Last Saturday afternoon Alan Soong, a friend of mine in Singapore, took Westley Field and myself on a tour around Kampong Glam and Arab Street [Gallery]. During the afternoon, as the heat increased, after all, Singapore is only about 1.5 degrees north of the equator, we decided that a cool dessert was in order.

We took an air-conditioned taxi to Liang Seah Street, between North Bridge Road and Beach Road. Alan led us to a classy little establishment. It was called “Remember Me”. [I had forgotten the name as I was writing this post and coincidentally Alan has just come on via Skype to plan some future workshops at NTU. He reminded me of the name of the eatery. How could I possibly forget?]

We three sat down at a table. We perused the menu and we ordered our rather exotic dishes. We consumed a variety of desserts. I had a red bean dessert. Yum.

Then Alan pointed out this dessert called Hashimi which included lizard saliva as an ingredient. Westley wondered what process was involved in securing saliva from a lizard. I kept envisioning the skinks and blue-tongue lizards that inhabit our garden. Of course there are larger “lizards” like Malayan Water Monitors (Varanus Salvator ~ don’t ask me why I remember that) or even the Komodo Dragons with their bacteria laced saliva.

Anyway, I ordered a bowl. It arrived on the table. The dish had a lid.

I carefully took the lid off the dish.

It looked quite fine. There were these wispy, ghostly remnants in the jelly. Was that the saliva?

Anyway, I ate the whole lot.

It was rather tasty. I enjoyed the dish. I will not be looking for lizards in our garden to milk them of their saliva. The proof is in the pudding.

Last week at the conclusion of the workshops at NTU I climbed into a taxi and made my way to Suntec City in the heart of Singapore. I headed down to the basement and to McDonald’s. Yes, McDonalds. That is where members of the Macintosh Evangelists at Nanyang gathered. [I had attempted to add a hyperlink to the acronym, Me@n, but the post editor would not let me.]

The old hands share some sage advice

It was a great evening. Thoroughly enjoyed it. I even consumed a cheeseburger and some chips (French Fries). We talked about everything under the sun. Politics, publishing, pricing, food, travels, countries, life and Macs, among other topics. I met some new members and caught up with some old members. I think I was the oldest member there, in terms of age, not membership. There were a variety of Macs present, a few cameras and a pair of B&O earphones that I had received from Singapore Airlines as a gift

The jury listen intently

Now, I think, the following tasteful people attended the meetup: Puay Ann, Ivor, Laurence, Kenneth, John (sg), Choon Chai, Kian Chai, Hanx, Yezdi, Colin, Kevin, Hamish, Julian, Jermyn, Marcus, Benson, John Larkin and Siva. I hope I did not make a mistake with the names on the gallery. Please correct me if I am wrong.

There are also galleries of the event created by Laurence and Kenneth. I have created galleries of earlier meetups:| April 12th, 2005 | April 13th, 2004 | November 9th, 2002 |

I look forward to the next one in July! Will you be there?

During the last couple of trips to Singapore I have managed to photograph a few places I had visited while I lived in Singapore and as a result a few before & after opportunities have presented themselves. Singapore is constantly changing, constantly.

Sometimes the past is preserved. At other times the past disappears.  Let me share three simple examples.

1. The corner of Club Street and Ann Siang Road

Before

Visit site: The Pasir Ris Mercury

After

Visit gallery.

2. Kampong Glam

Before

Visit gallery.

After

Visit gallery.

3. Sultan Gate ~ Abandoned property

Before

Visit gallery.

After

Visit gallery.

During the last couple of days I have sorted through photographs taken during my last two trips to Singapore in February and April of this year. I still have a few photographs to organise. I have created a number of new galleries and added them to the galleries of my main web site.

April 2008 ~ Singapore

Kampong Glam and Arab Street with Alan and Westley.
Workshop at Singapore Airlines Training Centre.
Hwa Chong Institution Workshop and Presentation.
Macintosh Meet-up with the team from Me@n.
Nanyang Technological University ~ Read-Write Web Workshops and Presentation.

