Well last week was busy, how it now can be busy when I don't work.... Well honestly I don't know, but I get up and suddenly its time to go to bed, not that I am complaining, I love it.
I went on a Welcome coffee meeting for new Swedish women in Singapore last week. It is SWEA (Swedish Women's Educational Association) who organized the coffee meeting. here comes there own explanation of what SWEA is:
SWEA är ett GLOBALT NÄTVERK med ungefär 8000 svenska kvinnor i 74 avdelningar och 34 länder. Vi är den största Sverigefrämjande organisationen utanför Sverige och vårt syfte är att sprida svensk kultur och tradition. SWEA ger donationer och stipendier på cirka 2 miljoner kronor per år.
SWEA är en icke vinstdrivande ideell organisation som utgör ett nätverk och skyddsnät för svenska kvinnor utomlands och ett starkt stöd för den svenska industrin ute i världen.
I will not translate that one for you who don't understand Swedish but please go into their homepage if you want to know more, you can get the whole page in English then :-). www.swea.org/singapore
It was really nice to meet other Swedish women in Singapore, if I understand it right there is about 140 Swedish women registered as members in SWEA. This means that there is even more Swedish people in Singapore, as all aren't members and it is only open to women. I also know there is 140 children registered at the Swedish school in Singapore... Another fact that can be interesting is that 39 women left Singapore and SWEA this summer and 38 new ones arrived!
I also went to Tim & Theos school for a meeting about the UN day, as their school have 53 nationalities and always have a lot of different nationalities at the school the UN day is a important day for the school. They will celebrate it on the 15th of October and I don't know why that day is chosen, because the real UN Day is on the 24th of October... I need to ask next time.
I don't know If I'm a good representative. The kids for starter are to wear National costumes......we don't have that... but it's cool, neither do the English, I was told... So the theme will be BLUE & YELLOW! After that we are supposed to have a room where we show up Swedish culture & food, so here we go, lingonsylt och saft, kanelbullar, köttbullar, knäckebröd och kaviar, mm. The Swedish embassy and church has promised to help me out with some information and maps etc. i will do some posters with the kids over famous Swed's, music etc. So I will try to keep Sweden proud over our work.
I also went to visit my work last week as I missed the smell of horses so much......it was really nice, but my whole body was screaming get back to work and start riding again.....I am so looking forward to start working again. There was this German man there having lessons with staff and clients, now don't ask me his name or who he was because I don't know, but I liked his way of teaching, so maybe next time.
Well otherwise, I have been out shopping for food in the big Supermarket, this is a challenge that takes time. First of all you don't know where everything is so you keep running forward and back all the time, but that will soon not be the case. Then there is all the "strange" looking food that I have to check out, my husband is going mad at me, as he just want to go in and out as soon as possible.
Is it cheap or is it expensive? That is a hard question, you can probably make it as cheap or as expensive as you like. Another thing is if you want to eat locally grown food you will be on a very poor diet.... Singapore have to more or less import everything, and I mean everything. The Island is far to small to have their own agricultural land for food production, there is some and I will explore that more when I have 2 functional feet.
All meat as far as I know comes from abroad, mainly it is from Australia. Chicken is cheaper than other meat. Sausages are mainly maid from chicken meat, or is at least the cheapest. But there is a lot of sausages to choose from in different sizes and spices. Rice and noodles are very common one eat that almost to all kinds of food. Potatoes are also common but more for adding to the food than as a main ingredients. Then there is all the different vegetables some looks more tasty than others. There is a vegetable that looks like Swedish "pepparot" that is between 50 cm to 100cm long! Maybe I can find out until next time what it is. I will have to take some pictures of it this week...
Then we have the famous fruit Durian, well it must be the Swedish version of Surströmming! The smell of this fruit make me run as far as Surströmming does. The taste.....well, I can eat it but I can't say I like it, just as it is with Surströmming. 
At the end I would say our weekly shopping is cheaper here than at home and we eat more or less the same food as at home during the week. Eating out is mostly cheaper if you go to the local food centres and about the same as home if you go to western type food places and after that you can pay a fortune for a meal if you go to the right places....
As I have not had the capacity to "run" a round to check out everything yet I will report more on the food issue later.
When you go by Taxi, which is cheap they usually ask you which way you want them to take to the place you are going, well I usually tell them I'm new to Singapore so I haven't got a clue...and then I tell them to take the shortest way... which I now understand means go as fast as you can! Every time I made the mistake of saying that the put the foot down. So I only say these days, you choose the best way. They would not dear to cheat you so it is safe to say that. That usually means the way with less traffic....A bit cryptic this Taxi language. Sometimes you have to show the Taxi driver on a map where to go to...especially if he can't read English.
This Hari Raya decoration the boys got when leaving the schools for the holiday weekend, they are typical decorations for this celebration.
Then Saturday it was BBQ time at one of the colleges place, nice to see someones else place, they only have 25 floors in their housing estate, in 4 towers.
The BBQ chefs below
Swimming at the BBQOne thing I have learnt is that my two boys are worth admiring, they are my HERO'S! Tim is amazing, how he is coping with his knew school. He has homework everyday, that takes 1- 1½ hours after school, and he does not give up until he has done it and knows it by heart. He is learning High Frequency Words at the moment, 8-10 new words everyday that he has a test on the next morning, so far he has learnt 90 words in total and only had 1 word spelt wrong. He really enjoys the challenge he is getting at the school. I'm convinced I would not have done that well at the age of 9.
Theo, is going everyday to school still calling it "Dagis", finding it hard and not shore in the morning if he wants to go, but comes home every afternoon telling me a new exiting story with a smile on his face. I think or can't even imaging how it is for them at the school, all the new impressions, new people, new routines, new everything....
Had a strange experience today, Theo comes off the bus with tears in his eyes, I asked him whats wrong? It was a girl on the bus that said she hated my eyes. No says Tim "the guardian" She said she hates blue eyes! I just looked at them and asked them how many times have people here not said the opposite? Many times they answered, I also said that the girl probably is jealous of their eye colour. And that was a new experience for me too.....
Well as usual we have fun at the pool daily and life are getting in to a routine even here, but with a different flavour. Well folks if you have been patient enough to read all this I have to give you praise for doing so. I will try to write more often but shorter in the future :-) Until next time, take care don't do anything I wouldn't do :-D
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