#IPEsingapore

[umichenginabroad]

Waffles and Turtles

I’ve just about reached the halfway point of my time here in Singapore, and there’s still so much to do. This next week is going to be recess week, basically the same thing as spring break. Not many of the local students travel, and especially few will be travelling this recess week due to virus concerns. South Korea has been added the list of countries to which travel is restricted by the university and now government. I will be going to Vietnam for recess week, so look forward to that in next week’s post.

This last weekend, I stayed in Singapore. I’ve had a bit of work I’ve needed to catch up on, and right now is midterm season. However, it’s much lighter here than back in Michigan. I only have one class with an actual midterm exam. Unfortunately, it’s at 7pm this Friday, which means I can’t leave for recess week until Saturday. I also have an essay to do for my history class, which has been quite interesting. The class is a seminar on the history of the interactions between South Asia (basically India) and the rest of the world, primarily before its independence from British rule. Learning about this provides a unique perspective because many of the students are from India or have relatives in India. Additionally, Singapore used to be administered by the British government in India.

This weekend wasn’t just schoolwork, though. A couple of friends and I went out to explore Singapore’s beach islands: St. Johns, Lazarus, and Kusu. They’re grouped together and are about a 30-minute ferry ride from the main island. St. Johns used to be used for quarantine during the British rule. These islands have since been reformed and added-to to create a beach island for the city-state. The result is a quite a beautiful island with one main sandy beach.

The Lazarus Island Beach

Kusu is home to a tortoise (or turtle?) sanctuary

Now to the other reference in the title. Waffles are a common desert here, on campus – all the canteens sell them. They’re similar to the ones you make in the US on your waffle iron at home or in the dining halls, although not as thick as the Belgium-style ones. However, we don’t eat them with syrup here. Instead, you get a strawberry, blueberry, or kaya (a type of sweet, dense fruit) spread on it. Or chocolate or honey. Or cheese and honey (don’t get that one). Or ice cream (not recommended either, it’s a mess). Then the waffle is folded in half, stuck in a bag, and you eat it like a bagged Jimmy Johns sandwich. Typically, they’re made fresh in front of you and they’re always warm.

Strawberry waffle

Canteen 2 – one of the most popular places for dinner, especially for exchange students. You can see the waffle-making bakery in the background.

Bingsu is another tasty dessert I’ve recently had. This shaved-ice dessert originates from Korea and isn’t available on campus but it’s quite good. It’s a mixture of fruit and syrup on the ice cream and shaved ice.

Mango Bingsu, which is better than strawberry Bingsu

Back on the subject of school, I still have very few live classes. This week even less because it’s “E-Learning Week” for the computer science courses meaning everything is online. In my operating systems class, the assignment was to watch a guest lecture from back when my current professor was an engineer at Honeywell Aerospace. He talked about a operating system problem with the Pathfinder robot which was pretty cool and used a lot of the concept we had learned.

Alright, now back to my history essay. Till next time from Hanoi

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Saya Bukan Kucing

I am not a cat. My Malay/Indonesian (very similar languages) is still pretty limited. This last weekend, a group of other exchange students and I took a trip to Bintan, an island of Indonesia, for the longer holiday weekend. Chinese New Year (or Lunar New Year) is much bigger of a deal here than a lot of other holidays. However, in Singapore, there wasn’t too much going on since most people just celebrate at home with their families.

There is a lot of travel that goes on though, so flying during this time would have been expensive. That’s why we took the one-and-a-half-hour ferry ride south to Bintan. Bintan is slightly larger than Singapore and is divided into two main parts. The northern tip which is filled with expensive resorts and the more affordable, but less developed and non-English speaking southern part. Conveniently, one of my friends that went with us is from Brunei and could speak Malay.

Only two people got seasick

The first activity on the first of our two whole days on the island was finding a car and driver. No one would rent you just a car because, apparently, they’d still be liable if something happens. We also wanted a driver due to the driving conditions. As far as I could tell, there are absolutely no road laws on the island. Drivers use their horns to communicate at intersections, there are no lines on the road, no speed limits, and the two traffic lights I saw we just drove through on red so I’m not sure if those function the way they do in the US. According to our driver, there are also no drivers’ licenses and no seatbelt requirements. Just witnessing that was quite an experience. (On the note of legality, apparently there’s also a known flat rate for bribing the prison guards to let you out of prison for an hour)

After finding a driver, we took off to view two Buddhist temples, one of which supposedly has the tallest standing Buddha statue in southeast Asia. From there we visited Gurun Pasir, the sand dunes of Bintan. Although, sand dunes isn’t really correct. They’re hard, coarse formations left over from a quarry. However, the super-turquoise blue lakes and these dunes made an impressively beautiful sight, at the cost of some sun burns.

