October 11 - Eating Crab with Your Hands is Hard!

Day 2 of work is here, and I still don't have a computer.  The replacement hard drive did arrive, so now I have to wait for that to be installed.  Since I didn't have a computer, I walked around most of the day meeting people.  We have around 500 people in our Singapore office and plant, so there are plenty of people to meet. 

I went to the cafeteria for lunch today.  There are 2 options:  Chinese Food, or Muslim Food.  I was told neither are good, but the Muslim is better.... so I got the Muslim.  I wasn't sure what anything was, so I just started pointing to things.  The plate started off with white rice (thank goodness!!), and I think I had spinach and possibly tofu on the side.  It was pretty good, and the best part was being able to eat with a fork and knife.  The people here mainly use chopsticks, but if they use utensils, then they use a fork and spoon.  They use the fork to "shovel" and the spoon to cut and eat with.  There are still no napkins in sight, and I have now noticed most people bring their own "travel tissue" and use that as napkins.

The SSO Singapore team (7 people) took me out for dinner for crab to Long Beach.  Singapore is known for it's chili crab, so they wanted to take me to one of the better places in Singapore to get chili crab.  One person did all of the ordering, and all the food was shared.  The first dish was cracked pepper crab.  It is served like a full crab, and you just grab it with your hands, and start pulling it apart. It was extremely messy, but really good!  They gave me the claw, because that is the best piece.  Everyone told me I did a good job getting most of the meat out, and all I could think of was "Thank goodness for my dad making us eat chicken legs until there was no meat  left on the bone!"  The second dish was clams (I think) served open in the shell.  This was very interesting, and the texture was especially strange.  The next was a whole fish, head, tail, spine and all.  One of my coworkers ate the meat behind the eye because "that's where the best flavor is."  The next dish that was served was the chili crab.  It was served as a whole crab, and you eat with your fingers. It was pretty spicy, but very good.  The last dish was breaded prawns, which were amazing. 

I forgot to comment on the drinks we had..... 3 people ordered coconut milk, and it was served in a real coconut.  The rest of us ordered a pitcher of beer.  1 beer in Singapore is about S$15, so I can not imagine how much a pitcher of beer cost. 

It was a good day, and an intersting meal!  Lots of new things to try here!