Taking on the City

My friends were still adjusting to the time difference on their second full day in Singapore, so we got a late start.  We began by heading to the wet market to have a tropical fruit taste test, and we picked up some strange local treats. On the left is a dragonfruit, which has a texture similar to that of a kiwi, but is less sweet.  There are two varieties- one with white flesh and one with purple flesh.  This one was purple inside, but I didn't notice much difference in taste, except that the purple one was much juicier than the white one I've tried.  The middle fruit is a pretty standard mango, and that odd red, bell-shaped fruit on the right is locally referred to as a jambu.  I asked around for an English term, but most people couldn't come up with one.  Someone finally called it a rose apple.  It was fun to try one, since I've enjoyed watching the monkeys eat them out at Bukit Timah.  The jambu turned out to be my favorite of the fruits we tasted.  It was crisp, light, and not very sweet.  Finally, the cluster of spiky fruits at the top are rambutan.  Once peeled, they look and feel a lot like eyeballs (hence the next photo).  They're a little sweet and really chewy.  Mark and I liked them a lot, but the texture seemed to put KT off of them. 

While out and about, we picked up some other local cuisine to test out- thousand layer cake, red bean paste wrapped in pandan leaves, and Mark got a doughnut.  KT and Mark were shocked by the doughnut- a lot of bakeries around here don't make them the way an American would expect, and this was one of those.  The doughnut tasted like a dinner roll with chocolate icing and whipped cream on it.  Ick!

After our hodgepodge meal, we headed downtown to check out some of the sights.  I got us a little turned around on our way to the Esplanade, and we ended up at a war memorial I'd never seen before.  The memorial was erected to honor those that fell during WWII, when the Japanese occupied Singapore.  The second photo is from inside the memorial, looking up.

After wandering the war memorial in the rain for awhile, I got my bearings and we made a beeline for the Esplanade.  The Esplanade is a large theater downtown, and it's one of the most bizarre buildings around- it kind of looks like a giant silver durian.  We walked through the theater and up to the roof to get a good view of the city.

From the roof, we could see a lot of the notable sights- the brand spanking new Marina Bay Sands Resort & Casino, which was designed to look like a cruise ship got beached across the top of three skyscrapers.  It's pretty neat, and it's been fun watching it built over the past year- Bryan and I have been tracking the progress of the construction since the building was somewhere around the 8th or 9th floor.

The Singapore Flyer, of Amazing Race infamy, can also be seen from the roof.

In the distance, through the rain that was falling sporadically, we could spot the merlion endlessly gushing water.

As the rain began to fall more heavily, we headed back inside and scoped out some of the art displayed inside.  My favorites were the tight rope walkers in the atrium.  The gymnasts and their tightropes were made entirely out of reused plastic bags.  I have a serious appreciation for artists who take trash items and make them new again by incorporating them into something fresh and interesting.

In one of the galleries was a huge painting depicting the recent conflict between the Red Shirts and Yellow Shirts in Thailand.  It was interesting to see a local perspective on the conflict, and I liked the funky, raw style of the painting...but no photos allowed, so you'll have to go see it for yourself!  In the same gallery was a little set where patrons were free to pose and take photos as desired.  We had another senior picture session, laughing at our own antics.

We walked around awhile, perusing our lunch options, and then settled on sushi at a Japanese restaurant called Ichiban Boshi.  I attempted to teach Mark to use chopsticks, but I must not have been doing a very good job of educating, because he quickly requested silverware.  Over lunch, we discussed the plan for the rest of the day, and decided our next move would be to go to Little India, so after yummy sushi we headed out there on the MRT.

Little India is a world away from the quiet, orderly atmosphere of the Esplanade.  It's loud, hectic, aromatic, and a bit messy.  I've only been there once before, so I was doing the same spinning and staring thing that I saw my friends doing.  We struck out down the street and spent some time ducking in and out of various shops and stalls- my favorite place sells sparkly Buddhas and optical illusions of Jesus, that look as though Jesus's eyes are following you everywhere (CREEPY!).