Gurun Pasir – the desert on the equator we visited on a sunny day at noon

Camels are better in 2D

The next day, we visited some of Bintan’s amazing beaches on the east side of the island.

Those who know sunsets may say this is a west side beach – we went there too

To top off this weekend trip, we visited Singapore’s Airport Jewel, one of the most impressive shopping malls I’ve ever seen. The waterfall, the plants, the glass ceiling, the Shake Shack burger, it was all amazing.

The Jewel

While near the airport, we, as everyone around us did, donned surgical masks. With multiple cases of the Wuhan virus and one death in Singapore already, it was worth restricting breathing to be a bit safer.

The university also evicted everyone from one dorm to turn it into a government quarantine facility. Luckily, that dorm is not mine and at the edge of campus. Additionally, anyone who’s been to China recently is required to take a 14-day leave of absence and stay 6 feet away from everyone else. Almost every public event, such as dorm dinners or guest lectures, has been cancelled or postponed. While I feel pretty safe on campus, I’m definitely feeling the effect of the outbreak, probably more so than in the US.

Lately, the weather here has taken a bit of a turn for the worse. It’s been raining almost continuously for the last two days. When it rains that much, you see why the rain ditches are so big and also the disadvantages of the mostly open layout of the campus. On the bright side, it is cooler.

I’ll let you know how my classes are going next time. Terimakaseh for reading!

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Departure: Goodbye Michigan

Hello, my name is Alex and I study electrical engineering. I’ll be abroad at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore this semester. You’ll be hearing about the wonderful city-state and the surrounding area from me this semester.

I can’t believe it’s almost time to go already. Winter break is almost over, and my flight is coming up. I feel excited and anxious to be going away from home for so long. I live 30 minutes away from Ann Arbor, and, although I’ve been abroad before, these four months will be, by far, the longest time so far away for me. I’m also a little sad that I won’t see my friends for such a long time too. Right now, I’ve always got this feeling that I am forgetting to do something or pack something. I shouldn’t be that worried. From what I’ve read and heard, I should be able to get almost anything I might have forgotten in Singapore.

 Clearly, too many Michigan shirts

I am interested how the visa process and immigration will work once I get to Singapore and along my travel through Shanghai. Right now, all I’ve got are two pieces of paper that say I have been approved for a visa and a piece of paper that says I’m enrolled at NTU. I don’t have anything very official looking or taped in my passport, but I’ve double checked all the information from NTU and I should be good.

Registration for classes at NTU so far has been confusing. I’ve been approved for some and I have a temporary schedule, but I won’t be able to change anything until next Tuesday (classes start on Monday). I’ll let you know how it goes.

For now, I’m focusing on getting packed and all ready to go. I’ll miss Michigan but not the cold winter here.

Till next time from Singapore,

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Trains, Temples and Haggling

This past weekend, I visited Bangkok with a couple of other students I met here in Singapore. Bangkok is a massive sprawling city and the capital of Thailand. Thailand, unlike most other countries in the area, was never colonized. The nation lost plenty of land in various agreements with the European powers but remained sovereign. It was called Siam until the 19th century.

One of the first things you notice after leaving the airport (aside from the football field-sized billboards in the style of Fahrenheit 451) is an arch over the highway with a picture of the current king and in English stating “Long Live the King.” This is the first of many, many pictures of the king and royal family. There’s basically a picture at every street intersection. Some high rises even have his portrait painted on the side.

Everywhere there are gold-painted stands similar to this one

The first place we visited was the royal palace and temple area. Everyone is required to wear long pants out of respect. As opposed to Indonesia, Kuala Lumpur, and Singapore, Bangkok appeared to be almost exclusively Buddhist, although they believe in a Hindu-inspired creation story, as far as I understand. Many of the temples shared similarities. Most of the ones we saw were built out of wood and contained gold-painted or actual gold Buddha statues. The murals on the insides of the temples impressed me the most though. These took up all the wall space and elaborately depicted battles and events from the religious history. The amount of consistent detail across so much area is just amazing.

