Marrow Through a Straw

Dec. 28

OK. After a good night’s drunken sleep at the Dragon Court, I am back at the Porcelain, freshly showered and sitting on the bed to use the computer.

My feet are even better today, and I didn’t even attend a religious service of any kind yesterday. I just drank lots of beer.

I worked at the Porcelain in the afternoon yesterday, and Joanna went out for a walk in the neighborhood. Larry was coming to meet us at the Dragon Court around 4.

About 3:30, Joanna and I were so hungry, not having eaten anything since the congee at breakfast, that we went to the Szechuan restaurant on the first floor and sat on the terrace.

We were polishing off a dish of pork kidney with fungus, bamboo shoots, and some really sharp ginger when Larry showed up.

We stopped at a purported backpacker bar near the hotel. It was filled with people who apparently are regulars and not a backpacker in sight. In fact, everybody seemed a little perplexed that strangers were coming through the door.

Karaoke is the big thing there, it seems, and it was cranked up. Nobody was performing, but they had recorded a few amateurs. I really don’t know what Justin Bieber sounds like, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have an Asian accent. If I remember right, Andy Gibb doesn’t have a Mandarin accent or a high, nasal voice.

We put down a couple of short Tigers and moved on.

We cabbed to Little India and went to another backpacker bar that Larry had visited once before and where they greeted him like a regular.

The music wasn’t as loud, and maybe some of the other people in the place were indeed backpackers. I could have asked: “Hey, did you get here in a backpack?” but decided that was too intrusive a question to ask of an utter stranger.

They had a lager on tap and an ale called Speight’s, so Larry and I tried each one and got into our unending discussion of high-alcohol top-fermented altbiers (Harry’s preference) and the crisp Pilsners that Larry favors. I find Pilsners OK now and then, and they always are good breakfast beers. But usually if I am craving the crisp, sharp flavor that Larry describes, I am going to bypass lager and Pilsner and go all the way to an India pale ale, sharply carbonated and fully loaded with hops. Hooray.

I forget how may years ago we started this debate.

From the backpacker bar, we took another cab through what we were told is a much-subdued Little India. Singapore’s first riot in 40 years occurred in the neighborhood a couple of weeks ago.

An Indian guest laborer was hit and killed by a bus. Other laborers rioted. They burned several vehicles. The police had the situation under control in about an hour. Several dozen workers are being deported and a smaller number are facing charges that could lead to jail time or being hit with a stick.

The riot took place on a Sunday, when the streets are usually full of migrant workers, because it’s their one day off. According to the cab driver, sale of alcohol has been curbed since the riot and there are restrictions against drinking it in parks and on the street. Even though the streets were full of people spilling over from the sidewalks, it was nothing like a usual Sunday night, he said.

This ride took us to the Newton food hawker center. The place is bigger, more open, and busier than the Maxwell Road center near our hotel. Also unlike the Maxwell Road center, you place an order at a stall, and they will deliver it to your table.

A guy met us as we were coming in and led us to a vacant table conveniently near his stall. He showed us the dishes he was delivering each time he passed our table.

We ordered some food from him--mustard greens, cockles in the shell, and rice.

Larry had brought us here especially for one dish. The plate arrived with lamb shanks in indelible red gravy. Very sloppy but also very tasty. You sip the marrow out of the bone with a straw. Rich and delicious.

Beer also showed up in big bottles.

Another distinction of the Newton center is the men’s room. I noticed that it is an official “Happy Toilet,” a designation granted by the Singapore Health Department or some such agency. I think it means that the facilities passed inspection with high marks.

We stopped at another open-air bar to kill a pitcher of Carlsberg. At the far end of the place, a rat lives under the slates of the walk. It would pop out from time to time to scavenge crumbs and then would duck into a crevice to disappear. I may have come under the spell of the Buddhists, I fear, because that rat was just the cutest thing, sort of like watching a squirrel or a cat.  Another interesting glimpse was of two motorcycles going by on Geylang Road. The bikes and the drivers too were covered in neon. Kind of a relative mix of flamboyance and traffic safety.

I also remember the strange glitter of light in the beer glass as I tilted it. It seemed so profound and thought-provoking. That always means time to go home.

Joanna and I were back at Maxwell Road for breakfast on Monday for more strong coffee. Well, I was there for coffee.

I believe the stuff may not need a cup to stand. It is so thick it puts a black ring around the spoon. We got some fresh papaya and pineapple and some Western-style muffins to go with it. Joanna doesn’t drink caffeine, so she had a glass of sugar cane juice. They squeeze the cane in a machine while you wait.

(I think there’s a video on the blog of one of those machines squeezing cane. It was in Macao in October 2012, posted in November.)

Today’s photo is Harry drinking 23-(or is it 24?)herb tea. Joanna caught me during one of our visits to the kwai leng guo shop. If I keep this up, I could be healthy some day. Or at least bright-eyed.

Be well, all, and eat your porridge.