Soul Food

Another year, another feast. These are the books I consumed last year – some quite nutritious, others purely indulgent, but for the most part, all greatly enjoyed. I’ve already started on this year’s batch – more on those in the days ahead. But for now, a 2009 recap.

First, the nonfiction. All were great reads - the ones in bold are highly recommended.

90 Minutes in Heaven (Don Piper)
Musicophilia (Oliver Sacks)
Readings from the Ancient Near East (Arnold, Beyer)
The World’s Religions (Huston Smith)
Markings (Dag Hammarskjold)
The Human Brain Coloring Book (Diamond, Scheibel, Elson)
What’s So Great About Christianity? (Dinesh D’Souza)
The Path Between the Seas (David McCullough)
Why Religion Matters (Huston Smith)
Outliers (Malcolm Gladwell)
Here If You Need Me (Kate Brastrup)
The Art of Asking: Ask Better Questions, Get Better Answers (Terry J. Fadem)
What You Can Change and What You Can’t (Martin Seligman)
My God, Our God! (E. Joseph Steier)
What Jesus Meant (Gary Wills)
First, They Killed My Father (Loung Ung)
My Stroke of Insight (Jill Bolte Taylor)
On Gold Mountain (Lisa See)
I and Thou (Martin Buber)
Death: The Final Stage of Growth (Elizabeth Kubler-Ross)
The Color of Water (James McBride)

And fiction which I’ve categorized a bit further:

Favorites:
People of the Book (Geraldine Brooks)
Their Eyes were Watching God (Zora Neale Hurston)
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Stieg Larrson)
The Girl who Played with Fire (Stieg Larrson)
The Girl who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest (Stieg Larrson)
84 Charing Cross Road (Helene Hanff)
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society (Shaffer and Barrows)
44 Scotland Street (Alexander McCall Smith)
Espresso Tales (Alexander McCall Smith)
Love over Scotland (Alexander McCall Smith)
The Unbearable Lightness of Scones (Alexander McCall Smith)
The World According to Bertie (Alexander McCall Smith)
La’s Orchestra Saves the World (Alexander McCall Smith)
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
Firefly Lane (Kristin Hannah)
To Dance with the White Dog (Terry Kay)
The Household Guide to Dying (Debra Adelaide)
The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol

Entertaining:
In the Kitchen (Monica Ali)
Inspector Singh: Most Peculiar Malaysian Murder (Shamini Flint)
Inspector Singh: A Bali Conspiracy Most Foul (Shamini Flint)
We Are All Made of Glue (Marina Lewycka)
Simple Genuis (David Baldacci)
The Red Thread (Dawn Farnham)

Left me feeling ? What the heck was that?:
On Beauty (Zadie Smith)
The Accidental (Ali Smith)
Never Let Me Go (Kazuo Ishigero)
My Favourite Wife (Tony Parsons)
The Angel’s Game (Carlos Ruiz Zafon)

Pleasant surprises recommended by Charlie:
A Scandalous Man (Robin Ester)
One Day (David Nicholls)

If you’re a fan of Lamb (as I am – I Know This Much is True is one of my all-time favorites) – otherwise, you may not like either one:
The Hour I First Believed (Wally Lamb)
Wishin’ and Hopin’ (Wally Lamb)

Happy reading!!

Coming soon to a bookstore near you!

What a night! This past Friday, 6 November 2009, marked – to my surprise – the inaugural meeting of the Jennie Smith International Fan Club. Perched high atop the city at New Asia Bar, my dear friends, Lou Anne, Scott, Pilar and Frank – presented me with an official plaque, a charter, and ID badge. I even have an official seal!!

So, you say – what is this all about? Well, this summer I wrote a novel. Raiders of the Red Dot – all about mystery and intrigue in Singapore. Valuables buried away during WWII. Treasured objects snatched from Baghdad museums. Precious sacred writings traded to the highest bidder. So, in anticipation of the bestseller list, my friends were kind enough to boost my spirits and lend their support as I wade through the murky waters of publishing.

Stay posted – and get your orders in now!

Winging it

Last night at dinner at the American Club, there were two men sitting at a table behind Charlie and me, one of whom had a vocabulary comprised mostly of the f-bomb. And he didn’t speak in mild tones. At one point, I was tempted to go to the library, fetch a dictionary, and present it to him. “Sir, there are a variety of adjectives in here. Have a go at learning some new words to define your world.”

Then I started thinking – what if the words we say created a tangible aura around us? What would mine look and smell like? Yikes…maybe I don’t want to know.

Words, written or verbal, are vital to our existence. They are how we build relationships, get work done, create our world. But I know I often use them recklessly and unconsciously.

My friend, L., and I were talking yesterday about the common stereotypes in organizations about various departments – legal, H.R., finance, marketing. I realized how debilitating these preconceptions can be to team spirit – and, even when we think we’re encouraging teamwork, how easily innuendo can undermine unity. An accountant walks into the conference room and someone says “Ah, the bean counters are here.” Or comments are made like “the folks from legal are sure to slow us down.” Or “those marketing guys don’t have a clue about who really does the work around here.” These little digs, often disguised as humor, are like poisonous darts aimed right at the heart of the team.

