#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

---

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!

---

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,

---

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.

---

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,

---

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,

---

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

---

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,

---

Alexander Steinig

Electrical Engineering

Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Arrival

It’s Jacqui, and I’m back for the second installation of my Singapore study abroad blog! 

I have now been in Singapore for about a week, and it has been filled with adventure. My first impression is that I love it here, not only is the country amazing, but discovering it with new friends makes the process even more rewarding. Being able to explore Singapore this first week without much of a rigid timeline or schedule has been so much fun. The very first day (last Tuesday) involved a walk around the NTU campus, followed by a bus into the city and tour around a few tourist highlights. I had a lot of fun seeing the sights and will share with you some of the cool spots we walked around. 

Before we get to that, I’ll mention that our tour started at the ‘Hive’ on NTU’s campus, also known as the very cool/weird place that I mentioned briefly in my last blog post. It was fun to connect the research I had done before my trip with the place I actually had a meeting. 

Next, we left the university and headed for the city on a bus. First stop, a park, where we followed a tour guide who led us towards the river, and the famous Merlion statue. Here’s a photo of it, with the famous Marina Bay Sands hotel in the background. This hotel was the most expensive hotel to build in the world, and certainly looks it.

I took a nice little panorama to capture the complete cityscape. I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. 

Next, we headed for China Town! Upon arrival, the girls donned a few extra garments to cover our shoulders and legs, and headed inside a temple. 

Here I am with some statues of Buddha. 

Our tour wrapped up in little India, where I snapped this shot. 

Most of our group, which is made up of about 24 people (20 from Michigan, 2 Canadians and 2 other US students) decided to stay in the city after this tour concluded. So we headed for the Gardens by the Bay, another sight I mentioned in my first blog post. This truly did live up to the the photos online. Here are some of my own. 

You can see the big ‘Supertrees’, which are covered in vines and lights. There is also a big ferris wheel in the background that looks out onto the whole city.  

The gardens look out onto the river, so the buildings from earlier in the day were up nice and close. 

We went for dinner at an outside food court at the base of the Marina Bay Sands. After hearing much about a local delicacy, ‘Iced Kachang’, I had to give it a try.

Probably like you, I thought this was going to be a nice sweet dessert, not too dissimilar from a snow cone, which usually I LOVE. It was, however, very dissimilar from a snow cone. As you can see, the shaved ice was covered in a corn syrup, with chunks of corn spread throughout the ice. At the bottom of the ice, there was a mixture of many unknown ingredients, as well as a syrup with red beans. Overall, it didn’t taste very sweet at all, and I was not a fan.

The melted product didn’t look too flashy either. 

Luckily, my main dinner was great, and I’m planning on doing a blog soon covering a range of food that I’m eating on my Singapore journey. 

After dinner we headed back to the gardens for a light show under the Marina Bay Sands. After waiting around for a bit, it seemed like the light show wasn’t about to happen, so we started on our journey back through the gardens to the train station to head home. Just as we were leaving the gardens, the lights on the big trees dimmed and a voiceover started playing. We were about to witness the Star Wars light show. It lasted about 20 minutes and was really a very amazing experience. There was loud music from Star Wars playing that was synced with lights flashing through the trees. We were lucky to have witnessed it. Here are a couple of still pictures from the show.

And with that, it was time to head home, and that was day 1. 

This has already been a pretty lengthy blog post, so I will leave it at this, and cover the rest of the first week in my next post. Hopefully you enjoyed it. 

Until Next Time, 

Jacqui Schafer

Engineering Undeclared

Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Off to Singapore

I like to tell myself that writing this pre-departure post while sitting at my gate waiting to board my flight is the most appropriate time to be doing this, but we all know it's because I procrastinated until the last minute again. And yes, by "again" I mean I was up until 2 in the morning packing, so although I should be tired, I'm too nervous and excited to feel sleepy.

