We are the only Western family for miles... so because we are white we have renamed ourselves Mr. White and Mrs. Wong.
The residential area is all double storey homes and terraces like ours, and not a tall condominium to be seen except in the far distance of the horizon from our roof top terrace. The streets are all tree lined and as the development ages, they will be beautifully green streets. The back yard backs onto a park with a substantial playground with fairly good equipment set on a sand base - so we have been known to take our sand castle building equipment out there and attract some neighbourhood kids. The park has been established for some years so the trees are huge and give great shade. Further to the main road there is a lot of lush tropical greenery and very big trees lining the streets - so you could say we live in suburbia. It's lovely really. Nice feeling to drive home.
Our house is three storey and a roof terrace where George has hung the retractable washing line and has become the hero of the household as all washing done in the morning is dry by noon and before the afternoon showers. We plan to have a party or two upstairs when we get more settled. It’s lovely looking over the tree tops of the park below.
Our ground floor has a large lounge with floor to ceiling glass doors, a dining room, fully equipped bathroom, guest room where our live in helper sleeps, a glass partitioned kitchen and glass back door, leading to a small backyard, a storage room which we use for kitchen/catering gear and a further outdoor bathroom. Next floor is our master bedroom again with floor to ceiling windows, and a master bathroom that has a wet area and bath that has light streaming down through a light well about10 feet high - it's fabulous. The home had two large built in double wardrobes with mirror doors and we bought a further 2 metre wardrobe and decided on mirror doors to have continuity in design and also to keep the light which is a big focus of this building. However, after the first day I realized I'd made a huge mistake. Not being one for vanity, I hadn't thought of the horror of seeing oneself reflected all around the room. One of my friends suggested I painted all the mirrors black and only leave slithers in shapely contours as mirrors. Laugh Also on this floor is Mya's bedroom with an en-suite and she looks out to the park. Upstairs is my office/sewing room, where the en suite gets used for storage of batting and paper for patterns and box making. It's a real craft room. And last but not least is our master guest room with a huge 4 poster bed in it and unfortunately all the boxes of books I want to sift through and cull - now we are living in an English speaking country with an extensive library system I don't need my own books like in other countries where there were NONE available to the public! The master guest room also has an en-suite and has the best view (apart from the terrace roof.) So that's it.... home sweet home. If you want to look where we are - we're close to Seletar airport near the intersection of the CTE and TPE expressways.
What I love most is the neighbourly feeling. Once you are outside, someone will come out and say hello and talk and chat. We are quite a novelty being the only whities in the area. I did meet a French family at the playground, and that's been all. When we go shopping at the local mall george and I play "spot the whitey".
It's a long way (anything in Singapore over 15 minutes is considered a passport potential drive), to George's work and Mya's current school, but just as close as the old place to the airport (as Mya calls it - "George's second office"). When George is in town I drive them both to the station where they take a train and go from the beginning of the line to the end of the line taht bisects the island, then he takes her by taxi to school as there is no public transport in where her school is hidden, and then himself back to his work and I pick her up and bring her back home in the afternoon by car. When George is out of town, I do two return trips a day - 100Kilometres and two hours in the car. Not quite the 15 minute walk or 3 minute drive we used to do in melbourne to get to school. As a friend reminded me bleaklytoday that's my JOB! I can't wait till Mya goes to the Australian school - it's 6 minutes away and the bus will collect and return her.
All in all life is good at the moment - our house in England has suffered a freak flooding after torrential rain (as did our neighbours' houses) and it is under 6 inches of foul water and the tenants have moved out. He's in hospital with an infection caught from the water. The insurance assessors tell us it will be 8 months at least till it's livable again. I think I'll have to get a job soon, that was to be our retirement fund. Anyway as long as the guy gets well soon, it's all just bricks and mortar and lots and lots of money down the drain.
On the bright side, mum's still without pain. Apartently absolutely skeletal now. She had a heart induced hospital stay again after I left and was well enough to go to lunch with a friend the next day. She really is remarkable. We're planning to go and visit her whilst mya has school term braeak and Easter break.
Before that we plan as a family to go to Langkawi and really look forward to that as we have not had a decent family holiday more than 3 days for just on a year when we went to Vietnam for my 50th birthday. Yes, that came around quickly didn't it. Little did we know when we were touring Mya's homeland what the next 12 months would bring. Mum's house is sold and the settlement occured today and she has now paid her bond to stay where she is and everything is settled. Loretta went down to help Mum and did all the running around with solicitors and agents etc. She missed me being there especially when the table needed to be moved downstairs. Luckily a neighbour took it. We did well getting rid of things over the last 12 months, the Christian charity took a lot of mum's things, the Muslim refugees got lots of furniture to help them set up homes for newcomers and last week we culled Mya's room and all her excess toys, books and clothes went to the Buddhist orphanage in Cambodia. We've got all our bases covered now. Laugh.
This is the third clear out we've done of Mya's room - the first one went to Vietnam, the second went to Thailand and this one is going to Cambodia.
You see who doesn't need any more presents???
