Hello From NM

Hard to believe it, but I'm about halfway through my time out here in NM. It's been quite an adventure so far - pretty much everything I'd hoped it would be. We started out with two intense weeks of training over at the Grand Canyon - learned a little CPR, wilderness first aid, off-road driving, how to handle pesticides, and take apart and rebuild a chainsaw. Even had time for a little hike (almost) to the bottom.

Since then we've been all over the Sevilleta NWR - which probably isn't on your maps - but is pretty centrally located as far as things go. We've got some pretty amazing work-sites - mostly canyons and arroyos that are 1.5 hours down back roads (and one that's another 3 mile hike in from there). I walk past mountain lion tracks on the way to work some days, never see a soul except for the my fellow crew members, and am pretty much as far from an office as you can get. I eat lunch on under the sun (which is quite nice in the fall here), and then climb the mountains and mesas that surround us while the crew takes their siesta. I'm also getting pretty handy with a chainsaw, so if anyone's got any downed limbs, I'll be back in the east sometime in the spring.

I'm pretty exhausted most days (we get up at 5 - well before the sun's up, and then some days don't finish until 6 at night). It feels very good to be busy though, so I'm not complaining. We've gotten out to do a bit of exploring on the weekends too - climbed most of the nearby mountains, and then got out to some higher country a couple weeks ago for a nice taste of fall. This weekend it's a UNM-Utah fooball game, a rattlesnake museum, and some good mexican food.

I've got another month and a half here - split between a couple of the other refuges around the Rio Grande, and then it's off to the next adventure - Christmas in India. That's all for now -

Neal

(The buildings in the middle are where I live)

Chinatown and New Foods continued

Prior to heading out to Chinatown, Morris and I had to enjoy some delicacies right at home on Cluny Park Rd.

As you know, Deb broke her toe earlier this year. As a result of the injury she received a number of fruit baskets. Within each basket, there was fruit and, as in all good fruit baskets there was: oatmeal, birds nest and essence of chicken.

As it was the middle of the afternoon, we did not partake in the oatmeal. (Who eats oats after 12:00?) But we had to sample the birds nest and the essence of chicken.

According to Wikipedia, birds nest is:

is a delicacy in Chinese cuisine. A few species of swifts are renowned for building the saliva nests used to produce the unique texture of this soup. The edible bird's nests are among the most expensive animal products consumed by humans. The nests are composed of interwoven strands of salivary laminae cement. The nests have high levels of calcium, iron, potassium, and magnesium.

And essence of chicken here is: “Essence of chicken with abalone extract.” The sample here is made from “pure abalone extract together with the finest selected chicken.” Our bottle was prepared using “traditional double-boiled method, giving it a very flavourful taste.”

Both foods help cure the ill and, in the case of essence of chicken, it is “particularly suitable for a highly stressed lifestyle – from work or family commitments.”

While I don’t seem to have the family commitments at the moment, my non-working lifestyle seems to be quite high stressed, so there was no doubt I was going to try the essence of chicken.



However, as we say here in Singapore “In for the Essence, in for the Nest.” We sampled both. The verdict?

Birds nest, which includes “natural” sucrose in its list of ingredients, was not too bad. If you drink it without chewing the gelatin parts (of the nest), it is a sweet, thick liquid.

Essence of chicken tasted like thick soy sauce. I hope my family commitments do not become stressful so that I don’t have to drink the essence as a daily supplement.



In Chinatown, Morris and I met a few locals and a few Filipinas enjoying an afternoon without work. A good time was had by all.



If all goes well, Morris may be back in town in April to celebrate the birthday of our new friend, Jamal. If so, Morris (and I) will try to stay on Jamal’s good side as he told us one of his friends is a big time criminal who has no problem causing harm to those who deserve it.







Bjm 10.30.08

When Morris is in town...

adventures can happen.

Morris, a guy I met at school in Xela and again on a boat in Nicaragua, flew into Singapore last week to start a 6 month tour of SE Asia. Deb and Sean have been kind enough to open their door to him.

One goal he has during his tour is to try new and interesting foods. For some reason, I have taken part in this experience.

On Saturday, we went to a "hawker stand" in Chinatown.

Hawker stands remind one of food courts in US malls but unlike the US malls, the food at the hawker stands is often much more interesting. At your average hawker stand in Singapore, you often have a variety of food styles: chinese, thai or indian and a variety of food tpes: veggie, meat, seafood or noodles.

However, when you go to Chinatown, the hawker stand is mostly chinese food but the sorts of foods you can get still varies quite a bit. We started off our "dinner" at a stand that seemed to sell everything duck - except the meat part. You could order duck heart, duck head or duck feet. They did have duck wings, too but there did not appear to be a duck breast to be had. We got a free sample of duck heart - not bad.

