The last few days however (since this latest blog entry was begun) have been VERY hot and dry. So much for the diatribe on the rain!
Lizard update #1 (that's right, there are 2 lizard episodes): Lucy the Lizard jumped out one night - jumped out from between the refrigerator and freezer doors. Nearly caused one of us to have a heart attack. Screaming, howling, hopping all over the place tearing her clothes off at two in the morning in case a lizard just leaped into them kind of heart attack.
Oh – and we didn't catch her – she disappeared! It wont be long though – I'll take this opportunity to remind you that the last time we named a house guest (that was Rasmouse) he died a sudden, violent and very disturbing death. You cant catch these things with mouse traps, but you can catch them.
She does turn up every night though to leave us a little present in our kitchen sink. There are probably worse things in the world than gecko crap in your sink though.WHAT COULD BE WORSE??? Ok - cockroaches could be worse.
Lizard update #2: We saw a baby or maybe a pre-teen lizard run across the floor in the hallway. Then - it just vanished! It took a few minutes before Mo's super vision detected two little eyes staring up at him - the lizard had turned the color of the marble on the floor to camouflage itself! Very cool. Mo will tell you he calmly swept the little thing into a dustpan, however arms were flailing and there were a few little girly shrieks that came out of him! Despite that, he managed to take the lizard outside whereby he sent it on its merry way (far from our apartment).
We had our first real night on the town last Saturday. A very nice Singaporean friend of Taimur's introduced us to a fabulous restaurant called Mimolette on the grounds of the Singapore Saddle Club. This is not a place we would have ever discovered on our own. It was a gourmet meal comparable to many excellent restaurants in New York. Then we went to the new Dempsey Hill area (a trendy new section of town that has restaurants, wine bars, and shops built in former warehouses - opened in the last 6 months). We had drinks under the stars and stayed out way past our normal bedtime.
So…what you've all been waiting for. We tried durian...the real stuff - no puff pastry or pudding to hide its true colors. It has a very complex taste that is not altogether unpleasant as it enters your mouth, but then the taste of what one could only compare to hot garbage (not that any of us have eaten hot garbage) attacks your mouth. Swallowing doesn't help. Oh and nobody ever tells you about the barrage of durian-flavored and durian-scented belches that transpire over the next 4 to 8 hours. From one bite! Mo ate the whole damn thing and pretended to like it. He burped it up for days.
There's another take on this. If you can get past the smell, there's this really interesting tropical fruit, with a pudding like texture that you've never seen in a fruit before. And you stop smelling it after two bites so you actually only taste the nice part of the fruit.
And you have to give the fruit's real fans their due. They aren't interested in toning it down for your Gringo noses. http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/03/30/news/durian.php
As for the burps – that’s another story. Its not like all that lovely tropical fruitiness is what comes up in a Durian burp. Nope – just the hot garbage. Its enough to make you think this isn't something you'll do twice.
There's more to fruit in Singapore than Durian – the lovely mangosteins which we got spoiled by in Dubai, this little red guava/pear/apple like things from Thailand called water apples (at least in Gringo), passion fruit - Lauren's favorite new fruit so far. Ahhh yes, and mangos from Pakistan; I have been telling Lauren for years that she had no idea what a good mango was.
He was right - Pakistani mangoes are to die for. Dragon fruit is pretty to look at, but doesn't have much taste. Here is a picture of the dragon fruit (the pink ones) at a local wet market. 
The next blog entry promises to be more exciting and full of photos. Tune in again early next week!
Love, L & M
