David gets Married!

Another one (of us) was consciously coupled this weekend when I flew out to Albany for my college roommate's wedding! It was an amazing reunion, not just with my college roommates, but with everyone I went to college with! It kind of felt like I was going to a dressier house party from my undergraduate days in Ann Arbor! (Better booze, classier setting, but still same people. Can I do this every weekend? Next time in Detroit though.)

In college I lived in a house with five girls and one guy- and our guy roommate is the first of us to get married! (I would post an old college photo of all of us but nobody needs to see that.) Not all of us could make it to the wedding, but the rest of us grabbed a picture with the groom at the wedding. He and his wife are fabulous and we had a great time celebrating them. 

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Our Malibu Memorial Day

Surprise! We are in California again! It's not a shock this state is so crowded because it's so BEAUTIFUL!

My boyfriend surprised me with a spur of the moment trip out west. It was a total blast driving from Phoenix- you get a glimpse of desert, go up through the mountains, get a peek into Mexico (or at least at the line), and slowly things get greener and more lush as you get to the coast, going past vast fields of fruits and veggies in a rainbow of colors and cute farm stands (of course I made him stop).

We did make one major pit stop on the way- we stopped at Joshua Tree National Park, but it was a last minute detour, mostly out of curiosity, so I cannot remark too much on the park. It was mostly a "hey, can we use this as an excuse for a quick hike to get out of the car for awhile?" kind of stop.

We stopped and did a quick mile hike in Joshua Tree. It was hot- at least in the upper 90s! But the hike there was different from the other hikes we'd done in Sedona. Different Cacti, different rock formations, different desert to see. The park was a little crowded because of the holiday weekend, but, that's what they're there for, right?

This is not a Joshua Tree. But it is me surviving a very hot hike, which is also impressive.

When we finally made it to the beach (we actually stayed in Marina Del Rey), our room wasn't ready so we got upgraded to a little house suite!

The next afternoon we snuck off to a couple beaches- El Matador & The Leo Carillo State Beach. El Matador was incredibly crowded but had some beautiful rocks and cliffs. Apparently it's one of the most popular beaches in the area. Add that to the fact that it was a holiday weekend and we couldn't be too upset that it was so difficult to find a place to put down out towels.

After awhile we grabbed some snacks and went over to the Leo Carillo beach. It was a lot quieter, full of families and had tide pools by the rocky shore where we snooped around for crabs and starfish. It made for a pleasant afternoon.

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Headed Home

After the wedding of the century, it's time to head home! It was extra tough to leave this time (because I'm finally not jetlagged or heatsick unlike Thailand) because Singapore may be one of the most beautiful places I've ever visited. I want to say it's like a scenic, tropical New York, but somehow that doesn't even do it justice because this is so different. I definitely need to come back.

These orchids at the Changhi Airport were (a) completely real, and (b) actually bigger than the palm of my hand. Singapore is like a city tucked into a fragrant garden, with flowers cascading everywhere.

We flew back through Hong Kong, then another long haul 13 hour plane ride to the east coast, then a quick night in a hotel, then back to Detroit for me. I'll miss you Singapore, but I bet I'll be back.

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Vivian gets Married!

Have you ever had one of those moments or days where you look around and think "I need to record every second of this"? Well, today was one of those days! I wish I could could replay it in my head again and again- and I wasn't even the one getting married!

After our morning sightseeing, getting rained on, and transferring hotels, we really had to hustle to check into out next hotel to get dressed and ready. I was super excited to wear my dress because I had looked EVERYWHERE for something appropriate for this wedding and was excited for this dress to see the light of day! It was a purple neoprene number from Marciano- hopefully I'll have a chance to pull this out again sometime because I love it!

So why did we really fly ALL THIS WAY? Our college roommate Vivian was getting married!

Me and the bride! Us at 21 in a club in Ann Arbor, clubbing as undergrads! We look like such babies right? I had no idea my life would still change so much! (And I'm sure it still will!)

Us now pushing 30 at her wedding at the Cappella Hotel on the Sentosa Island in Singapore, possibly one of the most beautiful places on earth. She had two wedding dresses! I died at how beautiful her wedding was and how amazing she looked.

College reunion- this was the crew from Michigan with the Bride & Groom!

Ok, so I'm completely weirded out because when I looked at this picture later I was so surprised to see four women who look so put together and...adult? It literally took my breath away to see how great everyone looks and realize all the work that has brought us here. From clubbing in Ann Arbor, to graduate school, to building careers, to dating here and there, visiting each other at our starter apartments, one of the best parts of growing up is seeing your friends grow up too.

