Our First Post

Jane and I arrived on Thursday, January 10th in Singapore at 1AM for our house hunting trip. We have talked and emailed with a few of you, but we quickly realised we needed to try to set up a blog given the time difference and how many of you there are that we want to stay in touch with. Here it goes...a Stein Family blog!


We were a bit nervous given that we had four days to choose a place to live for the next two years, but we were optimistic because we had viewed some nice places during our "Look-See" trip in November.

At the end of the first day, we found two places we liked and Jane and I spent the night debating pros and cons and by morning, we had chosen the spot. We went back the next day to both places just to confirm our choice and see a couple of other condos, but by the night we had submitted a Letter of Intent. The process here is not as simple with standard "Texas Association of Realtors" type contracts as there are specific clauses for expats (for example what happens if our visa is revoked) as well as a chance to ask for certain improvements to be made before move in (new curtains, put child locks on doors/windows, etc.). We'll send the address to everyone soon.

Jane returned home to Austin after we found the place (thank you Nina, Kelly and Stein parents for taking care of Nathan and Eli!) She has the huge task now of deciding what items we want to leave in Austin, send over by air or by sea. She also is working to sell some items (kids stuff, cars, etc.) as well as getting the house ready for a two year vacancy :(

I started work on Tuesday, January 15...by getting on a plane to Bangalore, India with my new boss. Because I booked the flight the day before, I was in a middle-seat in coach in the back of the plane for the four-hour flight on Singapore Air, but luckily I got upgraded on the return (whew). I had the chance to see people I worked with from years past at Dell in the call center services group but spent most of my time with all new people (sales force that is selling into the local India commercial market - not consumers).

On Friday night, Jane's friend and her husband took me to see a one-man play in Singapore that was at the National Museum of Singapore. Allison is Jane's 'big sister' in Theta from SMU and her husband is a nice German guy working for a US-based asset management company in Singapore. Small world, eh? The play is called Eclipse and it follows a young Singaporean man as he makes the journey back to his father’s birthplace in Pakistan with the latter’s ashes. He retraces the original journey made by his parents and grandparents in 1947, during the partition of India and Pakistan. Afterward we went to the Maxwell Hawker Center for dinner and ate goaza & drank Tiger beer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawker_centre

Saturday I went to Sentosa Island with a guy from Dell Australia who happened to be in town and I had worked with over the phone about a month earlier. Sentosa is attached by a bridge ($15S cab ride = $11 USD) and cable car. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentosa_Island We spent a couple of hours relaxing at the beach (nice sand, warm water) but the view is not good at all...you gaze at a parking lot for huge tankers coming into the port of Singapore (someone said it is the 'world's largest and busiest', but I don't know). In the afternoon, I got a Thai massage (first time I'd had one, no 'happy ending') which was pretty good and priced right ($65S = $45USD for an hour). In Singapore, you don't tip - every bill already has a flat 7% added for tax and then a 10% gratuity...all the prices you see on menus or goods already include those two amounts. Unlike Europe however, the service is good and people really want you to be happy and come back again.

This week I know is going to be busy for both Jane and I to prepare for our 'final move' in early February. We can't wait to see many of you Saturday night (Feb 2) when we are all in Austin. In the meantime, take care and feel free to call either of us on our US cell phones :)