February 2008 ~ Singapore

Friends and Food ~ eating out with Tom Reeves, Westley Field, Siva, Airani, Anand, Vivien and Sheryl.
Good To Great 2008 Teaching and Learning Seminar, Nanyang Technological University.
Hougang Primary School.
Hougang Primary School Podcasting Workshops.
Chinatown.
Views of Singapore from the Peninsular Hotel. Day and night.
Changi International Airport ~ The new T3 Terminal.
First flights on the Singapore Airlines Airbus A380.

There were a number of other catch-ups with friends and culinary delights that I am going to blog about specifically in the near future, so please stay posted.

Well, I would like to thank several people and two organisations. First of all I would like to thank Evan Hamilton and Jen Anderberg at Flock. They have worked tirelessly to assist myself to allow Flock to blog posts to my self-hosted wordpress blog. Evan and Jen, you are beautiful!

With their guidance it was figured out that one of my files needed tweaking. We verified the permissions on the xmlrpc.php were correct and determined that we needed to ensure that the host would allow requests to that file.

I contacted the support at my host, ICDSoft, and they confirmed that I needed to modify the mod-security rule on that file. I needed to add some code to my .htaccess file in the root directory. I did so and here I am blogging from within the Flock browser. Excellent.

Thanks Evan, Jen at Flock and the team at ICDSoft!

I finally purchased Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds’ latest album, Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! It has been out since March. I was waiting until I knew I could sit down and simply listen. Here I am sat, next to the cat, alone and free of disturbance. Tracks on the album remind me of the Mercy Seat, Tupelo and songs from Abattoir Blues. Some of the tracks simply rock while others stroll languidly along with a sideways glance across the street if you follow.

I admire Nick Cave. He is an independent beast with a considerable intellect. His lecture series on the Secret Life of the Love Song provide insights for students and songsmiths alike.

Other albums I recommend by Cave if you wish to give him a listen include The Boatman Calls, Nocturama, The Lyre of Orpheus and No More Shall We Part. A couple of my favourite tracks include Into My Arms, Breathless and Red Right Hand.

Links:

Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds
Nick Cave Online
Bad-Seed.org 
Wikipedia entry: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds

Photograph by Lilith Delilah.  Adelaide, 2007. Some rights reserved.
—————-
Now playing, and dedicated to Clay Burell: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - We Call Upon The Author
via FoxyTunes

Friday saw my last workshop for this current excursion up to Singapore. It has been a busy week with workshops and presentations on each of the five days. The last workshop which was conducted in the School of Computer Engineering multimedia lab #3 at NTU covered blogs, wikis and podcasts. The tools we explored included Wordpress, PBWiki, Audacity and Propaganda.

It was a hectic workshop as problems with Wordpress slowed us down during the first half of the day. Why is the Wordpress server so slow I ask? The PBWiki and podcast publishing functioned at lightning speeds given the 100mbps broadband connection in the lab. Wordpress was sluggish. Pathetically slow. I switched across to Blogger at one point and its server was fast. No more Wordpress workshops for me in future.

Participants from Nanyang Technological University, the National Institute of Education, Tan Tock Seng Hospital, Singapore Polytechnic and Marsiling Secondary School attended the workshop. It was an eclectic group of participants.

During the course of the week I had two loyal participants that attended nearly all my workshops at NTU this week… Ms Teo Juin Ee, a teaching fellow of the Curriculum, Teaching and Learning Academic Group at the National Institute of Education attended three of my sessions. As well, Mr Chang Boon Hai, Chief Information Officer at Singapore Polytechnic and Director of the Department of Computer & Information Systems at Singapore Polytechnic attended four of my sessions during the week. I feel honoured and also proud to share with educators of the calibre of Juin Ee and Boon Hai.

Mr Chang Boon Hai and myself

Ms Teo Juin Ee and myself

 The workshop moved along gradually during the day as I juggled with the temperamental Wordpress server and a stomach-ache caused by a mix of Yakult and a roti-prata with curry combination. Please avoid the combination at all costs. It was as if I had a miniature volcanic experiment within my stomach. I am sure the rumblings within set off some seismic equipment within the Asia-Pacific region.

