Another night of restless sleep. It didn't help that some of the people in my room were sleep talkers. It's quite entertaining to listen to people talk in their sleep in another language. What were they saying? Probably the same silly shit you would hear if it was English. The language doesn't matter. "Yes, I would like another glass of water. No, you cannot pet my cat. Get away from me with that giant pair of chopsticks." By the noises one girl was making, she was having a bad dream or a really, really good dream...
My room consists of 5 bunk beds to accommodate 10 people. At this current time, it is 9 girls and myself. I must be in heaven, right? Except the reality is ... I feel kinda like a creepy weirdo! I acknowledge that I'm probably 8-10 years older than all the girls sharing a room with me so I must kind of make the room feel awkward. I admit it - I look a little strange for a guy (twisty mustache, tattoos, painted toenails, crazy t-shirts) - heck, they may even think I'm gay ... so perhaps they're more comfortable with me then I think! In any case, I just avoid direct eye contact, stay away from forced chit-chat, only pop in the room to sleep or get my stuff, and try to keep the discrete tits and ass leering to an extreme minimum. I am a gentleman, after all.
I stepped out of the bunkbed room around 7am, realizing that there is no way in hell I'd be getting any more sleep. The free breakfast consisted of white bread, mixed fruit jam (orange, strawberry, and pineapple), peanut butter, and a couple cereal choices (honey flakes and chocolate flakes). There is also "cream" milk to add to the dry cereal choices. I immediately made a cup of the fantastic black coffee in a steeping bag. It comes out so dark and rich - best instant coffee ever. I then toasted some white bread and made myself a pj&j to go with my coffee. Candice was already up and ready to set off to start her day. She said she had some toast but was already considering a more substantial breakfast. She asked if I would like to join her for some Kaya toast and I said, "Hell yes, what is kaya toast?"
We walked about 4 blocks north of the Chinatown hostel to a little street cafe near the edge of, what looked to be, the business section of the city. Kaya toast, Candice explained to me, is a kind of coconut spread served on toast with a hunk of butter added for good measure. The Kaya spread is made from eggs, sugar and coconut milk and flavored with pandan. It is sweeter than french kissing a gingerbread woman (or man, let's not be gender-based here). With our Kaya toast was served a cup of ice coffee (with cream and sugar because the kaya toast was obviously not diabetes inducing enough) and also two "hard boiled eggs" which were actually the most runny, snotty, soft boiled eggs I have ever seen. My eyes bulged out of my head when the cafe waitress put the small bowl of eggs in front of me. "Excuse me, you forgot to cook these," ran through my head. Fuck it - it was time to break out of my shell. This boy, who only ate eggs over-medium or scrambled, picked up his spoon and broke the yolk of his eggs. The thick yellow ooze mixed with the varying egg white textures and my bowl soon looked like a work of abstract art. I took my toast, dipped it in, and ate away. Of course, I only was able to eat half of the bowl of egg white/yolk soup before pushing it away and saying, DONE. I'll try to finish it next time.
After breakfast, Candice and I walked back to the are of the hostel. She was off to look at apartments, but before heading off she directed me to the MRT ticket office where I can pick up an EZ-Link card for riding the buses and trains. The EZ-Link card is an electronic card that is credited with money. When you get on a bus/train, you tap the card on to the toll reader and then tap it again when you get off. Fares are determined by distance traveled - not unlike the BART back in San Francisco. When you run low on credits, you just go to a kiosk and add more.
I spent the rest of the late morning showering and doing stuff on my computer. When I got hungry again for lunch, I ventured back to my friends at the vegetarian Chinese restaurant and got some organic brown rice with veggies. Again, the meal was damn tasty and the owner and wife were very happy to see me back. Before I left, I told them they would see me again soon.
