FAMILY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's Monday and I'm exhausted!!!!! My brother arrived just past midnight on Friday morning and we've been going strong all weekend. When Doug came off the plane and through customs I started to cry...it was so nice to see him. I'm honored he has come to spend some time with me. When we got to my apartment we were just talking and talking and talking and talking and suddenly we realized it was 4:00am. Oh my goodness!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So we went to bed. I believe Doug was sound asleep before I even left the living room where he is sleeping and entered the bedroom. We had decided to get up at 8:30...that's only 4.5 hours of sleep!!!


Friday I took him around Singapore showing him how to use the MRT (train) and the bus, as well as just seeing some sights. I loved listening to his wonder at everything. I'm sure I was like that, but I was saying the things, not listening to someone say them!



Saturday we ventured to another country...Malaysia. It's just over a bridge, so to speak. It's sort of like leaving Iowa and going over the bridge to Nebraska on I-80...only you have to go through immigration to exit Singapore and then go through immigration to enter Malaysia. The process at Singapore went very smoothly for me, but Doug had a big hiccup in that he didn't have a form with him that they had given him in Singapore when he got off the plane there. It was quite a fiasco for him, but about 15 minutes after they "detained him" (see his blog for his rendition) he was with me again....he felt as though it was 3.5 hours!!! We jumped on a bus and ended up at the Immigration for Malaysia. Singapore's immigration was well organized and had AIR CON...Malaysia, not so much!!!!! It was hot, a bit smelly (was that me, Doug or someone else...oh, probably all of us!) and the air was stifling. When we finally got through immigration we were in Malaysia and realized we forgot to find out how the currency exchange was...so, even though we knew how to get Ringget (or as Doug called it...Ringlet) by going to the ATM, we didn't know if we were getting out $10 USD or $1,000 USD. It was very odd that neither of us thought of this...especially Mr. Research Douglas! Anyway, we just started walking, not knowing where we were going. We found Malaysia not as clean as Singapore...by a long shot. We found an ATM and I withdrew $100 RINGGET. We walked a bit more and found ourselves at a mall....in we went for the AIR CON. We instantly bought some water and walked around a bit. I found a great gift for Zac (can't tell you what it is because then it wouldn't be a surprise to him) and Doug found a few things. Suddenly we realized we were very hungry. We spotted a Pizza Hut and went in. We looked over the menu and knew we had enough Ringget to purchase lunch without going to find an ATM again. We ordered pizza and a pitcher of PEPSI (ahhhhh). I got on my Blackberry and looked up the currency conversion and started laughing...all most uncontrollable...the $100 Ringget was only $27 USD. Geez...here I thought I probably had withdrawn a few hundred USD!!!!! Then I got laughing to think all we had purchased in the mall and lunch and still had cash left over. I think it was the heat that made me laugh so much!!! Sure Deb!!!! Then we got laughing at how cheap the pitcher of Pepsi was...it was like $5 Ringget which made the Pepsi like $1.35 USD for an entire pitcher of Pepsi. I'm not sure I've ever enjoyed Pepsi as much!!! We then went off to another mall for a bit and then started back to the "border" so to speak. It went much smoother going "home" since Doug had the proper form. We were tired, but we sure had a good experience. I couldn't believe it when Doug said later that he was ready to go back because some things were so inexpensive once we learned the conversion rate!!!!

I told Doug I needed to do some "normal" things on Sunday and have some rest. We got up, after sleeping in a bit, and off we went to the grocery store. It's expensive here, and I've gotten use to it...but when Doug saw the prices I thought he was going to faint. He kept picking things up and saying "in Denver this only costs...." Once, in the whole market, I remember him saying "that's so cheap"....Nutella is very inexpensive here compared to Denver! In the afternoon we went to purchase an umbrella for Doug before heading to Little India. We got the umbrella and within 2 blocks it was raining! Fabulous that we had the umbrella. We jumped on a bus to get to the MRT station and I realized we had jumped on one that wasn't going to the next MRT station...but since we were in no hurry and it's was raining very hard, we just rode the bus around a bit. It was fun...I love the adventure in it!!! We ended up getting off at a mall...that's funny because everywhere has a mall!!!! We ate lunch and then hopped on the MRT to Little India. It was an experience...the people...they came from all over...and there were more than on the busiest day at the Iowa State Fair...truly, way more than at the Iowa State Fair!!!! By the time we were done doing some shopping and getting through all the people back to the MRT station we were exhausted...we hobbled home, plopped our butts on the couch and sat. Hmmm...need supper....too tired to go out....so we had french fries. Yep, that was Sunday night supper for us!!!! We were tired!!!

So, I promise to put some more pictures on the blog soon....there is so much excitement having Doug here and finding time seemed to be non-existent this weekend, but I'll do it soon!!!