That detail

Bangkok is also home to many markets that sell anything from clothing to souvenirs, and vegetables to power drills. A little outside of the inner city of Bangkok, we visited a floating market. This market exists across a number of small piers and boats. Floating markets are remnants of old Bangkok when there were more canals than streets. Nearby, we visited a train market. This market exists literally on train tracks. Whenever a train comes, everyone has to get out of the way. Walking through it, you almost wouldn’t notice. There’s roofs and large umbrellas covering you from the sun and these make it seems like a low building.

The shopkeepers move the roofs in and out depending on the train

Part of the market culture, or anywhere you want to buy something (except for food in most cases), is haggling. Nothing is for sale for the price marked. You can usually get anything for around half the marked price depending on the product. We all tried it out, but I can’t say I’m particularly good at it.

Speaking of haggling, we frequently haggled with tuk tuk drivers. Tuk tuks are pretty much three wheel motorcycles that can transport you small distances within Bangkok.  On the note of transportation, Bangkok did have a good transportation system consisting of multiple overhead train lines and bus lines. However, all the buses looked like they were from the 1970s.

Two tuk tuks ready to go – they almost all look identical

Bangkok is a pretty modern city, but these buses - they look decades out of place

Muay Thai is a martial art similar to boxing that is televised and watched live in Thailand. We decided to view an event while in Bangkok. We visited the Channel 8 Muay Thai studio, paid no admission, and got front row seats. We just want to take a quick look, but we ended up staying for over three hours. The sport is pretty exciting to watch. The last and biggest match ended up in a tie, so we had to stay and watch the tiebreaker as well. It was a fun night.

This guy ended up getting K.O.-ed in the first 5 minutes of the fight

Back here in Singapore, classes are going on as usual. Plenty of online lectures to watch. Next week is what’s called “E-Learning Week” which means more things technically would be online but almost everything is already online so there really won’t be much of a difference.

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

The Lion City

Singapore literally translates to the lion city from Sanskrit. The legend is that Sang Nila Utama, the prince that founded the city, saw a lion at this location and because of it, decided to found the city. But lions aren’t native to this part of Asia.

As the number of infected people has increased, the Novel Wuhan Virus, as its being called, is disrupting more and more of life. Singapore, already having a number of cases and being the source for a number of spread cases, is taking virus precautions very seriously. In collaboration with the government, the university is as well. As of last Monday, we students are required to record our body temperature twice per day in the online university portal.

Public temperature measuring station

Additionally, we are required to list any location we plan to travel to, especially if it’s close to China. Multiple professors have emailed students (me included) not to come to lecture but to instead watch the recorded lecture. Any classes with over 50 students are required to be moved online. Unfortunately, the online lectures are a bit lower quality than what I’m used to at Michigan, but they’ll do. Anyone who’s been to China must isolate themselves for 14 days. The government has upped the warning level to “orange,” the highest it has ever been (the system was only implemented a few years ago). This means all public events are canceled and those that still do take place will require temperature monitoring stations. Most public buildings have temperature monitoring stations in front as well. Now would be a really bad time to have just a regular cold here. Whenever someone coughs, people move away worried it might be the virus.

Plenty of professors and students wear some kind of mask as well. However, there’s been a lot of controversy as to whether they are actually effective.

Borders aren’t closed, so I’m still hoping to travel. Unfortunately, several my friends’ parents won’t allow them to leave the country or want them to come home. While the virus certainly is a real danger, I do still want to explore with many more precautions than usual. I’d say its worth noting that all these actions taken by the Singaporean government and NTU are preemptive rather than reactive which makes the situation seem worse than it actually is, which is a good thing.

My engineering classes (I’m taking Operating Systems, Advanced Computer Architecture, Electromagnetism, and Modeling and Control Systems) consist of two lectures and a tutorial each week. A tutorial is basically a discussion at U of M. It’s not required (except for electromagnetism) and there’s a few problems we go over. They’re taught by professors or grad students. I always do the problems, but I don’t always go. If I have a good grasp of the concepts, it doesn’t make too much sense to just watch the grad student go over the answers. As for the lectures, they’re all online now, so I watch them when I want to. All the engineering classes have labs as well. Operating Systems and Computer Architecture have labs every other week, while electromagnetism only has two total and Control Systems only has one. Overall, the workload from these is a lot less. The labs need to be completed within the lab period, so there’s a bit of time pressure but no work outside, meaning they tend to be easier than what I’ve done back in Michigan. No homework assignments also help with the lower workload, too.

My 5th class is on south Asian history, so India. It’s a three-hour seminar each week and it’s my most work-intensive class. I have to do a lot of reading but it’s pretty interesting.

