. See how much I know now!

In the end though, we was robbed though as 4th form swept the board. Harsh I thought.

Saturday
Chinese New Year Eve started with a gym visit. As the old Chinese proverb goes ‘end the year as you mean to go on and go to the gym’. Later on we went down to Chinatown which was madness, absolute madness. We got drinks, dinner and watched the fireworks. They were quite good, but made even better by the ‘ooohs’, ‘aaaahs’ and ‘woooweees’ of those around us.


This was my first time to the waterfront area, it was very pretty.


Ooooh...aaaah....wowee!

Sunday
Chinese New Year is a bit of a free holiday, like Thanksgiving was. Very little is expected, Chinese people spend it visiting family and friends while us white folk have little responsibility.


This man was burning stuff right outside my bedroom. I'm not sure why, it must some sort of Chinese New Year tradition my class failed to tell me about. Maybe there's an old Chinese proverb 'burn your stuff outside Tina's bedroom to bring prosperity to your life'.

This morning a few of us went on a walk to the highest point in Singapore, which stands at a whopping 163.63m. So it’s not exactly altitude training heights, but it was hard work climbing up it, we actually turned into a sweat balls.


Finn had the easiest trip to the top, promptly falling asleep.


Everest it is not. But it is the only natural rainforest left in Singapore. According to the information guide, David Bellamy says there are more varieties of trees in one hectare here than in all of North America. Who knew? Fair enough, David Bellamy did.

There was lots of nature to be seen too. Butterflies, caterpillars, giant ants and the pièce de résistance, monkeys. I, being so at one with nature, commented ‘oh look, it’s a monkey thing’. David Attenborough, me.

So Happy Chinese New Year to you and yours. I'm off Monday and Tuesday which would be great news if I didn't have work to do. Maybe I could adopt myself into a Chinese family and go visiting instead? Nah.