Little India's colonial shophouses are really colorful, and they make for great scenery.

We took some photos of the Sri Veeramakaliamman Temple, one of the more colorful Hindu temples I've seen.

We wandered the streets a bit aimlessly, just checking out all the sights.  Eventually we happened upon Mustafa Center, a huge Indian grocery store that our friends have told us about.  We popped in to check things out- I love to cook Indian food and I've had trouble finding some of the ingredients I need (like frozen paneer), so I thought it might be a good place to look.  The store turned out to be a megastore- stories high, jammed with groceries, people, and smells from wall to wall.  The aisles were all really narrow, so people were squished in, squeezing by one another.  The experience was a little overwhelming, and we ended up popping out of the store almost as quickly as we'd popped in.

After walking awhile longer in the heat, we decided to stop for a nice cold beer.  We sat down at one of the stalls along the street, which I referred to as a bar until KT pointed out that it was really just a bunch of tables in an alley.  KT and I shared a delicious Tiger and then decided to try something new.  I saw an ad for a beer that I'd never heard of hanging on the wall, and I said to the waiter, "Excuse me, could we have a Canon One Thousand?"  He threw back his head and laughed, "You mean Canon TEN Thousand.  Super strong beer.  No girl can drink," he said, shaking his head.  I laughed too, then replied, "Well, we'd like to try.  May we have one?"  He smiled broadly as he delivered the beer to the table, but KT and I smiled bigger when we saw the bottle- the label said simply "Canon 10000 SUPER STRONG BEER" and nothing else.  We drank it (despite his warning, we girls stomached it just fine), and it was delicious.

After hanging out and tasting funny drinks for awhile (Mark was cycling through some of Singapore's stranger juice offerings, like soursop juice), we got on the MRT to go up one stop to Chinatown, where we were meeting Bryan and my friend Oliver for dinner.  Another Singaporean friend of ours had told us about a good dim sum restaurant there, a place called Red Star, and we wanted to try it out.  It will probably demonstrate my naivete about Chinese food when I tell you that I had no idea that dim sum is not typically served for dinner, but how was I supposed to know?  Mark told me that it's generally a day time type of thing, but by then we were already on our way to Chinatown.

It turned out to be incredibly fortunate that we asked Oliver to join us, because without his Chinese language skills, I seriously doubt we would have ever found the restaurant in the first place, let alone managed to order dinner.  He stopped for directions a couple of times, and then navigated us to a back alley, through a door, into a dim elevator, and up to the seventh floor of what appeared to be an apartment building.  If I had been with a stranger, at that point I would have plotting my escape from my inevitable kidnapping, because things were looking pretty shady there for a minute.  When we got to the seventh floor, we were in the back of the restaurant, and ended up entering right next to the kitchen (I like to make a grand entrance).  As Mark predicted, dim sum was not being served, so Oliver helped us order a family style meal from a hulking, irritable waitress who slapped Mark's hand away when he tried to pour KT some tea. 

I thought the food was okay, but I understood that a traditional Chinese restaurant isn't the best place to go to get delicious vegetarian cuisine.  Everyone else seemed to enjoy the feast, and the un-American presentation of it- whole shrimp with their tails and skins still on, an entire crab that took up almost a whole platter, etc.  I skipped the meat and enjoyed sticky buns, tofu, and veggies.  Despite Mark's shellfish allergy, he chowed down on things he wasn't supposed to eat , and was predictably covered in hives by the time we got dessert (the strange black blob in the photo below was dessert. It's called gui ling gao, and it looks like black Jell-O and tastes like pretty much nothing).  We detoured to a drug store to get Mark something for the hives, and again we were thankful for Oliver, who knew much more about the local medicines than I did.

