Singapore Edition

Singapore edition
Logan’s run in real life! Mind you, I only visited a few places. Chinatown was so-so, very touristy which ruined what might have been an interesting ambiance. Little India was awesome, that’s definitely the place to go if you are in Sing. It was a welcome respite from Jakarta to be able to walk around and take the subway. The fact that it bore a resemblance to HK and Toronto perhaps goes to show to what degree the Chinese community of Toronto have influenced the development of my own city. I wasn’t really able to do anything interesting while I was there, the first day I was incredibly tired, the second day I was shuttling between my delivery of documents and pickup from Mr. Wahap. What a shady situation! I did two things that were fabulously stupid today. The first was to surrender my passport and a large amount of cash to basically a stranger. The second was to take a ride from the airport in an unmarked car that clearly wasn’t a taxi again from a stranger. Back to the topic of SGP, great place for the unintrepid though, easy to get around, go anywhere, unlike Jakarta. AND, AND... I got scammed by a traveller scammer! It felt like an unofficial introduction to the world of being a traveller. An old Korea man, posing as a Japanese man, tried to sell me his books on topics as diverse as archaeology, history and philosophy. He was a self-professed expert on Nietschze (his actual words!) who praised me for being alone. He clearly had a bone to pick with women. Anyway, I finally relented and bought one of his terrible haiku books, replete with rudimentary grammar errors, for a mere SGP$ 2. It was worth it for the show. His meandering conversation was clearly designed to probe for a soft-spot, which he would exploit and play on your sympathies. One bold statement was his defence of the Taliban, because they hated TV, just like "Hideo Asano" (his moniker).
Upon arrival back in Jakarta, the airport really lets you know you are in the third world. The millions of guys hollering at you that they are legit taxi services.

Does money reduce men or are they inherently base? SGP is a clear example, Indians and Malays usually doing the dirty jobs, the Chinese doing the shopping. But, perhaps if I was able to see with outsider eyes, I would realize similar things are happening in Toronto.