This last weekend, I stayed in Singapore so I decide to check out the night safari. The night safari is a special part of the zoo that’s made to be visited at night. All the animals are nocturnal, so you get a completely different perspective than what you’d usually expect from a zoo. It was pretty cool to see the animals out and about.

What did the prince actually see?

The fire show at the entrance of the night safari was amazing, and one of the only things I was able to get a good picture of

This weekend I’ll be off to Thailand, so, till next time,

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Muddy Confluence

Last week Thursday, I caught the tail end of Singapore’s Chinese New Year celebration downtown at the Float of Marina Bay. Although the public holiday here in Singapore was only Friday evening and the Monday of last week, the downtown celebration is everyday for nine days. In China, a lot of people have this period off as well.

The celebration consists of multiple musical performances, interviews, speeches, skits, and, best of all, fireworks. The entire event is entirely in Mandarin and caters mainly to the majority Chinese population of Singapore.

Happy Chinese New Year!

Last weekend, a couple of friends and I visited Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, or simply “KL” as everyone here calls it. Kuala Lumpur means muddy confluence because KL is built at the intersection of two rivers. We took a bus, which took around 6 hours total. For around $25, it was very comfy and even a little too cold from the AC. The immigration system between Malaysia and Singapore is also extremely smooth. Overall, travel between the two cities was not difficult at all.

KL is in many ways similar to Singapore. Like Singapore, it had massive growth in the 20th century that made it the modern city it is. Although not as clean as Singapore, laws are somewhat similarly strict, but for a different reason. Singapore enforces strict laws with harsh punishments because the government sees its people as its most valuable resource. The island is about half the size of Rhode Island, so there’s not much in terms of natural resources. The laws are intended to keep its citizens a good and healthy workforce in a clean environment. Malaysia enforces strict laws as a result of its Muslim majority.

The Muslim majority in Malaysia is also apparent just by walking around KL. In Singapore, the one mosque I’d seen so far was in the Arabic Street part of town. In KL, there were plenty of mosques, including the massive National Mosque.

The National Mosque has plenty of water features

Although over 60% Muslim, Malaysia is home to large Buddhist and Hindu populations as well. Our trip took place just a week before Thaipusam, a Hindu religious festival celebrated on the first full moon of Thai, a month of the Tamil calendar. In KL and Malaysia this is celebrated at the Batu Caves, a series of massive caverns just outside of KL. It is a special holy shrine. Even though the festival was not yet taking place, we saw plenty of people already observing it, all dressed in yellow.

It’s a really big cave

Outside the caves are the 272 painted stairs leading up and a massive gold-painted statue of Murugan, a Hindu god. The entire cave area, including the stairs, are a no-shoe area. Climbing those steep stairs without shoes was a bit of a challenge.

That statue is 140ft tall

Beyond these religious sites, KL also has a super awesome skyline that was amazing to view, especially at night. Although parks close at 10, (and guards really make sure you’re out, which was a tad annoying) many have fountains with light shows visible from the towers, and KL tower, the massive TV tower, has its own lightshow.

The KL tower in performance

The Petronas Twin Towers do not have a light show, but they don’t need one. These towers are just so stunning to look at during the night.

I really like the architecture – if only that gold building back there was centered

As an engineering student, something I found interesting about Malaysia, is that because of the rising cost of gasoline, many cars can take both natural gas and gasoline. One of the cab drivers we hired showed us how he could change between the two different fuels with the flick of a switch.

Back in Singapore, I’m in a total of five classes: four engineering and one humanities. Overall, the workload is significantly less that what I’m used to which is great, considering how much I’ve been traveling on the weekends.

Till next time, from a climate where 70 degrees is cold,

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Die Die Must Try

I can’t believe I’m already entering my third week here in Singapore. It’s amazing and you die die must try, as they say in Singlish. 

(If you want to try to speak Singlish, just add “lah” to the end of every sentence and you’re halfway there, lah.)

There is such variety in good food here and it’s all relatively inexpensive. Everywhere around Singapore there are these locations called Hawker centers which is basically just a bunch of tiny booths where you can order food.

Hawker center in Jurong near NTU

I’ve tried so many new dishes here from the common chicken and rice to rice porridge, from Singaporean Laksa to hand-made noodle dishes and the best butter chicken I’ve ever tasted. So many times, I’m really not sure what I’m ordering but it’s always been delicious and usually pretty filling. A meal here at most places will only cost you around S$4.50 (about $3.50 USD). Surprisingly, fast food (like McDonalds and KFC, which a pretty common) is more expensive.