After dinner, we headed back to our flat to play some cards and hang out for awhile.  Mark's hives raged on for some time, but were looking a little better by bedtime.  As I fell asleep that night, I thought back to leaving the apartment that morning and couldn't believe everything we'd jammed into one day!

Back in Action: The Epic Asian Adventure Begins

My recent posting hiatus is due to the fact that I had friends visiting from the U.S., and we were very busy adventuring all over Singapore and outward into Thailand and Vietnam.  As a result, I now have lots of what I've come to think of as "blog fodder"- new photos, stories, and travel advice to dispense.

The friends that came to visit were KT and Mark.  KT has been my friend since childhood, and we've stayed close through my moves to Minnesota, New Mexico and Singapore.  I was thrilled when she and another friend came to visit me in New Mexico a couple years ago, but when I announced that I was moving to the other side of the planet, I didn't really expect anyone to make the epic voyage to meet up with me.  I was cautiously optimistic when KT started talking about planning a trip, and was thrilled when she actually bought a plane ticket.  A few months before her trip, she called and asked if her cousin Mark could join her, and I happily agreed- I've spent so much time with KT's family that I feel like her cousins are mine.

In the months preceding their trip, we exchanged a passel of emails, rambling about plans to travel outside of Singapore, foods to eat, sights to see, all punctuated with loads of exclamation points.  By the time I was finally headed to the airport to meet them, the excitement had built up so much that I felt like a kid on Christmas. After eleven months of not seeing anyone from home, I was giddy about their arrival.  I stayed glued to the glass wall by the arrival hall, watching for a sign of them, and spent about 30 minutes thinking that every person walking by was KT or Mark.  Once I finally spotted them, I started waving like a fool from about 30 yards away.  Mark looked buoyant and excited, but KT looked like traveling had gotten the best of her.  Her eyes looked like she'd been drugged, but she was still happy.  It was so wonderful to finally see them both.

Our taxi ride to my place reminded me of Bryan and my first view of the island, riding in a taxi through a moonlit Singapore.  We were just like KT and Mark, eagerly looking out the windows and taking it all in, especially enjoying the lit up Singapore Flyer alongside the road.  The ride flew by and we were back at the apartment in no time.  Everyone settled in and got some sleep in preparation for the first day of what we had long since dubbed the "Epic Asian Adventure."

After a good night's sleep, Bryan was off to work and KT, Mark, and I were ready to explore the city.  Our first order of business was to eat, and the hawker centre by our flat seemed like a good introduction to Singaporean food.  KT and Mark were hoping for some tame food after so much traveling and sleep deprivation, so they got some pretty plain noodles, which we followed up with yummy Portuguese egg tarts from a nearby bakery where Mark also got a piece of cake.  Little did I know then that this was the first of more than THIRTY pieces of cake that Mark would eat while in Southeast Asia.

After the hawker centre, we headed for the Singapore Botanic Gardens.  It was raining and, having been thrown out of my normal routine, I'd forgotten an umbrella.  I figured that the rain would stop within an hour, like it usually does, so we went on our way sans umbrellas.  I couldn't have been more wrong about the rain, which continued as our bus stopped outside the gardens.  It was letting up a bit, so we got off the bus anyway, only to be met with a renewed onslaught of rain.  We got drenched, but I didn't really care.  It was nice to be with friends from home, sopping wet and all.  Plus we looked hilarious.

Not wanting to wander the gardens in the pouring rain, we hopped back on the bus and headed to Orchard Road to wait out the bad weather in the comfort of the endless network of overly air-conditioned malls.  Mark and KT were appropriately dazzled by the sight of the towering, neon-adorned buildings swarming with hordes of shoppers eager to score a deal during the two month-long Great Singapore Sale.  We roamed a while, and sat around sipping coffee to warm up and to fight the jet lag that KT and Mark were struggling (it doesn't get much worse than a 12-hour time difference).