My mind is pretty blank right now, and it still hasn't really sunk in yet that I'm spending the next 3 months on my own halfway across the world. Since I tend to worry a lot, I'm trying to distract myself by reading the documentation for the programming language I'll be using for my internship project.

I'm looking forward to a challenging and fun experience in Singapore, but right now I gotta brace myself for the 12 hour flight to my stopover in Tokyo, so I’ll leave you with a fortune I got about a month ago that I think sums up up how I’m feeling right now:

“Real courage is moving forward when the outcome is uncertain.”

Singapore, I'll see you soon. Bye Michigan, see you in August!

Laura Huang

Computer Science

Grasshopper in Singapore Internship

[umichenginabroad]

Goodbye Singapore!

Yesterday I had my one and only final of the semester. I know I didn’t write about my classes here a lot, so this post is dedicated to it!

* This is a super long post but there are some fun travel pics at the bottom

Before I studied abroad, I was really nervous about the classes here. For the most part, things have been okay with courses. It was pretty frustrating registering for courses since you do not register until classes start essentially, and it was kind of difficult working with Michigan to get classes approved. At NTU, you get on a waitlist for a class and every night people are randomly chosen off of it to enroll in the class, so when things were changing by the day getting classes approved with Michigan 12 hours apart it was difficult.

I ended up enrolling in history of Indonesia, history of Japan, Chinese 1, and an electric circuits course. As I said before, I wish I could have taken classes for my major, but I didn’t find out until after I had committed to study abroad that Michigan would not accept transfer credits for courses in my major. The next paragraph is more in depth about courses at NTU which you can skip if you aren’t a prospective exchange student.

In general, I wish there had been more support for exchange students in my courses. I found it extremely difficult to get updates on how I was progressing in my classes and there were no extra instruction opportunities like study groups, office hours, or tutor lists. Like seriously, my final paper for one of my classes was due 3 weeks ago and in the online grading system there are still 0 graded assignments for the entire semester. I had to go seek out tutors and extra help, but my professor didn’t seem to understand the concept of a review session or office hours so I was mostly on my own. If you’re studying abroad at NTU, I would highly recommend making sure that your class is not an online course, because you will literally be alone with a video as your only resource to learn the material. As an exchange student who doesn’t know any other students at the university you won’t have the same peer resources that a full time student does so I would try to not take online courses.

On a better note, I really enjoyed my Chinese class here. It was mostly exchange students since most of the students here already speak Chinese as their native language, but the class was fun to meet other exchangers and had a lot more involvement. To me, it seems like NTU students are very quiet in class, like in my history classes we would have class discussions but the local students were very hesitant to participate. I don’t want to characterize an entire group of people, but it seems my classmates here are perfectionists. They didn’t really want to offer discussion in class in fear of being wrong, and a little thing that struck me was that everyone uses white out. Like if I was writing notes in class in pen, and I wrote something wrong, I would just cross it out and move on, but students here always perfectly white out their mistakes in things as simple as notes from class. It just struck me as something very different than I was used to.

RIP my long hair ... I went to Japan a few weeks ago and something was lost in translation and I now have very short hair.

One of the last days in my Chinese class, our teacher surprised us with a day of making dumplings! He showed us a video of how to make all the fillings, then we rolled out the dough and filled them!

For my Chinese class, our final project was to create a short video with a partner. My friend who is a Chemical Engineer at Michigan and I made our video together. Here’s a link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlfhlS0ekqQ (if anyone watching this actually speaks Chinese I will be very embarrassed because our pronunciation is terrible)

Overall, NTU was a very interesting experience. It’s definitely different than Michigan in that the campus is all self contained and not part of a city at all. You could live on campus the whole semester and not leave campus, it would be boring, but possible. It was fine to be here for a semester, but I’m definitely leaving happy that I go to a school as amazing as Michigan at home.

