I've found a place to stay,
On the top floor of a place,
Using the right feng shui way.
Geez...that sounds terrible but I just felt like singing. It wasn't easy to find a place that had to have the right "feng shui".
Anyway, halo all! It's been a week already?? Well...time flies when one is busy hunting for a place and more recently, one has a new toy to play with (Sony PSP).
As I mentioned before, finding a nice-ish place with the right feng-shui balance was NOT easy! I must have looked at about nine different places over two weeks before I found this little pearler BUT...it's going to cost an arm and a leg after the relatively cheap rent I got at my last place in Melbourne.
This unit is named the "Penthouse" because it's on the top floor (that's the way they advertise it). It's still only a two bedroom apartment and it sits in the Geylang area of Singapore which is famous for it's prostitutes and good food (including that smelly bean curd place - yuk!) Mum, if you're worried, I'm on the northern side of the main road and far away from those areas.
It's funny how everyone reacts the same way when I say I'm in Geylang, "What? You're in Geylang? Do you know what area that is? Why on earth would you want to live in Geylang???"
On the response that I'm on the northern side near the MRT station, "Ohh...that's OK then. It's a great area." Go figure...
Anyways...back to my apartment, it's fully furnished which means I'm going to have trouble because I have a shipload of furniture coming in a container. Sigh...anyone want to buy a dining table and bookshelf? Let me know and I'll express post it to you. :-) The furniture is very nice. The apartment was owner occupied. They've decided to get a new place and rent this one out. The dining table has a marble top which is pretty cool. The apartment is about 1,100 square feet in size and has a huge master bedroom and a guest-unfriendly (sorry guys) sardine can sized second bedroom. One of the best features? There's a huge 1,000 square foot private roof top upstairs complete with a gazebo, table and four chairs! Imagine reading a book while sipping a glass of wine or a game of mahjong with some mates. And because the Geylang area doesn't have many tall buildings, I have quite an unobstructed view for miles. That is when the !@#$% haze lifts.
I also noticed that each floor only has two apartments and they're serviced by two elevators. That's good for those mad dashes home to use the toilet eh?
The cost? A whopping SG$500+ a week! That's about AUD$400+ a week!! I guess that's the price of apartments nowadays. Funny thing is houses are generally cheaper to rent here. I guess everyone likes to have condo facilities or something. I looked at a huge house in Siglap (about 15 mins drive from Geylang) with four bedrooms, modern kitchen, etc. and it cost less than this apartment. BTW, Geylang is about 10 mins drive to the city and about 20 mins by bus or MRT.
The worst is yet to come, in Singapore, most renters have to sign a two year lease to get a better price and therefore we have to provide a two month rental bond. Add to this a month's rent in advance and the agent's commission (payable by tenant if rent is under $2500 a month) of a month and I've got to come up with a whopping SGD$10k before I move in! #($@#%!@#()*@! Bloody hell accommodation is expensive here but I'm still financially better off than when i was in Australia so you can guess how bad the taxes were over there.
I've tried to attach some photos from various websites online advertising other apartments in the same building. I'll take proper photos once my camera cable arrives in the container. Yes, I stupidly packed it.
Food experience - I was thirsty the other day so I headed to the drinks place in the food court. Guess what? They have sugar cane juice. It has been many, many, many years (more than 15?) since I last drank sugar cane juice. Tell you what, it's so refreshing and really sweet! (well duhhh!)
I've got trips to Manila and Bangalore coming up soon. Apparently there are volcano activity warnings near Manila so it should be interesting. I wonder if I can get a tour to go visit one of these active volcanoes? I read in the papers that a mini earthquake or tremor hit Melbourne last night. I think it was 2.6 on the Richter scale or something. The epicenter was not far from St Kilda.
It's holiday season here right now. Deepavali was last Saturday (Happy Deepavali to my Hindu friends) and Hari Raya (Happy Hari Raya to my Muslim friends) is tomorrow so this year's celebrations have been dubbed "Deeparaya". All flights to Malaysia are full, all buses are full and all rental cars are gone so it's a pretty big thing. I was hoping it might help reduce the PSI reading since there are less cars running around Singapore but it's only made a marginal difference.
I got bored over the weekend so I bought myself a Sony PSP. Man it's addictive and it's amazing what they can pack in a tiny little console like that nowadays. I just don't like the way Sony packages the thing. You can either get the basic console with just the battery and charger for $230 and nothing else, or you can get the PSP value pack which jacks the price up to $359 and it comes with a wrist strap, memory card and headphones. If you try to buy the memory card on it's own, it's going to cost you. Grr....
I still haven't got my laptop yet because of a stuff up at work so when I heard that the latest PSP had wireless capabilities, I was keen to give it a go. I've given up now. Because there is no keyboard and the console is not a touch sensitive screen, punching a simple URL like this blog takes so long my fingers cramp up and I need treatment for RSI! Guess I'll just have to wait for my laptop. One of my colleagues jumped for joy when he got his today. I asked him how long it took and he said two months! That's corporate efficiency for you.
Time to go...have a nice holiday for those of you in Malaysia and Singapore.
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