By the time we made our way back outside, the rain had stopped and we were ready to tackle the gardens.  On our way, we saw the BiodiverCity Photo Exhibition that I previously posted about here.  I thought the exhibition was impressive- the photos were easy to leisurely peruse, and there was a little room that you could go into, which was playing a slide show of nature images to the soundtrack of local nature sounds (cicadas...always cicadas).  It was especially interesting to see the nature photos displayed in the context of Orchard Road.  I thought it was a poignant example of the range of landscapes that exist on the small island- primary rainforest thriving mere miles from the ultra-modern shopping mecca of Orchard Road.

We finally made our way back to the Botanical Gardens, and we were happy to be able to enjoy it in the sunshine.  We meandered through the Spice Garden(where we saw torch ginger, my favorite!!), alongside the amphitheater, and past a few statues, eventually making our way to the National Orchid Garden.

At  the Orchid Garden, we first spent a few minutes browsing the gift shop, which is full of fun local knick knacks, including two of the creepiest mannequins I've ever seen.  I told Mark and KT that I would love to start a separate blog called "Creepy Mannequins of Southeast Asia."  I'm sure I would have no shortage of material, as most of the mannequins around here look like they were salvaged from a haunted house.  Exhibit number one...

Children of the Corn, anyone?!  And WHY DOESN'T THE ONE ON THE LEFT HAVE ANY ARMS?!?!

The garden itself is pretty amazing.  I've never seen such a wide array of flowers- all different colors and sizes- and it's so hard to believe that they're ALL orchids.

I loved these mossy statues stationed outside the orchid garden, as well as this bright red pineapple.  I've never seen pineapples still on the plant, and I was surprised to see them growing on the ground.  I guess I thought they grew on trees!  Maybe it's obvious that I didn't grow up in the tropics.

As always, the highlight of my day was the pitcher plants!  There was a whole area devoted to all different kinds- fat, skinny, solitary, clusters, plain, and speckled.  Neat!

KT, Mark, and I got a kick out of taking what we referred to as "senior pictures" in the garden.  It was silly, but endlessly entertaining.

We decided to stroll out of the park and go meet up with Bryan at Indian Wok 'n' Grill on Orchard Road, a tasty restaurant that Bryan and I tried out when we were new to S'pore and living at the Orchard Parade Hotel.  On our way out, we made a few detours, first by Swan Pond, which lived up to its name, as we saw four elegant swans cruising around.

Beyond the swans, we got sidetracked through a small area that's been preserved as natural forest, and Mark and KT got their first taste of what nature really looks like in Singapore, although they'd get much more in the next few days.  We also meandered by a delightful collection of apparently gravity-defying sculptures (my apologies for the somewhat grainy pictures throughout the post- it was alternating between raining and being incredibly humid and overcast all day- a rather honest introduction to the Singaporean climate).

There was a couple at a nearby gazebo taking wedding shots, and although the garden was a magnificent backdrop for their photos, I couldn't help noticing my sweaty self and wondering how this couple was managing to take stunning photos in a heavy wedding dress and a full suit.  Not for the first time, I wondered if Singaporeans lack sweat glands.

After our long, wet adventure, we were grateful to sit down at the Indian restaurant.  Mark and KT enjoyed their first Tiger while we waited for Bryan, who had been sleeping when my friends came in the night before, and then he'd left for work while they slept the next morning. When he finally got there, he was bombarded with greetings and stories about our day (WE GOT SOAKED!!!  MARK ATE SO MUCH!!).  The food was scrumptious, and the meal was a relaxing and delicious way to end the first day of the adventure.

You're American?!

People just say the darnedest things sometimes.  Bryan and I have encountered a variety of sometimes hilarious responses to our heritage.

One day I was following the monkeys at Bukit Timah and a woman started asking me some questions about the monkeys before moving on to interrogating me about my origins.