Not sure what to do with the rest of my day, since it was Sunday and I was still unsure when my future roommates would be arriving, I decided I best get some exercise, go for a hike, and finally see the location of the campus. My hike ended up being a serious endeavor and I quickly realized I would need to consume several bottles of water before my journey was complete. Walking around in that heat and humidity sucks the life and hydration out of one like blood to a leach. By the time I reached the campus, I had walked quite a few kilometers and was thoroughly drenched in sweat. I took some photos of the campus sign, much to the annoyance of the campus security guard at the front gate. He stepped out of his little air conditioned cubby and watched me with stern eyes and a rigid stance. I ignored him as I continued to take photos, but felt his disapproving eyes the whole time. Finally, I turned and walked over to him, explaining that I was an incoming student and wanted to see where the campus was located. "The campus is closed today," was his response. I told him I was aware of that, had no intention of going in, and just wanted to see what it looked like. After a brief conversation, revealing that I new enough about the campus dates that I was most likely an actual student, he lightened up, smiled, and bid me farewell. As I walked away, I wondered what he must do in that security cubby hole all day - especially on a dead Sunday. Was he watching movies? Porn? Damn, that job must suck. I'm glad I gave him some excitement to break the monotony.
Heading back to the hostel seemed like the most pain in the ass thing to do after my long march of sweat. My feet were starting to hurt and last thing I wanted to do was encourage some blisters to join me back at the hostel. A couple blocks into my return hike, I decided it was time to put my bus pass to use. The 51 was the bus line that would take me into the vicinity of Chinatown. Thankfully, I didn't have to wait long at the bus stop for it to arrive. Upon stepping in, I was greeted with a glorious blast of cold air. I've never been so happy to be on a bus.
My troublesome sleep and ridiculous hike in the heat were starting to take their toll on me. By 5pm I was feeling very, very tired and weak. I decided to get some food to regain some strength, but resisted the urge to go to a hawker stand as I had been eating a little too much at the tasty, but oily, establishments. I headed off to where the Kaya toast cafe was from earlier this morning, since I had seen a lot of eateries there, but was disappointed to see that every place was closed. Damn Sunday afternoon. I wandered back to the direction of the hawker stands, stopping in front of a few Chinese take-away places to ponder. I was really over fried food, even though I love it, and decided I really needed something more light and overflowing with vegetables. Of course, the Chinese vegetarian place popped in my head, but I had already been there once today and didn't want to appear to be stalking the place.
Inevitably, I ended back at the Maxwell Hawker stands and drifted through the aisles until I decided on some halal food - a dish similar to Roti Prata but with chicken stuffed in it. I forgot the name off hand, but just consider it a relative of Roti Prata. The meal really was exactly what I was not looking for - oily and heavy - but it was cheap and I finally got food back in me. On my way back to the hostel, I was craving some juice and stopped in a 7-11 to see if they had orange juice. Fortunately they did, but it was the strangest orange juice I ever had. It was like a cross between orange juice and Tang. The first ingredient on the bottle was sugar, followed by concentrated orange juice and orange flavoring. That made me smile. Back in the states, it would have been corn syrup or high fructose corn syrup, but I was in the land of sugar. All this time, the sweets and drinks I've had have contained real sugar - not some corn byproduct. I really liked that.
I again worked on my computer until about 7pm when I was overcome by exhaustion. I walked back to my bunk bed harem, flopped down on my bed, and attempted to read before passing out. Another girl in the room said something that sounded like another yet another foreign language - I assumed she was on her phone. I ignored the dialogue, like I have with all other strange languages, until I felt her eyes looking at me and realized I was the focus of her attention. She was speaking to me! I looked up from my book and she said again, "Are you allowed to walk around with beer? I see people with drinks in the market place." I blinked, realizing the strange language I heard was indeed English, and responded, "I think so. At least I've been told people have been walking around with open containers." She thanked me and walked out. That interaction really shocked me. It wasn't like her accent was that strong - she sounded like she was from Australia or New Zealand. To think that I've become so indifferent to listening to languages and accents that I couldn't even recognize English when it was finally spoken to me. My brain had shut down in the realm of language and needed to be rebooted when the opportunity for conversation appeared again. I now understood what English sounded like to non-speakers - it's a weird language. I fell asleep with that thought in my head.
I woke up at 9pm with stifling heat and stuffiness in the room. I was too tired to get up and move and just willed the air conditioner to come on until it finally did (because someone with more initiative than myself finally went and requested it to be one). Once the cool air hit me, my eyelids slammed shut and I slept long and soundly for the first time since arriving.
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