Tuesday night the four of us from U of O decided we'd had enough of $3.00 chinese dinners and decided to go out. We went to Boat Quay (pronounced "key"), which is a string of restaurants just across the Singapore River from the Asian Civilizations Museum of last weekend. It was early, and a week night, so the place was pretty empty. We were targets. Wait staff accosted us, demanding we read menus, admire fish tanks, and look at shiny food pictures while promising free drinks and steep discounts. I would have crumbled immediately and followed the first shouting man, but thankfully I wasn't in charge. When a place was chosen, a careful game began in which we tried not to get ripped off by the very polite waiter. This was the playing field:
Round 0: Drinks on the house - points for everyone.
Round 1: Appetizers
Our team was handicapped: we hadn't practiced together, we didn't all know we were playing, and we were hungry. Yong Su scored a point for us with an order of 6 grilled prawns, in butter. They were delicious, little legs and all.
Round 2: Main dishes
All dishes came in sizes small through large. Individual or family style? Let's share. How many? What size? Do you like fish? Who wants what? I don't care. You decide. I want vegetables. No spicy. What? We were swimming in unanswered questions. The waiter sensed his advantage and struck. This was the resulting meal:
Broccoli in butter: $22. Point for the waiter.
Grilled Grouper fish, in butter and garlic: $48.
We also wanted rice. Seafood fried rice?, suggested the helpful waiter. I said yes; Justin asked how much. Twenty-two dollars? We'll have white. Point for us.
White rice: priceless.
It was time to calculate the bill:
$2.50 x 6 = $15 for prawns
$22 for broccoli
$48 for fish
10% tip
=$93.50
-30% discount
Divide 4 ways
Convert to USD
The final cost was US$10 a person. It felt like we were getting ripped off, and we probably were, but by those standards eating in the US is a terrible deal, all the time. A couple hundred meals like this and I'll pay for my plane ticket.
The next day a slightly modified group of us had no class, so we went to Sentosa, the island beach resort located 200 m into the South China Sea from Singapore. It was probably the best Wednesday during the school year I've ever had. Pictures and story to come, but here's a hint: really big spider.
Coming up, this weekend Matt H. and myself will join 20 other exchange students and a brave NUS staff person to go camping in Malaysia, at Mt. Panti. Here's a satellite picture of roughly where we'll be:
View Larger Map
That's the island of Singapore at the bottom of the map. Use the "+" and "-" buttons to zoom in and out. You can click and drag on the map to pan around.
It's forecasted to be rainy, humid, and hot. I'm going to walk around in a rain forest! I'm so excited!
3 comments:
WOW! That camping trip sounds very neat and I am jealous of all the food you get to eat for so cheap. Since I was hiking so much, I got to feast every day on an obscene amount of food and it was the most satisfying month of my life. On our last night we tried to use up all our food and ate blueberry pancakes followed by quesadillas and then two boxes of mac 'n' cheese and I was sooo happy. Now I am back, and I am very happy to be here but I have to start eating spinach salads instead of beef ribs again. Can't wait to read your blog, talk to you soon!
mmmmm...that prawn was delicious! I love crustaceans.
you are getting matt to try new foods! Good. Now make him eat tofu!!!
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