You can watch a video of the whole ride here:
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Efteling
You can watch a video of the whole ride here:
From African hair to babies.
I had an appointment to cut M's hair today, and I learn more about African hair everyday. This is the time of the year when lots of African girls start to wear caps, hats and wraps and I was wondering why until I found out that it's time to take off their false braids. Supposedly they can only wear them for about 6 to 8 weeks, and seeing that it's a few months into the school year, understandably they haven't had the time to go and get their hair braided again.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
I am a woman.
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Eid ul-Adha
Selamat Aidil-Adha to everyone! Here it was one day early than in Singapore (16 Nov). Also known as the Feast of Sacrifice and the Feast of Haj, this Eid is different from the other, post-fasting Eid. During this Eid we remember Prophet Abraham's spirit of sacrifice - he was willing to give up his younger son, Ismael upon the orders of God, and would not let Satan convince him otherwise. This day also marks the end of the Haj, which is the pilgrimage to Mecca.
The Belgians were here
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Susu pekat manis.
Haircuts
I've started a little business here, cutting hair. I put up these flyers all around school, in the hostels and in pigeon holes. It's good fun, requires no capital and makes me feel like I'm paying less rent than I am now, haha.
Monday, November 8, 2010
Modern Singapore.
Monday, November 1, 2010
Exams
Monday, October 18, 2010
Cycling
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Teaching
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Amsterdam
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Economics for Everyone
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Hollandse Nieuwe
Education funding in SSA
Friday, September 24, 2010
TGIF
I get excited about a lot of things everyday that I want to keep posting statuses on Facebook, until I realise that this is why I have a blog. Haha.
Lectures for Global Politics in the Developing World have started, and two professors are sharing the 6 lectures. First we assume that the developing world is a separate entity and that its politics are different, and there are different ways of approaching these issues.
I met Ellen from Ghana during lunch and we went for a lecture on some new indices of social development developed in Harvard, which turned out to be hopelessly boring, so she invited me to her room for lunch. There are two hostels which are just behind the main building, and living in one of them ensures that you develop enough inertia to not see anything more than the main street in front of ISS!
So I had Ghana cuisine for lunch thanks to her - fried plantain, egg stew and bean stew. Interesting flavours!
I also met up with the one and only other Singaporean here - he's doing some research for ISS. He did his MA here about ten years ago, and we had some very interesting conversations with his colleague from China. However, when the conversation veered towards the productivity of women being naturally low, I made my hasty exit, haha.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Weekend
In the streets near my CS host's house there was a market (just like a pasar malam, except from 10h - 15h) so we had to go see that first! This was nothing typically Dutch though - no windmills or milkmaids or whatever else my blog name conjures up of Holland :) In fact, what I gather from observing the streets in the past week is that Dutch culture consists of a lot of cultural appropriation, especially when it comes to cuisines! More on that later, with pictures to boot. So when I saw a stall selling 'soeto', I had to check, and in this case it was correct.
Then we rented a bike and went cycling near Scheveningen Bos ('forest'), which is about 2 or 3km northeast of where ISS is. We went further than that, since we hit the sand dunes! Seeing hills of sand amidst temperate forest is something special. Silvery poplars are abundant too, since they grow best in sandy soil (artefact information from a course on silviculture I took in Spain 2008).
We made it back to the bike rental shop with 7 minutes to spare, and got a quick dinner at Ming Kee chinese restaurant (they must make a lot of money if they're selling rice + 2 meat + 2 veg for 5 euros!) before heading to Korzo5hoog near the Centraal Station.
The performance was ''Readymade Dance/Part of the Deal" by Andre Gingras, for the fabulous student price of 6 euros. The first piece used boxing and its related shuffling, skipping and punches to create a dance. One dancer even got a bloody nose at the end, but the blood was a bit too bright red to be real (I hope, anyways.). The second piece spent some time deconstructing steps from hiphop and breakdance, before breaking out into a frantic dance involving live singing/sounds coming from a wo/man (I really couldn't tell.).
Today is back to school and I also have to start settling into a normal life i.e. laundry, cooking, cleaning.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Apartment
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
School
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Arriving
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Bye!
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Gratitude.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Housing
Doing exchange in Valencia was good preparation. My friend and I stayed in a backpacker's hostel for 3 days and walked around for 10 hours a day viewing apartment, but it was sheer chance that we found the apartment we eventually ended up living in. We wanted to stay in the centre of town, even though school was about 2km away. And it turned out great because most of the town's cultural activities e.g. Fallas were happening right in our neighbourhood! We hardly slept during Fallas for the constant fireworks and when we did, we woke up to street processions.
Also, cycling to school on a bicycle bought on a (dodgy!) black market was exciting as long as we keep to the cycling paths. But the thrill of being able to reach school in 10 minutes! A total change from the hours on buses and the MRT here.
The Hague is flat and Holland is a country of cyclists! I can see loads of cycling paths on Google Street View, hurray.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Taking stock
1. Bought cookies
2. Bought books
3. Bought envelopes
4. Donated to my Grad School Fund!
Mille mercis to all of you, I can't thank you enough.
A short update on the state of things is in order (in other words, an order from Dad). I've been baking everyday without fail since 1 Aug 2010, bringing the total of cookie jars made to... 79! Productivity has risen since I got out the industrial strength Kenwood mixer of Mum's, cranked the oven up to 180 degrees (from 150), and hired an army of elves. Okay, so the last part isn't true. But I can roll cookie dough in my sleep now, I'm pretty sure of that.
I've sold 33 books and get this... 1059 envelopes. Even I had no idea it was that many.
It isn't easy to earn money in this way at all, and I had no idea. In the first few days, when I had no stamina for baking, I was exhausted after making 3 batches, but now I can breeze through 6. And making envelopes seemed like an awful lot of effort for a little bit of cash, but help from friends (Agent 1 of Operation Envelope, you know who you are!), I've got hundreds easily made.
Humility is something I need, and I will always need more of it. I've new-found respect for the man I met in Marrakech, peddling clocks to tourists sitting in cafes under the fierce Moroccan sun; and for the lady who sells karipap in the underground passage from Novena MRT to Tan Tock Seng Hospital.