Our Cabin:
View of the whole island:
Beach/Water pics:
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Weekend in Rawa
Jimmy has been traveling the past 4 weeks so we thought it would be nice to have a relaxing weekend together. We went to Rawa Island in Malaysia which was about a 3 hour drive from Singapore plus a 1/2 hour speed boat ride. The island is really small - the only thing on it was the resort we stayed on which had about 60 cabins, a restaurant and a bar. It was exactly what we needed. It was very low key and peaceful. The water and beach were beautiful and you could see other islands off the coast of Malaysia in the distance. The cabin wasn't fancy but we spent most of our time outside anyway. All of our meals were included at the hotel restaurant which were buffets. We might go back there again but we have so many places we want to see I'm not sure if we'll have time!
Our Cabin:
View of the whole island:
Beach/Water pics:
Our Cabin:
View of the whole island:
Beach/Water pics:
Wednesday, September 4, 2013
Living in Singapore
So I realized I've talked a lot about our move but haven't talked that much about what it's like in Singapore so here are some of the things I've learned:
Location:
When I told people we were moving to Singapore, most knew it was in Asia but had no idea where. The whole island is only about 30 miles by 30 miles and is at the southern end of Malaysia near the equator. Indonesia is also really close. We can easily take trips to parts of Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia by plane in about 2 hours. We can also get to Malaysia by bus since there are bridges connecting it to Singapore which would take us less than an hour and we can take ferries to some islands in Indonesia that would take less than an hour. For perspective on how far we are from other places in Asia - Beijing is about a 7 hour flight, Hong Kong is a 4 hour flight and Tokyo is a 7 hour flight.
Temperature:
It's hot and humid....all the time. The temperature is usually in the high 80s There aren't seasons here so we don't get to look forward to a break from the heat. Pretty much every time I go outside I start sweating. You know those days in Cincinnati during summer when you don't want to go outside because it's too hot and humid - that's what it's like here every day. People here must just be adjusted to it though because I see people wearing jeans and sweaters who look completely comfortable, meanwhile, I'm sweating in shorts and a tank top. At night when the sun goes down, it does feel nice out and we can usually eat outside which is nice.
Transportation:
We have decided not to have a car. It is extremely expensive. If you want to buy a car you have to get a certificate for about $65,000 and then you can buy a car that will be about twice the cost of the US. Then gas is about $8 a gallon. There is the option to lease but that would cost over $1500 a month for a Camry. Given the cost it is amazing how many luxury cars we still see on the road. We usually use the MRT and the bus which has been fine because we're less than a 10 minute walk to the MRT station and we have a few bus stops right by us. We'll take a cab if we buy something that's too big to carry home. Taking a cab is much quicker (about half the time) than the MRT/bus but the MRT/bus is a lot cheaper. The MRT would probably cost about $2 a ride for a cab ride that would cost about $15. I became comfortable with the MRT system right away because it's really easy to navigate but for the buses I have to look up the routes because there are so many I just have no idea where they all go - fortunately we have Google maps and apps on our phone that make it much easier to figure out.
Dining:
Eating out can be really cheap or really expensive - there's a pretty big range depending on what you want. We can eat at the hawker centre for less than $5. The negatives are finding a seat (at some that are crowded it can be really difficult to find a place to sit down), no air conditioning, and they don't provide napkins - you learn quickly to start carrying them with you.
Dine in restaurants vary in price but if you want to have alcohol you're bill will quickly go up. Most places by us will have happy hour specials but when it's not happy hour it will be at least $10 for a beer or glass of wine - and that's getting the lower end offerings. I can get pretty much get any US food I want here. As far as US chains go, there is McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, Starbucks, Subway, Chili's, Dominos, Popeyes, Long John Silver - just to name a few. Unfortunately, there is no Skyline Chili so if anyone wants to ship some over let me know and I'll give you my address : ) I can also get just about any type of food I want - we can get Italian, Mexican, Korean, Japanese, Indian, German, French - you name it we can get it.
Housing:
We were hoping to get a house when we moved here but all of the houses in our price range were not close to the MRT station which was really important to us since we don't have a car. We have a 3 bedroom, 3 bath apartment with 1600 sq ft. It also has a maid's room and bathroom - the maid room is basically a storage closet and the maid bathroom is a toilet with a shower head on the wall - I'm not exaggerating when I say you are basically on the toilet while showering.
Most people here do have live in maids which is why a lot of the apartments come with a maid room/bathroom - we have no plans on getting a maid right now. Most of the maids are from Indonesia or the Philippines and only cost about $400 a month but you also have to pay all of their living costs + $200 to the government each month. We're on the 3rd floor and right above us there is a pool and a gym. Our place is nice but by no means up scale and it's $4500 a month! In Cincinnati I could rent a mansion with that budget. Speaking of mansions, I take Candy for a walk down the nearest side street to us since our road has a lot of traffic. There are walls around the houses so you can't see them easily but I started looking more closely and realized that these houses are huge. I decided to look it up to see how much these houses are renting/selling for on this street - the rent is about $20,000 a month and I saw one on sale for $35million! Not only that but these houses have multiple cars in the driveway - not the Camry I mentioned above either - these are all BMW's, Mercedes and Range Rovers. We are definitely the poor people in our neighborhood : ) I read something this weekend that said that almost 20% of people in Singapore are millionaires - guess they are the ones driving all the fancy cars we've been seeing.