Classes actually ended about three weeks ago, then there was a one week study period, then a two week long exam period. That was very different than Michigan when there’s like two days to study then all the exams are in less than a week. I only had one exam which was the second to last day of the exam period, so in the time I had off I went to Japan for a week then Bali for a week with my mom. Now that courses are over, I’m going to Hong Kong for a few days then I will be returning to the United States May 12.

Since this post is already really long, here are my last 2 trips in pictures:

Feeding deer in the Nara Deer Park in Japan (post hair cut)

Mt Fuji from the Shinkansen (bullet train) from Tokyo to Kyoto

Me at a Ryokan (traditional Japanese Inn) in Yugawara

In Kyoto at peak Sakura (Cherry blossom) season - people here LOVE cherry blossoms

BC - before (hair)cut - at the Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto

* This trip to Japan was mostly solo so if anyone has questions about taking a solo trip let me know! 

My mom and I at a rice terrace in Bali

Swimming with a sea turtle in the Gili Islands!

So excited and grateful to have one more adventure still, but I am very happy to be returning home in a few short days. I’ll probably post one more time when I get home, but as my time has ended in Singapore I’m so so glad to have had this amazing experience. It has truly been a once in a lifetime five months.

-Reilly Wong

Computer Science Engineering

Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Vietnam With My Family

While my dad and brother were visiting, we went to Vietnam. My dad had been to China before, but my brother had never been to Asia before so it was a totally new experience for him. Singapore is pretty clean on Western standards,  but Vietnam was totally different.

Us in Ho Chi Minh Square with the Ho Chi Minh statue

We started in Ho Chi Minh City, which used to be called Saigon, but was renamed after Vietnam’s famous communist leader. It isn’t the capital, but is the largest city in Vietnam and is in the south.

French propaganda posters at the War Remnants Museum

We went to the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City, it was very weird being there as an American. The museum is all about the “American War of Aggression,” the Vietnam War as we know it. Even though it was very one sided exhibit, the descriptions of the United State’s actions during the war were very sad. There were many parts of the museum dedicated to showing the effects of the United State’s usage of Agent Orange in the war, which still linger today. I’m sure there were terrible things done on both side of the conflict, but the museum was interesting because it did not talk at all about any possible wrongdoings of the Viet Cong. The only positive things the museum had to say about Americans was the portion that talked about the many Vietnam War protests in the United States, especially on college campuses.

Saigon Notre-Dame Cathedral

Post Office

As a former French colony, the French influence in architecture can easily be seen!

Inside the post office, with the large portrait of Ho Chi Minh

Bags of herbs at the Traditional Vietnamese Medicine Museum, we also visited a Vietnamese History museum in Hanoi later

I tried Pho for the first time, which is a Vietnamese rice noodle and broth dish, it was really good! I’m definitely going to try to find some Pho places in Ann Arbor.

After a few days, we went to Hanoi, the capital city that is in the North. The weather was cooler, which I was very happy about.

I think every city in Asia has a KFC

There were so many dogs here, I haven’t seen that many dogs while abroad so I loved it!

Visiting a local market, so many cool ingredients I hadn’t seen before!

My brother and I in front of the Mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh, it was closed on the weekends but I was ok with not waiting in line for hours to see a body ...

I loved Hanoi so much! The city has seven million people living in it, and seven million motor bikes. Crossing the street is a challenge because there aren’t many traffic lights in the old quarter, where we stayed, so you have to just wait for traffic to slow down then start walking and don’t stop. The bikes will go around you as you walk.

We happened to catch a local school getting out, all the parents came on their bikes and picked up their kids

There was tons of really old buildings that were left to look old, something I thought was super cool. We spent a lot of time just walking around looking at the different historical buildings. One of the most historical places was the Hoa Lo Prison, known as the Hanoi Hilton, where war prisoners were kept in the Vietnam War. Senator John McCain was kept there for over five years.

We saw a traditional water puppet show, which dates back hundreds of years in Northern Vietnam. In general, the culture there seemed like a unique mix of Chinese and French culture through the food, the puppet show, and the architecture.

