May is here! 6 weeks left!

Let’s talk about this past week, and then I’ll tell you some random updates. This past weekend my roommates and I hosted a little “American night” with the Americans from our cohort. Quick shoutout to them because I love my cohort (the entire group) but our little American group has a lot of history now and it feels like family. We did a “pot luck” so everyone brought food, and we sat in my tiny tiny “living room” and crammed together to play card games. I love doing simple things like that so it definitely filled my cup!! On Sunday, it apparently was international jazz day, so my friends and I went to an outdoor concert at the Botanical Gardens.

Us on the hill!

The venue

Moving into the school week, Monday was pretty normal, but Tuesday got more interesting. I had my Data Science class, a 1 hour call with my client, and then 3 hours of my Asian Cultures and Societies class. A monk came in and taught us all about Buddhism and led us through a meditation- MEDITATING IS COOL. After that class was over, one of our old professors decided to take us out for drinks (he was one of my favorites and taught us Ebusiness). The class was only taught to my cohort (34 of us) so we had a blast and got to see a new area!

Low quality pic for a high quality night with everyone

On Wednesday we had no class, so we did a pool day and bummed around some of Clarke Quay for “girls night” and then went to the movies. Moving onto today, I apparently was feeling very productive. I started my day off with my lovely consulting group and we spent a solid three hours together doing a brain dump and writing every part of our project out. We have 5 weeks left to consult our hearts out, so we made a game plan on a huge whiteboard, and it was really satisfying to have the whole picture down after a lot of time spent researching content and making slides. One thing that I love (this goes for the whole semester) is that I always eat lunch with my friends. It's so simple but there’s always at least one person who wants food at the same time, so we either eat at school together or walk over to a nearby hawker center (Singapore food court). Today was no different, so I got lunch with two people in my consulting group. Normally we aren't in a rush, so there’s a lot of time spent just talking about everything and catching up on life (as if we don't spend every day together).

Once I got home I was feeling motivated (definitely because of my intense runner friends) and I decided to go for a longer run (I ended up doing 6 miles!!). I felt really good and researched upcoming races here, and I made a decision to sign up for a half marathon at the end of May. Very spontaneous of me so hopefully I don’t regret that. :) I have been working out a good bit here, so I convinced myself that after a couple long runs I would be in enough shape do one (I ran one half marathon before high school but that was a long time ago). I think it’ll be fun and I convinced at least one of my friends to sign up with me, and running a half marathon at 4 am through Singapore would be a cool thing to do.

My motivated face

I am in a very “you only live once” type of mindset recently and I’d highly recommend it. I’ve been realizing that I have less than a year left with my people here, so I’ve been being intentional, trying to plan things, and reaching out as much as I can. Pro tip- if you decide to study abroad, limit the time you spend alone in your room as. much. as. possible. You’ll never regret it, but you will regret wasting hours away not making memories. I definitely like being in my room and taking naps, and sometimes I need days to just be alone and recharge, but I try to not make a habit of it. I am a lot happier when I am out and doing stuff. The issue with this though, is that I end up spending more money when I’m out (normally on food or just activities that cost money). There’s a tough balance when you’re abroad because you don’t want to miss out, but sadly money DOES exist, so sometimes you have to miss out on plans. Everyone goes through it and has to budget. But my whole cohort has agreed that with Singapore being the most expensive city in the world (or one of the top), we’ve all spent more than we thought we would at this point. It happens, but I'm trying to be a little more cheap with food and cutting in places that I can. It’s so fun adulting. 

Speaking of food, I wanted to share some meals that I’ve been fixated on recently. They’re super easy but I'll list my ingredients anyways :) Cooking for one person is only as fun as you make it. 

• Greek chicken bowls- Rice, your favorite dressing, cucumbers, tomatoes, chicken (season however), feta, a whole onion 

• Salmon/”poke” dinner- Frozen salmon, (salt, pepper, garlic, lemon, honey), rice, steamed broccoli (rice cooker with a steamer has saved our lives), avocado 

• Chicken pesto pasta- Chicken breast, pasta, pesto sauce, spinach, broccoli or tomatoes 

• Taco bowl- Ground beef, canned beans, salsa, canned corn, tomatoes, avocado, lettuce, chopped onion, cilantro- I buy tortilla chips and scoop the bowl out

So, coming up for May and things that I will be doing, there’s a lot going on. May will probably be my busiest month here which is exciting!! I have three exams this month (one next Friday that I need to study for) and I will go on two trips this month. The first trip will be to the Philippines, and the second will be to Tioman island with a big group of my cohort. There’s also a lot of hangouts/plans already, and we will have to mostly be done with our consulting projects by the end of the month too. On top of that, I will only get four weeks home after Singapore and before Brazil which means we need to finish our Visa process now. It’s so much fun to be an American, in Singapore, going to the Brazilian embassy to get my Brazil student visa (that takes months of back and forth mailing, FBI fingerprint checks, and about 13 pages that need to be printed of every piece of information about me and my parents). It really has kept life interesting here, but at least we are all in the same boat, so we’re going through it together. I also need to book my ticket to Brazil and decide on my housing there.

This coming weekend, Singapore’s national stadium is hosting a huge international rugby tournament, so I’m thinking about getting tickets. Also, Singapore is hosting a LIV golf tournament on Saturday and Sunday- the guys in my cohort have brought these to my attention, so maybe I’ll look into going! I’ll update my decision in my next blog. Also, in my next blog I want to talk about some funny or interesting things that I’ve learned about Singapore. It’ll be pretty random but it should be fun to dump things that I’ve noticed here (I’ve kept a notes list)!

Thank YOU for reading - hope you are doing great!! 

Love, <3

Brigitte