Another word abuse to watch out for is the use of the term “girl” for almost any female co-worker. Would you call a male co-worker a “boy”? “Who’s that boy in engineering on the first floor?” I don’t think so, unless you are truly employing child labor. So what term is appropriate? I personally like “colleague”. It’s gender-neutral, professional, and respectful. Take it out for a test spin.

In the book of Samuel, the elder Eli mentors the young boy Samuel, instructing him to listen to God when he calls. Samuel does, and we are told that “the Lord was with Samuel as he grew up, and he let none of his words fall to the ground.” (I Samuel 3:19) When Samuel spoke, his words were true, purposeful, and sound.

F-bombs drop loudly, and bring no lasting return to the speaker nor reward to the hearer. But good words – words of integrity, honesty, and generosity – these words soar.

May your words have wings.

A careless word may kindle strife,
A cruel word may wreck a life,
A timely word may lessen stress,
A loving word may heal and bless.
-- Author Unknown

It takes a village

We set our alarm a little earlier so we could enjoy the hotel buffet a bit longer before our trek to two villages, first on land, then on water. Vy and our driver were waiting – with a 4-wheel drive. Our first stop was a rough ride down a dirt road to a small village. The town center was bustling with commerce. From there, we traveled by oxcart, or as Vy says - “Cambodian BMW” - further into the village where we visited a school.

Cambodia was colonized by the French, but gained independence in the 1950s under the rule of a prince who was eventually replaced by a democratic government. In 1975, the country was seized by the Khmer Rouge, a radical group with a vision of creating a perfect agrarian society with no Western influence. Before they were overthrown by the Vietnamese, the Khmer Rouge under the leadership of Pol Pot, killed one-fourth of the country’s population, almost 2 million people. The trial of one of the leaders is currently underway right now so check out CNN for more information. Also, the book “First They Killed My Father” by Loung Ung is a heart-wrenching story of one family’s experience. Amazingly, the Cambodian people are beautiful, generous, and welcoming – in spite of the horrors of their recent past. Or perhaps because of it. They seem to take special joy in simple things – food preparation, friendship, children, nature.

After a brief rest back at the hotel, we set off for the floating village. Many of the homes in Cambodia are elevated to accommodate rising waters during rainy season, but the floating village takes it one step further. It’s floating 24/7/365 – including the stores, schools, dogs, gas stations, even a pig farm.

Now for some shopping. What would we take home to remember this lovely country? The Khmer Rouge had been especially hostile to educated people, artists, doctors – urbanized people. Cambodian culture lost many of its teachers and artists during the genocide. Artisans Angkor is a special school that was established to train students in traditional arts, such as silk weaving and painting, lacquer, and stone carving. We had a short tour of the school and then visited the gift shop where we picked up a variety of items. After that, it was a stop at S. Khey Art Gallery where Kate purchased “Happy Monks.”

Then it was back to the hotel around 5 p.m. A very long day, we were hot and tired, but not too weary for a visit to the pool and a chat with Bun Von. We met another American couple there and shared tales of our adventures as the sun set on our last night in Cambodia. Back to Singapore tomorrow, but we hope our future holds a return to Siem Reap.

Village People

Temples, Temples, Temples

We stumbled to the breakfast buffet around 6:15 a.m. and quickly woke up – the food was too good to be ignored. Upstairs in the lobby a few minutes later, bellies happy, we met Kuy Vy, our guide from Sage Insights who was taking us on a tour of the temples.

We started out at Angkor Wat – a one-day pass for $20 got us into all of the temples in Siem Reap. We climbed up through the ruins and descended on the other side into the temple grounds. To our right, a group of three monkeys was having a morning chat, oblivious to passersby. They were only the first “wildlife” we would encounter that day.

Vy was expert at knowing his way around the temples – we went through Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom and La Prohm – the latter being the location for the Lara Croft Tomb Raider movies. I won’t try to recap all the history and culture of the temples – way too much, but there are lots of good websites. Just Google any of the temple names.

I’m more than a little squeamish over creepy, crawly things, yet the morning turned out to be full of them. Entering the first passageway, we noticed (what we thought was) a large spider on Vy’s back. We told him so. He said “a really big one?” To us, yes. He turned to look, shrugged, lifted it off his back and placed it gently on the wall where it scurried off.

Later, a lady walks by with a grasshopper on her arm – a grasshopper that might qualify for the Guinness Book of World Records. Kate hurried away from it, but for some reason, this lady decided Charlie should have this grasshopper on his shirt. She walks up and starts trying to deposit it onto him. He said “no, thanks.” Vy and I were watching this from a distance and he told me that many visitors respond like that. But locals are used to it; in fact, they see the insects as food when necessary. He explained – we are a poor country and we can’t be so particular about what eat.

