Every day, when I take Charlie and Anna out for errands, usually at stop lights I see people pointing, staring and then laughing. No, not at me, thankfully. At my very American (actually New Zealander) stroller. The double stroller. Anna very visible in front (much cooing ensues), and then, peek-a-boo! Charlie pops her head out from the back. "OH!" is the first reaction followed by a laugh and then much consideration of the stroller, sometimes questions on price, most of the time, a conversation held privately between the two locals and some neck craning as I walk away. From other expats (English, French, Australian), I mostly get the envying eye (and I stand tall and proud), but no comments. This is the closest I will ever get to celebrity and must admit, have been enjoying it just a little.
What also tends to get much attention is my daughter Anna. Cooing aside, I hear frequently, "ah, nice boy, big boy!" even when she's in head to toe pink. "Girl" I respond. And they respond, "Ooh, she so much like boy!" There is no sense of shame or embarrassment here at the mistake. In New York the classic response would be something along the lines of "of course" or "sorry". On the other hand, according to the Chinese here, I have doomed poor Charlotte. "What's her name?" I'm asked, "Charlie", "whaaaa? That boy name!" followed by confused silence, and I feel, an expected explanation. I learned right away I shouldn't bother with that, as they will keep coming back to the original point "Whaaa? That boy name!".
As for street wear there are a few things which have caught my eye. One is the regular appearance and the proud display of the man-purse worn by (seemingly) 90% of the local Asian population. And worn with pride. Vuitton! Prada! Fendi! And no, not by gay men (who seem to have much more sense). Straight men. With wives and paunches. Their purse is either worn in the old-school girl "pocketbook" way (strap diagonally bisecting the chest, purse resting on hipbone), or held in one hand like a clutch. It is amazing to me, but I am in Asia, I remind myself.
Another thing which has astounded me is here there are more open lesbians (in couples or walking alone) in one city block then I have ever seen gay men in NYC, and transsexuals. It seems to be that lesbians are out, open and accepted, whereas I never got that sense in New York. Same for the transsexuals. I write transsexual and not transvestite, because these men are not in costume, they are going about their daily lives. They just happen to be wearing make up, skirts, heels as a normal woman would, to do her daily errands. I find this very refreshing, especially in such a controlled state. But then again, Singapore is all about acceptance of race, religion, ethnicity - so I suppose, slowly slowly, "this" bubbles into "that".
As for the controlled state piece, I haven't really seen much evidence of it, except for the end result, which is the orderliness of everything (which I do appreciate after NYC). In fact, our residence is adjacent to a police station and I have yet to see one police officer - anywhere! I asked a friend here about that and she said that she heard that most of the officers are plain clothes policemen and many are also cab drivers, which helps them keep their finger on the pulse of the city. Who knows what is and isn't true, but it is peculiar to be in a city that is so incredibly safe and not see police anywhere.
I have kept my eye out for them out of curiosity, but also because I have found it hard to kick my jay-walking habit. Putting aside my fear of getting hit by a car because the cars run on the "wrong" side of the street, the pedestrian lights are incredibly long (those that make you wait) and the walk lights are incredibly short. In fact, you could miss your opportunity to cross the street simply by searching for a ringing phone in your purse (not that it's happened to me, of course). In most crossings you have 15 seconds - I know this because the light has a count down, and you're gypped out of "13" - 14, 12, 11 and so on. And then when the light gets to10 it actually speeds up the countdown!! I haven't officially timed it yet, but am considering this experiment. I'm willing to bet the actual amount of time you're given is about 10-11 seconds, but the amount of time you have to wait to cross is somewhere around 3/4 minutes.
Another curiosity here is the obsession with nails and weight. Like NYC, you find manicure salons everywhere, but unlike NYC, people here take their nails very very seriously. There are endless choices of colors, patterns, designs and glitters that you could choose for your nails. I have seen these elaborate designs on many women. I haven't gone as far as experiencing this to document, but am considering it. Not sure what Oliver would think... As for the weight, there are slimming boutiques here almost at every turn, and not your Jenny Craig type of thing, places that offer - slimming tonics (either topical or to ingest) or diets geared towards women, men, virgos, geminis, rabbits, pigs (Chinese astology here) and so on...!
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