One of my favorite places we ate was called Ngon Villa in Hanoi, I didn’t get any pictures but food was amazing! The manager helped us pick out a variety of Vietnamese food from all over the country (the style varies with location), and was so great. If you are ever in Hanoi, you have to go to this place.

One of the things I was most looking forward to was seeing Halong Bay. I’d seen so many pictures before I had even gone abroad, but I didn’t realize how big it would be! We went on a boat trip, but didn’t get to see close to all of the hundreds of rocks and islands.

Famous rock that’s supposed to look like fighting chickens?

Our canoe driver took this picture for us

When we got back to Singapore, we went to the Gardens by the Bay to see the nightly light show and to the Night Safari

Couldn’t get any pictures of the other animals since it was dark! It was cool seeing nocturnal animals since you don’t normally see that in zoos, and seeing Asian animals that you don’t see anywhere else! You could get really close to them, most of them didn’t even have real fences separating you from the animals!

I’m so so glad and thankful that my dad and brother were able to visit me and that we could go to Vietnam together. It was a really cool mix of learning new things at the different museums and historical sites we visited and fun seeing new places and trying new foods. When my family left, I almost felt like I should be leaving with them, but I’ll see them in one short month!

-Reilly Wong

Computer Science Engineering

Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Singapore Tour Guide

My Dad and brother came to visit me in Singapore this week! My brother is a senior in high school and on his spring break, so we spent the first few days of their trip here exploring Singapore a little.

They were a little jet-lagged from the 24 hour journey to get here, but I was so glad to see them after so long. This is the longest I’ve gone without seeing my family, but it was nice to have facetime and skype to be able to talk to them and see them.

Arab Street, one of the many ethnic neighborhoods in Singapore

My brother and me on Haji Lane!

In front of the famous Merlion statue! 

My dad and brother thought the Marina Bay area was very modern, they were amazed at how clean Singapore was. I’m jealous that my brother gets to go on such a cool spring break trip! 

On top of the Marina Bay Sands Mall!

Making my family take me out to eat while they’re here! 

One of the things I heard you had to try in Singapore was the chili crab, so my family and I tried it at my favorite food place by the bay, Makansutra Gluttons Bay. They are staying in Chinatown, so they loved getting to go to all the different hawker stands that Singapore is famous for. 

We finished up the day walking by the bay at night and looking at Singapore’s amazing skyline. 

This weekend, we all went to Vietnam together, which I’ll talk about in a separate post. My family is here for a few more days, there’s still so much for us to do here, but I have to spend time on campus studying too! I’m jealous they got to go to the beach without me while I was in class ...

- Reilly Wong

Computer Science Engineering

Nanyang Technological University - Singapore  

[umichenginabroad]

Spring Break Pt. 2

Here’s all about the second half of my spring break trip! I went to Thailand, and it was pretty long, so I’ll try to keep it pretty brief. 

Pai

We started in the North of Thailand in Pai, a small backpacker town about 3 hours outside of Chiang Mai. It’s really far up in the mountains, so it actually got pretty cold at night! We stayed in a cabin hostel up the mountain from the main city. It was so relaxing to be up in the mountains and enjoy the beautiful nature scenery - except the huge three-inch spider we found crawling on the wall the first night! 

We rented motorbikes and spent a few days getting lost in the mountains. We visited a few waterfalls, but it was the dry season so they were more like pools of mountain water. There were lots of controlled burns in the trees on the mountains, and at night you could see the lines of fire. 

The mountainous terrain was so fun to explore, and the cooler weather was a great break from the hot and humidity of Singapore!

The actual town of Pai was really cool too, at night different food carts and stands selling jewelry, clothing, and souvenirs line the streets. We ate dinner from the different stands a few nights to be able to try everything from Thai food to crepes and bruschetta. 

Chiang Mai

After Pai, we took the long 3-hour bus ride back through the mountains. The extreme high speed curves are known to make passengers sick, but we were alright. 