Also, there are a few differences in housing vs the US. When we go to shower we have to flip a switch to turn on the water heater. Each bathroom has its own water heater.
The kitchen does not have hot water. We also don't have a dish washer. It's very uncommon to have a dish washer and if you do, it's a separate appliance not built into the cabinets so it takes a lot of extra space. For air conditioning, we have a unit in each room built into the wall. There are remotes for each of them to turn them on and adjust the temperature. Unlike the US, it doesn't just kick off when its the temperature you want it to be. We were told if we just leave it on at night when we are home that it would be about $200 a month but if we left it running all the time it could be $600-$700 a month. We've been leaving it on just at night and the bill wasn't too bad so we'll work on increasing our usage a little bit because I've been pretty toasty during the day : ) The ovens here are also smaller so some of the cookie sheets I've brought won't fit into the oven. We have a lot less closet space here so things we used to hang we are now folding up and putting on shelves - I have bags of hangers because we have so much extra now. Our washer and dryer set up only has 1 outlet so we can only use one at a time. The washer takes 2 hours and so does the dryer so when you can't run both at the same time you can't get too many loads done in a day. It's a little inconvenient but you get used to it.
Currency:
The currency here is Singapore dollars. Overall it's pretty similar to US dollars - there are coins for everything $1 and under and bills for everything over $2. As of today the conversion rate is 1USD = 1.25SD. When I give costs on my blog I usually try to convert to USD.
Language:
There are 4 official languages here. English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil. Pretty much everyone speaks English here though. When I'm at the hawker centres I have some difficulty communicating with them because some don't speak English but I can usually just point to stuff and it's fine. Other than that I don't really have any issues. People here do speak with a bit of an accent though so sometimes I'll have to ask them to repeat things. .
Location:
When I told people we were moving to Singapore, most knew it was in Asia but had no idea where. The whole island is only about 30 miles by 30 miles and is at the southern end of Malaysia near the equator. Indonesia is also really close. We can easily take trips to parts of Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia by plane in about 2 hours. We can also get to Malaysia by bus since there are bridges connecting it to Singapore which would take us less than an hour and we can take ferries to some islands in Indonesia that would take less than an hour. For perspective on how far we are from other places in Asia - Beijing is about a 7 hour flight, Hong Kong is a 4 hour flight and Tokyo is a 7 hour flight.
Temperature:
It's hot and humid....all the time. The temperature is usually in the high 80s There aren't seasons here so we don't get to look forward to a break from the heat. Pretty much every time I go outside I start sweating. You know those days in Cincinnati during summer when you don't want to go outside because it's too hot and humid - that's what it's like here every day. People here must just be adjusted to it though because I see people wearing jeans and sweaters who look completely comfortable, meanwhile, I'm sweating in shorts and a tank top. At night when the sun goes down, it does feel nice out and we can usually eat outside which is nice.
Transportation:
We have decided not to have a car. It is extremely expensive. If you want to buy a car you have to get a certificate for about $65,000 and then you can buy a car that will be about twice the cost of the US. Then gas is about $8 a gallon. There is the option to lease but that would cost over $1500 a month for a Camry. Given the cost it is amazing how many luxury cars we still see on the road. We usually use the MRT and the bus which has been fine because we're less than a 10 minute walk to the MRT station and we have a few bus stops right by us. We'll take a cab if we buy something that's too big to carry home. Taking a cab is much quicker (about half the time) than the MRT/bus but the MRT/bus is a lot cheaper. The MRT would probably cost about $2 a ride for a cab ride that would cost about $15. I became comfortable with the MRT system right away because it's really easy to navigate but for the buses I have to look up the routes because there are so many I just have no idea where they all go - fortunately we have Google maps and apps on our phone that make it much easier to figure out.
Dining:
Eating out can be really cheap or really expensive - there's a pretty big range depending on what you want. We can eat at the hawker centre for less than $5. The negatives are finding a seat (at some that are crowded it can be really difficult to find a place to sit down), no air conditioning, and they don't provide napkins - you learn quickly to start carrying them with you.
Dine in restaurants vary in price but if you want to have alcohol you're bill will quickly go up. Most places by us will have happy hour specials but when it's not happy hour it will be at least $10 for a beer or glass of wine - and that's getting the lower end offerings. I can get pretty much get any US food I want here. As far as US chains go, there is McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, Starbucks, Subway, Chili's, Dominos, Popeyes, Long John Silver - just to name a few. Unfortunately, there is no Skyline Chili so if anyone wants to ship some over let me know and I'll give you my address : ) I can also get just about any type of food I want - we can get Italian, Mexican, Korean, Japanese, Indian, German, French - you name it we can get it.
