4th Long stay in Boring Singapore? Not the Best Choice

20th August 2007, Monday

Yu-kun, our law-studying Kagoshima-born, Tokyo-based Japanese friend made his 4th long stay to our sunny (not so recently) island since last Thursday with EK's place providing him the necessary lodging needs...

The La Tendo gang surely made our presence felt during his stay, none more than EK and Karen of course...

But the amazing part is that unless on business or diplomatic or cultural-exchange motives, I doubt any visitors would wanna visit our sleepy, boredom-ladened city for more than twice, the number of endaring tourist attractions can be counted with both hands...I really wish I could be a ambassador to Singapore to sell it constantly to our overseas friends, but most of us had ran out of ideas of which precise corner of the island we can confidently bring our friend to and hope it is a brand new experience for him...which we haven't done before....

Fortunately Yu-kun, being so cordial and obliging didn't mind most of the events we had planned for him as ultimately it is the blatant mingling with the entire lot of us which he enjoys and triggers his frequent returns over the past couple of years...

This time round with the unprecedented heat wave due to global warming which had claimed like 13 lives now, heading southwards seems like a pretty good choice especially we had a surprisingly cool August perhaps some typhoons bypassing towards Philippines and to Taiwan and China perhaps... In short our planet is on the brink of a meteorological breakdown and it will worsen as years go by....

So Yu-kun spent the 1st of 3 weekends here in the midst of some local flavor...

On Friday it was the fireworks celebration at Marina Bay as part of the National Day celebration... well they have a abundance of those during their summer festivals (夏祭り), so I supposed he wasn't too awe-struck by the grandeur display...

On Saturday, the gang introduced the magic of getai (歌台), no not the actual stage performances in the heartlands omnipresent this time of the year but the new Roystan Tan movie, "881" which narrates the lives of some getai singers... it very good insight to something uniquely SIngapore with some sob tales entwined within as Tian Tian could verified by wasting a whole packet of tissue paper...
Though I didn't slammed it with the blunt "I don't support local production" comment by the Chong brothers, I felt the movie was not worth my good $9.50, so I gave it a miss as well

Finally Sunday, it's badminton to Clementi, that after a sweat-inducing jog by Chinese Garden for our Japanese friend, somehow he seems to enlisted to our version of "The Biggest Loser"...
A pretty impressive roll call for once with Chan making the effort to appear despite working overnight and Tian Tian after such a sabbatical reappeared in out badminton scene and sprained her ankle along the way...
After brunch, we headed to East Coast Park for the roller-blading session which was overdue for some of them...I stick with cycling which becomes pretty economical these days...and it can be quite an experience trying to balance my hefty mass on the mountain bike after such a long time (the last might be that faithful sprawl at NUS down that slope)...
The likes of Bryan and Karen had difficulties covering some distance on rollerblades while Yu vamoose around without breaking a sweat...
There was a downpour while we left Clementi by noon and the rain soon caught at the East side and disrupted our biking-blading session and I noticed some silly Malay lads trying to catch that little wave crests there was to offer for some surfboarding... maybe after the boards, they couldn't afford a trip to a nearby surfboarding haven for the real deal...
So we had to call it a day at the beach and headed to EK's place for some wash-up before I departed for home with the missus who had done with her product fair....

In the coming fornight, we had the blueprints laid out for a potluck party at Vincent's place where we can have the first taste of Nintendo Wii which got EK all buzzed up...

It is sure a torrid time at Old Trafford as my beloved Red Devils still find winning elusive this season after 2 meek draws with Reading & the Pompey respectively...
To add salt to the wound, they had to lose to bitter derby rivals Man City as Sven Goran Eriksson surely worth some managerial magic that brought him titles everywhere he had coached....
It's been ages had we seen the Devils lingering just above the relegation zone, and Fergie better work his hair dryer tactics to rejuvenate the ailing reigning champions of EPL...

Japanese word of the day: 考え (Ideas) We surely had none left to sell an equally ailing Singapore...