Us dancing away at the end of the night. Was the dress shopping, passport renewal, visa research, hotel and itinerary planning, 15 hour flight, jet lag, airport running, and constant hangover worth it? YES OF COURSE YES

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A Floral Fantasy

Upon arrival at the Marina Sands, we had this amazing view from the hotel of the bay and all the ships coming in. We had a view of these beautiful garden attractions with a bunch of spaceship looking things and big clam shell greenhouses.

Since we spent most of our free day before at the pool (no regrets), we decided to spend the morning before the wedding doing an attraction. Man, our day was busy! Julia had to wake up insanely early (3am!) and take a taxi to the wedding venue to get ready for her bridesmaid duties.

We got up, packed bags, checked out, and grabbed some Starbucks for a taste of home, and headed off to the spaceship trees to stop and smell the orchids. (We are in Singapore, after all.)

(Hey, they got a lot closer with my name than most US places!)

It looks some kind of jungle out of a movie, except everything is controlled chaos. Beautifully manicured chaos. The spaceship-looking towers are actually some kind of hydration system for the park.

Gardens by the Bay is a conservatory under several domes that contains acres and acres of greenery and amazing flowers. It takes quite a while to get through. You should be prepared for a LOT of walking! (We were not.)

As we were leaving to go back to the Marina Sands to grab luggage and head to our next hotel it poured down rain and we got absolutely soaked! We even bought rain ponchos for the walk but they did nothing to stop the downpour we got caught in on the way back to the hotel. I actually think I got soaked down to my underwear and ruined my shoes, I got so wet (notice I posted no pictures of that to spare everyone).

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Mermaids, Marina Sands, and Merlions, Oh My!

We originally had plans to absorb all the local culture, check out the Singapore Museum and Gardens by the Bay (eventually we did make it there!). But when we got to our hotel for the night, the famous Marina Bay Sands (We had to splurge on a fancy room for at least one night) we COULD NOT RESIST checking out the famed sky pool.

This is not the best photo, but it looks like a boat perched on top of three buildings. The pool is on top!

It did not disappoint. Once we made it up there and settled in with our contraband booze smuggled in from duty free, we had to camp out all day.  (Alcohol is obviously very expensive at the hotel, but it's incredibly very expensive in Singapore in general.) We ordered lunch and just generally pretended we were movie stars. Splurging on a room here, is totally worth it just to use the pool.

 The little round buildings in the background are built to look like Durian, Singapore's national fruit! (The buildings are concert venues.) Sadly we didn't get a chance to try any Durian when we were traveling! (Maybe next time!) In the airport on the way back I was prohibited from buying dried Durian (I thought it might make a good gift) because Durian is actually banned in the United States. (You have to get your passport scanned when buying duty free and that's when I had to trade out the Durian for some Mangosteen!) The fruit is supposed to be really sweet but has a terrible, distinctive fart smell that is apparently still pungent when it's dried and packaged.

Also we met a MERMAID! (I think she was a performer promoting a show, similar to a Las Vegas performer) If this flight wasn't so long I would be coming back to Singapore much more often.

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Bachelorette Fête at the Four Seasons

We had to hit the ground running! We got to our hotel, ran out to grab some lunch with a friend at a cafeteria (because real estate is at such a premium in Singapore, a lot of shopping and restaurants are in multi-story malls). No drive thrus here!

Then we all ran back home and got dressed for the Bachelorette party! It was dinner and drinks at a restaurant in the Four Seasons Singapore.

Singapore is...shall we say, a more polite place? So us American girls making the trip knew we needed to spice up the Bachelorette party! We packed a literal bachelorette party into our suitcases for the bride and patiently hauled it all the way from NYC (in my case, Detroit). Everyone was pretty surprised when we pulled out our gifts!

 One gift that was not impressive to some was this giant inflatable penis we brought! (Although all of us girls loved it!) We actually took it to a fancy bar afterward and the bar refused to let us bring it in! They made us check the penis with their coat check like it was a coat, can you believe it? They gave us a ticket for it and everything!

"Excuse me, Ma'am I'm here to claim that penis over there!"

It was absolutely absurd, but it happened.

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Singapore, We have Arrived!

We are officially in Singapore! After a brief flight from Phuket on what I would call "the Spirit Airlines of Asia," an Airline called Scoot Air, we are officially here and ready for the wedding (Unless it's really really cheap I would not recommend it- or just pack your own food and drink in your bag, like Spirit Air in the US! Lesson learned!)

We came here ready to PARTY! So we stopped in duty free to pick up some provisions for the bachelorette party and for relaxing by the hotel pool (we may have gotten carried away and yes we did buy all of this!). We spent so long shopping in duty free after immigration that our luggage was in unclaimed, thank god we were able to find it or else our trip would have gone downhill fast!