Housing:
We were hoping to get a house when we moved here but all of the houses in our price range were not close to the MRT station which was really important to us since we don't have a car. We have a 3 bedroom, 3 bath apartment with 1600 sq ft. It also has a maid's room and bathroom - the maid room is basically a storage closet and the maid bathroom is a toilet with a shower head on the wall - I'm not exaggerating when I say you are basically on the toilet while showering.
Most people here do have live in maids which is why a lot of the apartments come with a maid room/bathroom - we have no plans on getting a maid right now. Most of the maids are from Indonesia or the Philippines and only cost about $400 a month but you also have to pay all of their living costs + $200 to the government each month. We're on the 3rd floor and right above us there is a pool and a gym. Our place is nice but by no means up scale and it's $4500 a month! In Cincinnati I could rent a mansion with that budget. Speaking of mansions, I take Candy for a walk down the nearest side street to us since our road has a lot of traffic. There are walls around the houses so you can't see them easily but I started looking more closely and realized that these houses are huge. I decided to look it up to see how much these houses are renting/selling for on this street - the rent is about $20,000 a month and I saw one on sale for $35million! Not only that but these houses have multiple cars in the driveway - not the Camry I mentioned above either - these are all BMW's, Mercedes and Range Rovers. We are definitely the poor people in our neighborhood : ) I read something this weekend that said that almost 20% of people in Singapore are millionaires - guess they are the ones driving all the fancy cars we've been seeing.
Also, there are a few differences in housing vs the US. When we go to shower we have to flip a switch to turn on the water heater. Each bathroom has its own water heater.
The kitchen does not have hot water. We also don't have a dish washer. It's very uncommon to have a dish washer and if you do, it's a separate appliance not built into the cabinets so it takes a lot of extra space. For air conditioning, we have a unit in each room built into the wall. There are remotes for each of them to turn them on and adjust the temperature. Unlike the US, it doesn't just kick off when its the temperature you want it to be. We were told if we just leave it on at night when we are home that it would be about $200 a month but if we left it running all the time it could be $600-$700 a month. We've been leaving it on just at night and the bill wasn't too bad so we'll work on increasing our usage a little bit because I've been pretty toasty during the day : ) The ovens here are also smaller so some of the cookie sheets I've brought won't fit into the oven. We have a lot less closet space here so things we used to hang we are now folding up and putting on shelves - I have bags of hangers because we have so much extra now. Our washer and dryer set up only has 1 outlet so we can only use one at a time. The washer takes 2 hours and so does the dryer so when you can't run both at the same time you can't get too many loads done in a day. It's a little inconvenient but you get used to it.
Currency:
The currency here is Singapore dollars. Overall it's pretty similar to US dollars - there are coins for everything $1 and under and bills for everything over $2. As of today the conversion rate is 1USD = 1.25SD. When I give costs on my blog I usually try to convert to USD.
Language:
There are 4 official languages here. English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil. Pretty much everyone speaks English here though. When I'm at the hawker centres I have some difficulty communicating with them because some don't speak English but I can usually just point to stuff and it's fine. Other than that I don't really have any issues. People here do speak with a bit of an accent though so sometimes I'll have to ask them to repeat things. .
Monday, August 26, 2013
First trip to Malaysia
Jimmy and I decided to take a bus to Malaysia this weekend. It takes a little over an hour to take the bus and it only costs a few dollars so we figured we'd check it out. To get to Malaysia we just had to cross a short bridge over the Straits of Johor. Once across the bridge, we were in Johor Bahru. There isn't really a lot to do there but they did have a mall right when we got out of immigration that we walked around. I saw a dessert place that looked good so we stopped there. After I ordered and went to get a seat I realized the seats were toilet bowls. As we looked around we noticed people's food was served in toilet bowl shaped bowls! Then we realized we were at a place called T-Bowl - A toilet bowl themed restaurant! That was definitely not something I ever would have thought of. After eating on our toilet seats, we walked around outside for a little bit too. They had this really pretty garden/park that we wanted to walk around but as we got closer there were signs warning that you would be shot if you entered so that was a no go! We were able to see Singapore from where we were so we got a few pictures. There is an outlet mall in Johor Bahru but we didn't go there - that's something I can do with my mom when she visits. They also have a Legoland and a few other amusement parks more targeted at kids. I doubt we'll head back to Johor Bahru unless its for the outlet mall but we're definitely going to visit some other cities in Malaysia.
Secretariat Building
Views of Singapore from Malaysia
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
2 weeks in!
I've been here 2 weeks and we've gotten a lot done. We brought Candy and Ozzy home from quarantine on Saturday and they are both doing great! Candy sits in front of the fan for awhile when we get back from our walks because its so hot here. Ozzy spends most of his time sleeping as usual.
It's starting to feel like home especially with them being here. Everything is unpacked but we still have a few things to put away. When we aren't running errands, we've been relaxing at home since the past few months have been crazy. We did go out for drinks one night - below is a picture of us at 2am dessert bar which was really good. There are tons of great dessert places around here - temptation is everywhere!
We worked out all of our wedding details over the past week as well. We'll get married at the Registry of Marriage in Singapore (like a court house wedding) on November 1st and then we'll leave for our honeymoon in the Maldives on November 2. We'll do a beach wedding ceremony while there on November 4th. The hotel offers a wedding package so there's really nothing else we have to do but show up. We're going to be staying in one of those huts over the water which I'm really excited about!
