School's in for Summer

So far the days we have spent at school have been staff only days, students start tomorrow. 2 of these days were for new staff. This year there are 40 new staff at the school, the most they have had in one year. This number is due to the usual staff turnover as well as an increase in numbers across the school. Teaching staff are given an initial 3 year contract, however the average stay time is 5 years. It is interesting starting at a school where everyone is also new to the country. In the 2 days for new staff we were not only learning about the school but about Singapore and how to function here.

The school is preschool to Year 12 and there are over 200 teaching staff and over 2500 students. Everything is on the one campus so it is huge! The school is divided into preschool (age 3 - 5), junior school (prep - grade 2), primary school (grade 3 - grade 5), middle school (grade 6 - Year 9) and senior school (Year 10 - Year 12). Each part of the school has its own main building, each building is 4 floors high. The school has very good facilities: pool, 2 gyms, theatre etc. The school runs the IB program but in Year 11 and 12 students can choose whether to do the NSW HSC or the IB diploma program.

Two thirds of the students have Australian citizenship, however many of them have never lived in Australia due to their parents working in different countries. The other third of the student population is made up of 40 different nationalities. Singaporean students are not allowed to attend international schools in Singapore except in circumstances where they have studied overseas.

The school has guards at the gate, they are there 24/7 so if you want to you can go in on the weekend. Up until 2 years ago the guards carried machine guns, not just at international schools but at all schools. Now the government believes the security situation in Singapore is pretty good so it is no longer necessary. Now they have armed patrols that turn up every now and again in armoured vans and swarm the school. This is more so they get to know every school just in case they are called upon. In our induction program they said not be alarmed if we see this!

The school day is 8:30am-3:15pm Monday to Friday. At local schools students go in the morning to early afternoon as well as in the evening. They also go on Saturdays. There is a lot of pressure placed on local students, they have an exam to go from primary school to high school. Yesterday we saw a group of Singaporean teenagers come into a McDonalds and start working on maths questions. I'm not sure how our students will compare.

Each staff member is required to run a co-curricular activity for 1 hour per week. I am running Irish dancing (assuming anyone enrols), and Jared is doing the International Mathematics Competition. The co-curricular activities are not compulsory for students but are very popular as there isn't that much offered for school age students outside of school in Singapore.

Tomorrow term one begins but in week 2 we have Chinese New Year, this means no school on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. Chinese New Year is definitely our favourite holiday!

Humidity

Humidity is a huge problem in Singapore, more of a problem than just making it hot and sticky. Humidity makes things damp and if left that way they will go mouldy. In apartments everything is vulnerable to this humidity, from kitchen cupboards to computers and TVs.

There are a few ways of dealing with humidity:

1.  Air conditioning
Air conditioners suck in humid air and blow out dry air so they are fairly effective dehumidifiers. The only problem with air conditioning is that it is very expensive if you run it all the time. At the moment we are only using the air conditioner at night in our bed room.

2.  'Thirsty Hippos'
This is one brand name for the small plastic containers that can be placed in cupboards and other confined spaces. They absorb moisture in the air and when they are full they need to be replaced. We have one of these in just about any space they will fit. They are effective, however only to a point. We had one in the bomb shelter but it was full in a week.

3.  Mechanical/chemical dehumidifiers
This is the modern answer to humidity. They are small electronic appliances they are plugged in and somehow absorb the moisture in the air. When they are full you simply empty the water container. The only problem is they are expensive (S$100 - S$200) and only cover a small room. Apparently they are quite effective so this may be the solution to the humid bomb shelter problem.

Renting in Singapore

We are lucky to be looked after so well by the school. One of the ways they look after new staff is by linking us all up with a real estate agent who helps us find rental accommodation. In Singapore the landlord has an agent and the tenant has an agent, this can be positive if you have a good agent like we do, but real estate agents are as potentially unreliable here as they are in Australia.

Before we arrived in Singapore the agent emailed us the details of a property that would become available when we arrived in January. After many emails back and forth we decided we would take it. Another difference in Singapore is you can negotiate the rent as well as anything you would like done to the property, such as new paint, new furniture etc. Most apartments in Singapore are fully furnished.

As we had only seen photos of our apartment we were a little nervous about what it would actually be like. We checked out of the hotel and took a taxi with all our luggage to the apartment to meet the agents (both ours and the landlords). It was pouring with rain and 5pm so we were really hoping it was all going to work out ok.

We were relieved when we walked in and it was exactly as the photos looked, even a little bigger in real life. The landlords showed us through and demonstrated how everything was working in order to write the condition report. It was interesting to see how our agent firmly requested different amendments to what was on the condition report. It was nice having a real estate agent looking out for us for a change!

We have had 2 nights in the apartment so far and so far we love it. It is furnished but today we went to IKEA (pronounced "eekea") to get a few extra things. Tomorrow the things we shipped are being delivered so then it will really feel like home.