And then Morris ordered a duck head.



Despite their size and their look, after being fried, a duck head does not seem to have too much to offer. But at S$1/each, I guess you can't complain too much. We each had a bit of the brain - not much taste and not a texture I enjoyed. And Morris got to eat the duck tongue. Although the head was friend and there appeared to be a bit of a crispy covering all over the head, there were still some small feathers on the head, which made the thought of eating the crisp unappetizing.

The duck pieces were a bit of an appetizer. For dinner, Morris went for a duck-meat noodle dish, while I took the easier road with a veggie noodle soup. In Singapore's Chinatown, it appears that "duck meat" includes duck liver as more than 50% of the "meat" resembled a liver. But I am not doctor.

Morris shared some 20+ oz Tiger beers with one of the locals. These big beers were $6 each, while 12oz Tiger beers at bars can be $12.50 each.

If you are looking for cheap beer, Singapore is not your place.

After dinner, we had a local fruit favorite - durian. There are a number of ways you can eat durian. In this case, we had durian pancakes. They took a small pancakes an spread some cold (mashed?) durian on it, folded it over, placed it in a small bag and handed it to you. The dessert resembled a crepe that you ate with your hands.

If you have never had durian, let me tell you, it is unlike any other fruit you have ever had - or will ever have. The fruit of the durian is encased in a prickly orb that seems to be the size of a large pineapple. The orb is cut open to reveal the fleshy fruit. I haven't seen the whole - remove the skin procedure so I am not 100% sure how it works or how it looks.

While the prickly covering seems to be a unique design, it is the smell of the durian that sets it apart from all other fruits.

Sean likes to compare the durian to a "well-used out house sitting in the hot sun."

I am not sure I could describe it any better.

The smell is overpowering. Sean and I walked in a very clean and modern grocery store last week and a rotten smell hit and overwhelmed me...durian. Sean tells me that they ban the fruit from many hotels and from the Indonesian ferries.

Needless to say, eating durian is a challenge.



And I failed the challenge.

I was able to take a very, very small bite of the durian pancake but then I had to throw it out. The love the fruit here and in other parts of SE Asia but it will not make it to my dinner table any time soon.

I would rather eat a whole duck brain than have a nibble of durian.

But don't let me dissuade you from trying it.

bjm 10.28.08

Down and give me 20!!!!

In an effort to provide me with some wonderful memories here in Singapore, Sean has decided that my body needs to hurt.

As they say: No pain, no gain.

I've made three trips with Sean to his trainer's gym. While I know I am not at my strongest right now, I never thought that lifting so little could hurt so much.

In just over 1 hour, we do a warm-up, 3 sets of 6 free-weight exercises and 3 sets of 3 machine exercises, and we finish with some warm-down stretching.

By the end of the hour, I am dead.

that is not quite true. By the middle of the 3rd exercise, i am fairly well spent. And at the end of the hour.....there is not much either one of can do except collapse.

It hurts but I'm sure it is good for me.

bjm 10-20-08

WHY DOES THIS POSTING SEEM LIKE DEJA-VU ALL OVER AGAIN?

Jones-Brennan Update

Hey all, if you want to keep up-to-date on Jones-Brennan happenings, we are posting events from the pregnancy (and other random stuff Dave comes up with) on our blog at shaanddave.com (Brendan, is there a way to link our blog to this site?) To give you a taste of what's there, we recently had a doctor visit and got to hear the heartbeat again. Dave (lovable technophile that he is) recorded it and posted it on our site. In a couple weeks we go for a pretty thorough ultrasound and will hopefully have video of our little peanut to share. We will also find out the gender so we can stop calling it "Peanut".

In non-baby news, things are going well in Stanford. I'm on an autopsy rotation this month. It isn't as bad as i thought it would be as long as the eyes are closed. (The patient's, not mine.) I'm learning alot and it's been pretty evenly paced so I get home at a reasonable time and have time to write blogs. :) Next month I'm on a surgical pathology rotation which is faster paced but more sterile.

Dave's been pretty busy. He survived a round of layoffs at his company and is now doing the work of 3 people. The plus side (in addition to still being employed) is that he gets to choose his own title. I suggested he go with "Grand Poobah and Omnipotent Lord of Marketing Communications", but I think he's going to go with something more generic like "Director".

Hope everyone is doing well.

Sha

Have a seat

...but not in Singapore.

Sean mentioned it to me and I have begun to notice myself - there are very few places for the public to sit in Singapore. The city is like one big casino - they always want you moving or at one of the "tables", i.e., stores.

There are restaurants and cafes with outdoor seating, of course. But you don't see benches along the street or along the water or even in the park across the way.