[You may note I am becoming reluctant to utilise the term Web 2.0. I think its currency is about to expire. I prefer to utilise the terminology read-write web. It seems to be a more appropriate descriptor. There is already a Classroom 3.0 Ning group. I just joined. Goodness gracious me. ]

During the course of this week in Singapore I have experienced some rather impressive thunderstorms and downpours. I captured a few of the moments on my trusty little camera while walking around Nanyang Technological University where I have been conducting a series of workshops and a presentation.

The rain is pelting down

The drains are pushed to the max

Drenching rains and running drains

Last Thursday afternoon, after taking a taxi ride from the Singapore Airlines Training Centre to Bukit Timah Road, Singapore, I conducted a presentation and workshop at the Hwa Chong Institution in Singapore. The Hwa Chong Institution is a centre of learning excellence that evolved from a merger between the prestigious Chinese High School and the equally famous Hwa Chong Junior College. I felt quite honoured to receive an invitation from Jasmine Tey to conduct the workshop. We had met following my presentation at Nanyang Technological University last February.

Jasmine Tey, centre, and some of her colleagues following the workshop

I covered such points as the evolution of the read~write web and the fact that the Internet allows for participation. We are no longer consumers but producers. We are no longer simply passengers along for the ride on the Internet. We are now guides and even drivers.

During the workshop…

We had a hands-on session with Wordpress and we looked at a few other tools such as Twitter and del.icio.us. As I have blogged elsewhere, I am not too impressed with some of the new design aspects of the Wordpress look and feel, the slow Wordpress host server and the fact that javascript is no longer welcome.

A teacher and his students preparing for an event

Following the workshop I took the opportunity to photograph some of the activities around the Institution. It is an amazing campus. Inspiring in fact. Jasmine and the team at Hwa Chong Institution took great care of me during the afternoon. They were all excellent hosts and I felt most welcome. It was a most valuable experience to visit and present at the Institution.

Students hard at work in their own time following school

Practising for a comedy sketch

Honour rolls and the school vision statement

Last Thursday  morning I conducted a two hour presentation~workshop at the Singapore Airlines Training Centre, the home of the world famous Singapore Girl where the newly recruited attendants are trained. When I had worked at ICUS eLearning I had led the design for some eLearning materials for Singapore Airlines. The online courses had covered areas such as ticketing procedures and cargo handling.

Staff of the SIA Training Centre

I worked with Line Yeo, an instructional designer and senior officer with Singapore Airlines, during the development of the online courses. I first met Lina following a presentation I gave to a post-graduate class of Masters’ students in Instructional Design at the National Institute of Education, Singapore, back in July 1999. She was a member of the class which was taught by Dr Cheung Wing Sum. Wing had also taught me at the University of Wollongong during my own Masters’ Degree in 1994.

Staff of the SIA Training Centre

Lina caught my presenatation at NTU last February and asked if I could repeat the presentation for her colleagues at the SIA Training Centre. I adapted the presentation and materials to focus on the corporate sector. The presentation considered how SIA could deploy social networking tools within its various divisions and scattered international offices to develop collaborative communities. We also looked at how other airlines, such as SouthWest Airlines are using tools such as blogs and even Twitter to reach out to its customers.

Staff of the SIA Training Centre

Following the presentation I had a chat with staff and shared stories of my times in Singapore and experiences on their aircraft. I quite enjoyed the chat and it certainly raised some very sentimental and nostalgic moments for myself. I have lost count of the number of times I have flown with SIA. I am most fortunate indeed. We then retired to the canteen for morning tea. Trainees and staff were present and I grabbed the chance to take some photographs.

Relaxing in the canteen

The training centre’s canteen ~ note how the food stalls deploy SIA’s trademark font

Newly recruited SIA flight attendants ~ future Singapore Girls

Flight engineers relaxing in the canteen

The wonderful staff at Singapore Airlines, in particular Khee Boon, Linda, Catherine and also Lina, took excellent care of me during the visit. I really felt quite at home there. Everyone was courteous, friendly and very helpful.