Buddah Attack!

i'm sitting up in karen's executive suite working on my talk. i have to say, 30+ floor views here are pretty neat. i slept like a baby. i decided to splurge and get the hostels "suite". but it's only $40 instead of $400 so i don't feel so bad. it's been grey all day. not too wet, but grey. i can't tell whether this is normal or not for this place - there's been a huge grey cirrus layer that seemed to strech here all the way from japan. this place smells funny. steamy and dank. hot and wet. but here's the funny thing. this place doesn't feel like asia at all. honolulu felt more asian. i feel like a slob wearing shorts and a tshirt. everybody is in a suit. the river walk from my hostel to the conference center was awesome, although i did get assaulted by a buddhist monk who wanted $50 to build a temple. i let him get away with $5 in exchange for some beads and a good luck card. anyways, singapore has a reputation for being strict. there's a heavy fine for the really major crimes here like jwalking, spitting, and gum-chewing. yes, you will get fined for spitting. there's under and over passes for almost every road so you have no excuse for crossing it. but, here's the twist. it's not just some stairs and a tunnel. it's a giant underground mall. yes, a mall. you are forced to walk through a giant macy's to cross the street. every street. the buildings here aren't connected by sidewalks. they're connected by malls. i was trying to find the entrance to karen's hotel and i had to walk from the conference center, through the center's mall, over the cafe-catwalk, into the congrad mall, through the hotel-restaurant, and then finally i got into the hotel lobby, where there wasn't anything to buy. my wallet is cowering in terror. i'm going to get really fat too. food is all over the place. liz would love it. on my walk home, i had intentions of taking night time pictures of the city. the quay was really calm with a ton of people out walking. couples on the boardwalk. and i really began to understand why they talk about singapore being a city of food. everybody was eating somewhere in these huge groups. that's what you do here. eat like crazy.....

Karen working away.

The Giant pedestrian "underpass" mall.
Buddah attack! $50 and I'll give you beads!
the infamous roundabout
lunch with comet people.