For such large animals, the elephants were so quiet when they walked, so the wooden clackers on their collars were necessary to hear them coming

Here, we visited the Elephant Jungle Sanctuary for the day where they taught us about the history of elephants in Thailand. In the past, they were used in logging camps as work animals, but logging was banned by the government in 1989. After that, many elephant and elephant trainers, mahouts, were left without work, elephants even wandered the streets of Bangkok with their owners begging for food. Elephants can eat up to 500 pounds of food a day, so many were left starving with no work. 

After this, many elephants were sold to circuses and riding camps where tourists can pay to ride them. This is bad for elephants because they are not meant to carry multiple people on their backs all day with little rest. Also, they are often abused when being trained to do tricks at these circuses and riding camps. 

The elephants we saw at the sanctuary were mostly rescued from these circuses and riding camps, you can tell which ones were rescued because their ears are cut and have holes from where they had collars and chains attached.

These elephants were all female Asian elephants, so they did not have their tusks removed, they naturally do not have tusks

We saw some baby elephants that had been born in the sanctuary, with their mothers still around. We fed them bananas and they also feed on the vegetation of the forest. We also got to give them a mud bath in the river and clean them after - the babies in particular loved the water! They would lay on their sides and kick their feet in the water, using their trunks like a snorkel above the water. We saw only female elephants, but the sanctuary also has males. The males usually do not interact with visitors since they can be harder to control. 

At the jungle sanctuary, they told us how each mahout (usually a man) gets their elephant when they are young, and they stay with their elephant their whole life. Elephants have similar life spans to humans when they are cared for and not forced to work, so it is a lifetime commitment. When we were playing with the elephants, the mahout was never far and directed their elephant by commands or gently pulling on their ears or tails, not by using hooks or force. 

Koh Phi Phi

After Chaing Mai, we took a quick flight down to Phuket (pronounced Pu-ket). We originally planned on going to Koh Phi Phi for two days and Phuket for two days, but ended up staying the whole time in Koh Phi Phi.  

There, I did a morning snorkeling trip to swim with the Black Tipped Reef Sharks that sleep near Shark Point on the island. We saw groups of about six sharks swimming around as they woke up in the morning, it was pretty cool! 

If you look closely, you can see the shark. They blend into the rocks and water very well!

We had to be very still and quiet to not scare the sharks off, they are very afraid of humans. They taught us that shark attacks are actually very rare, and often occur because people look a lot like sea turtles (sharks’ main food source) when they are surfing. Still, thousands of sharks are killed each year out of fear, when most shark species are actually more afraid of humans than we are of them. 

The beaches in Koh Phi Phi were the nicest I’ve ever been to! We went on a tour to visit the famous Maya Beach and Monkey Beach.

White sand and clear blue water! 

Kayaking to new beaches!

My friend sat down on a swing, and two monkeys came and sat next to him!

Unfortunately, the monkeys did not like me as much. When we returned to Monkey Beach with our boat tour, there were many tourists feeding the monkeys, which is against the rules of the beach. The monkeys were getting mad that we didn’t have any food to give them; they were trying to get into our pockets and crawling up on us. I was sitting on a bench, and while I wasn’t looking, a monkey came up behind me and bit my shoulder. 

Still continued on the tour after the monkey bite though

Me in a Thai hospital getting my rabies shots after the tour!

Koh Pha Ngon

After a few days in Koh Phi Phi, we finished up our trip by meeting up with the rest of our group in Koh Phangon for the Full Moon Party. The Full Moon Party happens every month on the full moon and people gather on the beach and stay out all night to watch the sun rise in the morning! 

We got there a few days before the full moon, so we did a cooking class one of the days. 

My ingredients to make Thai Green Curry! It’s made from coconut milk, sweet Thai basil, green eggplant, baby carrots, a special type of kaffir lime leaves, long beans, and green curry. It’s my favorite Thai dish and I the one we made was my favorite that I ate! 