It's starting to feel like home especially with them being here. Everything is unpacked but we still have a few things to put away. When we aren't running errands, we've been relaxing at home since the past few months have been crazy. We did go out for drinks one night - below is a picture of us at 2am dessert bar which was really good. There are tons of great dessert places around here - temptation is everywhere!
We worked out all of our wedding details over the past week as well. We'll get married at the Registry of Marriage in Singapore (like a court house wedding) on November 1st and then we'll leave for our honeymoon in the Maldives on November 2. We'll do a beach wedding ceremony while there on November 4th. The hotel offers a wedding package so there's really nothing else we have to do but show up. We're going to be staying in one of those huts over the water which I'm really excited about!
Sunday, August 4, 2013
The first few days...
After getting Ozzy checked in at the quarantine station, I spent Wednesday and Thursday unpacking. All of the boxes in the picture below that are still assembled are full of packing paper - they wrapped up everything with a ton of paper! We probably would have had about 1/2 the boxes if it hadn't been for all of the wrapping. They obviously know what they are doing though since none of our stuff was damaged.
Some of the things that we marked as storage vs shipping got mixed up but nothing major. The only thing Jimmy was upset about was that his PlayStation3 went to storage - but now its an excuse for him to get PS4 when it comes out in a few months : ) Everything is unpacked now but we're still cleaning and organizing. The moving company is coming back today to get all of these boxes out of here which will be really nice to get some more space. We had to buy new electronics here since the voltage is different. Jimmy already had TVs delivered but we had to get some kitchen items, vacuum, hair dryer etc so now we're all set. We had our cable and internet set up on Friday so I finally felt a little more connected. The TV stations here aren't bad but I've heard the TV shows are a few seasons behind. We have a sling box set up to a cable box at my parents house which will allow us to watch US TV which will be nice to watch the latest seasons and all the sports we won't get here.
We also went to the quarantine station to visit Candy and Ozzy and they are doing well. They each have their own room. When we visit we can take Candy outside in a gated green area (below). We'll be excited to bring them home on Saturday.
To give you an idea of where we are living, below is a map of Singapore and the different MRT lines. If you look at the yellow line, we are less than a 10 minute walk to the Holland Village MRT station. This map is a little outdated but it gives you the general idea.
Near the Holland Village MRT station, there are a lot of shops, restaurants, banks, groceries etc so its really convenient for us. There is a hawker center in Holland Village also, so I can go up there for lunch and eat for under $5 and get pretty good food which is nice.
So far everything is going really well. I've been able to text and facetime with my parents with no problem which has been great. Once we're settled in more I'm sure we'll explore the city more and I'll be sure to put up lots of pictures!
We're all in Singapore!
We all made it to Singapore safe and sound! On Monday morning, Candy was picked up around 6:30 am and driven to Chicago.
They walked her and fed her and she got on a flight to Amsterdam where she had a long layover and was walked and fed again. From there she flew to Singapore and got in around 3:20pm on Wednesday afternoon. Ozzy and I left for the airport on Monday morning around 7:30am. He just went as a carry on with me. I was worried about how we would do going through security since I had to take him out of his carrier but he was fine. We flew to Chicago first and then had the long 16 hour flight to Hong Kong. Fortunately the seat next to us was open so we had a little more room. He was good for the first 8 hours but then he cried most of the time - I didn't hear most of it since my friend got me some awesome head phones so I wouldn't hear him. With about 3 hours to go on the flight I noticed a pretty bad smell - yep Ozzy had finally gone to the bathroom. Fortunately, I had bought some padding for his carrier so I was just able to take him back to the bathroom and change it out so it wasn't too bad. When we landed in Hong Kong we were going to get back on the same plane for the flight to Singapore but we still had to get off and go through security to get back to the departure gate. When I got to security, they kept asking for different paperwork which I had and they had me sit there for awhile while they went and got a United airline representative. The rep informed me that its illegal to bring animals through Hong Kong as a carry on. I had purchased a ticket for Ozzy for the entire flight so I asked why they would let me do that if it wasn't legal. The flight shows up in their system as direct from Chicago to Singapore so it didn't flag it when I was on the phone booking it originally. He told me I had 2 options. One was to sit at their airline counter with Ozzy until departure and they would take him straight to the gate and I would meet him there after going through security again - even though this wasn't technically legal they would make an exception since I was already in transit. The second option was to stay at the airport for a few days until I could get some type of license and figure out how to ship him as cargo. This was obviously a no brainer. They brought him to the gate and they escorted me through all the other security checks they do at the gate and gave him back to me when I was getting on the plane. The flight wasn't very full so they put me in a row by myself so we wouldn't be by other passengers which was awesome. The flight from Hong Kong to Singapore is less than 4 hours. When we got to Singapore I gave Ozzy to a lost and found counter where they let me take him out and feed him before they put him back in his carrier for the night. We got in around midnight and he wouldn't be transported to the first quarantine station until 8am when they opened. Jimmy met me at the airport and I went back to our place and got a few hours sleep. When I woke up I had to go back to the airport quarantine station to get Ozzy checked in. I had to take the MRT (mass rapid transit) and then a bus to get out there. While on the bus, I was about to get into the cargo area of the airport where the quarantine was located when a police officer came on and asked me if I had a pass. I had no idea what he was talking about. He told me I had to get off the bus and get a pass. I got off and had to fill in some paperwork and surrender my passport to get a pass to get to the quarantine station. Once I had the pass I was allowed to catch the next bus. At the quarantine station I just had to give them some more paperwork and everything went smoothly. I was able to see Ozzy which was nice.