Woman with a Bad Ear for Accents: So you're Australian, huh?
Obviously Not Australian: Australian?!  No.  I'm from the U.S.
Woman with a Bad Ear for Accents: No...really?  You don't sound American AT ALL.
Obviously Not Australian: Welp, I am.  Born and raised!
Woman with a Bad Ear for Accents: (Lengthy pause as she digests this information) Are you SURE you're not Australian?
Obviously Not Australian: Seriously?  I've never even been there.  I will show you my New Mexico driver's license, if you really don't believe me.
Woman with a Bad Ear for Accents: (Appears to consider taking me up on my offer, then decides against it, and walks off, shaking her head.  Even as she walks away, I'm pretty sure she thinks that I'm lying to her) .

On another day, Bryan and I went out with some people we'd never met after listening to a talk at NUS.  An English guy asked us where we were from, and we said the U.S.  He seemed surprised, and then complimented our "soft, pleasant accents." Later, after a couple of beers:

Englishman: Where are you guys from again?
Standard American: The U.S.
Englishman: Wow.  You guys definitely sound Canadian.
(20 minutes later)
Englishman: You're REALLY QUIET for Americans!!!

One day, I hopped into a taxi outside our building in Jurong East.  Before pulling away, the taxi driver twisted all the way around in his seat to look me up and down.  He turned back around and then:

Taxi Driver:  You stay here?
Not Like the Others: Yes, I live in that block there (pointing)
Taxi Driver: (Guffaws)  But your face!
Not Like the Others: (My hand flies to my face.  Oh God, did I have cereal on my face again?  A milk mustache?  Was he mocking me for being sweaty?)  What about my face?!
Taxi Driver:  No, no, no!  (still laughing)  You FACE! YOU FACE!
Not Like the Others: (silently mouthing the word "face" over and over, trying to figure out what he is saying)  My RACE?!
Taxi Driver: YESSSSS!!!  Why you live here?!  No foreigner live here!
Not Like the Others:  Well, the rent is cheap and my boyfriend and I thought it would be interesting to live among Singaporeans rather than other Westerners.
Taxi Driver: You boyfriend live here too?!  (renewed laughter)  He foreigner too?!
Not Like the Others:  Yes, we're both American.
Taxi Driver: WOW!!!  No foreigner live here.
Not Like the Others: Yeah, we don't see many others like us.
Taxi Driver: No!   Not!  Hahahaha, how long you live here?
Not Like the Others: Since July...
Taxi Driver: (more laughter....)
It continued like this for awhile...

One rainy grocery day, I had dragged myself to Giant to stock up on cheddar cheese (there's suddenly a dearth of yellow cheddar on this island.  At every store I go to, it's either been taken off the shelves, or marked up to some exorbitant price, or the only "yellow cheese" available is some nasty knockoff "cheese product" that makes Velveeta look organic.  Giant is the only place I can currently find good, normally priced yellow cheddar.  End rant).  Anyway, I was standing in line with all my groceries up on the conveyor belt.  I thought I had pretty normal stuff- a pumpkin, a couple types of whole wheat pasta, milk, the coveted cheddar cheese, strawberries, etc.  The woman behind me apparently thought that I was some sort of anthropological oddity, because she kept staring at my groceries and then eyeballing me.  Eventually she just started picking stuff up and prodding other stuff.  She was especially fascinated by the whole wheat pasta, and picked both bags up a few times.

Old Lady: (gesturing at me with a bag of wholemeal spaghetti) Where you FROM?!
Girl Who Makes Apparently Bizarre Dietary Choices: The U.S.
Old Lady: HAHAHAHAHAHA
Girl Who Makes Apparently Bizarre Dietary Choices: (bemused)  Ummm...
Old Lady: You stay here?
Girl Who Makes Apparently Bizarre Dietary Choices: Yup, since July of 2009
Old Lady: Wow!
Cashier: Do you LIKE it here?!
Girl Who Makes Apparently Bizarre Dietary Choices:  Sure, Singapore's great.
Old Lady: You like the food?
Girl Who Makes Apparently Bizarre Dietary Choices: Um, I love some of it, but not all of it.  And sometimes I miss the foods that I ate in the U.S.
Old Lady: (Nods sagely while prodding my pumpkin)