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Phuket Night Market

After taking the last taxi from the big Buddha back to old Phuket and eating some questionable seafood, we had a chance to wander around the city night market.

They had anything you could imagine for sale- clothes, hair extensions, services, and plenty of counterfeit luxury goods. It's so prevalent in Asia that I'm definitely going to think twice whenever I see a fancy purse anymore! (I guess I don't need to save up for one anymore!) We bought some snacks and wandered around, thankful that we could finally be outside without sweating to death.

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Paradise in the Phi Phi Islands

When we got to our hotel in Thailand we immediately went down to the front desk and made friends with the clerk working there. He pulled out a pile of brochures and gave us a bunch of great suggestions- pineapple and tea plantations, zoos, elephant sanctuary, temples, just about anything you can imagine.

And as much as we love pineapples and tea, we really couldn't pass up paradise! So we booked a boat cruise for some snorkeling, sightseeing, and instagram photoshoots galore!

We saw monkeys and plenty of other wildlife...

Spent the day on a chartered boat cruising through what looked like a movie set...

And kept ourselves hydrated all day long! Our boat crew made cure everyone drank lots of water throughout the day because it was HOT! (Upper 90s...Not the kind of weather to get really drunk- more like a happy buzz.) We even made friends with our boat buddies. It was a great way to spend a day!

For the low, low price of 1500 baht (which is about $50 each), we spent the day snorkeling, drinking, and boating around the Phi Phi islands. We went to Maya Bay, Monkey Beach, and some of the lesser Phi Phi Islands. It was a blissfully exhausting day!

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Phuket: Wat Chalong & Big Buddha

After breakfast we got ready and flagged down a taxi outside the hotel. Breakfast didn't cut it so we went back into town for some Burger King (hey, a girls' gotta eat). We decided to take in some local culture so we picked a temple about an hour away for our adventure. We stopped at a stall and picked up a big grocery bag of longan fruit (similar to lychee) to eat on the way. I'd never eaten them before; they were like hairy, fleshy grapes with a small pit inside. (Don't eat the pit or the hairy part ;))

After lunch Julia flagged down a crazy disco taxi with with big speakers, lights, and an open back to take us on our temple jaunt. The driver was ready to party so he played some Thai club music to entertain us while we worked our way through our longans and slowly sweated through our clothes in the 98 degree sun.

First we went to the Wat Chaiyathararam Buddhist Temple (common name is Wat Chalong). It's the largest temple in Phuket, so it was crowded with Thai worshipers and tourists like us. 

There are a handful of customs that go along with visiting a temple: taking shoes off before entering the temple, cover your shoulders and wear a skirt or pants that extend all the ways to the knees, and don't touch any relics. Well...I was aware of the modesty thing, but when it's almost 100 degrees outside, there was no way I could stand to wear pants or a long skirt- I opted to wear a cotton shift dress. The other girls were even more naked than me wearing cute two piece sets. 

Thankfully on the way into the temple, there was a line of stalls selling offerings and clothing and we bought some large wrap shawls to cover up. A sweet old lady sold us all matching ones and showed us how to wrap our shawls. It's tough being modest in this weather.

Somehow it was hotter inside the temple than outside in the sun! We had to slip off our shoes before entering the marble sanctuary, and the marble was so hot it felt like walking on a fireball. Inside the sanctuary it was like an oven, trapping all of the incense smoke and candles. It was very beautiful, full of gold and marble, depicting Buddha and the monks who've cared for the temple. Admittedly, it was difficult for me to fully appreciate it's beauty, because I was busy sweating out every pore of my body- I even had sweat running down my legs and was worried I'd wet my pants. I like warm weather, but this is truly extreme.

Outside they were also selling flowers, frogs, snakes, and small fish to use as offerings inside. I'm thankful to report I didn't see any snakes slithering around, or else I would have been OUT of there, beautiful or not!

There were about four different sanctuaries at the temple, and when we walked into the biggest one, there was a docent there that took one look at our outfits and handed all three of us these long pink skirts to cover up- the PINK SKIRTS OF SHAME. They were basically pink polyester trash bags that immediately created a sweaty greenhouse gas effect and sped up our tours. 

We hightailed it to the closest water stand, then hopped a taxi to our next destination- "Phraphutthamingmongkhol-akenagakhiri," or the big brass Buddha. It's a big statue on top of a mountain about 150 feet tall. Its up in the hills, and the Buddha statue sat on top so he could see Phuket, Patong, and the islands around. We had a beautiful view from the top:

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