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THE BARUTI COLUMN PART 3: Singapore by baruti armstrong aka robotsex Singapore The road to Singapore is south on a neatly paved stretch of highway splintered by Rain Forests on both sides, and traffics at points in between the three toll booths and two customs check- points from here to there occasionally. But for the most part, the North-South Highway is an innocuous stretch of road where even though the speed limit is 90 kph, one can easily gear it up to 140 kph for most of the trip. From Kuala Lampur we made it there in about 3 hours, but I can't seem to remember exactly what the distance is between here and there. I had started out running a little bit late, but the time was more than made up in the drive. I was sitting in the back seat gazing at the scenery having caught a ride. Before I know it we're at the border and I hear the birds in the rafters chirping away. I see soldier statues standing guard, holding their assault rifles like scarecrows holding up the straw that protrudes from their sleeves and the corn stalks in fields in Nebraska. We cross the causeway and the beginning of the difference between Malaysia and Singapore becomes audibly apparent, as there were no birds singing songs in unison from the rafters at the Singapore customs check. At the customs window a cute young Indian woman helps me, performing her duties very properly and in an orderly fashion. She's all business. She hands back the passports, and I notice the henna drawings on her hand and her nose ring. I give her my best greedy ear- to- ear smile which I let creep into my face and a look of admiration. She smiles back. The radio gets turned on, but it wasn't me that turned it on, as I was not even paying attention. The dj zooms in Slingish (a hybrid language, Singapore- English) about an Olympus s730 Digital Camera, the Singapore Post Building, the name of the area, and KLAS 95 FM. Then she plays the Justin Timberlake song produced by the Neptunes that's always on the radio these days and follows it with the latest Kylie Minogue tune. I look out the window as all of this goes on and take account of the buildings I see, Daimler Chrysler, Phillips, HP, et cetera. Soon we're off the highway and I'm on my way to get to where I will be staying. Off the highway, left toward Jin Bukit Merah onto Lower Delta Road, another left just before where some relatives of mine used to live, down the narrow winding road, left at the Malaysia Embassy Building/Chatsworth, right on the street those same relatives used to go walking on all the time, left on Tanglin Road, right on to Ridley Park, arrival. Over dinner I get an education on Singapore. The island is very small. Singapore has the fourth largest income per capita of any country in the world. Singapore is largely dependent upon its expatriate population for its revenue and has been hurting in the impact of the Bali bombing. Most people on Singapore live in apartments. Much of Singapore has been built up, reclaimed, from the ocean in the last 20 years. Singapore this. Singapore that. 
I woke up later than I wanted to- probably a direct result of me assuaging my alertness the previous night with MTV Singapore late night and an episode of the Amazing Race flipped back and forth continuously for over an hour. I get up and go through my normal routine. Out on the street I find my pace and soon realize that what I had originally put foremost on my to do list, I can't do because I don't have my address book with me. I decide to walk. I walk aimlessly for more than two hours. I get a good look around and make mental markers so that I have a foldout mental map in my head. Then I decide to put some purpose into it, and I buy a coffee (iced mocha late at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf), then make my way to the famed Orchard Road. My thought process: When in Singapore, do as Singaporeans do, i.e. shop. But I quickly readjusted my thinking, Well, window shop anyway. I had seen it all before. Orchard Road is Market Street. Orchard Road is Park Avenue. Extremely sexy Asian women walk by in the latest Vincci straps molding their feet with Christian Dior t- shirts and wearing Addict to match; beautiful Singaporeans and tourists holding Louis Vuitton and shading their eyes with Versace. No wonder I haven't seen a whole lotta good looking women in KL, I think to myself, They're all in Singapore. Then think about why girls all around the world seem to go for that blinged out- slutty- stare at my breasts or my ass please-MTV-Christina Aguilera-high maintenance look. Before I come to some ultimate decision on that I find a record/dj shop, and soon become unimpressed by the records I see while conversely amazed by some of the equipment that I see. I mill around. I see urban youths that look as though they want to stop me and chat about hip-hop music or about the latest in Latin downtempo house. I could hear the conversations before they began: The new J- 5, and that Dilated Peoples blah, blah, blah. But I had planned accordingly to avoid this and I was dressed to look more like a bum than a hip-hop music encyclopedia. Polo Ralph Lauren knock off shorts 10 sizes too big, Reef sandals/thongs, an olive Banana Republic shirt I bought despite my own product restrictions against the Gap, and a 15 year- old black tank top with the words Trinidad & Tobago etched under a picture of two jumbie looking individuals on stilts. Not to mention the 1946 Random House hard cover print edition of James Joyce's Ulysses I clutch in my left hand like I were a Bible salesman out to convert the Buddha himself. Suddenly I need to get away from it all, so I take the MRT train to the coast (as close as I can to it) and have a walk around before I decide to go back. It¹s refreshing. On the train ride back I drop my pen and it draws a vertical line in red ink down the left breast pocket side of my shirt. I think nothing of it and find a strange solace looking out of