One day, a couple of students from NUS came out to Bukit Timah to join me and another researcher to test out whether they might be interested in monkey research.  Over lunch, I had this conversation with one of them:

NUS Student: So where are you from?
Indian Food Lover: The U.S.
NUS Student: Oh.  Do you like it here?
Indian Food Lover: Yeah!  I like the monkeys and the other wildlife.  And I like all the different cultures mixing together in one place.
NUS Student: But what about the food?  Do you like the food?
Indian Food Lover: Well, I love some of it, but I really don't like some of it.  Sometimes I miss the food from the U.S.
NUS Student: But Singapore's food is why all the foreigners like this country.
Indian Food Lover: Yeah, I know.  I really like some of the food.  There's awesome Indian food here.
NUS Student: (exaggerated eye roll) You Westerners all just LOVE Indian food.  I don't get it.  It's disgusting.  And it's bad for you.
Indian Food Lover: Well, I don't think it's disgusting.  And plenty of it is good for you.  The stuff that's bad for you is stuff with too much butter and oil, but a lot of it is made with tons of fresh vegetables, and that's great.
NUS Student: Yeah....I don't like it.
Indian Food Lover:  Clearly.

Sometimes it feels as though every single day in S'pore is an adventure.  That was certainly the case when I was walking home one day, rushing in an effort to beat an approaching storm.  As I hustled along, someone shouted "Ma'am!" but I ignored it and kept walking.  I often ignore men when they yell at me, since they usually want something less innocent than to tell me I dropped something.  The man yelled again, this time with such urgency that I stopped.  A man came up to me and asked me for directions to the Science Park.  Assuming he meant the Science Centre, I pointed him in the right direction, and then resumed walking.  He kept stride with me, obviously not intending to use my directions.  I pointed to a mapboard, and told him he should go over there.  Before he did, we had the following exchange:

Creeper: So are you Singaporean?
So Not Interested: Do I look Singaporean?
Creeper: Heh.  So are you European?
So Not Interested: I'm American.
Creeper: Oh!  So you like Negroes?
So Not Interested: (convinced that I must have heard him wrong) WHAT?
Creeper: You like Negroes?  Dark skin men?  Americans like Negroes.
So Not Interested: (how exactly does one answer this question?  I don't want to say yes and imply that I have some sort of fetish for dark-skinned men since he is a dark-skinned man, and I don't want to say no and sound racist)  Uh...they're fine, I guess?  I'm married though, so it doesn't matter what I think of dark-skinned men (my new philosophy: when backed into a corner by a creepy stranger, lie your way out)
Creeper: Can I have your phone number?
So Not Interested: I'M MARRIED!  NO! (green man arrives just in time to save me, and I dart across the street)

We've also been mistaken for Israeli, Iranian, Canadian, Italian, and Spanish.  It's always an adventure meeting someone new, because you never know where they're going to guess that you're from!

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!!!

A stupendous Father's Day to all the great dads out there, especially my own!   I have always been grateful to have such a great Dad.  I have lots of happy memories of my dad- flying kites in the park, playing in the snow in our backyard, playing marathon games of Monopoly at the kitchen table, and sneaking Christmas cookies from behind my mom's back....which we still do.  I can't wait to hang out with my parents when I get back to the U.S. Strangely enough, I couldn't find a picture of just my dad and me, so here's one of the whole family at my college graduation.

Special wishes to my brothers too.  Growing up, I remember my brothers popping out of my closet wearing monster masks and bribing me not to tell my parents about the pretty girls that showed up while our parents were away.  Who knew that my big brothers would turn out to be two of the greatest fathers I've ever seen?  Seriously, despite the fact that they traumatized me by threatening to feed my guinea pig to their friend's boa constrictor, my brothers have always loved and supported me, and now they're doing the same for their kids.  I'm very proud.

