This weekend I got my first full-length taste of kabuki and, boy, was it delicious. This form of Japanese theater is fantastic and fascinating to watch — for its dramatic acting, stylized makeup and simple, effectual music — but it’s even better when you have some sense of what people are saying. Lucky for me, […]
Posts in the Singapore category:
this is what they think
Traveling around Southeast Asia is a joy. The variety of the people, the familiar things that are somehow different, the mixes of cultures — it really makes every turn a surprise. It’s fun also to tell people that I live in Singapore. I can relate to Singapore this way: it’s kind of the odd little […]
ambient sounds
Singapore had one of the loudest thunder and lightning storms I have ever heard in my life today. I recorded the sound, in case I ever miss tropical storms. If you need some background music you can listen too. singapore_rain.mp3
Singaporeans love acronyms
Had to rehash the old cliche because:
Pakistan on my mind
I’ve been pretty consumed by blogging lately. I started a blog for my students, to get them more interested in reading. Not sure if it will take off or how invested the other contributers will be, but I thought I’d give it a shot. I spend a lot of time in the library here, and […]
Zouked Out
This is a little bit late in coming, but Singapore had it’s biggest party recently. It’s called ZoukOut, an all-night beach party on Sentosa island where DJs spun on four stages while party-goers alternatively danced like mad and half-passed out on the sand. It was exhausting, but fun. Some of the acts were very impressive. […]
And now I present to you…
I’ve been thinking a lot about presentations lately. Singaporean students have to give a lot of presentations. They give several in my classes, and many for their other classes as well. There’s a lot of enthusiasm here for creativity — the prime minister managed to step outside of regular speech-giving in his National Day address […]
Smoking
I’m just catching up with the news about the wildfires in Southern California. A friend told me that the Los Angeles Times is really covering the story well — and it’s true. I really like the “Voices from the Field” stories — I was happy to see the coverage not focused on the Malibu elite, […]
Los Angeles to Singapore
Three weeks ago, I moved from Los Angeles to Singapore. After three years editing an online publication about Asia, I decided it was time to be here, in Asia. I’m going to spend my time teaching writing to students at Ngee Ann Polytechnic and, hopefully, doing some writing myself. It’s a great gig, to be […]