They walked her and fed her and she got on a flight to Amsterdam where she had a long layover and was walked and fed again. From there she flew to Singapore and got in around 3:20pm on Wednesday afternoon. Ozzy and I left for the airport on Monday morning around 7:30am. He just went as a carry on with me. I was worried about how we would do going through security since I had to take him out of his carrier but he was fine. We flew to Chicago first and then had the long 16 hour flight to Hong Kong. Fortunately the seat next to us was open so we had a little more room. He was good for the first 8 hours but then he cried most of the time - I didn't hear most of it since my friend got me some awesome head phones so I wouldn't hear him. With about 3 hours to go on the flight I noticed a pretty bad smell - yep Ozzy had finally gone to the bathroom. Fortunately, I had bought some padding for his carrier so I was just able to take him back to the bathroom and change it out so it wasn't too bad. When we landed in Hong Kong we were going to get back on the same plane for the flight to Singapore but we still had to get off and go through security to get back to the departure gate. When I got to security, they kept asking for different paperwork which I had and they had me sit there for awhile while they went and got a United airline representative. The rep informed me that its illegal to bring animals through Hong Kong as a carry on. I had purchased a ticket for Ozzy for the entire flight so I asked why they would let me do that if it wasn't legal. The flight shows up in their system as direct from Chicago to Singapore so it didn't flag it when I was on the phone booking it originally. He told me I had 2 options. One was to sit at their airline counter with Ozzy until departure and they would take him straight to the gate and I would meet him there after going through security again - even though this wasn't technically legal they would make an exception since I was already in transit. The second option was to stay at the airport for a few days until I could get some type of license and figure out how to ship him as cargo. This was obviously a no brainer. They brought him to the gate and they escorted me through all the other security checks they do at the gate and gave him back to me when I was getting on the plane. The flight wasn't very full so they put me in a row by myself so we wouldn't be by other passengers which was awesome. The flight from Hong Kong to Singapore is less than 4 hours. When we got to Singapore I gave Ozzy to a lost and found counter where they let me take him out and feed him before they put him back in his carrier for the night. We got in around midnight and he wouldn't be transported to the first quarantine station until 8am when they opened. Jimmy met me at the airport and I went back to our place and got a few hours sleep. When I woke up I had to go back to the airport quarantine station to get Ozzy checked in. I had to take the MRT (mass rapid transit) and then a bus to get out there. While on the bus, I was about to get into the cargo area of the airport where the quarantine was located when a police officer came on and asked me if I had a pass. I had no idea what he was talking about. He told me I had to get off the bus and get a pass. I got off and had to fill in some paperwork and surrender my passport to get a pass to get to the quarantine station. Once I had the pass I was allowed to catch the next bus. At the quarantine station I just had to give them some more paperwork and everything went smoothly. I was able to see Ozzy which was nice.
A few hours later he was transported to the main quarantine station where he and Candy will stay for 10 days. Since Candy didn't arrive until Wednesday afternoon, she was transported to the main quarantine station on Thursday morning. Since we had a service transport Candy to Singapore they took care of checking her in at the airport quarantine station so I didn't have to go back out there again. It was a long trip over but we all arrived safely so now our adventure can begin!
Thursday, July 11, 2013
Final Move Date confirmed!
I can't even keep track of all of the dates I thought were going to the "the final move date" but I finally booked my flight today! After getting our final quarantine space confirmation for the pets and figuring out transportation for Candy, I am finally set on moving July 29th! We decided to have a service ship Candy so that she'll be able to have a layover in Amsterdam where they will take her out, feed her and walk her. This way she won't be in her crate for over 30 hours. She's also going to be driven to Chicago to catch her flight because her crate won't fit on the express jets from Cincinnati - I now know way more about pet travel than I ever wanted to. I'm going to carry Ozzy on the flight with me. The vet gave me Xanax for Ozzy to calm him down on the flight - I think I'm going to need some too with all the angry looks I'll be getting from the people sitting around me! Jimmy is set to move into our apartment this weekend and all of our stuff will get delivered on Monday. He's in India this week, China next week and Japan the following week so he won't have a chance to do any unpacking before I get there. I can't believe I have less than 3 weeks left in Cincinnati but I'm hoping to spend as much time with friends as family as I can before I leave!
