I am feeling slightly overwhelmed when it comes to blogging about this trip of ours. Especially if I'm doing it by "day"s instead of "part"s. But I will get through it. I have already loved looking through them and choosing which ones were wasted space and which ones I wanted to remember most.
Here we go (this is a continuation of Day 1):
After Fiona picked us up from the airport, we drove into town, about 25 minute drive. We were very anxious to get out of the car. During the car ride, I looked down and noticed my super super fat ankles. Maybe from sitting in a plane for so long with no leg room? I did stand for a good 30 minutes here and there, but never longer than that. Maybe the extreme humidity had something to do with it as well. We were all joking about that.. Mark kept joking about my elephant-titis feet. Very funny Mark. Real funny.
We checked out our apartment- we found out we were staying with one of the co-owners of the club TAB, and his girlfriend or friend? Still not totally sure. Tofu the dog was another resident. He made himself very known when we came home, or just when we were home. He'd bark his little itty bitty tail off until we let him in our room. So that was a shock. It was very hot and we didn't have much time to change and grab stuff for our night around the town. I did strip down to the barest of clothes because everything was so sticky. I wanted the ocean. That's all I kept thinking..where is the nearest body of water??
Then we went to Mark & Paul's apartment. It was very nice and really close to the club which was nice for them. We had a good walk and subway ride then more walking from our apartment. But I wouldn't have changed anything.
This building is what you see when you leave Mark's place and head over to TAB. Across from Orchard Hotel (the lady boy's hotel :/)
Entering TAB- when you walk in the doors- there is a really tall escalator that takes you to the actual club. You pay at the bottom.
One of the three bars in the club.
We ended up with Fiona again and walked around the city. We quickly realized that this place called "Singapore" was resembling NYC, or a watered-down version of NYC. You can find really anything you can here in America.. Pizza Hut, 7/11s EVERYWHERE.. you get the idea. But it was still fun exploring. And HOT. We also realized that to get anywhere cool, you'd have to take a subway. So we thought we'd take on the subway adventure the next day. Instead we stayed in the malls. Malls are everywhere. You can either get to a mall by subway (the exit is the entrance of a mall..no joke) or from the street. I came to the conclusion that there are so many malls because there is no body of water to retreat to, and it's just too stinkin hot to be outside. Malls are very nice and very air conditioned.
Next day:
Getting ready for our day in Little India. This is our apartment room.
We didn't want to have to make the trek back to our apartment after our day's adventures, so we brought everything with us, merch, guitars.. the whole bit. But we didn't totally know how to get to Mark's place to drop off the stuff...so that was another 45 minute detour, just wandering around hills and streets trying to find something that looked familiar. Finally I asked a pedestrian, or he asked us if we were lost and how to get from here to there.
Well we did finally get to them and it was a joyous occasion because we could let all the bags off our shoulders and get on our with our day. Off to Little India!
This was outside of a temple Paul & Drew walked into (barefoot, not our thing).
We stopped to get lunch right when we got to Little India. We decided we wanted very authentic Indian food, not a place that was going to be crowded but kind of a hole-in-the-wall type place. Well, we found it! We sat in this room that looked like a utility room with make-shift tables. There was a guy sitting there that saw Paul's shirt that said something like "Salt Lake City, Utah" on it, and the guy said he had a house there or something. He was American. We never really saw too many of those Americans over there.
I ordered Chicken Tika Masala, you know, the norm. It tasted NOTHING like what we have here in the US. Or atleast the kinds I've had, in Provo and Orange County. The kind here is like candy and you can sip and drink the curry. Over there, it's like eating chicken with tomato juice, like V8 juice.
Drew ordred something that he loved and could have eaten all day long. Maybe I should have ordered his too.
I asked our waiter if they had gluten free naan, and they did! But the communication wasn't very clear, he didn't speak very good english, so I'm sure I had bites of both kind of naan. Everytime we would say "Is that gluten free naan?" He'd say "No sir, yes sir." or "Yes sir, no sir." Talk about confusing. Our bill ended up being more than wanted because of the bad communication, but whatever.
It started getting late and we had to be at the club around 5 if we wanted to eat and do sound check. So we headed back.
The way to pay for your subway ticket is strange. You can only put a round trip ticket, and it gives you credit for every ride. A typical ride was $2.10. So we were at these booths quite often. If we were staying for more than a month we could have paid a lot more to save us time at them.
Bought these glasses because I forgot mine.. cheap $5 glasses. Awesome!
We went back to Mark's place, went in the apartment pool, I read a book with my legs in the water while the boys played games like- see who can do more laps than the other without coming up for air. I didn't want to get my hair wet because I didn't have my stuff for the night.