In addition to these tasty dishes, many Hawker centers offer fresh juice. For a dollar or two you can have a fruit freshly squeezed or blended into a refreshing drink.

Alright, now on to the sights I’ve seen. Last weekend, a student group here at NTU led a tour of Pulau Ubin, a nature filled island off the north coast of Singapore.

To get there, we hired boats at the ferry terminal. These small boats are the only way to and from island, even for residents.

Small, wooden ferry boats

On the island, we saw monkeys, wild boars, historical houses, and too much jungle in the very hot and humid weather. It was interesting for sure, but I wouldn’t say the island is a must-see.

Wild boar curious if we have any food

On Sunday, a group of us from NTU went to Little India. Little India was pretty unique from the rest of Singapore I’ve seen so far. The streets were lined with all kinds of shops selling cheap electronics, saris, and gold jewelry. There was a point when we walked past five jewelers in a row. Hidden between some of these stores were temples either for Buddhists, Hindus, or (surprisingly) a combination.

A row of shops in Little India

A temple hidden between the buildings.

From there we went to Arab Street. Of the weekend, Arab Street was my favorite location. It was so colorful and scenic.

Just look at all these colorful buildings with a backdrop of Masjid Sultan mosque

As the name would suggest, this area was originally home to traders from the Arabian Peninsula who played a role in making Singapore the port city it is now. 

Just outside Arab Street, we noticed an amazing mural and I have to thank my friend Marvin from Germany for bringing his wide-angle lens to capture it all.

My roommate Jacob and I in front of this stunning mural we stumbled upon

The rest of the week has been classes and doing class work. It’s still add/drop period, so classes still aren’t finalized, but, hopefully soon, I’ll know my final schedule.

Next weekend is Chinese New Year and some of my friends and I are looking into traveling. I’ll let you know. 

Till next time lah

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

City in a Garden

I’m finally here and it’s been a week.

A view from Mount Faber Park located in the middle of the city

When I first arrived, Singapore reminded me of Europe, mainly due to the traffic signals and systems. But it was much too green and much too clean to be Europe. Singapore, and especially NTU, is a garden.

The campus is absolutely beautiful. It’s located in the hilly tropical forests of western Singapore, a two-hour train ride from the airport. The buildings are mostly white and open air with closed classrooms and lecture halls. Everywhere there are flower beds with all kinds of plants. Since it is built into the hills, getting around can be very confusing. In some buildings, you’ll enter on the 5th flour and others, basement 3. The hills also mean a lot of stairs, which at a constant 85 degrees and 85% humidity, can be a bit exhausting to say the least.

North Spine of the nature-filled NTU campus

Even with that temperature, many Singaporeans wear long pants and sleeves because the classrooms and lecture halls are cooled to a frigid 65 degrees. On the other hand, my room does not have AC. It’s pretty bearable with our large fan. My roommate, Jacob, is also one of the many international exchange students here and also from the US. There are over 1000 international exchange students here in total and I’ve met people from all over Europe, Asia, and America.  

Last Saturday, a group of exchange students and I went downtown for the annual Light Festival. The festival took place across locations, many of them having impressive light projections onto their front walls. The Marina Bay Sands hotel and casino, the surfboard-on-stilts or banana-on-a-fork shaped building, used lasers and water jets to make a super impressive show.

Projection onto the Victoria Concert Hall and Theater

Something that’s stuck out to me is that since Singaporeans drive on the left side of the road, people also walk on the left side of the sidewalk. They also speak a dialect of English called Singlish. Singlish is mostly not-entirely-correct English mixed with some Tamil, Malay, and Chinese words, all spoken fast. A simple example: “can two go, can?” meaning “Do you want to go eat at canteen two?” At times, this can be difficult to understand.

A sidewalk encouraging me to walk differently

This week and next week here are the add-drop period, so not much will happen yet in the classes, since people are still figuring out what classes they can get into. I’ll update more on classes next time I write.

Till next time from the City in a Garden,

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Xin Chào from Vietnam

This post is a little late due to me writing on my phone, the limited stable internet in Vietnam, and just me being busy. There’s so much to see in Vietnam. So much in fact, that I won’t fit all of it in one post. This post, written mostly on my phone, will cover the food of Vietnam. 

Pho (pronounced Fa) is one of the most well known dishes here in Vietnam. Pho consists of rice noodles, meat(usually pork), some vegetables, and broth. The broth is one of the main parts of pho that differentiates good pho from average pho. Good broth is a bit spicy and very flavorful. 

Similar to Pho is Bún bò Huế, a very common breakfast dish. The only major difference between the two dishes is the type of noodles used.