Thursday, July 4, 2013
House Hunting Trip Part 2
Thursday I went and checked out 8 more places in the Holland Village area which Jimmy and I decided was where we wanted to live. There is an MRT station nearby and there are also a lot of restaurants and shops nearby. My top 3 choices were all from day 2 of house hunting. On Friday, Jimmy checked out the final 3 with me and we picked a place! It's a 3 bedroom apartment with a pool and small gym. The paperwork is all going through now and Jimmy will be moving in on July 13th. Friday night we decided to head back down to Clarke Quay and try the Chili Crab at Jumbo - it was delicious even though I made a complete mess because I have no crab eating skills.
We walked around a bit after dinner where I walked through a lit up fountain and we could see the light show from Marina Bay.
We walked around a bit after dinner where I walked through a lit up fountain and we could see the light show from Marina Bay.
On Saturday we went to Sentosa Island which is where there are a lot of resorts, restaurants, Universal studios and some beaches. We got a bucket of 5 beers that cost $36US!!
On Sunday I finally tried Hainanese Chicken Rice at a hawker center which doesn't sound that exciting but it is really good. It's a pretty basic meal just done well. I think the 2 main foods Singapore is known for are Chicken Rice and Chili crab so I have officially checked them both off the list already! I had to get up early Monday morning for the long flight back. A guy in front of me at security during my layover in Chicago was whining about his long 13 hour day - if I hadn't been so tired I might have slapped him : )
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
House Hunting Trip Part 1
I finally got to spend some time in Singapore on my house hunting trip. It was great - I absolutely love this city and am so excited to move here. I had been worried about the heat and humidity but its not as bad as I thought it would be. So here's a recap of the first half of my trip - I wanted to capture it all before I started forgetting what happened.....
I left Cincinnati at 11 am on Thursday and the total travel time was supposed to be 25 hours with layovers in Newark and Hong Kong. On the flight from Newark to Hong Kong the person in front of me had bought a seat for his cello! I hope that cello was made of gold for him to have paid for a seat for it. On the plus side the cello didn't recline the seat so I had plenty of room. When I got to Hong Kong I found out that my flight to Singapore was delayed 4 hours. So instead of arriving in Singapore at midnight on Friday I got there at 4am on Saturday. (Singapore is 12 hours ahead of Cincinnati). Jimmy had been in Beijing on business all week and planned his flight back to Singapore at 11pm so he could just wait for me so he ended up sitting at the airport for hours too waiting for me. There have been fires in Malaysia that caused a really bad haze in Singapore for the past week so visibility wasn't great as we drove to the apartment Jimmy's been staying at but by Saturday it wasn't bad at all. We spent Saturday and Sunday walking around some of the different neighborhoods trying to get a feel for what area we want to live in. Saturday night we walked around Little India and went to a place called Banana Leaf Apolo where our food was actually served on a banana leaf.
On Sunday, we stopped by Marina Bay Sands for lunch which is a huge casino/resort/shopping mall.. It's 3 towers with a sky park on top that has restaurants and an infinity pool that is supposed to be amazing.
From there, we head to East Coast Park which is a really nice park right on the beach - the beach here isn't great though so there are more people hanging out in the park than on the beach and in the water.
I started the company sponsored look see/house hunting part of the trip on Monday. Jimmy decided not to join since he's been here before and had work to do. I got picked up Monday morning and we drove around all day hitting all of the major points of interest in the city (Fountain of Wealth, Singapore Flyer, Merlion Park, Marina Bay, Raffles, Clarke Quay, East Coast Park, The Grandstand, Holland Village, Little India, Kampong Glam, Chinatown etc). I can't wait to get here and explore each of them and of course take pictures for you all to see! On Tuesday, I went to the P&G office to meet with a potential hiring manager about a job at the Singapore office. I was so proud of myself for getting from the apartment to P&G all by myself using mass transportation. From there I was picked up to do house hunting all day. We saw 8 places and there was 1 I was interested in that was right by Orchard Road. Most of the apartments here are pretty small and the majority don't have dishwashers. Some don't even have ovens. We already have our furniture being shipped here so a big factor in picking where to live will be making sure all of our furniture fits. Most of the places I saw wouldn't fit our king size bed but the place by Orchard had tons of space. Tuesday night Jimmy and I went down to the Promenade for dinner - it's this cute area right on the Singapore river with a lot of restaurants (pretty much every area here has a lot of restaurants). I had 2 beers and they were more expensive than my meal! I think we'll have to do drinks at home even though alcohol isn't very cheap at the grocery either.
Wednesday was my first day with nothing scheduled. I started off by doing laundry - I'm going to be doing laundry every few days here because the washers are tiny compared to the US. I took a trip down to the gym for a run (I'm too much of a wuss to run outside in this heat). I got on the treadmill and put in my normal pace and thought, wow I'm in really good shape because this seems really slow to me. That's when I realized the treadmill paces were based on kilometers! Of course I wasn't in better shape after a few days of stuffing my face. All of these conversions are going to take awhile to get used to. We also received our air shipment on Tuesday so I had to go through those boxes to make sure there was no damage to anything. Once my chores were done I decided to head down to Orchard Road for some shopping. WOW is all I can say. Orchard Road is like the Magnificent Mile on steroids. It was raining when I got there so I kept wandering into different malls and I pretty much got lost in all of them. I think there were even times that I ended up on the other side of the street when I came out of the mall and didn't even realize it until later. Hopefully after a few more trips down there I'll get better at navigating my way around.