We also cooked pad thai and spring rolls!

Of course we spent some days hanging out on the beach and in the ocean!

By the night of the Full Moon Party, I had been traveling for over 18 days. I didn’t make it all the way to sunrise, but the night was still so fun! The nine of my friends and I were all sharing a huge 10-person dorm room, so we all got dressed up in tie dye and body paint and went to the beach.

There was SO much fire. From people spinning fire batons, shooting fire cannons into the air, and the famous fire jump rope and limbo. 

I’m not that coordinated, so I just watched people do the fire jump rope!

By the end of the 20 days, I was exhausted and happy to go back to Singapore, but what an unforgettable trip. It’s over halfway through my study abroad now, and I only have a month left of classes, but it’s all gone by so fast. 

I’ve been catching up on classes this week. My dad and brother are coming to visit and will be here Sunday, so I’m really excited to see them! We’ll be going to Vietnam together, so I’m trying to get ahead on my classwork before they come! 

-Reilly Wong

Computer Science Engineering

Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Thailand Again - Bangkok

Even after almost two and a half weeks in Thailand, we didn’t have time to visit Bangkok, so last weekend I took a trip back!

We stayed by Khao San road, which is a big backpacker street in the city. I had heard from other people that the city was hit-or-miss, but I really loved it!

We saw the Grand Palace complex and Wat Pho, I really loved all the colors of the buildings! It was much cleaner than I expected from Bangkok too.

Here in the capital, many people were still wearing black to mourn the King who died in October. He was the longest reigning monarch in Thai history, and there is a year long mourning period following the passing of any king.

We saw many pictures and memorials for the king, traditionally the Thai people adore their kings.

In Bangkok, we met up with one of my friend’s friend from home, who took us to see a professional Muay Thai fight.

Muay Thai is kind of like WWE in America, so this fight was actually filmed for TV! We found the recording on youtube if you want to watch it - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JHkJ6K0_-OA

One of the guys who took us there is living at a Muay Thai gym and training to be a fighter, so he explained to us more what was going on. In these type of fights, it was one Thai fighter vs a foreigner - one of the foreigners was American so we cheered for him, unfortunately he lost.

Our last day we went to a floating market on the banks of the river that goes through the middle of Bangkok.

There were tons of vegetables, fruits, fish, and even snakes and turtles for sale

We took a boat tour down the river - it’s packed with boats transporting food and people from market to market.

We saw a few huge water monitors on the tour - in the middle of Bangkok!

Our last night we went to a sky bar, it was really cool to be able to see the skyline of the business district!

This week I’ve been hanging out with my Dad and brother who got to Singapore late Sunday night. I’ll post all about what we’ve done together next week!

- Reilly Wong

Computer Science Engineering

Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

[umichenginabroad]

Spring Break Pt. 1

Hey everyone! I haven’t posted for a while because I was on the epic spring break trip. We got a week off from school for study week (which is what they call spring break here) so we took a little extra time to extend it, to 20 days to be exact. 

The first part of the trip we spent in Myanmar, which was one of the places I was most excited to visit. In the past, the government had issued a ban on tourism due to concerns of human rights violations, but the situation has improved and the ban lifted, so tourism is quickly growing in this Southeast Asian country. 

Stands line many of the streets in Yangon, but we were warned to be careful of what we ate due to high rates of travelers getting food poisoning.

We began the trip in the capital, Yangon, which is one of the main entry points into the country. Yangon was one of the least Westernized places I have been in the world, it was often difficult to find someone who spoke English, and although it was over 95 degrees everyday, no women at all wore shorts. Luckily I packed a few pairs of loose cotton pants to wear when we saw temples, so I wore those around the city. 

At the airport, we were lucky to find a driver who offered to drive our small group of friends around the city for the day, and to carry all our luggage since we would be departing by bus that night and did not have a hostel to store our luggage.

