12/15/13 - Western Weekend in the Pulau (Penang)

Busy season is upon us folks and that meant some additional late nights and a Saturday in the office. The good news is, flights were cheap from Singapore to the Pulau and I found myself with a roommate for the weekend.  On a scale of hibernating to climbing Mt. Everest, we found ourselves on the low end of activity, but sometimes you need to recharge the batteries that way.  What we did do (is that even proper English?) is pay a visit to our 3 favorite Western joints on the island.... once we of course had had some dumplings on Thursday.

Marshall's - the new kid on the block.  How I Met Your Mother has been my favorite TV show for going on 7 years.  So much so that we made sure we had the proper TV connections and internet apparatus to be able watch it over here.  Especially because we finally get to meet the mother this season.  As usual, I digress.  In one episode, Marshall is on the hunt to try and re-find the best burger in New York City.  He found it once, but was new to the city, got lost, and could not find his way back. Even Regis gets involved trying to find this burger.  Apparently there are two people on this island who love HIMYM because one guy named his burger restaurant after this specific episode of the show.

Normally, we consider OK food here to be good and good food to be great, more on that in a minute.  In this case, this is a pretty good burger that you would even consider to be a good burger back home.  The names crack you up - if you order the "Bison" you get two patties and bacon and cheese.  You can use your imagination for the chicken burger names (everything is a burger here - even if its really a sandwich).  I was hemming and hawing as to whether or not I really needed 'dos patties' but it took minimal prodding to add it to our order.  Just an extra little slice of burger heaven in the tropics.

Campbell House - I've written about this place before, but its like coming home when you walk through the door.  In fact, its kind of like being Norm on Cheers - everyone knows your name.  It had been a few months, but we settled right into our usual table, the usual drinks appeared without having to order them and the next 2 hours could have been at any Italian joint on the planet.  The Christmas music was a nice touch, I had completely forgotten where I was as Bing Crosby sang White Christmas to me while digging into my ice cream dessert. I almost expected to see little snow flakes drifting past the window outside.  Then I caught a food cart out the window and a stray cat walking by - right back to the present day.  Didn't matter, the food was great as always - the peppercorn steak I had would have been outstanding anywhere in the world.  We followed it up with the annual viewing of Love Actually.  In a moment of desperation my acquiescence to watching it yearly was given as a Christmas present.  Oops - another year down - dozens more to follow.

Berlinz - you know if there is a Z in the name of the place it must be good.  The better example is if there is a #, but this will have to work for Asia.  Its kind of like my theory on how hand claps in a song equal excellence (see Mellencamp, John "Jack and Diane" or Boston "More than a Feeling).  A combination German/European Bistro that I have to admit, does have the best tap beer on the island and the service is rapidly moving up the list as well.  The usual Cesar salad, potato wedges and Hawaiian pizza were ordered. If you think that combination sounds odd, well, the couple from Chicago/London sitting next to us would agree with you.  Nice folks, funny how you meet people from relatively close to home all over the world.

Only one more week and then the family adventures continue - from the islands of Penang/Singapore to the island of Phuket.  Relatively live updates have been requested.  My guess is, the level of frequency will be directly correlated to the amount of Singha that is pushed in my direction - likely with diminishing returns at some point.  I'll ask Mr. Whittington to graph it out at a later date.  Feel free to send donations towards to cause, Thai Baht are cheap when paying in US dollars.

Until Thailand......

12/9/2013 - Interview with an Expat

I recently sat down with an avid reader of the blog for a brief one on one to catch up on the past month. And by avid reader I mean he's read it once, but has "considered" reading it on multiple occasions.  He offered me a mystery box prize for 30 minutes of my time, so I decided why not.  We'll call him Mr. X for short.

Mr. X: Good to be here Dan.  So you call yourself a blogger.... don't you actually have to write something new every now and then to claim that label?  Where have you been hiding?

Me: Thanks: Thanks - why do I already I regret doing this and have the feeling the mystery box doesn't even exist?

Mr. X: Oh its real, there are a pair of gym socks in it, thanks for ruining the surprise.  You're welcome by the way.

Me: Who do I look like, Danny Noonan?  Anyway, we've been on a few 9,000 mile flights in the past month and spent the past week resetting the body clocks. Thanksgiving in Singapore was fun last year, but sometimes you just need to stop in for some family, friends, food and football.  So we did the 20 hour flight from Singapore to Minneapolis in the back of the bus, folded up like accordions.

Mr. X: How was the travel this time?  Were there more screaming babies or more people who sounded like they were trying to cough up multiple lungs?

Me: Surprisingly little external distractions, the noise cancelling headphones helped, I highly recommend them.  On one flight I woke up to the person behind me having an IV bag hooked up to them and on the next flight one guy was wandering around the cabin with a glass of scotch in his hand like a cross between Ron Burgundy and Kristen Wiig in Bridesmaids.  Apparently neither of them learned the two glasses of wine with dinner and then sleep the rest of the way trick.  Not, two glasses of wine with dinner and then as many little mini bottles as you can get your hands on until you need medical attention or an additional restraint beyond your seat belt.  Speaking of sleep, I stayed up the night before we left for the States and slept, even in coach, almost the whole way to Minneapolis.  Add that to the travel toolbox.  Our other new travel tip is order the vegetarian meal on the flight.  Your food comes first and you aren't exposed to mystery meat X.....much like the mystery box.


Mr. X: Is that a dig at me?

Dan: I'll let you be the judge of that....these socks don't fit by the way.

Mr. X: I'm not surprised, I bought them off of my taxi driver.  He may have been wearing them.  How did you spend your time at home? Cowering from the cold and dreaming about dumplings?

Dan: I think the word you are looking for is "hibernate" and yes, I went into full on bear mode for a solid week.  Wake up from my cave, i.e. pitch black bedroom with no windows, walk to the window, ponder the growing ice on the lake and decide to stay inside and get some work done.  At some point during the day I was treated to delicious comfort food, would get sleepy from a full stomach and the process would repeat itself.  Bears have a good life.  I did venture out on occasion, usually football related. Found a Bloody Mary that would have constituted a meal for me in Singapore.

Mr. X: So you didn't miss anything about SE Asia?

Dan: Now now, I didn't say that.  When we got off the plane, hot and humid never felt so good in my entire life.  I could almost see my skin re-hydrating.  Two days later I was eating ramen and dumplings in Penang and was starting to slide back in the groove.  The real kick came this past weekend.  Both of us were still craving Asian food so we hunkered down at Maxwell Food Centre for a few hours and tore into fried noodles and chicken rice from the highest ranked place in Singapore.  Honestly though, we still prefer our Farrer Road Chicken Rice - that guy rocks.

The highlight of the afternoon was the new discovery - sweet potato dumplings!  I can't remember what the stall was named, but you can't miss it.  All they do is sell sweet potato dumplings and have a giant vat of oil that is constantly churning, frying sweet potato dough and looks like a Shakespearean play prop.  It just needs a witch churning the cauldron instead of a mechanical arm.  The plain ones are only 60 cents each, but you can buy dumplings with coconut, vegetables and red beans in them.  Yes, those are in order of "I would absolute try that to don't get that red bean stuff anywhere near me."  Just a hot, gooey, sweet potato pie in a donut hole shape - sweet!

Mr. X: Well that's about the length of my attention span - welcome back to Singapore.  Try not to be so lazy the next month and write something every now and then. I may actually read it.

Dan: I'm back! If you need a last minute Christmas present, I can give you a good deal on some socks.