Time to go to the school yard!

     Nǐ hǎo!  Hello!  你好

     I had for days of orientation at my new school last week.  For the last couple days we rode the MRT home.  The MRT is the subway here.  You have to have an EZ link card to ride it.  Sometimes it is so packed you can’t even grab the railing. 

 

 

     In Chinatown things are getting very busy because of Chinese New Year.  Here is a picture of a huge snake made out of lanterns that we saw.  We got decorations for the celebration of Chinese New Year.  Usually the decorations are based on the animal of that year.  This year is the year of the snake.  They have good luck knots and lanterns. 

 

 

     Here is a picture of a fruit called durian.  It really stinks!  My dad says he wants to try it.  I don’t!  I seriously smells like poop!  My dad says that he has heard that it tastes like it too.

 

 

     Today was my first official day of school and here is a picture of me getting off the bus.  It is huge and it does not look like a school bus in the USA.  It actually looks like a regular bus.  We sit in individual seats with the seat belts that actually have the shoulder part that you would wear in cars.  There is a bus “auntie” that keeps you in line.  If you do something wrong she corrects it.  Don’t misbehave!!

 

     My new school is cool.  My teacher’s name is Mrs. Tuli.  She has done 35 years of teaching.  Today I had Mandarin lessons.  I have them every day.  Ni hao means hello.  I learned how to write the Chinese character for “ren” which means people.  We call our Mandarin teacher Lee Lǎoshī. 老师 

     My school is a really big school.  The cafeteria is open to the outside and we have a soccer field and pool.  At lunch recess we are allowed to go to the library or the gym.  We have drama once a week and PE class for the next four weeks is swimming.  In art we are drawing self portraits of us as superheroes.  My name is “High Note” because she flies with super sound.  J  Her side kick is a white tiger and instead of stripes he has lines and notes like a piece of music. 

     This Friday we have to dress up in traditional Chinese wear for our school festival.  We also get 2 days off of school for Chinese New Year.  I am excited to celebrate and I will write another post with pictures as soon as all the events are done.

     Zàijiàn! Goodbye! 再见

Duck, Duck, Monkey!

     One of our adventures was on a Duck boat tour.  This is a boat with wheels and we toured Singapore on land and on water.  Here is a picture of a Duck boat in the water.

     Here is a picture of the Singapore flyer we rode on last week.

     Here is the Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Casino.  It's a very cool building that you can go on top of and there is a swimming pool that is called an infinity pool that is so big it looks like it is going off the edge of the building.  Don't swim off!!  I want to go there.

     Now we are doing our land tour on the Duck boat.

 

 

     Today we went for a hike in the jungle.  Here is a picture of me and Mason when we first got in.

 

 

 

     We saw a monkey!  It was a girl.  She is a long tailed macaque.  She looked straight at us.  She is a wild monkey.  Here is a picture of her.

 

 



 

     We are not supposed to feed them.  There are signs all over the place that says not to feed them.  We found this picture when we looked up how to spell their name.

 

 

      We moved into our apartment.  I will post pictures of it soon. 

 

      PEACE OUT!!!!!

  





 

Time to explore

     I am having a lot of fun.  We went exploring for most of the week and saw the Merlion fountain.  It is statue that represents the history of Singapore.  The Indian prince who discovered Singapore that he saw a lion when he came here but it was actually a tiger.  The fish tail is for the ocean.

     Another day we went to the fish spa and put our feet in the tanks.  It really tickled!  The fish are from Turkey. 

 

     Here are my feet getting eaten by the fish.  They are eating off the dead skin.

     After the fish spa we went to Chinatown and got henna tattoos.  Mason got a dragon and I got a rose.  At first it looks like this picture.  Then it dries and you flake off all the brown stuff and it leaves a stain on your skin.  It will last 2 weeks.

     Yesterday we got our school uniforms.  These are our regular uniforms.  We are wearing our backpacks and floppy hats.  We have PE uniforms and swimsuits as well.  We are the Stamford Lions.  Roar!

    These are our Chinese New Year outfits that we will wear to school for the celebration.  There used to be a long braid on Mason's hat but he did not like it.

      The funny thing here is that almost everything is opposite.  They drive their cars on the other side of the road.  The driver sits on the left side instead of the right.  To spend $100 Singapore dollars is not very much compared to spending $100 US dollars.  You barely use knives and forks.  Here you use chopsticks and big soup spoons.  And no napkins!  People are shorter than in the US.  Lots of people where nice clothes all the time.  People walk every where and some people wear jeans even though it is very hot.  My hair curls up like crazy!  Today I got a furby.  Yay!

     We move into our apartment this week.  I will post some pictures soon.

     Note:  I made my mom indent for Mrs. Reeder.  :)

     I miss you all a lot!

The big day of the move was on Friday, December 28th.  We packed up all our bags and headed to the airport.

Our first flight was from St. Louis to Los Angelos, California.  Once we were there we had a 4 hour layover so we walked around and hung out for a little bit in the Singapore Airlines lounge.  It had snacks and places to charge our iPads.

 

 

We finally got to get on the plane.  This flight would be 18 hours.  What????  Here is a picture of me in my seat.

 

I had my own tv, a couple cool spots to hide my stuff away and a table that came out for me to eat off.  We were served dinner and breakfast.  I loved the pancakes of course!  They also brought hot towels around to wipe down your face and hands.  I liked that a lot too.  The coolest thing about my seat was that it folded down to make a bed.

Good night!!!!

We left St. Louis on Friday at 1:20pm and after 28 hours in airports and on the plane we made it to Singapore at 6:00am on Sunday morning.  Singapore is 14 hours ahead of St. Louis.  So when you go to school at 7:30am it is 9:30pm here.  Crazy.  Anyway, we made it.  Yay!

Our apartment that we will live in is not ready for us yet so we are staying in a service apartment for a little while.  A service apartment is kinda like a hotel but it has 2 bedrooms and baths and also a kitchen and living area.  It also has a fun pool.

It is very warm here and humid.  It is usually around 85 degrees all year round.  It also rains every day but only for a short amount of time.  Right now is monsoon season so it downpours like crazy.  The humidity is not good for my hair.  It gets crazy curly frizzy.  My mom can't stand it.  Here we are as frizz heads!

 

 

Here is a picture of me and my brother Mason out exploring at night.  They still have a lot of their Christmas decorations up and they are crazy big.

 

 

I have tried some Korean dumplings and really love the sweet and sour chicken here.  We have also had chicken rice.  It is a popular meal here that is just roasted chicken and rice.  The people here eat a lot of rice and hot soups.  I have also found some of my favorite food places here.  We have been to Subway and McDonalds and ordered Pizza Hut.  Mason also had to go to ToysRUs.  I was surprised to see a lot of the same restaurants and stores here.  I am bummed there is no Justice here.  No fair!

We have gone to some cool places but I need my dad to get the pictures off our camera so I can write another post.  I hope it will be soon.  I miss all of my friends!!!