A Couple Major Differences

A lot of people have been asking me what some of the biggest differences have been so far.  So I made a list!

1.  Money - In Singapore they use what is called the Singapore Dollar.  There are 2, 5, 10 and 50 dollar bills and coins worth 1 dollar, 5, 10, 20 and 50 cents.  Price wise, everything here at the University is way cheaper than in the US (something about because its owned by the goverment, I dunno).  For example, we eat meals in the dining center for S$2.50 or S$3 (S$ means Singapore Dollar) versus the $8 we pay at ISU.

2.  Breakfast - APPARENTLY, breakfast doesn't exist here.  Its not that they don't eat in the mornings, they just have the same thing for all three meals.  WHO DOES THAT?  So the other day Brett and I went to the dining center at 7am and had pork and rice.  With a cup of broth to drink.  No cereal, no bagels, no OJ.  Oh yeah did I mention that we had broth to drink?  Yeah, no one drinks regular liquids with their meals.  Wow.

3.  Word Differences - We had one heck of a time trying to purchase the lil baby you're seeing on the right there.  CELL PHONES don't exist here.  They have HAND PHONES if you need one.  But no CELL PHONES.  Oh and neither do PAY AS YOU GO or PAY BY THE MINUTE phones.  But they do have phones that you can TOP UP.  Also, when I walked into the store the other day I was asked, "How can I please you?"  Yes, she did work at the store.  :)

4.  Height - Walked into the grocery store.  Easily the tallest person there.  Kinda freaked me out.

5.  Accents -  Almost everyone has accents here (except for the guy that we met from Arizona, but he doesn't count).  I can usually understand about 90% of the things that people are saying, Brett is lucky to understand 50%.  It is HILARIOUS.  We'll talk to someone for a while, walk away and then he'll turn to me and just say, "What?"  He gets so confused!  He approaches people to ask them questions and will just smile and pray that he understands enough to answer his question.  He also prays that they don't ask him a question because if they do and he doesn't catch it, he'll just stand there.  Its so funny.  Sorry Brett, I had to say something...

6.  American Food -  So we've tried eating at a couple major chain food places since we've been here to see what the differences are.  McDonalds is basically the same, minus the fact that real beef is a rarity here.  They either have chicken or pork burgers.  We also tried Pizza Hut.  Besides pepperoni pizza, everything is different!  They have all kinds of crazy seafood pizzas, asian soups and NO SAUSAGE.  There's chicken sausage if you're interested...
And no, your eyes aren't deceiving you.   MCDONALDS DELIVERS!  I laughed so hard when I saw this guy.

8.  Transportation -  Oh yeah.  They drive on the wrong side of the road.  Who knew?