Later, we arrived at La Prohm and I’m admiring the temple from a distance before we go inside when someone slapped me on the back. I turned to see who it was. A small Chinese lady said “sorry, but there was a huge bee on your back.” I screamed. Not because of her slap, that had only made me curious, although for a small person she delivered quite a smack. My scream was elicited by the mention of the bug which had just recently been touching me for pete’s sake. She was with a large group, and my scream brought down the house. They were laughing and pointing. In fact, most of the tourists turned to see what has causing all the commotion. When these things happen early like this, it’s nice. At least my odds of another embarrassing moment are slim and I can enjoy the remainder of the day a bit more secure that I won’t do something that makes me look like a total idiot for perhaps another 24 hours.

We stopped to take photos with the monks – Charlie stood between us at Vy’s instruction as the monks are not allowed to touch women. Then we went off to another great lunch and back to the hotel for the afternoon. We hung out at the pool with our friend, Bun Von, and talked to another tourist, a young Aussie girl who lived and worked in Vietnam and had come over for holiday.

In the evening, Vy arranged dinner for us at Kullen II, a dinner buffet and cultural show. Food was good, and the dancing was beautiful. We had fallen in love with Siem Reap and its people and were looking to more adventures the next day.

Temples

Off to Siem Reap

5:15 a.m. and we are headed to Changi for our flight to Siem Reap via Kuala Lumpur. But first a quick stop at the Amex counter to change our Sing dollars into USD – the currency of choice in Cambodia. The country does have its own monetary unit, the riel, but it has no value on any exchange. We later learned that there were no national banks until about 10 years ago. USD is king. One US dollar is the equivalent of 4,000 riel. Feeling rich with all these 1,000 riel notes – until we realized they’re worth a quarter! On the other hand, a dollar goes a long way in Siem Reap.

After a brief and unappetizing layover in KL, we arrived in Siem Reap around noon. Immigration was easy. All we needed was $20 bucks, an extra passport photo (add $2 if this is missing and they’ll scan the photo from your passport), a valid passport, and a short visa application form – handed it all to the first guy at a long counter. He instructs us to go to the far end. Then 13 – yes, I counted – fellows pass our documents along, supposedly checking something at each point, until it makes it to the last step in the 20-foot production line. This final inspector calls out our name, one at a time, we step forward, he eyeballs us, our photos, us, our photos – finally, he says okay, hands the documents back to us and points us to another check point. Here, after much more looking and stamping, we are in.

Our driver is waiting and whisks us off to Angkor Palace Resort and Spa – we’d found a great deal here through Expedia. It proved to be a good choice, very colonial. We spent the afternoon at the pool and spa – unbelievably great spa at low, low prices. We all three chose the aromatherapy massage, then Kate and I steamed ourselves silly before a final swim before dinner. We met Bun Von here, the bartender at the swim-up bar, a cheery Cambodian with great English who enjoyed chatting with us almost as much as we enjoyed getting to know him and to learn about his country. We talked about education, food, the world, travel. Having good language skills is a big plus in a place where tourism accounts for a major portion of the employment.

Dinner was on Pub Street and we arrived by tuk-tuk, an open-air cart attached to a motorcycle. It was $3.50 one-way. When we got into town, the driver wanted to take us back at the end of our evening. We said we didn’t know how long we would be and didn’t want to make him wait. He said no problem, and we did see the advantage of having someone to take us home who knew where we had come from. We offered to pay him for the first trip, but he refused. No, pay in full once he delivers us back to the hotel, he said. Okay, off we went.

Pub Street has an abundance of choices so we scouted about for a bit and finally decided on the Cambodian Soup Restaurant which had a good buzz about it. As we placed our order, the waiter became so tickled he could barely contain himself. What could be so funny? We soon found out. Although we had only ordered $28 worth of food, the servings were so large that our table was overflowing and, even with our prodigious eating skills, we were well beyond our depths to put a dent in the feast before us. The $6 pot of Cambodian soup was rich and herby – and large enough to feed a family of four. Add to that pineapple rice, curry, amok, veg, spring rolls – well, you get the picture. Absolutely delicious – like most of the Cambodian food we had. Very fresh, very spicy.

Sure enough, after dinner when we came around the corner to the agreed-upon meeting place, our driver, number 4565, was sitting there waiting, talking to another driver, and quickly jumped up, waving at us. Off we went, tuk-tukking along. Then it was to bed – our guide would be waiting in the lobby for us at 6:30 a.m. for our temple tour.

Siem Reap Photos

Day 1

We’ve just had a beautiful holiday! It started with Kate’s arrival around midnight on Saturday 14 March. On Sunday, our first stop was her favorite food court at Ngee Ann (knee-awn) City, one of the many gigantic malls along Orchard Road. There are dozens of stalls serving all kinds of food – Thai, Korean, Chinese, Vietnamese, Western. It is a feast for all the senses – sorry that pictures can only feed your vision! We sampled a few dishes, but simply ran out of room before we ran out of options. Eating is one of Singapore’s national sports; shopping is the other. After a few hours of such intense work, we were hungry again and headed to Fish and Co for gigantic servings of fish and chips. Then home early and to bed because on Monday we would be in the cab on the way to the airport by 5 a.m. Headed to Siem Reap. More on that next time.

Check out the photos here:

Day 1