Wednesday night Jimmy and I went to a hawker center for dinner. A hawker center is an open air food court with good food that's pretty cheap. Jimmy ordered a chili crab and the crab actually crawled out of the bucket while being weighed - you know you are getting fresh food when you watch it try to run away!
That's it for the first half - I'm off to do more house hunting today - fingers crossed we find a place we like!
I left Cincinnati at 11 am on Thursday and the total travel time was supposed to be 25 hours with layovers in Newark and Hong Kong. On the flight from Newark to Hong Kong the person in front of me had bought a seat for his cello! I hope that cello was made of gold for him to have paid for a seat for it. On the plus side the cello didn't recline the seat so I had plenty of room. When I got to Hong Kong I found out that my flight to Singapore was delayed 4 hours. So instead of arriving in Singapore at midnight on Friday I got there at 4am on Saturday. (Singapore is 12 hours ahead of Cincinnati). Jimmy had been in Beijing on business all week and planned his flight back to Singapore at 11pm so he could just wait for me so he ended up sitting at the airport for hours too waiting for me. There have been fires in Malaysia that caused a really bad haze in Singapore for the past week so visibility wasn't great as we drove to the apartment Jimmy's been staying at but by Saturday it wasn't bad at all. We spent Saturday and Sunday walking around some of the different neighborhoods trying to get a feel for what area we want to live in. Saturday night we walked around Little India and went to a place called Banana Leaf Apolo where our food was actually served on a banana leaf.
On Sunday, we stopped by Marina Bay Sands for lunch which is a huge casino/resort/shopping mall.. It's 3 towers with a sky park on top that has restaurants and an infinity pool that is supposed to be amazing.
I started the company sponsored look see/house hunting part of the trip on Monday. Jimmy decided not to join since he's been here before and had work to do. I got picked up Monday morning and we drove around all day hitting all of the major points of interest in the city (Fountain of Wealth, Singapore Flyer, Merlion Park, Marina Bay, Raffles, Clarke Quay, East Coast Park, The Grandstand, Holland Village, Little India, Kampong Glam, Chinatown etc). I can't wait to get here and explore each of them and of course take pictures for you all to see! On Tuesday, I went to the P&G office to meet with a potential hiring manager about a job at the Singapore office. I was so proud of myself for getting from the apartment to P&G all by myself using mass transportation. From there I was picked up to do house hunting all day. We saw 8 places and there was 1 I was interested in that was right by Orchard Road. Most of the apartments here are pretty small and the majority don't have dishwashers. Some don't even have ovens. We already have our furniture being shipped here so a big factor in picking where to live will be making sure all of our furniture fits. Most of the places I saw wouldn't fit our king size bed but the place by Orchard had tons of space. Tuesday night Jimmy and I went down to the Promenade for dinner - it's this cute area right on the Singapore river with a lot of restaurants (pretty much every area here has a lot of restaurants). I had 2 beers and they were more expensive than my meal! I think we'll have to do drinks at home even though alcohol isn't very cheap at the grocery either.
Wednesday was my first day with nothing scheduled. I started off by doing laundry - I'm going to be doing laundry every few days here because the washers are tiny compared to the US. I took a trip down to the gym for a run (I'm too much of a wuss to run outside in this heat). I got on the treadmill and put in my normal pace and thought, wow I'm in really good shape because this seems really slow to me. That's when I realized the treadmill paces were based on kilometers! Of course I wasn't in better shape after a few days of stuffing my face. All of these conversions are going to take awhile to get used to. We also received our air shipment on Tuesday so I had to go through those boxes to make sure there was no damage to anything. Once my chores were done I decided to head down to Orchard Road for some shopping. WOW is all I can say. Orchard Road is like the Magnificent Mile on steroids. It was raining when I got there so I kept wandering into different malls and I pretty much got lost in all of them. I think there were even times that I ended up on the other side of the street when I came out of the mall and didn't even realize it until later. Hopefully after a few more trips down there I'll get better at navigating my way around.
Wednesday night Jimmy and I went to a hawker center for dinner. A hawker center is an open air food court with good food that's pretty cheap. Jimmy ordered a chili crab and the crab actually crawled out of the bucket while being weighed - you know you are getting fresh food when you watch it try to run away!
That's it for the first half - I'm off to do more house hunting today - fingers crossed we find a place we like!
Monday, June 10, 2013
Jimmy's Journey Begins!
I took Jimmy to the airport yesterday morning for his move to Singapore. He arrived around noon today after 26 hours of travel with layovers in Chicago and Hong Kong. Singapore is 12 hours ahead of Cincinnati so it was midnight in Singapore when he got there. He'll be staying in a long term residence for the next month and will be busy setting up our cell phones, bank accounts, credit cards etc while also having to travel to China and India for work. I'll be going to Singapore next week for about 10 days to have my look see and house hunt, so hopefully we'll find something while I'm there so Jimmy can move in during early July. (The look see is part of the relocation package and it's basically a day where they help us get familiar with the city.) I'm so excited to finally get to visit the place we'll call home for the next 3 years!!
