Two Years in Singapore (actually it's 2.5 years now!)

2 July 2014
We arrived in New Zealand yesterday morning. Apparently, so did winter! After one of the warmest Junes on record, we arrived to strong winds, lots of rain and the occasional sunny break. The temperature was about 12 degrees. A big change from the humid 30 degrees we left in Singapore. We had been preparing Matilda for winter by talking about it for the last two or three weeks. When we got out of the airport, she asked "where is the winter?" :) Something of coincidence is that today marks exactly 2 years since we left New Zealand for Singapore.

In some ways I find it amazing that 2 years has passed so quickly. A fair bit has happened in that time.

23 November 2014
Again I've been having trouble finishing off my blog posts, as you can see. From starting this post in the 3rd week of our 'summer' holidays, it is now four weeks until our Christmas holidays! This year has started off really well. Our roll has grown significantly and is now approaching 750. With the growth in numbers has come an injection of new staff which has been really positive. Quite few of them came from another school here in Singapore, where they weren't treated particularly well by management. They all seem pretty happy at ours:)

We've done some traveling over the last six months. We took my mum and dad to Cambodia in April which was really cool for them. Then in July we hit NZ and Australia for 2 weeks each. We caught up with a lot of family and friends in both places which dulled the cold somewhat. Although it was very chilly in Australia, with several frosts while we were at mum and dad's place. On the the third or fourth night we were there, Mel said me as we go into bed, "I am so sick of having so many blankets on!" :) Since being back in Singapore, Mel and I have both been able to do training courses overseas. Mel had three days in Phuket in September and I was in Nanjing for 5 days at the end of September. I love that our principal encourages us to do lots of external professional learning.

It was great to get back to Singapore and officially move into our new apartment. We didn't want to leave The Hillside as we really liked it, but our landlords decided to put our rent up by $100 a month despite the market slowing right down to the point where several neighbours were given reductions by their landlords. A bit silly really because as far as I know the place is still empty nearly five months later.

Our new place is great. We have a ground floor apartment with a patio front and back. Which means we can have a bbq! Also, we are much closer to school, which is great for Tilda as she started nursery this year. I can literally ride my bike home in 5 minutes! The pool is also very nice and we have a water slide.

Christmas will see us back in Australia for a couple of weeks and then Mel & Tilda will head to NZ to see her mum and dad, as well as Rose and her girls. They are excited about that. I'l be hanging out in Melbourne for a bit to catch some cricket and catch up with some people.

That'll do it for the moment. Hopefully I can post more soon(ish)!

T

Myanmar

Visiting ancient places has always given me a feeling of … I’m not sure exactly. Excitement isn’t the right word, nor is interesting. Hmm … maybe fascination is a better word? Anyhoo, I have been fortunate enough to visit places such as the Great Wall & Ming Dynasty tombs in China and Angkor Wat in Cambodia (twice!).

Being sandwiched between India and China, South East Asia tends to be forgotten, despite the fascinating history of the area. I have been fortunate to have visited almost all the ASEAN countries and last week I finally made it to Bagan in Myanmar.

There are so many temples, pagodas and shrines on the plain in the area it seems as though someone has scattered a bucket of them. It is noticeable as you drive around, but more so when you get up high. Many of them are quite small but there are several large ones that are very much worth visiting. And although they are very old (perhaps 800-1000 years in some cases), there are some that are still functioning.

We happened to be in Bagan in time for the full moon, which is an auspicious time for buddhists. The day of the full moon was a public holiday and there were large crowds of Burmese people at some of the temples. In the carparks were many small trucks packed to the gunnels with people, with their belongings piled on the roofs. It was interesting to see, though my daughter Matilda become a little tired of the attention she attracted from local people.

Bagan is an amazing place and I would love to go back at some point. A balloon flight over the temples would be and taking the boat from Mandalay would be very cool.

A Holiday in Cambodia

One of the biggest motivating factors for my wife & I moving to Singapore was to be able to travel easily to lots of places. We had lived in Japan & Thailand before moving to New Zealand (where Mel is from) to be closer to family. While in Japan & Thailand we did quite a bit traveling to places Korea, the US, the Philippines, Thailand, as well as the UK. This is not to say we didn’t travel internationally while we were in NZ. We visited the Pacific island nations of Samoa & Tonga, as well as Australia (where I am from) to visit family. We also went to Singapore and Cambodia. It was on this trip that we felt we could definitely live in Singapore.

Sunset at Angkor

We went to Cambodia to see the ruins of Angkor Wat. Visiting the ruins around Siem Reap was simply amazing and I was always very keen to return. The opportunity to go back to Siem Reap came up this year. My parents were coming to visit us in Singapore in our school holidays. We suggested that we go to Siem Reap to see Angkor Wat and they were keen.

Obviously I wanted to see Angkor, the Bayon and other places while we were in Cambodia. But I was also very interested to see how the area had changed in the six years since had visited. I am a geography teacher and one of the ‘big ideas’ we talk about in geography is change.

So, how had the area changed? Well Siem Reap has definitely grown. The town is more built up and there are many more hotels; including several that have been left incomplete. It follows that there are more people around, both Cambodian & foreigners. Although I don’t know the exact figures yet, I met someone who works in tourism in Siem Reap who told me that a few years ago, Siem Reap received around 1000000 visitors per year. Now the area is receiving that many in a season (i.e. a 3-4 month period).

The traffic seemed busier with more cars, as well as the ubiquitous motorcycles and tuk tuks. Sadly, there was definitely a lot more rubbish lying around, especially in the outskirts of Siem Reap. I wonder if the proliferation of rubbish is a product of a lack of education? Going back to Siem Reap has led me to start thinking about taking a group of students to visit Siem Reap to do research on how the tourism industry has affected the town and surrounding area.

"Big Faces" at the Bayon

Another strong motivation for traveling is to expose our daughter to new places and cultures so she understands that there are many different places with different people who believe in different things. Although Matilda is not yet three years old, she has been to Thailand three times, Vietnam, Japan and now Cambodia. She is quite an accomplished traveller. She loves going on aeroplanes and was very excited to see the “big faces” of the Bayon as I have a large photograph of them in our living room. While my mum & I were doing an early morning tour with a photographer, Mel took Matilda to see Angkor Wat & the Bayon, which she was delighted with. We also bought her a Cambodian flag to add to her collection.