Life in United States... (bad)

Today is the 7th day in Philly. If I can start blogging it goes to show how ULTRA bored I am. I simply have nothing much to look forward to. I really really really miss all my good old friends. All the sessions (poker! taxes "hold'em"! wahaha!), basketball games, mahjong, dinners... Talking about dinners... I think I have already eaten at least 3 out of 7 days of instant noodles (mee pok from Singapore). Oh man, I really really miss the food back home... My "ba cho mee"... =(

Life here...:

1) Traveling / Transport - Oh man, sucks. My workplace is like a freaking 1hour 15mins of bus ride. Not that it matters alot lah, but hor, back home when I travel from home to NUS, it also takes about 45mins to 1 hour, but then, it just didnt feel thattt longggg. Maybe cos' of TV mobile (though most of the time I am asleep) and the seats are also actually much more comfortable than those of SEPTA's.
*SEPTA = SBS Transit in Singapore, the operator of all the buses here.

And public transport here is also pretty expensive. They have "tokens" here which is supposed to be cheaper as compared to using cash alone. One token is USD$1.45. There are different zones and will cost different lah. But minimum one trip using cash is $2 or a token. For me, my workplace is in Zone 4, so I need to use 1 token + $1.50 = $2.95 per trip. 1 day will cost me $6. 1 month = USD$120.

Haiz, so people, please dont complain that Singapore bus fare is expensive (haha! Actually I always complain one!) Compare the quality of the buses, the service and the frequency of buses, the fare in Singapore is really reasonable to a certain extent.

I have thought of investing some money in a second hand car, but I think, not now ba, I still dont know how much am I being paid for the job monthly... *dumb*


2) My job - I will have to be a general worker / receptionist for like a month! Receiving items from UPS, DHL, Fedex, USPS, answering phone call by saying

"Good Morning/Noon! You have reached XXX. I am SORA. How can I assist you?"

~!@#$%! I think that takes about 20 secs to complete...


3) House (e place you call home...) - Haiz, the place I am living in is like an apt type. Dont imagine those nice scenes of those american houses you see on TV. It's on the 3rd floor, basically there are 2 rooms, a so-called living room, a bathroom and a half kitchen. Why I call it half kitchen is cos, its a small area, a bar like type of place. So compared to proper kitchen, its more like a bar. Oh and there is NO windows in the living room, only 1 in one of the room and 2 in the other room. What does this means? Insufficient lighting!!! And another problem is that there is no place for this thing call washing machine and dryer. So laundry how?

Option 1: Carry all your dirty linens for the week or 2 weeks or 1 month, go like 2 streets away to the laundry shop and use the washing machines there to wash your clothes. Its coin-operated type. I think 1 wash is about $2 or so? If you choose SUPER wash (dont know what's the freakin diff), then more ex. Also, here people use dryer to dry instead of hanging out the clothes to dry. So then you have to pay for the dryer too, er, I think is a quarter will dry for 7 mins. Usually you need at least half an hour of drying, depending on your load too. I think if you split the load might be cheaper and faster.

Option 2: Bring out all pails, scrubs etc, go into the bath tub and manually wash it yourself!

Haiz... Last time when I was here, I used to go for Option 1. This time, I decided it cost too much and too troublesome to walk here and there, so I went for Option 2 today. Pfft... so bad, if I do it at home at least there is a proper bath room with enough space for 2 to 3 pails to do the washing. Here, the pathetic little bathroom has everything, a bathtub, a toilet bowl, a wash basin. All in one, imagine how small it is and you can probably only do the washing by squatting in the tiny bathtub. The comes the drying. Normal clothes I am ok lah, but today I washed a freaking thick towel lah. My arms can still feel the twisting... I think I will develop alot of arm muscle when I go back...


4) Food - Singapore is better, so much better... Talking about food, from next week on I have to bring my own lunch box to work because the office is located along those highways and there is no way I can get over to the other side of the highway by walking, eat and get back to office in time. Even if I drive, I feel its too troublesome too. Haiz... back in SUN, there were so many choices... Chinatown, Clarke Quay, Hong Lim, the fish dumpling... *****


5) Language - Before coming over, I told my friends that I am worried that I might not be able to communicate with people here. To a certain extent I think it is quite true. I think because I dont speak with that kinda accent, the pronunciation, tone and everything might sound a bit different to them. At work, luckily quite a number of them are chinese, so we speak chinese sometimes.


Pfft... The first 4 days here were still pretty nice because the guy renting this house was still around and I at least have someone to talk and joke with. But he moved out 2 days ago. Sigh... Lonely... Tomorrow wont be alone anymore cos roommate coming back, but well actually... haiz... dont say le...

1050pm... Think I going to bed... SEE!!?? ME going to bed at 11PM!!! I never do that in Singapore. Most of the time I am only home probably at night or I will be busy watching all the great TV programs at this golden hour... Oh ya, I only have a CRT TV here and no reception, cant watch a shit... Can do something about it, by applying for cable tv or whatever, but, haiz... this stupid old house, dont even know if it will work well...

OFF TO BED... (10.55pm)