Friday, May 17, 2013
Empty House
The movers have been here all week and the house is now empty! We close on May 31st but the relo company will be taking care of that so we're pretty much done with the house. I'll now be going to Singapore at the end of June to house hunt because Jimmy has to travel with work the first 2 weeks he's there. Now we just have to get everything straightened out with the pet move and we'll be set!
Sunday, May 5, 2013
Change in Plans
So we were planning to move to Singapore on June 9th but while at the vet this week we found out that Candy and Ozzy's rabies shots don't count in the Singapore government's eyes until they've had their microchips implanted. They have to wait 120 days to go to Singapore once they have had their microchip/rabies shot so the earliest they can go is the end of July. We also have to make sure they can get quarantine space which we can't reserve until we get their titre/rabies test results back which will be about 3 more weeks. For now, the plan is for Jimmy to move around June 9th and I'll come house hunting a week later then head back to the US. I'll move out to Singapore at the end of July with the pets. I'll be moving in with my parents later this week since the movers are coming to pack up all of our stuff next week. We're very lucky to have great friends and family who will take care of Candy and Ozzy while I'm at my parents house! There seem to be new things that come up every week so I'm sure the plans will change again next week.
We accepted an offer on the house 2 days after it was listed so now we just need to work on the inspection details and hopefully everything will work out and we'll close on May 31st. Jimmy finished the sale on his car this weekend so now we just have to get my car sold which I'll probably do in July. We've been busy but we're getting excited that the move date is getting closer!
We accepted an offer on the house 2 days after it was listed so now we just need to work on the inspection details and hopefully everything will work out and we'll close on May 31st. Jimmy finished the sale on his car this weekend so now we just have to get my car sold which I'll probably do in July. We've been busy but we're getting excited that the move date is getting closer!
Thursday, April 25, 2013
House for Sale!
We've spent the past few weeks getting the house straightened up and cleaned and now its finally up for sale! We had 2 showings the first day so hopefully that's a good sign. Jimmy has sold his car so we're making pretty good progress. I'll probably put my car up for sale in the next few days. It's looking like our move date will be June 9th but its not definite so hopefully that will be confirmed in the next week. The movers are coming to pack up our house in a few weeks since it will take about 8 weeks for the shipment to get to Singapore and clear customs. Once the movers take everything, I'll be moving in with my parents and our next door neighbor will take the pets since my mom is allergic. We also got Candy's crate that she'll be shipped in delivered this week. The vet recommended getting it early so she could get used to being in it - that was a great idea because right now she is not a big fan of it. We're putting her food in it as an incentive to go in but as soon as the food is gone she gets out. Hopefully she'll get used to it in the next month. Other than that we've been filling in a lot of paperwork and have been going through our stuff deciding what to bring and what to store. We're excited its starting to get close!
Sunday, April 14, 2013
We're Engaged!
Jimmy and I were in Maui last week which was a nice break from getting ready for the move. The morning after we arrived, we went to Haleakala to watch the sunrise. After the sunrise, we went for a hike which is when Jimmy proposed. We are so happy and had a great trip!!
Sunrise at Haleakala
My ring on the beach
Surfing
View while driving around Maui
Cows blocking the road on our drive
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Prepping
Right now we're at the beginning of the relocation process and will be putting our house up for sale in the next few weeks. As part of the relocation process, we had to interview 3 realtors this week. They are all probably hoping we don't pick them - nobody wants to sell the hillbilly house with the mattress in the dining room.
We also have to sell our cars and decide what we want to take with us and what we want to store in the US. For insurance purposes we have to list every item we own and assign a value. Singapore also requires that we document every serial # on our electronics items to make sure we've had them for 6 months and we aren't trying to bring over items to sell. Jimmy has been in charge of determining which electronics will work over there and what type of adapters and converters we need. We also have to start the process of getting our pets ready for the big move. Candy and Ozzy got micro chipped and vaccinated this week and they'll have to go back for a few more shots before we leave. When we get to Singapore they will have to go into quarantine for 10 days which is better than the 30 we originally thought it was going to be. We've been pretty busy but we're getting alot done!
Jimmy's New Job
I've decided to start this blog so that our family and friends can check in and see what our life is like as we relocate and live on another continent for the next 3 years. For some background on us, I've lived in Cincinnati my entire life and the majority of my family and friends are here. Jimmy was born in Taiwan and has lived on the on the east coast and west coast of the US before coming to Cincinnati for a job with GE and to meet the love of his life. We've been dating for a year and a half and live with our dog (Candy) and cat (Ozzy). In February 2013, Jimmy was offered an opportunity to work with Pall in their Singapore office. After a few weeks of sleepless nights, lots of wine and multiple coin tosses to decide our fate, we decided to accept the new position. Jimmy will be working in Pall's New York headquarters for training the next few months and we'll be moving to Singapore in the summer of 2013. We've got a lot to do to prepare over the next few months but we're really excited for this next chapter in our lives!
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