Its funny. You never see these nights coming. In fact, they always seem to happen when you least expect them. In our case, we were going to use Sunday to get ahead on some work and school projects and on our way out the door at 7:30 PM Saturday said 'lets try and be home and in bed before midnight.' Little did we know 11 hours later would find us back at that very same door, trying to beat daylight. I'm getting ahead of myself though, so lets begin what can only be described as a very authentic Singapore experience.Periodically throughout the school year, the various ethnic groups have been coordinating cultural dining events. I've already written about our Chinese New Years experience as well as the Indian dining adventure. Both were excellent. This weekend the Singaporeans stepped up to the plate and we were on our way to the East Coast Seafood Park to eat chili crab at Jumbo. We had been here once before during our initial visit to Singapore and it truly is a local experience. Jugs of Tiger Beer and big, messy crabs in a sweet chili sauce. The best part of the whole meal is actually ordering these little tiny fried Chinese buns to soak up the sauce. When we sat down at the table I think we said 'order more buns' at least 5 times.... people were skeptical at first, but in the end I think they all had wished we even ordered more.
After making a complete mess of ourselves and Sarah somehow sending a crab leg via her claw cracker at one of her classmates at the speed of a cruise missile (thank goodness for bibs) half of the crew adjourned to a table outside by the water for a few more beers. At this point it was 10:30 and we were still feeling good about our midnight deadline. A few more beers, taxi home, no problem. We should have known that you start talking, hearing stories about Indian weddings, growing up in Germany, places people have traveled in Asia.... well time gets away from you.
At midnight, Jumbo closes, so we assumed we were on our way home.... wrong. The suggestion was made to stop for a drink on the way home. This seemed logical, we were on the wrong side of the island, so might as well break up the taxi ride. The only problem that occurred to our merry band of 7 (the group had been cut in half again) was the recommended establishment (by our Singaporean colleague no less) was closed. Lucky for us, the 'Honky Tonk Lounge' next door was open and was willing to serve us some Tiger. After settling into lounge chairs that may or may not have been used on the set of Anchorman and letting our eyes adjust to darkness, we started to take in our surroundings a little better. Not that many people in the bar, stale smoke smell in the air even though you aren't supposed to smoke inside, Korean cover band on TV singing Wilson Phillips songs.... something seemed a bit off. The owner in the corner, casting sideways glances at us, trying to figure out what motley international crew of guys and girls had just walked into his place. Maybe it was just the equivalent of a 'townie bar' back home? Regardless, drinks paid for and out the door after one beer, time to find a taxi home, right? Negative.
Now if you're ever in Singapore the bars in Clarke Quay are open until at least 4 AM. None of us had the energy or the fortitude after our previous stop to head down there. However, the bright idea out of left field from our Finnish friend - lets go sit on my porch and have a glass of champagne! I can't really blame Peter for this, in Finland this time of year it doesn't really get dark out so he'd be fighting instinct in wanting to go to bed. Well Sarah has never turned down a glass of champagne in her life and I was surprisingly awake so off we went.
By the time we arrived, we were down to just 4 of us... each location had progressively chopped our group in half. A glass of champagne, a beer, a Finnish cocktail as a nightcap (good morning drink?) and we finally decided it was time to head home. When we looked at my watch, 5:30 AM, I honestly thought it had stopped. There was no way it could be that late. As Sarah and I meandered through another random neighborhood in Singapore towards the MRT (which closes from about midnight to 6, but we seemed to have solved that problem) we had a good chuckle. It was even funnier standing outside our door a few minutes later and joking that the sun was coming up. Not so funny when it really did come up and we were trying to catch some shut-eye.
The good news - all's well that end's well. We were both further along in our work than we had realized and shockingly did not have a problem sleeping Sunday as well. Plus, we had one for the ages traversing the island.
Editors addendum: This happened a week ago and it took me that long to recover to write about it. I'm getting to old for this s***.
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