Foodie SIN

I'm finishing up almost 24 hours here in Singapore on my way between Tokyo and Delhi. Somebody asked what I was going to do here and I think I said "I don't know; eat", which was pretty accurate. I arrived quite late (1am) and leave quite late (2a next day) and mostly walked, ate, and slept. (OK, I did spend a chunk of the afternoon at the Asian Civilisations Museum, taking a tour of the gallery ... under the theory that educational growth is important too.)

Some highlights:

• My distaste for seafood is as usual limiting - there have been a bunch of things that look like they'd be tasty to others that I've passed on ... but it wasn't a total bust. Freshly-made almond soya milk with chewy tapioca balls, tropical fruit, and variety of dim sum pieces for breakfast. Oh, and chilled green tea- I think I'm addicted after a week in Japan, though it felt odd not to buy it from a vending machine on the street.

• Late afternoon snacks at the food hawker center near my hotel was a heaping plate of Satay. And I do mean heaping - I think I made the equivalent of a beginner's mistake at Dim Sum.... I ordered so much from the first stall that it was hard to get much from subsequent places. However, it was quite pleasent to sit under a covered roof as the rain poured and eat some hot and smoky chicken and beef satay, cucumber/onion, and rice cake meal.

When "Automated" isn't 24/7

So I'm in Tokyo for the week on business. My flight into Narita landed a bit later than planned and so ran to catch the bus to the hotel. Knowing there was a post office/ international ATM near the hotel, I didn't worry about having no Yen with me.

Why the post office? Most of the ATMs in Japan only take domestically issued ATM cards, but the post office is also a bank, and has ATMs. But here's the rub: the ATM closed at 17:00. Silly American, why would you assume an automated banking machine would be open 24/7?

Fortunately I still had a few hundred Yen on my PASMO, and so could take the train to a bank a few stops away...but really.

Fourth of July

So while many were celebrating our nation's independence from the Brits, Jonathan and I were enslaved to our home. He (with help from Josh) worked on removing clay from our new planting areas... who knew we could make pottery from the "dirt" out back?!

Always in need of my own project, at some point this spring I proclaimed that we were going to repaint the downstairs bathroom. I've had about all I can take of realtor beige. So, with help from Carrie, the downstairs bathroom is now blue (with white ceiling), a new mirror and light fixture. I also opted not to hang the door on the upper cabinet (reflected in the mirror) -- it's a cute "spa" look....

Not bad for a weekend's work, eh?

More on the patio

Okay, so Jonathan's feeling sheepish that the patio is "messy" but (shhh -- don't tell him I said this) even messy it's so much better than the Swiss Cheese that used to be there -- it looks great. So, in an effort to share (even messy) views of the work we've done, I'm including some photos here.



Below is the view you have after stepping out of the sliding doors (from the kitchen). Beyond the table (note new umbrella!) is a big planting area that is Jonathan's Purple Plot.


In case you're interested, here's the detail of the pavers.

Jasmine, Eggplant, Zucchini, Lavender, and Pavers

Wow, it's been awhile since we've posted anything...

We've undertaken several home improvement projects this summer. One closest to completion has been our backyard, which many of you may remember was previously our rotting wood deck; that's now gone, and has been replaced by concrete pavers, landscaping, and drip irrigation.

It's still a work in progress, but the infrastructure is in and I've done a bit of transplanting. Here are a few updates:

Our Japanese eggplant is growing nicely, and--since protecting it with Sluggo--seems to be safe from the snails. Chiu-Ki gave us some of her extra Zucchini seeds, and we're batting 0.660 in terms of seedlings. We've named them "right" and "left", but through a catastrophic turn of events, and the usual degree of obfuscation, the plant on the left is actually "right".

In a nod to downtown Palo Alto parking, we've named this region the "purple zone", with a variety of flowering plants, including our recently transplanted lavender and jasmine:


Set your expectations appropriately since you know how frequently we update this blog, but additional garden details, photos and tracking can be found on (you guessed it) the web's latest Gardening 2.0 adventure: MyFolia. Check it out.

Short stay in Paris to wind down...

My Spring '08 world tour is winding down after almost a week here in Paris. Work was quite productive here with with colleagues, partners, and customers, but fortunately I had a little time to wander around the city and and enjoy a brisk early spring here. I love to explore cities by just walking...though obviously much more fun with Katz around. It's been almost five years since were were last here ... and I had almost forgotten how beautifully the historic buildings are lit, so that was a real treat. And as a bonus, in most places at night there weren't too many tourists -- the Marais and even the Ill de la Cite were surprisingly peaceful.

Our office is near Trocadero by the Eiffel Tower, and I so was quite surprised by the hordes of tourists even in 8-12 degree weather. On Tuesday evening I thought I might try to blend into the crowd and take the elevator to the top for a view of the city at dusk ... but the queue was so long and I wasn't terribly patient, so I decided to go for two other tourist activities instead -- avoiding sidewalk landmines, and having a warm crepe fromage from a street-side vendor.

