Speedracer

 

Maisie cracks me up. She often tells our taxi driver, "You're going too fast. Slow down! It's dangerous to drive too fast."

Of course, this week it's been practically impossible to even get a taxi because the roads have been blocked off for the really fast drivers. The entire town has been getting ready for this weekend's Formula 1 race. Singapore's race is the only night version of the Formula 1. The cars race all through the downtown area, near the Marina and right by Tom's office.

For a couple of weeks, make-shift stores have cropped up on Orchard and a few other streets, hawking all sorts of race-related stuff. Cars have been on display for all to see. Everybody kept talking about the race and where we'd be to watch it. Tickets for the grandstand can go for more than $1000 though the ticket includes a view of the concerts. Last night at the qualifying round? Maroon 5 played. Tonight after the big race? Katy Perry was up. 

We were going to buy tickets for something called "The Walkabout" where you literally kind of wander about the street with access to this and that. I get the feeling you wouldn't see all that much (though Typhaine says otherwise), but it'd be fun to be in the middle of all the commotion. By the time we decided to fork out the $125 for last night's ticket, the darn thing was sold out! Walkabout tickets for race night are $168 so that was that.

Luckily, we'd already planned to spend tonight at Connie and Joe's fabulous 54th floor apartment overlooking the track. What a very civilized way to see the thing - high up and air-conditioned! Of course, part of me wanted to be on the ground watching the cars whiz by and feeling the sound pound my chest. I really wish my brother-in-law Jeff was here. He loves this stuff and could have explained it all to me a lot better. It'd be fun to watch it with somebody who really enjoys it.

 

The track was on the other side of the bay from us (see the brightly lit "stripe" above) but we could still see a lot of the race, including the one, seriously hard hairpin turn. We could watch the race on TV and then look out the window and see it as well. We all ran to the TV to see details about the one, not-so-serious wreck. More so, we could HEAR the race, all the way across the bay on the 54th floor. Cheryl said you could hear the race in our apartment and that's saying something!

The food was great and the company fabulous. Joe works for Exxon so we were the only non-Exxon folks at the party. It's a very weird thing hanging with Exxon people because most are from Texas. We all say "y'all" here in Asia!

One man there lived here in 1990. He explained to me that none of what we were looking at was here back then. Literally, everything we saw used to be the sea. I've explained this before, but Singapore didn't have a fresh water supply so the government created the bay and an intricate water drainage system across the island. Every time it rains, water then runs into the bay and forces the sea water back into the sea. The freshwater in the marina is actually the water supply for the entire country. Yes, we can drink the water from the faucet though it's not the best tasting water I've ever had.

Sadly, if we move here, we won't get to enjoy the company of most of these folks as Exxon is sending almost everybody back home in March. This is probably the last time we'll see this view at night, though Wednesday, Connie and Joe are having a third birthday party for Michael so we'll see them - and their place - one last time before we leave in a couple of weeks.

Afterwards, there were fireworks which we caught from the ground floor this time. They do fireworks here a lot - National Day, Race Day, New Year's, Chinese New Year's. I just love that! And for National Day, they rehearsed the fireworks for several weeks prior!

As for the kids, we played it very low key today. Our big accomplishment was going to the grocery and going swimming. Hopefully by tomorrow, they'll be all rested up for school. Legoland wore them out! I did pop over to see Typhaine, Fred and Emeline. What a cute baby! Of course, I'm a sucker for babies. I hadn't seen their apartment since we've been here. It's very nice and quite a lot bigger than ours. with lovely views. Their lease is up and now they're eyeing one of the ones I saw and posted on the blog. Hysterical!