the window. The train stops keep coming: Tanah Merah, Bedok, Kembagan, Eunos, Paya Lebah, Aijunied Effectively I have done nothing with my day. It feels really good. I get back to where I'm staying around 6pm and wonder about the legend of the dinner that I'm going to be having. Reservations for 7pm- but we don't get there until 7:45pm. Everyone arrives and we leave. I can't say that I remember how to get there, but I can say that once there the place was impressive, although only impressive in that same way that Fisherman's Wharf San Francisco is impressive to someone who's never been there. We park far out because I'm told that it'll be good exercise to have to walk so far after we consume as much as we will consume. Jumbo Seafood Pte Ltd. Blk. 1206 East Coast Parkway #01- 08, East Coast Seafood Centre, Singapore 449883, just in case anyone is curious as to where I went. The place was jammed so it was a good thing that we had made reservations. We got a table promptly. We had pre-ordered, and that helped to speed things along also. I took a few pictures of the setting, the South China Sea lined with so many oil tankers I could've mistaken them for the lights to houses on the other side of the bay. I enjoyed the breeze coming in from the sea as we joked about how much food was going to come and how we were going to eat until we were dizzy. I eavesdropped on a conversation at the table next to us, directly on my left. Three Japanese businessmen talking about the women in Singapore. Then talking about one of their businesses, I think he worked for a car company. I acted like I wasn't listening, and for the most part it was a struggle to understand exactly what was going on. Then the food started coming. First, the pineapple rice came, and then the broccoli something, and then a shrimp dish. But then what we had all been waiting for found a spot on the table from the clutches of the waitress. Sitting there like an invited friend, crammed all onto one plate the size of a really large plate, the chef's specialty, and, as rumor has it, Singapore's soon to be new national dish. The legend was true. I was bearing witness to it. 
And with it all before me I decided to let everything go. Pepper crab. Mounds of it, sat before me and I was given the green light. There was no hesitation. There was no misplay of manners or etiquette. I ate crab like I had never consumed anything in my life. There was no stopping me. I was a machine. I cracked and broke and nearly choked, but kept going. One plate full of odds and ends, seconds, thirds, another order, an order of chili crab, it all kept coming. Another beer. More crab, and I ate crab like no one had ever eaten crab before, like a gluttonous-balding-Chicago meat packer with a secret cure for indigestion. I shrugged responsibility, I disregarded the consequences, and I filled up. Pepper crab in all of its glory and splendor. It was endless; I had come across a bottomless pit of crab, cooked like I had never had any crab before. I could no longer make out the conversation going on in Japanese beside me- I thought that they were talking about Samurai Jack and the Power Puff Girls. I stopped listening, convinced that the crab was impairing my ability to think straight. I didn't stop. I ate so much that I started to see superstars sitting at the tables across from me. I made eye contact and flirted with Jennifer Connelly, who waved for me to come over, but I'd be damned if I was going to leave my crab. I watched Ashton Kutcher swallow the head of a chicken and then ask me where his car was. I saw the entire cast of the Real World Las Vegas strip down and jump into the South China Sea behind me. I saw Pinocchio and those kids in Peter Pan, all child actors that never made anything with their lives, eating crab and making fun of Michael Jackson, who was sitting right behind them with Miguel Tejada. I was going delirious I was eating so much crab, but I continued to pack it away. I thought to myself, Don't laboratory rats chew off their own feet when they get in the kind of eating frenzy that I'm in right now? Was I going to consume my hands thinking that they were crab also? But then I had a realization. I took a good look around. The place was packed and everyone was eating crab. It was the crab, it was bringing everyone together, it was keeping everyone from falling out of their chairs; it was making political decisions, running nations, it was entrenched in the arms race. The crab held the secrets of the universe. It may sound crazy, but it's true. I had put it all together. The crab was just an example, just part of the larger picture. The picture that showed me that this part of the world is run by the food it consumes in a much different way then the United States is. That's just one thing that I could say about South East Asia, everyone eats and is not afraid to eat. In that respect I fit right in. And I continued to fit right in until the last of the crab was gone, until I was the only one left eating and everyone waiting on me. Nirvana. The pepper crab was worth the trip to Singapore alone. I inched back to the car, drunk off the crab, talking effusively about the latest in computer technology with my well traveled uncle who had began too many of his sentences with, "I remember the time when I was in "Switzerland," or "Angola," or "Cambodia," some place that made you think he was an international diplomat or something. Hmm I wonder if he is an international diplomat or something. I was giddy and raving mad. I made it back to where I was staying. I wished my relatives well, and plopped myself down for a good night's rest. I didn't have that much time in Singapore so I was eager to get up and get an early start the next day, and the day after, and as long as I could manage it. I wondered what else Singapore had to offer. I decided that I would do my best to find out. The Baruti Column Volume 2 The Baruti Column Volume 1 |
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