Other than going for evening strolls, I haven't had much time to explore the city on this trip. But I have had a few wonderful meals. On Wednesday night I went to a lovely restaurant in the western part of the city: Les Jardins de Camille with lovely food, good company, and a wonderful glass wall with a view of La Defense and the Eiffel Tower. I guess I can say I've never gone to the top, but have seen the twinkly strobe lights at the top of several hours...

For my last full meal in Paris, I was in an intimate bistro in St. Germain called "Au 35", located on 35 rue Jacob. This was fitting end to the trip - a salad with duck confit, a sublime chicken pastilla with a spiced honey sauce, and an assortment of cheeses for dessert. Very tasty food, with reasonable prices in a convenient location.

Asia Travel Update

I guess it's been a few days since I last blogged. I spent most of the week in Tokyo for business. I did make some time to do a little sightseeing, and also got to go out and eat some good Japanese food. I had tried to go to Sen, but unfortunately the owner is sick and they're only doing lunch at the moment, and the reservations are booked through April...so we went to Nagamine instead which was great.

On Thursday morning before I left Japan, I went to the auction and fish market at Tsukiji at 4:45. It was an interesting experience to see huge numbers of marlin, tuna, etc, auctioned off to a growing crowd of fishmongers...but I actually had a lot more fun wandering around the warehouses of vegetables and fruit. (This may be related to the fact that I don't eat seafood. Though in general the market didn't smell too much.) While walking around I ran into two friends who were taking a nap:

I arrived into Hong Kong on Friday for a meeting with one of our customers, and went to dinner with a colleague afterwards. I'm staying on the Kowloon side, which is a first for me, but has been pretty convenient, even though I spent most of my day on Hong Kong island today. I started early and took the express bus to Stanley to try to beat the crowds, and found a really nice (blue; surprise) shirt for about 80HKD. I enjoy treasure hunting at Stanley, but it's always hit-or-miss, so I also picked up a few shirts from my tailor while I was in town here.

I guess today's theme was, fittingly, dim sum. Based upon Chiu-Ki and Francois' suggestion last month I went for dim sum at Maxim's above city hall. When they suggested it initially I was quite puzzled, because I didn't understand that "City Hall" is not a government building as it would be at home. It's a municipal building that has performance venues, and other meeting places...with a number of shops and restaurants above. Maxim's is on the second floor with a wide swath of windows with a view of the harbor. At least where I was seated, I didn't get much of the view ... that would've meant I couldn't see the carts going around. The food was very good -- classic dim sum items...most of which I can visually identify, though only about three or four by name (Char Siu Bao; Siu Mai; Har Gow). Dim sum really needs a large crowd such that one can sample variety, so going alone today limited my options.

I wandered around Hong Kong a bit longer after lunch and then came back to Kowloon to go to two museums: the science museum and the Hong Kong history museum. The science museum had a bunch of interactive exhibits about E&M, energy efficiency, and a number of other topics focussed on life in Hong Kong. One interesting thing was how the energy efficiency exhibit talked about advances in appliances...and right up there with air conditioners and washing machines was "rice cookers"; induction-based cookers are much more efficient than stovetop cooking.

Without a doubt my favorite part of the museum was a little room that showed a bunch of "process" videos. For example, there was a five minute video showing a tour of an instant noodle factory, going through mixing the dough, steaming, frying, weighing for quality control etc. A number of other region-focussed videos too: making bean curd and soya milk, making moon cakes, as well as making ice cream and a bunch of other ones.

These brought back memories of my childhood. I loved sesame street and PBS (and as y'all can attest, still do) but one of my favorite segments was the crayon video. This was a fifteen minute tour of Crayola -- starting with a girl drawing with crayons and then staring at a peach colored one. The video of making crayons is actually on YouTube! And it turns out it isn't fifteen minutes long, but barely two--which shows what my attention span was. Anyway, I may no longer be doing engineering work, but I've always been an engineer at heart.

I spent a few hours in the HK history museum, seeing how the government presents the history of the opium wars, British occupation, etc, and then went back to Hong Kong island for dinner. I went to what I think was Marah and my favorite restaurant here -- I think this is my fourth time now? I'm a little embarrassed by the name-- it really is called "Dim Sum", and is located at 63 Sing Woo Road in Happy Valley. But the food is that good. In fact, it was featured on a recent episode of the PBS show "Gourmet Diary of a Foodie". Their char siu bao also includes bits of roast duck, and their pak choi/mushroom dumplings are tasty with an good/interesting mixture of textures that I haven't been able to find in California (yet).

Anyway, that's an update from here in Asia. Tomorrow I fly on to New Delhi for business.