Newsletter 01: Departure

Thursday, October 16: The movers were due to show up to start boxing up our apartment between 1:00 and 3:00pm. The moving company called and said they'd be late, but that there would be two teams sent. At 4:30, one team (three people) showed up. They put things in boxes and wrapped furniture in bubble wrap until about 2 in the morning. We had over 200 separate items, mostly boxes of stuff. Some were labeled by a 20-year old with graffiti-style handwriting; he must have enjoyed brandishing the marker, because he drew smiley faces on some of the many boxes marked "books," using the double o's as eyes.

Our apartment became a warehouse full of large heavy objects and no floor space.

We checked in to a handicapped-accessible room (which had a nice shower) at the Princeton Hyatt Regency at around 2:30, having reserved a room on Priceline.com for a terrific slow-season rate.

 

We requested a wake-up call at 7:30, so that we'd be up and ready to return to Princeton in the morning. For Aquinas's 10:00am PhD thesis defense.

Friday, October 17: I woke up at 7:45 from the sunlight coming through the window. No wake up call. Upon complaining to the manager about the potential disaster, narrowly averted, we were issued a $50 gift card. The thesis defense was hampered by a severe lack of sleep, but sufficed to transform Mister Hobor into Doctor Hobor. Yea!

The moving company was due to arrive at 2:00pm with the shipping container to load all the furniture and boxes for their ocean journey. When it became clear that they would not arrive on time, we rescheduled for Saturday morning.

Saturday, October 18: Two guys started emptying the house onto the sidewalk at 10:00 am.

 

At 11:00am, two guys showed up with the container.

 

They started packing it.

 

They said they liked boxes much better than furniture, because they are much more regular and thus easier to arrange in the container. Previously, the packing team had indicated that furniture was a lot easier to handle; all you had to do was wrap up the outside, you didn't have to wrap and box up lot of tiny, individual objects. Due in part to our having mostly had tiny, individual objects in regularly shaped boxes, the container was completely loaded (and almost completely full) by 12:30.

 

Sunday, October 19: We constructed a 3-computer network in our hotel room to back up some files. It included a laptop, a 19" CRT, a 1TB network storage drive, two desktop towers, and one router to rule, er, that is, connect them all. When we wanted to watch a DVD during the backup, it only belatedly occurred to us that we might be able to watch it on the hotel TV. (As it turned out, however, the hotel TV didn't have a DVD player.) Later on, we did a deal for a desk, in pieces, in the parking lot of the Hyatt. That felt strange.

Monday, October 20: We ran around getting rid of the final things to donate, share, sell, and mail, until the car was empty and we transferred it and its keys, too. Then, with the help of a Tetris master from the Hyatt, we packed our four computer boxes (boxes that, by design, just barely met the airline restrictions on weight and dimensions for checked bags) into a friend's car, and headed off to JFK.

 

At JFK, we saw four very old, non-English-speaking Indian ladies in wheelchairs, being escorted through security by two somewhat impatient but generally respectful black guys.

At the Frankfurt airport, after the short leg of our journey, we saw a janitor and his equipment on a tricycle.

Tuesday, October 21: Somehow, we skipped this day entirely. It's all a blur.

Wednesday, 22 October: At Singapore's Changi airport, we had absolutely no trouble collecting our checked bags, er, that is, boxes.

 

They didn't verify these against our luggage stubs. We had no trouble passing through customs with our American OTC medication (some of which requires a prescription in Singapore; we'd carefully brought along prescriptions for them), or our bottle of wine.

 

In fact, the duty-free store between the baggage claim and the customs exit was happy to help us expand our alcohol inventory, up to the legal per-person limit for tax exemption (3 cans of beer, one liter of liquor, and one bottle of wine per person). Tobacco, however, has no exemptions whatsoever. We had no trouble bringing in any computer equipment, though I did notice the TSA had inspected my desktop and re-taped the box. No one searched us for chewing gum, not that we brought any, of course.

I'm a FOP: fresh off plane! I'm not in Kansas anymore. Or New Jersey, for that matter.

Tetris skills were not required to load our stuff into our hatchback taxi at the airport. The announcer on the radio informed us that cranberries, one of the lesser-known fruits, can fight infection, and thus should be included in one's diet.

Most of the cabs are recent Toyotas, but they look to me like Mercedeses. See comparison.

I love the twisty trees. Who knew that tree branches could grow in such a way that they are noticeably weird and different? It's not like I've never seen trees, for heaven's sake. But these are way cool trees. I'm in a different place.

In this place, "works" indicates "construction."

 

In this place, a bridge or overpass is called a "flyover," which to me sounds entirely too exciting, possibly even dangerous or threatening.

In this place, the day goes *before* the month.

In this place, there is no long word that cannot be shortened: "Expressway" becomes "E'way" here in "S'pore." Not kidding.

In this place, the coke cans have "Do not litter" printed on the top.

 

Most buildings have umbrella bags on a stand at the door, saying "For your wet umbrella," the implication being, in a cleanliness-obsessed place where it rains every day, that you must have one and that we wouldn't want it to drip on our floor.

 

(actually, not my photo; I'll sub in one of my own later)

In this place, plants grow everywhere, even in trees.

 

In this place, there aren't any napkins at fast food places, and $2 bills and $1 coins are commonplace.

In this place, left turns are easy and right turns are hard, because they drive on the left. The escalators, however, are inconsistent; sometimes you take the one on the left, sometimes the one on the right.

In this place, I have no address, no phone number, no job, and, still, no umbrella.

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