You mean that's smoke?

Dear Readers,

Singapore is on fire. Or rather Sumatra is. Somewhere in Indonesia on an island they are burning rainforest for all their worth. Why? To plant crops in the very ineffective mode of agriculture called slash and burn. It has been the way of doing things for centuries and in Sumatra, they think it's still 1000 A.D. So the smoke from these fires has blanketed Singapore and Malaysia for days now, blocking out the sun and causing the eyes to burn. It's very blah outside, gray and New York City like. Ha! I have never experienced smog before because I live on a farm in the U.S. It's common here in Asia but I never thought it would infer with my life as a sloth at the pool. What a tough life.

Now that my friend Tammy is back, it's time to get into trouble around the island. We try to go somewhere interesting every week and often find ourselves lost. You see, I am the navigator and it's like the blind leading the blind. I have a map (it means nothing to me) and Tammy isn't much help. So yesterday we decided to visit this mall called Great City that my other friend Annette often talks about. We had to take a taxi because there wasn't a MRT stop any where close. No problem. The mall was new, modern, and best of all we found a Kenny Rogers Chicken place. I'd never heard of it but Tammy knew all about it. So we has chicken for lunch and it was very good. I was delighted to find out the mall had a movie theatre as ours has closed down for nine months. Then came the tricky part. Annette had told me about Quilt and Friends in this Tan Boon Liat Building within walking distance. I knew it was on Mt. Zion street and it was near the Concorde Hotel. So we asked someone, they sent us in one direction. Then we asked another person, they sent us in the opposite direction. This went on for an hour and a half before we realized that the Holiday Inn has taken over the Concorde Hotel. We found a man who told us, yeah, the building next door really was the building he was looking for. Looking for the quilt shop? he asked. Yeah, what gave us away? His friend's sister worked there. Are you sure that ratty old building next door that looked like an government housing block was where we were suppose to go? The one with -was that underwear? hanging out from the top floor? Yeah. Well, we walked on, all around this place trying to find the way in. It was another mile before we actually came to the gate. The building was a warehouse. Up on the sixth floor I could see the place I was looking for. We looked at each other. Did we really want to venture into such a creepy place? Sketchy guys all around. Even sketchier guys in the elevator. We weren't allowed to punch the buttons ourselves. That was sketchy guy's job. Well, we finally got there and it was a real shop. I am trying to make the red chinese latern quilt for Tammy and we bought some white and red material. I got a card with an address-I will be taking a taxi next time! This shop is run by a little old Swiss lady and yes, she was real nice like Annette claimed. They told us to take a bus back to Orchard but we have no experience with that. We went back to the Holiday Inn and got a taxi. Poor Tammy was worn out!

Tammy told me some bad news. She and her husband Greg take lots of medication and have it shipped over through his company. The customs here seized their medicine and said they can't do that any more without a license. See, they aren't selling the stuff. They are taking the stuff. That didn't cut any ice with them. You don't mess with the customs people-they make life very hard. I am worried now about my medication which is just mailed in a box through the regular mail. Will I have to have a license to get an antacid? Does seem silly. I will wait and see how Tammy resolves this before I panic. Hope we don't end up in jail.

Well, we're off to Malaysia. Hope we can see the sights through the smoke.