I wandered around a 2 story mall today. (It may be 3 stories but I seemed to stay on just 2 of the floors). It is not huge mall but there are more than 50 stores. I only saw one place where people could sit that was not part of a food establishment. And at that spot there are 3 benches with 3 seats each. If you are tired but you're at the other end of the mall, you have to walk a ways to the benches or buy some food at one of the restaurants.

Maybe one reason people tend to be thin here is that there is no where to stop and rest your weary feet.

bjm 10-16-08

Some say that size does not matter

I'm not saying that the Murray-Henretta house is big....

....but last night, Sean had to use Skype to get in touch with me because I wasn't hearing him when he called for me from the second floor.

bjm 10-16-08

Work It Out

After spending some time in the American Club gym doing Sean's workout (but using less weight), I felt that I was on my way to getting in shape. I wasn't lifting any fantastic weights but I was feeling good.

Today, I went with Sean to his trainer's gym and...got my butt kicked. i do not know how long we spent with him. I'm guessing there was less than 30 minutes of lifting but I was more tired at the end (well, more like the "middle") of the workout, than an hour+ at the American club. My shirt was drenched with sweat and my hands were resting on my knees in an attempt to remain standing.

I hadn't hurt that bad from exercising since i ran a marathon in 2006 (or was it 2005?). I wish I could tell you that the sweat and the pain were due to lifting heavy weights but they weren't. They were due to working the core, like I've never worked it before. Prior to today, I might not have had a core.

At the moment, 9 hours later, I feel as if i've recovered. We'll see if I feel the same way when I wake up. Or if I go back on Friday.

In the meantime, I will just think about whey I decided to buy stocks on Tuesday. Prior to the marketing opening, it seemed like a good idea.

bjm 10-15-08

Singapore, Week 2

It is early in my second week in Singapore and what news do I have????? Not much.

I was told it would be hot and humid here. I lived outside of DC for 14 years - I know hot and humid....or so I thought. I think it can be said of Singapore "It's not the heat, it's the humidity." When I woke up this am, it was 29 and 78% humidity. I don't think we had humidity like that in DC.

This past weekend, I found some salsa clubs. I went out Friday and Saturday nights. At one of the clubs, there was a 3 piece band from Colombia. I met and hung out with the latino friends of the band. It is not too tough to pick out the latinos in a club full of Singaporeans.

There are some good dancers among the locals. I think they have a little different style than in DC - they seem to dance and move in a very small area of space - but they have some good moves.

Sean and I got a bit of exercise in last week, which was fall break for the kids. He lifts 3X per week and hits the track for some jogging. I hope to build up a few of my muscles while I'm here.

No news on the job front but I do have a local resume and I have some people to whom I can send it.

Connor's high school soccer team had a game against a local club team last week. I was told that the guys on the other team were probably out of high school. It turned out that some were out of work because they were near retirement age. The player/coach on the other team is in his 50's. Most on the team looked to be in their late 20's or early 30's. Connor's team was up 4-0 when the game was called with :50 to go after 2 guys on the club team starting fighting with each other.

That's the news for now.

BJM 10-14-08

One Day Tour of the Wild Singapore

The kids of the Singapore American School are off this week, so Miss Shannon and her friend, Gaby, took Sean and Brendan on a tour of outer Singapore.

The first stop was the Sungei Bulah Wetland Reserve. There does not appear to be too much truly open and untouched land in Singapore. In fact, the reserve may be the only such parcel (although it has certainly been touched by man) remaining in the city-state.

At the reserve, we saw a few monitor lizards. The one in the pic was the medium-sized one we saw that day. I am not good at determining lizard lengths but i'd say nose to tip of tail of the largest one had to be 8 ft. Maybe more.

In addition, we saw some mud skippers and a variety of birds, including some herons and egrets.

I'm not sure if the wetland reserve qualifies as a "rain forest" but we did experience a good downpour.

Here's a small mud skipper:



A Monitor lizard and some wet tourists:






After leaving the wildlife reserve, we went to a goat milk farm. No goat cheese to be had -just milk at about $7 or so for 1/2 liter. we did not buy any.

We did buy some grass to feed to the goats. We missed the miracle of birth of two kids by only minutes but we did not miss the miracle of the mother goat EATING the afterbirth.

One of the kids was up and about, more or less, fairly quickly; while the other kid did not seem to be moving as much. A worker assured us that the non-moving goat was just tired. We left without knowing whether the second goat would make it. Although we were not there long, it did not appear to me that the farm worker would step in to aid the second goat. But as I know very little (nothing?) about goats, I should not judge on their care.