A few interesting things:

• We have a bomb shelter, hopefully it will not be needed! It is a handy storage space though.
• It is common to have a maid live in your house. They are usually Filipino or Indonesian and are paid very poorly (about AUD$400), making them affordable to many people.
• Lots of buildings, ours included, have gas bottles instead of mains gas. Instead of buying your own gas bottle a man comes every couple of months and delivers new ones to all the apartments in the building and takes away the old ones.
• There is a notice on the resident notice board that says the management were made aware of a noisy game of mahjong that occurred recently. No signs of a repeat of this mahjong event so far.
• Singaporeans don't wear shoes inside.
• The Singaporean kids next door like to open their front door just a crack to spy on us when we are taking our shoes off outside our door.
• In Singapore you need to purchase a TV licence for SG$120 per year.
• Humidity is a huge problem and you need to put dehumidifying containers and sachets everywhere to stop things going mouldy. We will no longer be throwing out the small packets of silicon that come in packaged items.

In Singapore there are 3 main types of accommodation: landed properties, HDB and Condominiums.
Landed properties: basically a house with a garden.
HDB: these are built by and purchased from the government, sort of like government housing but people own them. They are tall apartment buildings. Most people live in HDB.
Condominiums: these are privately built and owned. There are apartment buildings with more facilities than HDB, such as have pools, tennis courts, security gates etc.

Housing is very expensive in Singapore, this is why most people live in HDB. Landed houses cost a minimum of SG$15000 per month to rent (about AUD$12000).

Our apartment is a condominium so it is a private building and has security gates and a pool.

Some more about our apartment:

• We have 2 bedrooms, each with ensuite.
• We are 2 minutes walk to one train station and 7 minutes walk to another one on a different line.
• There is a huge shopping centre that only opened in December only about a 5 minute walk away.
• We are a 10-15 minute walk to school, or a short bus ride.
• We have a rubbish chute in our kitchen, no more wheelie bins.

Getting a visa

We are in the process of getting our Employment Pass (working visa). This is a strange process as it can only be done once you are actually in Singapore, so currently we are on a tourist visa.

To get the Employment Pass you have a meeting at the Ministry of Manpower (nothing to do with Harry Potter or Jaime Durie) where you are fingerprinted and issued with a photo ID card. On top of this they randomly select people to have medical tests - Jared was one of these lucky people.

Yesterday the paperwork arrived for Jared's medical. He needed a HIV test, chest x-ray (for TB) and general check-up. We were anticipating this was going to take up most of our day. We hadn't made an appointment but as communicating on the phone is not always that easy in Singapore (we are not yet fluent in Singlish) we thought we would take our chance and head down to the medical centre.

Stading in front of an office building on Orchard road we were sure we must be in the wrong place, but sure enough on the 8th floor was a medical clinic. After only 20 minutes in the waiting room Jared was in with the doctor and only half an hour later he was done, check-up, blood test, x-ray and all. Talk about service!

Let's hope the Ministry of Manpower are this efficient. We will find out on Saturday.

Singapore Day 1

It was a relief to land in Singapore after a delay in Melbourne due to an engineering problem with a duct on our Qantas A380. It's not the sort of problem you want to hear about before getting on the plane, especially given the recent issues Qantas have had! Despite that, it was a pretty smooth flight and the food was surprisingly good.

When we arrived yesterday we were greeted at the airport by a man holding a "Taylor: Erin/Jared" sign, an exciting moment, and taken to our hotel. By the time we arrived it was midnight in Singapore, 3am in Melbourne, so we went straight to bed.

This morning we wandered down Orchard road. The weather isn't too humid today and is quite pleasant. Then we caught the MRT to see where our apartment is located. We don't get the keys until next Friday so we were just looking around the area. We were surprised at how close it is to 2 train lines. It is also very close to a huge shopping centre that only opened in December. The neighbourhood looks really nice, a mix of apartment buildings and houses that clearly only the rich could afford.

We had delicious dumplings for lunch at a restaurant voted one of the top 10 in the world by the New York Times.

We're now in Little India where we went searching for a game store Jared remembered visiting last time we were in Singapore. Unfortunately he found it - there goes our budget.

 It Things we learnt on day 1:
- We will always be seen as tourists in Singapore
- McDonalds serves breakfast until midday on weekends
- Everything is cheaper than in Australia
- All mobile phone plans (even the cheapest ones) come with 12GB of data
- They sell jumpers
- There are lots of Japanese stores (yay!)
- You don't hear much English for an English speaking country

On Thursday we have our first day of school, which is an induction for new staff, so we have a few more days of exploring ahead before that.

We will post some photos soon.

Now back to the hotel for a swim!

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Bags are packed, boarding passes are printed and goodbyes are said. Shortly we will be on our way to the airport. It's hard to believe that at midnight tonight (Melbourne time) we will be in Singapore begining our new adventure.

We will use this blog to keep you updated on our life in Singapore and our many planned holidays abroad.

Thanks for reading!