For Mother's Day, I posted all sorts of cute pictures of animal mothers.  There aren't as many caring fathers in the animal kingdom, but I did find some of the monkey males cradling some of the babies.  Pretty cute stuff!  Too bad I don't study seahorses- those are some of the most committed dads around!

Here's Luke, looking after Catherine's little boy.  Luke's pretty good with the little ones, and sometimes they run to him when they get in over their heads while playing with the bigger juveniles.

Leo, the alpha, doesn't really seem to have a knack for holding the infants, but he still does it from time to time anyway.

Here's Hercules, rolling around in the middle of a mass of romping juveniles.  He reminded me of a human dad, wrestling with his boys on the living room floor.

So, happy day to all the dads out  there- human and monkey!

Bali Day Four: A Long Drive...and Snorkeling!

Our last day in Bali was just as beautiful as the previous three had been.  We ate another delicious round of pancakes out by the ocean, and took a last cruise around the reef, knowing that it might be awhile before we get to break out the snorkel gear again.  Singapore isn't known for it's world-class dive sites.  We mostly saw the same things we'd been spotting for the past few days, with the addition of some large grouper.  The currents were stronger that time, and fighting them was pretty tiring.

After snorkeling, we walked down the road to Warung Mekar, where we had a delicious lunch cooked by the ultra friendly owner.  As at Warung Bobo, we were given fresh popcorn as an appetizer and we found that it was delicious with chili sauce on it.  After lunch, Bryan took another round with the camera while I got our stuff prepared to go.  He got some beautiful flowers, and a good shot of this delicate little olive-backed sunbird.

Bryan also took a photo of the unique boats that we saw everywhere.  They had outriggers on both sides.

Of course, Alice was along for the ride.  She loved the black sand beach.

I hung around and read while we waited for a driver to come and pick us up.

Late in the afternoon, our driver picked us up and we left beautiful, peaceful Amed behind.  It was nice to do the drive in the daylight since we'd missed the scenery on our way up.  There were different views around every twist and turn- people working the fields, green mountains (see the corn in the foreground?  It made Bryan and me feel very at home), terraced rice paddies, and beautifully landscaped homes.

 At one point, we saw some guys sitting in a circle along the road.  Two of them were holding chickens, and our driver told us they were having a cock fight.  He pointed out the row of basket/cages lined up next to the men, and said that the cocks are kept under the baskets so that their bodies will be clean and undamaged before the fight.  As some of you might have guessed, my stomach was turning at the thought of the poor animals being raised just to fight.

Here we are in the car- you can see the windy roads in the mirror.

As we got closer to Denpasar, there were lots of traffic circles with sculptures in the middle of them.  This one was one of my favorites.

As we went along, we were able to catch glimpses of the ocean along the road, and at some places (like the one below), there were ponds near the road, with the ocean further back.

My favorite site of the ride was this pig on a leash.  So random.

And I barely snatched a photo of this person, riding along on a motorbike with a glass bakery display case mounted on the back.

By the time we made it through a crush of road construction and to the airport, we had about two hours before our flight left.  Normally that's more than enough time, but this was an Indonesian airport, so we got right down to the business of waiting in lines, lines, and more lines.  By the time we made it through the multiple phases, we were hungry and all we could find was this unusual McDonald's. There was a sign advising you not to eat there unless you had 15 minutes to wait for your food.  You ordered your food and then someone in a McDonald's in front of the airport cooked it and then brought it inside. The food was fine, but the system was bizarre.

The KLM flight back was fun, as Bryan and I linked up our in-flight entertainment systems and dueled each other at Tetris.  We had a wonderful trip, and I think I can easily add Bali to the list of places that we wouldn't mind returning to someday!