Jackmans In Singapore: June 2009

My Mom and Jack (brother) came to visit us for a week in Singapore. It was the first time we had seen family in 6 months which is the longest I think we have both ever been without seeing our families! After 30+ hours of traveling across the world to get here we welcomed them to Singapore with lots of hugs and tears!

We took them to our favorite sushi place, Koh Grill, for lunch to start the trip off. It was funny to watch my mom try to use chopsticks. The sushi chef had to make her cheater chopsticks, which were still hard for her to use! Ben and I have become semi-pros since we have to use them almost every time we eat out. They enjoyed it so much we went back one more time before they left.

My mom with her cheater chopsticks

My mom, brother and I at Koh Grill (Ben took the picture :) )

We then took them to Clarke Quay for dinner where we had a few Pump Room 1-for-1 beers and some Satay. They were having some kind of celebration with a drum line and guys dressed up in funny costumes in the middle of Clarke Quay so we got to hear/see some of the action.

Speaking of funny costumes...while we were walking back to our condo, we stopped off at an outdoor theater where they were having a dance competition. It was a very confusing dance show...see if you can find the girl in this group....

You can't, they are all MEN!!! Very disturbing! I could have sworn at least one of them was a female....but NOOO!

We took them to the famous Singapore Zoo which is always fun! I'm sure we will be taking the zoo trip a few more times before the year is over to show all of our other family who is coming to visit! We watched the Elephants at Work and Play Show and the baboons fight and chase each other around. We also got to pet a tree kangaroo, hold some butterflies, and see the lions being fed. My mom even got her eye scratched by a mean little monkey that was hanging out in a tree next to us!

My mom and I with the tree kangaroo

Elephants at Work and Play Show...he's pretty good!

This little guy was so cute with his pot belly!

We then took them to Marina Bay to show them the Merlion, Esplanade, and all of the famous tall buildings. We rode the Singapore Flyer and were lucky enough to have our own private capsule! I told my mom how the Singapore Flyer got stuck a couple months ago and she wouldn't believe me, even though I was telling the truth! We also teased her and told her that it goes really fast, which is really a lie...it takes 30 minutes to make the full trip around.

We made a trip to Chinatown and Little India of course. We even took them to Dehli our favorite Indian restaurant here that is owned by this nice, old Indian man who always remembers us! We also had a fajita and margarita night where we made our own flour tortillas (they are very comparable to the HEB flour tortillas! It is our specialty :) ) Ben and I have to improvise here without good mexican food and I'd say we do a pretty good job!

Jack was very intrigued by all the funny signs around Singapore. He took tons of pictures of them. Here are a few of them:

They use a lot of cartoons to convey their messages here...

They had to have been worn out with all of the places we were taking them at this point! But we decided to take a day trip to Sentosa Island for some beach fun. It was nice to relax and swim in the "ocean with no waves"! We went to the southernmost point on the Asian continent.

Giant Merlion

The highlight of the trip had to be when we took them to see EIC, our favorite band in Singapore, at Wala Wala. It was definitely Jack's lucky night! Some random guy bought him a beer (odd) and the band members invited Jack up on stage to play his own song with them!

Us with Jack and Rai from EIC

Jack on stage with EIC playing his song "Higher Trial"!

So how did Jack get to play with them? Well, after EIC played their first set they came over and started talking to us, probably because we were the only blond, Americans in the entire venue. They were asking us where we were from and when my mom said Austin, TX they immediately started talking about SXSW and ACL, which we were surprised that they even knew what that was considering they are from Singapore! Anyways, we started talking about live music and how Jack (my brother) plays guitar in a band and they invited him to play one of his songs up on stage with them! It was so cool! And Jack did awesome! Here is the video of my brother Jack playing "Higher Trial" with Jack-the guitarist, Joe-the drummer, and Melvin-the bassist (Rai, the other guitarist, sat out so my brother could play his guitar). Keep in mind none of them had ever heard this song before that my brother wrote!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OftJEolA0xg

We had a great time with them and were so glad they could come out to see us! My Dad, Stepmom, little brother and sister will be here in a few more days for our second round of family! It is so great to see family but it makes us miss home a lot more :(

Stay tuned for more family visit updates!

God bless,
The Jackmans

No, not for us...for a couple in our small group here in Singapore! Our Small Group threw a surprise baby shower for Jen and Fred, the couple expecting, which was so much fun! They had NO idea! They thought we were having a normal Bible Study that night and were completely surprised! We were all worried that they might not come since they had just moved condos and were getting ready for their baby, Brandon, to come. But everything worked out perfectly! We even had extra time to prepare that night since they came a little late :) All of the ladies made our first diaper cake, which turned out to be a great success! We were a little iffy at first about making it, but I am so glad that we did because Jen and Fred were in awe when they saw it! They told us that it resembled their wedding cake, which was something hard for all of us to picture. But sure enough, it did! How neat that it worked out that way, God works in amazing ways! It was a wonderful shower and a great time of fellowship with our new friends! We are so blessed to be a part of a wonderful Small Group here in Singapore that is so welcoming and supportive! We can't wait to meet baby Brandon! Here are a few pictures from the shower...