The mother goat and the kids seemed to be in a pen with other pregnant goats. (Again I am no goat expert but the others appeared to have extra large bellies.) The kid that was moving about got separated from his mom for a bit and wandered towards the other goats. Those mom-to-be goats wanted nothing to do with the youngster. As the baby goat approached, all other goats backed away. It was quite interesting. I don't think it was a fear response; rather I think it may have been that they didn't want the youngster to try to take any of their milk.

Any goat experts out there?




After leaving the goat farm, we stopped by a koi fish "farm". Koi seem to be a very expensive goldfish/carp-type fish that are much sought after in Asia.

The "small" (6 inches) fish can go for $100+ and large ones with good coloring, can fetch $1,000's. In the in-ground tanks at the farm, we saw many different sizes; including some fish that may have been 6ft+ long. They were not choi and we did not inquire as to the price. With fish here as with jewelry on 5th avenue: if you have to ask, you can't afford it.

After that tour, it was off to an outdoor food court for a later afternoon lunch of a Thai roti prata, which, to the westerner, resembles (knda sorta) a crepe. Good eats.

If you go out for roti prata, i recommend the egg with cheese. At S$3, it is a bargain here.

A good time was had by all.

bjm 10.09.08

Run for Hope...

Or, in our case, Hope to Run.

Sean and I and his friend Chris participated in the Run for Hope - the Terry Fox Run here in Singapore.

Terry, with cancer and possibly only one leg, ran across Canada. We, with more than 150 years among us, "ran" 4 km.

It was a nice way to start a typically warm Saturday.

I hope you enjoy the pics.

bjm 10.9.08

Hello Asia!

I have arrived in Singapore. After leaving NYC on a 6:30 pm Egypt Air flight last Tuesday, I arrived in Singapore at 5:30 am on Thursday. Somewhere along the way, I lost 12 hours that I never had.

If you count travel time to and from airports, it took 29 or so hours to get here. The two flights (Egypt Air and Singapore Airlines) were fairly uneventful. I think I got a bit of sleep on both flights but certainly not as much sleep as I needed.

I arrived in Cairo at 11:30 am and I was not quite sure when my connection was taking off. I thought it was at 12:30. I asked a guy where Sing Air was and he told me that it was in a different terminal. I had to give him $2 for the advice and $10 to a guy who put me in a car and I gave the car driver a $1 tip,which was a 10+ minute drive, and a $1 to a guy who pointed me to the Sing Air desk. In my short time in Cairo (never leaving the airport) I discovered that everyone wants money. My $10 car ride was at least 2x the price that it should have been. but not knowing if there was a bus between terminals and thinking that I had an hour to catch my next flight, I don't feel bad about paying more than I should. It turns out that my connection was at 1:30, not 12:30, so I had an extra hour to sit around and watch Arabic music videos.

The women in the videos seem to dress the same way they do in MTV videos - the less clothing the better. I was somewhat surprised as i did see many women in the airport with their heads covered.

Although Singapore Air has some of the best looking flight attendants and good food - with real utensils - I do have a complaint about that flight: too many video choices. I think there were 60 or so channels to choose from. What i did not know until my brother told me, is that I could start any movie from the beginning. I would turn to a channel and info would appear letting me know the movie started 10 minutes ago or 46 mintues ago. I could have hit a button to start it over. no worries. Despite all the options, I was not into watching any. I think I had time for 5 movies but I watched 1+. I saw one Chinese movie and I think I watched a Hollywood movie but i cannot quite remember.

I arrived in Singapore on a hot and muggy Thursday. I found out quickly that "hot and muggy" is the norm for Thursday and every day of the week. I do not have my celsius temperatures down yet, but it was 26C when I arrived and it seemed hot.

Brother Sean and I have been getting a little exercise in since I have been here. I think that is good for both of us. We went for a jog on a track on Thursday and Saturday and we "ran" in a Terry Fox 4km event on Sunday. Each kilo lost starts with the first step.

I had many excuses not to exercise in the States. I am not sure if I'll be able to come up with good excuses here.

Early observations: hot, humid, expensive, money, and Asian.

Deb, Sean and I went to a mall on Saturday and it was bustling with people. There may be a financial crisis in the States but if you find a parking spot between the mercedes and BMWs and make it into the mall, you will see plenty of people buying name brand goods. I don't know where all the money is coming from but there seems to be a lot of it.

A Singapore dollar is worth .68 US or it takes 1.45 Sing to buy $1US. I will let you convert.

Gas costs about S$1.90 per liter here. Organic milk is S$14.00. OJ, on sale, is S$8.

Those are some of the prices I have seen so far.

I should have brought my car here. A 2005 Honda Accord LX (my same car on paper) is being offered for sale at S$45,000. Yikes!

It is Monday morning here and the first day of Fall break. This week, while I start my job search, Sean and Shannon will be showing me a bit of the island.

Updates to follow.

BJM 6 Oct 2008