Our first stop was the legendary Shwedagon Pagoda, a massive golden stupa that can be seen from much of the city. This stupa is said to have been built during the life of the most recent Buddha (over 2600 years ago), and contains eight strands of his hair. According to historians however, the pagoda was more likely built between the 6th and 10th centuries CE. 

Michigan chemical engineers Ronak Patel and Marcos Hadjicharalambous

Here, men have to wear traditional longyi, which is a long cylinder of cloth that is wrapped around like a skirt. Or, as my friends liked to call it, a leg scarf. Almost all men we saw in Myanmar wore this clothing, often with a button up shirt. 

Surrounding the main stupa, there are many smaller stupas and shrines. Many depict the Buddha and often tell stories from his life. It was interesting being able to interpret some of the figures from what I have read on Buddhism from my Buddhism course at Michigan. Buddhism is the main religion in Myanmar, so this site is very important to the country. 

After the Shewedagon Pagoda, we went to a market to walk around and have lunch.

Myanmar is known for their jade and other gems, I bought a smaller jade beaded bracelet and jade elephant to take with me

As we were walking in the market, the power suddenly went off. Apparently this is normal in Myanmar, because the shopkeeper we were talking to quickly reattached his lights to a motorcycle battery.

The Chaukhtatgyi Buddha Temple

The last stop we made in Yangon was the famous 217ft-long reclining Buddha. I learned in my Buddhism class that when the Buddha is depicted in a lying down position, it represents the Buddha as he is about to die and pass into nirvana. 

After a long overnight bus ride, we arrived in Bagan, Myanmar. It’s extremely expensive to fly within Myanmar, so bussing was our only option. The bus ride was an interesting time - we had the hardest time finding where it was supposed to pick up due to the language barrier. Then, as we read online may happen, they forced us to get off the bus for over an hour at a restaurant that the bus company owned as well, trying to get us to eat food there. However, it smelled very strongly of pungent Burmese food mixed with the smell of rest stop bathrooms, so we stood by the bus tiredly waiting to get back on. 

Bagan is famous for its over 10,000 temples, over 2000 still stand today

We rented e-bikes (electric motor bikes) and spent the next two days exploring the hundreds of temples in different states of aging and repair. 

My group poses after an early morning sunrise, dozens of balloons travel across the plain every day to view the temples. As you can see, some of the larger temples were damaged in a huge earthquake last summer. 

We were able to climb up the pitch black staircases of some of the temples, though some of them had been blocked off due to safety concerns. If this was in the US or even North America, we definitely would not have been able to climb up them given how shallow and steep the steps were, not even considering the fact that this area frequently gets earthquakes that can shift the bricks.

There were hundreds of temples no matter where you looked, it was incredible. It was super cool to be able to climb up onto things, but I know that in the future if this continues and tourism continues to grow as it has been, that the temples may not last for future generations. 

We were lucky to find such a great spot to watch the sunrise and balloons

One of my friends showed us a picture from Instagram that he had saved years and years ago of the temples of Bagan, hoping that they would one day be able to travel there. I think a lot of times, the pictures you see online are taken at the perfect time with the perfect lighting, but Bagan was beautiful and even better to see in person. 

Myanmar was beautiful and the least touristy place I have ever been, but it was also strange as an American. There were the frequent power outages, questionable food sanitation (seriously no bathrooms had toilet paper or soap, which left me concerned), and a mandatory curfew for all foreigners at 10pm in Bagan. The bars all close early and our hostel warned us not to leave at night or we may face police action. Also, there are still lingering problems with political prisoners and their human rights in Myanmar, although the new government is aiming to correct this. 

Overall, Myanmar seems to be improving with their changing government and tourism influx, and I’m so glad I got to see it as a less touristy place where I could really enjoy the natural beauty of the country. 

I spent the second half of my Spring Break in Thailand, which I will post about as soon as possible! I have a lot of catching up on schoolwork to do. 

-Reilly Wong

Computer Science Engineering

Nanyang Technological University, Singapore