Singapore Changi Edition
Changi Airport, Singapore - 1 September, 2017
Where I’m At: September, 2017 – Singapore Changi edition
Where I’m At: September, 2017 – Singapore Changi edition. A monthly update of what I’ve been up to, site news, and where I’m going next.
Greetings from Singapore! I’m at Changi Airport, AKA the best airport in the world. I have a month of travels coming up and I have a few hours here in between flights. To see where I most likely am at follow me on Instagram.
Where I’ve Been
Saigon
I started the month in Saigon, and it has been a deliberate month of staying still to work. I have three big trips planned for the next three months, so the downtime is welcome. This is the most travel I’ve had planned since before my back injury last year. I both happy to be on the road again, and cautious of the amount of travel.
Having spent so much time in Saigon I realised that I should add more travel resources to the site. I will be expanding the travel guide to the point where it will become a sub-category in itself. With that in mind, I looked at the things to do in Saigon list and realised that I haven’t been to most of the museums here. I’ve started visiting all the places I haven’t been to, such as The HCMC Fine Art Museum. It’s only a small collection of work, but the value is in being able to wander around the old mansions of a former Chinese merchant family.
Travel books I’ve read
Cruising Attitude: Tales of Crashpads, Crew Drama, and Crazy Passengers at 35,000 Feet
Cruising Attitude is a memoir by Heather Poole about her life as a flight attendant. I’ve been following her on Facebook for years so it was good to get the backstory on how she started out in this career. It’s a physically demanding job, you are only paid for flying time, and you are on call to work at a moments notice. Poole not only shares great stories, but also explains the behind the scenes of flying. This should be a compulsory read for frequent fliers, if only to get a better understanding of the life of the people who are part of your flying experience.
For more reading ideas visit the best travel books list.
Travel Reads
In Singapore, Chinese Dialects Revive After Decades of Restrictions
“Singapore’s language scene was once “a linguistic tropical rain forest,” chaotic but vibrant. Then came a campaign to limit speech to just English and Mandarin. Now, dialects are coming back.”
Turning buses into art in Pakistan
“Mohammed Rafiq has been painting Pakistan’s colourful buses for 40 years, but there’s a dark side to the industry.”
In Melbourne in 2006 there was a public art project that decorated a tram like a Karachi bus. I have been curious to see them ever since.
My week in Lucky House: the horror of Hong Kong's coffin homes
“Benjamin Haas joins the retirees, working poor, drug addicts and convicted criminals who live crammed into the city’s tiny plywood cubicles.”
I will never complain about staying at the Chungking Mansions again.
The decline of the Western tourist
“…the picture we get of global travel from glossy magazines - of mostly white Westerners experiencing "exotic” locales - fails to capture the biggest story in travel over the last decade: the rising tide of international travelers from the emerging world. The rise of “the rest” is now a travel story, too - and a potentially transformative one.“
Megacities Save $505 Million When They Put Their Trees to Work
“Leafy infrastructure saves bustling metropolises about $505 million each year, according to new research.”
Work Abroad / Location Independence
A currency designed for digital nomads
“Last week, an Estonian named Kaspar Korjus posted a speculative proposal online. Mr Korjus, who manages the e-residency programme at the agency responsible for attracting inward investment to Estonia, asked what would happen if the country were to become the first sovereign state to issue its own cryptocurrency.”
Amy Lyons, 24yo star of Chinese social media, takes stock of 'quirky' career path
“China’s internet celebrities, known as Wang Hongs, are cashing in on their growing social media influence. Australian student Amy Lyons is one of them.”
NapLab
“Bangkok’s latest co-working space wants you to sleep on the job. NapLab is the project of Awaken Design Studio, which has converted eerie old university dorms into a bright-lit space that’s equal parts work, play and rest.”
I usually take a siesta in my workday, so this work space appeals to me.
The Saigon One Tower has stood as an incomplete shell since 2012, with bad debt and mismanagement halting its completion. This month the tower was seized from the developer, so the saga of Saigon’s ghost tower continues.