HAha Sophia, I like your "America is not the easiest place in life in." Well, there indeed is a lot of crap. Singapore is still too much being taken for granted. Well, to be fair, there are things about Singapore which is(to be honest) not too ideal. I still think there are too many rules in Singapore and too hard for things to get done and too little spontaneity in Singapore. But I don't see the amount of struggle people go through here in America in Singapore. The poor is visibly poor. It is a society which for all its talk about freedom and equality, is drastically unequal. And sometimes their talk of individuality becomes an excuse for self-centredness. And this self-centered view covers everything from personal ambitions, to corporate ethics, to views on relationship and friendship. I don't know. I hate sounding so negative, but the truth is, it is a place where it is hard to see people at their best. Well, to be quite fair, I have only lived here a year and a half, plus I have only been in San Francisco this whole time. But the place strikes me as a very unspiritual place. A city for all its beauty, and quirks is blend and profane. I don't mean this in an insulting way. If anything my comment stems from a disappointment.

Some time ago, I decided that the characteristics of a city lies in its architectures, the layout, the sounds, sights, smell and sounds and the experience of space. Being in a city, living in a certain city, we are accustomed to seeing things from a certain perspective, angle, being used to certain aesthetic sense of experiencing space. When I was in Hong Kong the experience of the city jumps out at you. It is the pace of the movements of things--people,, cars, trains, information, words, graphics, colours. Everthing jumps at you. The city speeds along on various levels. Height becomes something people are accustomed to. Their highways are built on steep mountainous slopes. On a bus, one looks down to see from a great height several layers of highway traffic. Here, the city is often flat. I am always close to the ground. A certain dimension is missing. Sometimes, I feel that this flat way of experiencing space is echoed by the way people sometimes are single-minded and simplistic. It is not that they lack intelligence, it is that like the city, people here sometimes lack the ability to see otherwise , there are so many angles to look at things and they tend to get stuck on one. Their angle from where-ever they are standing. The inability to see otherwise fustrate me. The city is divided into various parallel lines which intersect one another. We are constantly walking on a grid. Corners are sharp. everything makes one think of squares. Because of the parallel streets, the squares and the corners. It is very hard to see buildings from several different angles. Usually, we are used to seeing buildings from a certain angle. (UNless someone wants to explore on purpose) if not certain views of buildings remain hidden). I miss spaces around buildings for me to wander around and explore. Here everything is stuck side to side.

San Francisco lacks spirituality. I miss the churches, temples, mosque I use to see on a bus or train ride in Singapore. BUt it is not that san Francisco does not have religous architectures, but it is the spaces surrounding the architectures do not promote spirituality. There is no pause on the landscape for thought or reflection. I did not understand the beauty of the HDB void deck until I got here. The Void deck , the corridors in HDB are actually more beautiful than we know. that space. A whole level of nothing. A pause, in the morning on our way to work. A pause, in the evening when we are back from work. A pause, at midnight when I loss sleep and need air. I have decided that is what I miss most--pauses in landscapes/cityscapes. In a way, this is also the characteristic of people here--forever on the run to do something. Sometimes we all need a pause. A fullstop at the end of the sentence can be quite refreshing. A second for thoughts. To sink in. to form. to burst. to distract.