The Sojourner

Yorick, sorry it took so long to reply, time differences etc. Haggis is a sheep stomach's filled with offal, oatmeal and onion and a few other ingredients. It tastes far better than it sounds, but like asian dishes its best not to ask too many questions. Personally I love asian food, although I have only been to Thailand. After trying various local dishes, despite being warned they were very hot, I thought I would seek out a true local restaurant that catered to the locals, in order to try the real thing. After enjoying a fantastic soup, served in a fresh coconut, I had beef with chilli. This turned out to be mainly chilli, as I had about 20 of the smallest and hottest chillies available on my plate alone. Unfortunately, I only realized what they wefe after 1 mouthful. I had thought they were red pepper or tomatoe. Never for one minute did I think any human was capable of eating a dish quite that hot. I soon learnt not to jump to conclusions and after drinking both my lager and my girlfriend's, along with a large jug of water, I beat a hasty and embarresed retreat. Still, I still enjoy other Thai dishes especially the chicken and lemon grass with (milder) green chillie.

If you travel to Mexico, I can recommend the chicken wrapped in banana but avoid the one in chocolate sauce, a bit too unusual to say the least. English cuisine is far more mundane and will prove dissapointing after French cuisine. Moiraine, if your reading this, I think you should introduce him to l'escargot and gruillon(?). Not sure if they are spelt correctly but I think you can guess.

Finally, don't be too adventurous in your diet as you are meeting old friends for the first time and you do want to create the right 'atmosphere'

[Moiraine]

Hi SuulBombYinn,

Escargot you spelled OK, but I can't think of anything like 'gruillon' ???

My husband is the cook of your couple (you DON'T want to eat anything cooked by me, I assure you , I guess I should buy this Orkish cook book in Charlie's shop ), so he will choose what to cook for Hugh ... I will choose the cheeses however ...

[Lord of Alcohol]

Stealth, your quite correct about not asking too many questions. In the Phillipines (Olongapo City) I ate many meals from the street vendors. Tasted very good but I think I ate a monkey. If you dont ask, you dont barf! Didnt work when I lived in China though. Tentacles are hard to hide!

[Charlie]

Hi Yorick.

Don't go looking for that pub (Donut) up North mate.... It's in London.
Enjoy yourself and enjoy life my friend.

[Cloudbringer]

Yorick, All that traveling sounds wonderful. New places, people, food. Well, the food part is sounding less and less palatable to this unadventurous diner, but the rest sounds great!
Whereabouts are you now?

[Yorick]

Still in Singapore/Temasek/Shonan-to/Singapura, somehow I got roped into singing a few gigs here. Last night I sung for a large business dinner put on by this very large church here (13 000 members). The speaker was a brilliant black American named Dr. A.R. Bernard. A wizard of words who if he sung would sound like Marvin Gaye (great voice).

I'm going to take a hike (by car, it's just a saying) into a bit of the Malayan peninsular today. Hopefully I'll see a bit of jungle but the jungle won't see me. (I don't want to meet a tiger) I won't go too far though because I've got a smaller pub gig with some of my new friends tonight.

I went into the expat part of town last night - I've been staying in a Chinese area - and up to an Australian mates apartment that was total 'Blade Runner'. 21st floor, a view to die for and a rent that'd kill you. Funny thing was, this dinner was the first western meal I had since being here, and the only time I got the runs..... very odd.

Thanks for the well wishes guys! It feels like I'm taking a bit of home with me when I log in.
Draconia you guessed right. I'm a muso, make my living either session singing (mercanary vocalist for recordings/commercials etc) or by producing/engineering independent albums for smaller artists. I have a few records of my own but if I lived off them I would be starving Moiraine probably has the biggest collection of some of my stuff on MP3 so if you want to hear some and she's cool drop her an email request as I can't send any at the moment

I made sure I caught up with the history of the place over the last few days. Normally as I love history, I have some sort of knowledge a place I'm in - as it inspired a reason to visit in the first place. With Singapore I was unnervingly ignorant, so have asked LOTS of questions, gone to a museum, watched a small historical film, and read a bit and now feel like I have a bit more of an understanding not only of the history, but also as a result, the 'collective psychology'.

It's a fascinating place. Like a trade based city state of old. A sometimes futuristic meeting point for travellers and businesses. It feels very 'hublike' in the scheme of things.

Well I'm off,

A bientot for now

[Moiraine]

OK, I've got the trick !

Everyone interested by Yorick's songs, please give me your mail address here, and I'll send you some, split in two parts.

You can download a tool allowing to join the two parts together here : http://www.ordix.com/mpack/index.htm

(I'll send you a short user guide along with the mail).

Please, don't be too many too ask, because I have one of two solutions :

- either I send you the songs from work, and if I send too many of these, it will get noticed
- or I send you the songs from home, and as I have only 40 H of Internet conexion per month ...

[Moiraine]

Suul-Yinn-Stealth-Bomber,

I sent you a Yorick song, please tell me if all is OK !

[The X]

Its a good thing for you to hike in Malaysia(Mt Ophir perhaps..?)since there's nothing much left for you back here in Singapore(almost no forest or jungle). There's buildings all around you!!!The only tiger you gonna see will be the one in the Zoological Garden.Have you perhaps been to one of the islands around Singapore? Pulau Ubin will be a great place for you to be one with nature and Sentosa Island will grant you a treat with all its fascinating sites and the cool beaches(The beach volleyball, the babes and oh yeah, the bikinis!!!).

Wow Yorick, you sound like a very busy guy. How fun it must be to be able to go to different parts of the world. I would love to be able to travel but with 3 kids, I hate to drive to the grocery store. What you do sounds like so much fun and alot of work. I would love to hear your music. I will definitely ask Moiraine, that is if she doesn't mind. Have fun in your travels and I wish you the best of luck.