Johor Bahru, Malaysia

Jaya's family! Brother and sister-in-law, Trav and I, Jaya, Jaya's mother and 2 nieces and Jaya's wife who is 8 months pregnant!

Travis' coworker, Jaya invited us to spend the day with his family in Malaysia on Sunday. Since we finally decided to get a car, which arrived last week!, the trip up to the border was very easy. Johor Bahru is just across the border from Singapore so we parked our car and walked across customs to meet Jaya and his family on the other side. We had a wonderful time. They showed us around Johor Bahru but the best part for me was spending time at their homes. We had drinks at Jaya's house and then later that afternoon we went to Jaya's brother's, also named Jaya (they were named after their father), for tea. They are a very close knit family with a Hindu background from India now living in Malaysia which is a Muslim country. I loved learning about their culture and traditions by seeing pictures from their wedding and touring one of the local temples. They were so good to us and have invited us to take holidays with them up the Malaysian coast or just to stay with them at their house for awhile. After they have their baby I hope we can do all of these things!

Lion Dance

The Lion Dance is auspicious for the Chinese around Chinese New Year. Companies will pay the dance troupes to come to their business and do the traditional dance to bring the company luck, wealth and prosperity. This year and last year I would see the trucks driving around with the dance troupes and people would say how tired they were of seeing the dances everywhere they went. Well I never managed to see one until last week. I was in the mall and I could hear the clanking of the symbols and knew they had to be there somewhere. I ended up in one of my favorite craft stores to see the ceremony. Here is what they did. The Lion danced around the store for awhile before he ended up at the check out area. Here they had 8 (lucky number) oranges (oranges bring wealth) laid upon a red (lucky color) cloth. The Lion danced here for awhile before he pounced on them. His movements were so real and well practiced and his eyes would blink, he was so cute! A nice lady explained to me that he was peeling the oranges and that when he was done he would make a Chinese character to bring the store good fortune for the year. The character he left the store was luck, at least that is what I was told! I was so glad to finally see the tradition but after I left there to meet my girl friends for lunch the Lion dance came to the restaurant. I guess I was bound to see it this year!

Valentine's Day

We did not do much for Valentine's Day this year but I think it was the best ever. Less is more!

Chinese New Year!

Wednesday

Gong Xi Fa Cai

Yeah! It is Chinese New Year again and China has 2 weeks off which means Travis has a nice break too! He only gets Wednesday through the weekend off from work but with China on holiday things will seem a lot more sane in the office! Sadly, we did not plan a trip for this holiday but we do plan to explore Singapore a little over the break. Tonight is Chinese New Year eve so we went down to China Town to take part in some of the festivities. It was alive with excitement and draped with red lanterns. What a neat time to be in Asia!

Sungei Buloh Wetlands

Thursday Morning

They call this the wetlands...can you see why? This place is a bird watchers paradise!

Water Monitor. This is just a little guy...maybe 4 feet!

He caught a fish! Good luck getting that one in your mouth!

This is why I have come to love exploring Singapore's jungles! Isn't she a beaut? These beautiful, spindly spiders can be found at all the nature reserves in town. This one we ran into halfway through our hike but I could have done without seeing her at all. She was just an isty bit larger than Travis' hand! Did you just look at your own hand? Well you should because she was a giant! I had nightmares for days!

CNY Party

We were invited to another Chinese New Year's party this year and this time it just happened to be at the most amazing house we have seen yet! It was incredible! After I finished taking notes of the floor plan, the decorations and the back yard I started socializing a bit. For the Chinese there are around 16 days of CNY and on all of those days they have an assingment. Some of which mean to rest but the others are for visiting family and freinds and temples! For us it just meant an afternoon of good food and good company! Travis, unlike his Chinses coworkers, gets to take full advantage of his time off for CNY relaxing by the pool (which we did 3 times), exploring new nature reserves (which we did twice) and going to parties. The Chinese do look forward to this time with family and friends though, just as we would for Christmas. The kids get gifts and lots of money and everyone eats way too much!

This is taken from the kitchen looking out into the back yard. I love how the entire back wall opened up to make the pool and yard part of the house. You could litterlly step straight into the pool from the dining room! What?!!

I like this because it is exactly what we do with our Christmas cards!

This is a little court yard in the middle of the house with a pond full of the biggest coi I have ever seen!

Lara's Birthday

Saturday
Since it is Chinese New Year a lot of our freinds were out of town for the weekend so we decided to gather a small group for raclette for Lara's bday (the blind folded one above!). Stephanie, the other blonde, is from Austria so she and her husband Marcus are masters at raclette and hosting for that matter. It turned out being a great night of amazing food and great company!

Monkey Business

On the last day of the 5 day weekend we decided to hike around MacRitchie Reservoir. It took us 3 1/2 hours to make it all the way around. Along the way we saw all of the usual suspects including the 5' water monitor, skink lizard (a shiny footlong), pretty birds, black squirrels, huge spiders and finally, on the way out, we ran into this 20+ troupe of monkeys. This is a public park, like Juila Davis in Boise, so it is the strangest thing to see monkeys running around. Great entertainment!

We received an email forwarded to us by Travis' mom letting us know that his second cousin Angie would be traveling to Singapore on business. Uncle Leonard (Grandpa Garber's brother) was kind enough to pass on our contact information so Angie could contact us when she arrived. While Angie's time in Singapore was short, we were able to spend a half day together quickly showing her around Singapore as well as catching up on the latest news from the "other side" of the family. Considering we've never had the opportunity to meet Angie while living in the US, it's funny that our paths would cross only after we moved half way across the world!