so javier finally came to visit, en route to mumbai where he is relocating to. i attribute our first meeting to serendipity in april this year, at a dear friend's birthday party at the nam hai in hoi ann. we were the handful of <30s and dutifully accompanying our respective mamas. or so the excuse went. but after the final birthday bash in this elaborate series of parties that spanned indochina (nonstop partying for a week as the group made its way through laos cambodia and vietnam...) javier talked alejandro into opening his villa for an after-party and we boogied the night away, much to my mama's chargrin.
but we became friends and when i was in valencia as part of the great grad trip this summer, javier was the most gracious host, extending his warm valencian hospitality to my friend yvonne and i. yvy and i have the fondest memories of
beer on his terrace, lazy days that stretched into the night that never really fell for the sky remained the deepest clearest blue without ever becoming black. we whiled away our time over countless hours of
peking express (javier was in the inaugural spanish run!) and tried to emulate coke and his irreverence for time. on a side note, we returned to javier's apartment after a late lunch one day and had coffee on the terrace. then at 4pm, coke invited us to stay for dinner and said he was, 'going out for an hour to do groceries.' we had a bit more to drink, vegged out and played with lao, javier's adorable sharpei, and before we knew it. it was 11pm and still no sign of coke! oh the luxury of one hour flowing into seven without us feeling it :) yvy and i realised that we had
absolutely nothing to do which was pretty darn amazing for us steeped in the ways of singaporean efficiency ;) and when coke eventually reappeared, we did ask, "one hour???" to which he blithely replied, "oh. i don't believe in watches." we wish we didn't either ;) the spectacular home-cooked dinner was eventually served at 1am but yvy and i were only too happy to immerse ourselves in the
spanish way of life. for as javier is constantly reminding me,
spain is different.
but back to singapore.
have a bad habit of being super chops when friends visit, then again we're limited more by their time constraints than mine. javier's only in town for the weekend before going to hong kong for five days so i had to grab this brief window of opportunity before his disappeared.
in valencia, javier had told me that the two places he wanted to go to while in singapore were the raffles hotel and sentosa. having spent a few years here as a child before leaving for good in 1999, he was semi-familiar with the city but only vaguely so. so we began with a late lunch, spanish tapas style, at the empire cafe at the raffles.
here's javier looking slightly apprehensive at the potentially scalding xiao long bao but he was a trooper and gamely ate carrot cake, crab meat fried rice, prata with chicken curry, char siew bao and XLB, washing it down with tiger beer, but of course.
after lunch we took a slow stroll to chijmes before stopping for a singapore sling and ciggie - he tells me that's the best way to enjoy a smoke.
from chijmes, we made our way to the former parliament house and supreme court for the national art gallery open house. expected to catch a free art exhibition, without realising that the open house was for the public to have one last look at the buildings before they were converted to the art gallery. ohhhh. but we did get some fun photos inside with the president, first lady and singapore crest. need to get that photo from javier's camera - but watch this space!
after the open house, we were lazy and cabbed to marina bay sands to check out the skypark. pity about the haze but we did get some nice views. having only been to ku de ta on the opening night myself, it was a first to see singapore from the top of the sands by day!
i couldn't tell javier what this construction site was but twee tells me it's the 'olympic park', whatever that means :)
sigh.
sunset offset by the haze. boo :( is not liking them subsistence farmers in indonesia very much!
and because the skypark was underwhelming (sorry, just being honest here...) javier had to get his kicks elsewhere. what better way than the reverse bungee at clark quay, after some liquid courage? :)
as a reward for his bravery, we went for his first taste of turkish ice cream. here's javier trying to disguise his surprise at that mountain of ice cream mr. turkish ice cream man is dishing him.
whoops got you there! actual scoop size is much smaller :(
by this point the photo fatigue had started to set in. we people watched at clark quay and i made a point to show him clinic with its macabre sense of humour. it's a bar with a hospital theme and patrons sit in wheelchairs instead of chairs, drink from iv bags instead of glasses and the lights are the same as those in the operating theatre. quirky or just plain sick (haha) - you decide.
packed afternoon and then we took the bus down river valley to great world where javier was catching a movie. i went on to a korean bbq, but that's another story for another time.
good night :)
p/s if you'd like to read more about my time in valencia, here are the posts from the travelogue.
day 30 and
day 31.
