Singrish 3, and some unique Singaporean signage...

 This is a slightly unconventional Singrish post--not all of these are grammatically incorrect, so much as they are strange or incongruous to the American eye. So let's start with something pretty familiar, shall we? The Korean-import notebook is a reliable start.

The small print says "Would you like some flavors that make your mouth come alive/something to set your mouth on fire". Kind of poetic, actually.

I don't even remember what this is! A money pouch or something, I think. Same for the sample below, "Handsome Min Splash". Love it!

 

Classic Chinese-style: "doesn't-really-matter-what-this-shirt-says-English-words-are-cool-right?" 

 

Actually, I think we might have these in the States too. Yes, I figured out that it's supposed to be Bump-its, but doesn't it just look like Bum Pits at first glance?

This just struck me as weird. Maybe no one else will see it, but doesn't it look like the DragonQuest cutout and the Marriage Central one are somehow related? It looks like the scheming dragon is saying, "Yes, dear, say I do to a happy marriage. And then I will kill you and roast you over a spit. Or maybe throw this orb at you, or whatever it is dragons do in this game. Mwahahaha!"

This next one is PRICELESS. I held up people coming out of the restroom behind me to take this photo because it is SO. WEIRD. The top of the word is cut off, but if you can't tell it says "Gentlemen". I.e. this is the sign on the entrance to the men's bathroom. I hope I'm not the only one who thinks this looks like a woman. Kind of like Pink, actually, if the hair weren't black.  I mean, he has full red lips, black-lines eyes, and the standard lesbian/Bieber haircut. I think those boob-shadows are supposed to be pec shadows, but come on people!

And finally, a quote, with a fitting reminder that this post is all in good fun, and that I love and welcome the variations that English takes on.

English is a language composed almost wholly of other languages--only 1% of words in daily use today are descended from the Old English of 1000 years ago. The abundance of Scandinavian, German, Latin, French, and Greek vocabulary and grammar that the language has absorbed is astonishing. That flexibility is one of the things that makes it a fitting global language in today's world. I find it humorous that this quote was on display in support of the government's Speak Good English campaign, which tells Singaporeans that their personalized version of English is not a legitimate variety, but "bad" English rife with mistakes. However, this quote is saying the exact opposite of what whoever put it up their thinks it means. They think it means "The English language doesn't belong to you, so don't mess it up." What it's really saying is "The English language belongs to itself, to the minds of every person who uses it and shapes it." (That's how the author meant it too--he's an esteemed poet and playwright from the Caribbean.) Please, when reading these posts, don't think "Oh, those Singaporeans/Chinese/etc. can't speak English! How quaint." I definitely don't mean it that way, as a linguist or as someone living abroad in a global world. Instead, I hope that when you read this you enjoy a laugh at something that strikes your eye as strange, consider the near-poetry or the resourcefulness that is shown, and appreciate how we live in a global world where languages is nobody's special property, but the property of the imagination.

Assorted August through October... :/

Hello my dearest friends! So, there was a good span of time this fall that I didn't write any posts. And then recently I discovered some photo gems from the time period that it would be a shame not to post. Therefore, this is a hodgepodge of interesting stuff I've fallen into. I'll keep the text to a minimun and let the pictures to the talking :)

Random guys dressed up as storm troopers downtown. There we 5 or 6 of them, and they were just kid of milling around and taking pictures with people if they asked. And this was like late August, so it was nowhere near Halloween AND super hot.

Some of you might remember my lantern festival/mid-auturm festival post from last year. (I know I should embed the link, but I'm not very tech-savvy and actually don't know how to do it, so here it is just copied and pasted: http://cmcastelli.blogspot.com/2009/10/mid-autumn-festival-thanksgiving-of.html)

So this year, it's kind of the same. They did have a big display downtown on the river that was nice--they had all the zodiac animals, and this is me in front of my sign, the rabbit.

They also had these really pretty larger "lanterns", which represented traditional works of Chinese literature.

 They also had a lantern festival on-campus, and they gave out free lanterns! I took the pink one ;)

 I went with my friend Hiram, who is in my department at school. They had a little tea ceremony booth, so this is him drinking a teeeeny cup of tea. Sorry for the awkward lighting...:/

We also met some friends--her name is Joanna. Unfortunately I can't remember her husband's name, oops! They helped us try to answer the questions on a quiz about the festival. But they were pretty hard! And we actually got most of them wrong, mostly because we weren't really paying attention and just wanted to get some little prize you got when you completed it. But then since we didn't get all the questions right, they didn't give us the prizes! So kiasu...haha.

Another thing I did was take a day trip to Malaysia on one of our holidays and randomly decide to get my ears double peirced! hahaha. Unfortunately, the whole reason I had never gotten double peircings before was that I have very sensistive ears, and even my regular piercings give me trouble and I seldom wear earrings in them. But I'd started wearing these cute smiley face studs and they hadn't been bothering me, so I was overconfident. After 6 weeks I tried to switch out the earrings, and they got all swollen and gross, and so I had to let them close up. But in this picture I didn't know that any of that would happen, and I'm all adrenaline and anticipation ;)

I've been spending the occasional weekend at my friend's condo taking care of her bunny when she goes on vacation. While I'm there I always cook a couple of meals, because I don't really have the luxury of a kitchen all to myself in my own place. So one weekend I decided to make pizza, but although the condo does have a "kitchen", it doesn't have an over. So I made it in a pan, oven free! I was pretty proud of my resourcefulness. And I made the dough and the sauce from scratch! Doesn't it look delicious?

Ooh another fun thing! In late July, David Choi came to Singapore! He's a very popular musicain who I follow on Singapore. He signed my CD and took a picture with me. He was really good, and my friends Jocelyn and Shermeen and Yi En accompanied me, so it was a really fun night.

I also went to a rug auction at a fancy hotel. If you are eve in Singapore on a Sunday afternoon and you think to yourself "I'd like to find some wealthy expats! I wonder where they would be?" Then you should try to find your local rug auction ;) But it was really fun. I fell in love with this rug, and it was actually "relatively inexpensive". As in, maybe $500 at the least. I still look at the picture sometime and wish I had it :(

Kathryn had a birthday in September. She loves rugs (hence why I was at a rug auction in the first place!) so I got her two Oriental Rug mousepads ;) I bought them at THE MOST AWESOME SITE EVER, http://www.vat19.com/ . Seriously, if you ever need to buy me a birthday or Christmas present, you should look there first. So, since I was already paying for shipping, I decided to get myself a little present:

GUMMI BEAR ON A STICK! It was delicious.