National Museum

Today I went to the National Museum of Singapore to an exposition about photography of families that live in different countries with some of my friends.

I really like the building and its surroundings! This is what it looks like from the outside:

The cuppola is very impressive even from the inside!

The exposition was really interesting. The artist had taken pictures of families that live far apart with the help of Skype. How did he manage to do this? Well he projected a picture of the family as it appeared on the screen on some wall and the person that was on the other side of the screen posed in front of the wall as if he/she was standing with the rest of the family. I know this explanation might be a bit confusing, but maybe you understand it better from this image:

The Pictures were really cool and some were beautifully composed plus I can definitely relate to this topic!

The museum has been explanded so there is a very modern part annexed to the older one:

The roof is made out of glass so you can see the cuppola even from the inside:

What especially caught my eye were those candelabra:

You don't see the best thing from the picture, which is the fact that they are swinging constantly:

Not bad, museum, not bad...

Dragons after work

On friday I left work to find this in front of the building (literally, the building in the background of the pics is where I work):

This scene explaind why it had been so noisy over the last ten minutes but raised even more questions. I remembered then how this one cab driver (I really learn the most from them) told me how they have these traditional dragon dances during CNY, where these dancers and musicians are hired by companies to dance and bring good fortune. Apparently they perform for a while and then they get Hong Baos as a thank you for bringing good luck to starting companies or any other customer. 

The dragon was really cute and fluffy. While it danced it was spitting things out and receiving gifts from what I assume was some kind of organizer (gifts were oranges (MANDARINES! It's mandarines! Damn it, they already got me!) etc...).

The dragon was performing to the beat of this huge drum which was INCREDIBLY noisy. I actually wanted to upload a video here as well, but it has been loading forever so, not today! I am off to bed! Good night.

Surviving the CNY crowd

As you may already know, during Chinese New Year I went to Chinatown with some friends to look around and take pictures. They do not only have a very beautiful decoration...

... but also a big market: 

(and again, the pinnaples). This place is PACKED. Once you get in be prepared to share most of your remaining life with the person that happened to be next to you, because there is no way out. And I mean it. There are a million stands and the whole crowd walks very (, VERY) slowly between them, through what appeared to bea street too long to fit into Singapore (OK, I have to confess I was a bit in a hurry to get out so this might have influenced my perception slightly). Be as it may, as you finally arrive at the end of the sreet (those who survived the decades of fighting their way through) there is no way you can go anywere else, because some security fences stop you and force you to turn into the parallel street together with the people you know better than your parents by then. Not that we would have done otherwise either way. The bonding is already too strong and we are glued too much by sweat as to walk separatedly. Thank god there were some bigger roads with restaurants where you could run between the tables and advance at a non-negative velocity:

By the way, a lot of the people in these places were having steamboat, just like the one I showed you:

Looking back and cosidering the inevitable Stockholm Sindrom it was quite fun and definitely and adventure. I just wonder where all those people came from all of a sudden...

Blending in II

Guess which one is adopted?

No wonder it's always my friends who spot me when we meet in crowded places and never the other way. This picture is from the CNY celebration at Justin's place. We did not only exchange oranges and obtain Hong baos, but also recieved every type of CNY sweet and beverages. I want to thank both Justin's and Karen's family for their very kind hospitality that made me feel part of the whole tradition. Also I want to thank Karen and Sandra for the Pictures I showed yesterday. If they had not been taking photos while we were throwing food around, I could not have shared this experience here. So far CNY has been quite an adventure!

Playing with food

Today I participated in one of the most curious Chinese New Year traditions so far! It is called Yu Sheng and it's a typical CNY dish. So what is so special about this? Let me tell you:

At the beginning it looks like this. It does not appear very extraordinary since it's basically shreds of carrots and sweet potato. Along comes this woman in the middle and starts adding condiments such as chips and different sauces while she recites some good luck invocations (in chinese of course, thank god I had my awesome (and very pregnant) private translator to help me understand what this woman was saying (Thanks, Xien!))

From left to right: some caucassian girl, the waitress performing our good luck ritual and my translator. Notice the pinaples hanging from the ceiling, they have them everywhere during CNY. Don't ask me why. It's probably good fortune, but the only answer I got so far was "They are good luck, because you have to roll them into every room of your house... No, wait! That is only when you move into a new house... or was that jumping over a small fire in the dorstill. Oh, no, that is when you get back home from prison!..." Where do these people get the ideas for their rituals from!!?

Anyways, this is what the dish then looks like. And all of this would not be very impressive so far if we did not do this:

Yes, we stand up, grab our chopsticks and start tossing that stuff around and throwing it up. Why? For the same reason you roll tropical fruits all over your appartment. The cool thing is you have to shout out your wishes while you do this and then they will come true. So imaginge everyone standing there throwing around this food and shouting stuff (mostly in chinese of course, we were only 3 non-asians). A picture for the gods.

Inevitably, the place looked like this after we were done, but that's a small price for having as many wishes as you want come true, right? 

One Altitude

After wanting to go there since I got here I finally went to One Altitude this weekend! It is a club/bar that is on the roof of what must be the tallest building in Singapore and it is incredible! It is at Raffles place, so very close to Marina Bay and therefore has amazing views:

The entrance and the drinks are pretty expensive so it is not convenient as an every day bar, but it's worth to visit it at least once! The music is good and you can walk all around the roof of this triangular building.

I really enjoyed it! After having been to New Asia Bar and to 33 the only bar in the heights missing is the helipad of the swisshotel. The bad news? It only opens once a month. I better step it up.

Presents!

Just like in our Christmas tradition you also get presents during Chinese New Year here. The good thing for me is that it is not restricted to the members of the family but to anyone who visits a family during the CNY period (which extends over two weeks). This is what you get:

It's called hong bao (red envelope (the one above might not be a great example for the name...)) and it contains money (depending on how close you are to the family and how rich they are I guess...). It is amazing how literally EVERYONE gets these. I mean, even I got two so far and I am usually a complete strager to the families of my friends. By the way, the one above shows all the chinese horoscope signs in the right order in case you ever feel the urge to recite them. 

This is another very pretty hong bao (I can almost live from this envelope business at this point...).

If you want to get one of these there is something you must do, though: bring two mandarines (or even better, FOUR, as i learned today). For some reason they keep calling them oranges but I have realised by now that in reality it's mandarines. Handing them over to the family is symbolic for giving them good fortune. But don't you worry! You'll get back another two mandarines (they also want to give you good fortune, of course!). 

And if you're lucky they'll come in those fancy bags:

Usually you will be offered CNY candy and all sorts of things on top of everything, so if you have any chinese friends near you this is definitely the time for a visit!