A local breakfast – Bun bo Hue

A specialty of Hoi An, an old UNESCO world heritage city that I’ll write more about later, Cao Lầu, is also similar but again has some different noodles with local seasoning meaning this dish is not often found outside of Hoi An.

The lime adds even more flavor

Speaking of Hoi An, I should mention white rose dumplings or Bánh Bao Bánh Vạc. These special rice dumplings are also unique to Hoi An.

Banh Mi is a dish that shows Vietnam’s French influence. A former French colony, Vietnam is home to many bakeries making baguettes. Banh Mi is a sandwich in a baguette that has vegetables, meat, and sometimes cheese. The meat is typically pork or chicken. Beef is less common in general in Vietnam. For about 20,000 to 40,000 dong ($1-$2), these are cheap and tasty meals and snacks. Honestly, we’ve had way too many of these on this trip.

I hope this doesn’t make you hungry

One of my less favorite dishes was Bánh Xèo, a Vietnamese pancake with seafood and vegetables. The ones I had tasted like shrimp shell, but I may have just been unlucky.

No post about Vietnamese food is complete without spring rolls. You can get spring rolls anywhere and they’re often pretty good. A spring roll is kind of like a taco. It’s chopped up vegetables and occasionally beef, pork, chicken, or seafood wrapped into a little cylinder with rice paper. Rice paper is like thin writing paper that becomes soft and flexible when wet. Sometime spring rolls will be deep fried, or, my favorite, stir fried. To eat them, you dip them in a chili sauce and enjoy.

Spring rolls and their sauce laying next to rice paper and Vietnamese pancakes - also notice the little plastic chairs in the background. Almost all places have these little tables and little plastic chairs for seating.

On to the drinks. Vietnam is home to a number of different refreshing and tasty drinks. Coconut coffee was one of our favorites. Usually, it consisted of coffee and some kind of frozen coconut milk and pieces which you would mix together. 

Mixed and unmixed coconut coffees

Also pretty good but a bit heavier is egg coffee. The cream on top includes an egg.

Most egg coffees come with a cool pattern on top

It’s worth noting that not all parts of the Vietnamese food culture are so amazing. Food poisoning is a very real problem, and a person in my travel group experienced it. Hygiene in general is less of a priority and you can’t expect the people who are making your food have washed their hands, even with the new propaganda due to the virus.

On a sadder note, many people in Vietnam live in poverty and make do with what they have, including eating animals we would typically not think about eating, such as cats and dogs. These were available for purchase in some of the markets we walked through.

Hopefully I didn’t make you too hungry or ruin your appetite. Till very soon with another Vietnam post

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Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

What’s new?

Why, you ask, did I take 10 trips to the bathroom today? The answer is simply because I thought it was a good idea to drink an iced rose tea on an empty stomach this morning, despite the fact that there was a sign by the cash register warning about the laxative effects of ingesting rose. “I’ll be fine, I’ve got a strong stomach,” I thought to myself. In the end, I payed S$4.50 and suffered hours of pain and discomfort, but hey, at least I got to keep the cup.

Ah, the things I went through to get this limited edition design

And this isn’t even the worst that’s happened. A few weeks back, I had some Nasi Lemak for lunch and woke up at 4 A.M. the next morning because I was experiencing severe stomach pain…and, well, I’ll spare y’all the details of what happened after that.

Anyways, my point is, although you might hate yourself for it sometimes, trying new things is a great way to step outside of your comfort zone and experience the unknown, whether it be a new food, a new place, or a new activity.

Claypot frog porridge at People’s Park Complex in Chinatown

As for me, I’ve mostly been eating food I’ve never tried before (photos of which can be seen in previous posts), but I’ve also tried a lot of new things:

I still suck, but at least I know how to play pool now!

Yes, I am afraid of heights, and yes, this was terrifying at first, but it ended up being super fun

Late-night biking! We biked from the Orchard area all the way back to Clementi!

Karaoke with friends!

Classics with Teresa Teng

And in this photo, we see the makings of a popstar

So besides some painful moments here and there, I've truly enjoyed every new experience I've had so far. I think it's refreshing and exciting to try things that make me nervous or uncomfortable, which is something I hadn't really done for a while before I mustered up the courage to come to Singapore for the summer. It's truly rewarding because I feel that the more I try new things, the more confident I become in my abilities to step outside my comfort zone, and that allows me to try even more new things!

Laura Huang

Computer Science

Grasshopper in Singapore Internship