Welcome to Singapore!

Ok, I am back, by popular demand. A couple of weeks ago, I got an email from a reader who wondered why I wasn't writing as frequently anymore. Honestly, I did not know that there were people who read this blog other than a few people I know. So now that I am popular (yeah!), I am back to writing more.

I remember the day I landed in Singapore in May. It was 5.30 am on a Sunday morning. I cleared immigration, pulled out two big suitcases from the carousel and languorously dragged myself and my suitcases out of the airport. I stepped out, looked around, looked at a familiar face, smiled and walked ahead two steps. Something did not seem right. Then I looked at the familiar face again. My friend Uma Thurman (to borrow from Penguin) came rushing at me and gave me a big hug with a loud 'Hi' that made everyone around give us a big stare. I took a few seconds to realize what was happening. 'You wouldn't think that we would not receive you is it? Welcome to Singapore!! '.

I secretly hope that someone receives me at airports and railway stations wherever I go, but having stayed and traveled alone most of last 10 years, I never expect anyone ever. I was totally surprised to see her at the airport. Absolutely touched. Poor her, she got up at 5.15 on a Sunday morning, waking her husband up in the process. Somewhere amidst all this thinking, I realised that Uma Thurman mentioned that 'we are here to receive you'. So I asked her, who is 'We'?

She pointed me to the escalator. As if right out of a classic airport scene in a movie, Penguin descends. Only background music was missing. She limps across swiftly. Penguin had twisted her ankle the previous evening, yet was cheerfully limping over at 5 am to receive me.

As we went over to my guest house to drop my luggage, I heard their sinister plans. They wanted to garland me, play loud music at the airport amongst other things to embarrass me. However, luckily, that plan could not be executed. After dropping luggage off at my guest house, we went to Uma Thurman's house where she made amazing blueberry and choco-chip pancakes. Slurp! Pancakes/ waffles with maple syrup are among my favourite breakfast items. The start in Singapore couldn't have got better.

I got a call from my friend Sp, who couldn't make it to the airport as she had an early morning shoot. Yeah, she is acting in an amateur movie (something like Hyderabad blues) and I can bet, she is going to be amazing at it. She is playing the lead actress. So Yea Sp, invited me over to her place in the evening and was quite insistent that I meet her that evening itself. Later that evening when I landed over at her place, she whipped out a carrot cake which she had baked amidst her busy schedule for my birthday. So I cut my birthday cake, blowing a small candle, wishing hmm.., for good luck. The cake was absolutely fabulous.

As I tucked into my bed that night, slowly drifting to sleep, I smiled at the great start I had in Singapore.

Invictus

It has been a long break away from the blog. The writing has been more infrequent than ever

Over the past few months, I have moved to my new role in Singapore. I am slowly settling down into my new assignment. My major markets are China and Philippines, which are quite different from the ones that I am used to. I hope to travel to these markets frequently, even maybe as frequently as I did to Delhi, Ludhiana and Chandigarh in the past few years.

I have found a house in Singapore and would be moving in next week. This will be fourth house shifting in 4 months. I am totally tired with all this house shifting business. Hopefully this should be the last one for a while to come.

I got a chance to make a very hurriedly planned trip to Shanghai and Manila for two days each. I was extremely excited. New countries, new places. Most of my business trips are the same- airport, hotel, conference room, hotel and airport. This one was also no different.

Shanghai was the first stop. The great Shanghai Expo is currently on. The Shanghai Expo lasts for 180 days. Yes, you read that right, it lasts for 6 whole months. It is an expo where each country has a pavilion, yes people, pavilion and not a stall. The size of each pavilion is massive. The expo is drawing close to 400,000 visitors daily. Overall in 6 months they expect 70 million visitors. Here is the link. http://en.expo2010.cn/. I don’t think that the Chinese ever think in anything less that Gigantic terms.

The entire city of shanghai is geared up for the expo. Tourists, businessmen from all over the world are in Shanghai now. The number of Indian businessmen and families that I saw at the immigration line and in the hotel was staggering. Most of them were there for the Expo, scouting for business opportunities and partnerships and new markets. Since our trip was planned at the last minute we struggled to get hotel bookings. We finally managed Holiday Inn express. After landing in Shanghai, I wanted to extend my stay by a day, so that I could get to go around the city, but alas, there were no hotels. Not even for backpackers. Quite disappointed I returned to Singapore without seeing much of the city.

