Since Thursday night, we have been staying in our new apartment in Jurong, Singapore, where we will be living for the next half year. The apartment consists of two bed rooms, two bath rooms and one big living-dining room. It is a furnished apartment, so that the bare necessities are here already: beds, cabinets, some chairs and tables, a fridge, microwave, laundry machine, air conditioning (it is hot here!) and even a TV. For everything else we are going Craigslist again, purchasing as much as we can carry from garage sales. We scored a nice snakes-and-ladders carpet yesterday, for example.

One thing that is immediately obvious is that the architects and interior designers for this place are not quite up to the level of their Japanese counterparts, from whom they could learn a thing or two about the placement and layout of closets and drawers.

More interesting than the apartment itself is its location: We are sitting on top of a huge four-storied shopping mall, so that all kinds of stores, restaurants and services are just an elevator ride away. Next to the mall are a bus depot and a train station, so access is also convenient. And directly outside our door, on the same floor is a large swimming pool (it is hot here!) and a gym.

As we have not completed the registration process for our residence (there will be government-issued ID cards), we could not yet apply for broadband Internet or phone plans, so for the time being I got a prepaid mobile phone, and wireless prepaid Internet (18 S$ for three days). The power plugs here are gigantic and three-pronged, none of our Japanese plugs fit. We have but a single adaptor at the moment, and I blew the fuse on that one when I connected a 100 V only device (an external hard disk, which I hope survived that).

We are about to enroll Kai to a day care centre, also located in the same building (and quite a bit more expensive than we expected). One problem is that he will turn 18 (months!) in December, which moves him up one age group, for which there seem to be no vacancies, so that he probably has to stay at home from January. Cissy's parents are planning to fly over and help out.