At the club, the chef came down to introduce himself since he would be feeding us for 5 nights straight. I told him about my allergy and he said he totally understood and he would make me a mystery dish. This was the mystery dish and it was the most AMAZING dinner I think I've ever had. Unreal. The carmelized onions and the tender chicken with the super good carrots. Oh man. I could eat it every night. And you bet I did!!!
They were nervous & anxious to play. They didn't know how many people would be there or how they would receive them. They sold a few shirts and CDs which was great news! It was a great start to the week and set the mood. There was an American there from St. Louis and he asked me if we were LDS (or Mormon) because Drew said something about growing up in Salt Lake City.. so of course, that question comes up!
See their you-tube videos I uploaded while they played at TAB.
After Fiona picked us up from the airport, we drove into town, about 25 minute drive. We were very anxious to get out of the car. During the car ride, I looked down and noticed my super super fat ankles. Maybe from sitting in a plane for so long with no leg room? I did stand for a good 30 minutes here and there, but never longer than that. Maybe the extreme humidity had something to do with it as well. We were all joking about that.. Mark kept joking about my elephant-titis feet. Very funny Mark. Real funny.
We checked out our apartment- we found out we were staying with one of the co-owners of the club TAB, and his girlfriend or friend? Still not totally sure. Tofu the dog was another resident. He made himself very known when we came home, or just when we were home. He'd bark his little itty bitty tail off until we let him in our room. So that was a shock. It was very hot and we didn't have much time to change and grab stuff for our night around the town. I did strip down to the barest of clothes because everything was so sticky. I wanted the ocean. That's all I kept thinking..where is the nearest body of water??
Then we went to Mark & Paul's apartment. It was very nice and really close to the club which was nice for them. We had a good walk and subway ride then more walking from our apartment. But I wouldn't have changed anything.
This building is what you see when you leave Mark's place and head over to TAB. Across from Orchard Hotel (the lady boy's hotel :/)We ended up with Fiona again and walked around the city. We quickly realized that this place called "Singapore" was resembling NYC, or a watered-down version of NYC. You can find really anything you can here in America.. Pizza Hut, 7/11s EVERYWHERE.. you get the idea. But it was still fun exploring. And HOT. We also realized that to get anywhere cool, you'd have to take a subway. So we thought we'd take on the subway adventure the next day. Instead we stayed in the malls. Malls are everywhere. You can either get to a mall by subway (the exit is the entrance of a mall..no joke) or from the street. I came to the conclusion that there are so many malls because there is no body of water to retreat to, and it's just too stinkin hot to be outside. Malls are very nice and very air conditioned.
Next day:
Well we did finally get to them and it was a joyous occasion because we could let all the bags off our shoulders and get on our with our day. Off to Little India!
We stopped to get lunch right when we got to Little India. We decided we wanted very authentic Indian food, not a place that was going to be crowded but kind of a hole-in-the-wall type place. Well, we found it! We sat in this room that looked like a utility room with make-shift tables. There was a guy sitting there that saw Paul's shirt that said something like "Salt Lake City, Utah" on it, and the guy said he had a house there or something. He was American. We never really saw too many of those Americans over there.
I ordered Chicken Tika Masala, you know, the norm. It tasted NOTHING like what we have here in the US. Or atleast the kinds I've had, in Provo and Orange County. The kind here is like candy and you can sip and drink the curry. Over there, it's like eating chicken with tomato juice, like V8 juice.
Drew ordred something that he loved and could have eaten all day long. Maybe I should have ordered his too.
I asked our waiter if they had gluten free naan, and they did! But the communication wasn't very clear, he didn't speak very good english, so I'm sure I had bites of both kind of naan. Everytime we would say "Is that gluten free naan?" He'd say "No sir, yes sir." or "Yes sir, no sir." Talk about confusing. Our bill ended up being more than wanted because of the bad communication, but whatever.
Bought these glasses because I forgot mine.. cheap $5 glasses. Awesome!We went back to Mark's place, went in the apartment pool, I read a book with my legs in the water while the boys played games like- see who can do more laps than the other without coming up for air. I didn't want to get my hair wet because I didn't have my stuff for the night.
At the club, the chef came down to introduce himself since he would be feeding us for 5 nights straight. I told him about my allergy and he said he totally understood and he would make me a mystery dish. This was the mystery dish and it was the most AMAZING dinner I think I've ever had. Unreal. The carmelized onions and the tender chicken with the super good carrots. Oh man. I could eat it every night. And you bet I did!!!See their you-tube videos I uploaded while they played at TAB.