I however managed to squeeze out an evening where I visited the post expat hangout area of Shanghai. I don't remember the name of the place. It was in Chinese and I couldn't pronounce it properly. I had to get it written down on a piece of paper and I showed it to the taxi driver in Shanghai who took me there. I managed to capture a few pictures of the place

In Shanghai, the predominant language is Mandarin. While the hotel receptionist may speak smattering English, the people on the road – shopkeepers cab drivers etc do not speak or understand English. So I did have difficulty in getting around, asking directions. I had to get everything written in Mandarin and show the sheet of paper to the people to get directions, order food and so on.

Manilla was like homecoming. The moment I reached the airport, I saw a huge queue at the immigration and it was exactly like how it would be in Madras or Mumbai. As we drove through the city to reach our hotel, the place reminded me of Mumbai for some reason. People spoke English, the shop name boards were in English and Filipino. There were big skyscrapers, a bay area, slums and shanties. I felt I was home :)

Again, I got only a few hours for a brisk walk around the hotel, which again happened to be an expat area in Manila - Green belt. It had a lot of good restaurants, shopping malls etc. I ate dinner at Cafe Havana, a Cuban restaurant in Mexico. They had some unique items in the menu which looked very interesting. With limited choice for a vegetarian, I tried their vegetarian Paella - which is actually a Spanish (or Valencian to be precise) dish. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paella The Paella was outstanding. Supremely tasty. Café Havana also had some good music and some dancing. A must visit place.

One picture of Greenbelt and one of the hotel where I stayed

The flight hours were long. Singapore shanghai is 5.5 hrs and Singapore Manila is 3 hours. All my flights were during the day. I was able to utilise my in flight hours to catch up on a lot of movies. I think I saw 6 English and one Spanish movie. The Spanish was of course for Penolope Cruz. Sigh!! Of the movies that I watched, Invictus has since stayed with me. Invictus is story of how Nelson Mandela tries to unite the fledgling nation of South Africa using the Rugby world cup in 1995 when rugby was in fact seen as the symbol of apartheid. A well shot movie by Clint Eastwood, Morgan Freeman as Mandela was almost like mimicry. He has acted just like Mandela. Wow! The soundtrack of the movie is very good and even during the movie I found myself responding to the background score. Here is one of South Africa's popular songs - a very catchy, light hearted one. Do have a listen.

But the highlight of the movie is the poem 'Invictus'. Nelson Mandela derived strength from this poem while he was imprisoned for 9000 days (27 years). I was introduced to this poem with Morgan Freeman reciting it. I have reproduced it here ..

Invictus

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the Pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll.

I am the master of my fate:

I am the captain of my soul.

William Ernest Henley

I have always been a sucker for words. They move me. And Invictus seems to have that effect on me. The poem may seem dark and cynical but it isn't so. It is liberating. May be we all can draw some much needed inspiration in our lives.Here is Barack Obama, talking about the power of words. This is during the election run up. So obviously ignore the political rhetoric and listen to him.

Change is in the Air

This blog has been silent for a while. It is not that there has been nothing to write about. It is just That, I was waiting for opportune time to convey it. So here goes.

I remember reading somewhere in the beginning of the year in some in flight magazine that this year would be the year of change. And a year of change it has been. It started, as if on cue, right on New Year’s Day. My landlord called us up to inform me that she does not want to renew the lease and hence is giving us a month's notice and that we had to vacate the house by Feb 1st. We were well settled in that place, our support systems everything well established. We had a routine going. The house was in a quiet neighbourhood (What a rarity in Mumbai!) and we had gotten to know neighbours and other people around. We tried our best to renew the lease, but well, it wasn't to be. And thus began our house hunt.

The house we had been living so far was a fully furnished place. If we were to look for a furnished place, that had its own consequences. It further narrowed down our choices and it also limited us to relatively older apartments. Coincidentally, my flatmate's cousin was shifting out of Mumbai and he was willing to sell off his furniture to us at discounted prices. He was recently married and had purchased the entire lot (fridge, microwave, table, bed, wardrobes, washing machine etc) less than a year ago. So now armed with relatively new furnishings we hunted for a new house in Mumbai.

Tallboy (who was mentioned earlier in this blog) had moved into a new apartment complex a couple of months ago. We quite liked the apartment complex and narrowed down to the same complex for us also. We tried to house hunt without hiring a broker (real estate consultant if you please). We scourged through internet sites, called up friends and acquaintances and even spoke to watchmen in the apartment complexes we were interested in. Alas! We were unfortunate in the search. With the moving out date fast approaching, we were left with no choice. We hired a broker and by end of the week we had finalised an apartment in the same complex that we had been looking. The brokerage amount was steep, but it was something we couldn't escape.

We are now quite thrilled with the apartment. It is a brand new two bedroom apartment, with new woodwork etc. It is on the 10th floor and I believe it has an awesome view. Here is the view from the balcony.

I had a bit of travelling to do during February and every weekend was spent setting up this house- shopping for curtains and cushions, interviewing maids, setting up the kitchen etc. So by early march we could claim that we had more or less set up the entire house. I still don't have internet at home and access most of the stuff from my mobile.

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Cut scene! Change location! Bangalore. I had been on a lookout for a property to buy in Bangalore for close to 9 months now. I had narrowed down to a particular property by October, identified and negotiated with a seller by November, got approvals for loan and purchased a compact two bedroom apartment by January end. I am quite excited by the buy. The complex is constructed by reputed builders, has a condominium like feel to it. It is huge with 500 apartments spread over 8-10 acres with all recreation amenities like tennis courts, swimming pool, gym, clubhouse, badminton and squash courts and so on. It has a very active association and a lot of events happen quite regularly. I am now submerged completely under a pile of huge debt, but hey, I think I have an awesome view from the balcony that makes up for everything. So Yayy!

From the date of purchase till now we have been working on the interiors for the house. I picked up a lot of interior design magazines and read them cover to cover for ideas, googled for different types of woods and so on. After some intense negotiations with interior designers we narrowed down on one. Of course, Google Sketchup was extremely useful. I quickly learnt that software and designed 3d model of the apartment. That helped us a lot in planning woodwork often giving great perspective on the space that would be occupied/left free and so on. It is a tedious job, I tell you! To imagine what the output would look like, what purpose each wardrobe, shelf etc would serve, whether the design would look good, matching the fan/lamp shades to the decor of the room and so on. Phew!

We had Grihapravesham/house warming on the 11^th of March. I had taken 10 days off from the 11^th to the 20^th as there were many minor pending activities to be completed for the house which needed my presence. My mom and brother had chipped in a lot over the past one month and I did not want to trouble them further. It also helped that my cousin's marriage also fell in the same week and hence was able to attend that wedding too.

So finally on the 20^th of March, I could happily proclaim that my trip has been a success. The house is completely done up and ready for immediate occupation. We have also fixed up tenants for the house who would be occupying it from April 1.

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So in brief ever since the year has started, I have spent an insane amount of time in house related activities. I have been in back to back telephonic conversations with designer, plumber, cable guy, electrician for two different houses which have left me so warped that I have called Bangalore contacts for some Bombay house related work and asked them why they hadn't turned up.

So the first 75 days or 2.5 months of the year have been crazily busy. But it has been a whole new experience and a lot of fun in many ways!

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Hold on people. Picture abhi baaki hai mere dost! The mother of all changes is yet to be revealed.

When I was in Bangalore, I get a call from my manager confirming the outcome of a conversation that I had been having him for a couple of weeks. I have been offered a role in Singapore for a period of 3 years and would have to relocate to Singapore effective May 1^st. A new team was being setup in the region and I would be part of this team working on a $500 Million brand with major markets in SE Asia and China. The profile that he describes seems very interesting. To be honest, I knew that a role change was due, but I was expecting around Sep-October. This is way too quick. But hey I am not complaining. :)

I am quite looking forward to my stint in Singapore. Professionally it is great. I am going to be part of a growing business with a significant investment pipeline. Working on new markets with a team that is quite diverse ( geographically dispersed is going to be quite a learning experience. Personally too I am quite excited. I have many friends and colleagues in Singapore who are as eager of my move there as me. I am sure I will get to travel much more easily to SE Asian countries and may be even sneak in a trip to watch a Boxing Day test match in Oz land.

So having setup this house in Bombay completely, I am to take it down by April end and relocate to Singapore. The next few months are going to be quite hectic. I have to close quite a few projects, on board the next person onto the role, onboard myself to the next role, search for new house and set it up all over again in Singapore.

If the first 3 months can bring in so much change, wonder what the rest of the year holds in store.