Arriving in Chicago

So I’ve decided to do a series on how I’ve adapted to life in gigantic America since leaving the tiny Island of Singapore. They will only be as detailed as my foggy memory will allow but hopefully still entertaining.

To start off, here’s a picture of me back in March of 2005 as a FOP (Fresh Off the Plane) in search of great teaching at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. The top three things that come to mind in adjusting to my new life in Chicago are:

1. The cold
2. Explaining why I speak English “so well” and …
3. Feeling like I’d gone backwards in time.

The cold. When I first got to Chicago I was constantly converting the giant Fahrenheit figures on Yahoo Weather to more reasonable Centigrade numbers so I would know I wasn’t imagining things when my fingers went numb. Going from 80-90F weather everyday of my life (except on holidays away from home) to 30-40F temperatures was no joke. I’ve since learnt to layer like crazy while avoiding too much static shock. And while I LOVE the snow, I still hate the cold. Ah, impossible wants!

My proficiency in the English Language. The first thing Americans would say to me (and still do) when they heard I was from Singapore was, “Wow! You speak such good English!”

Ugh!

A common misconception among people who don’t know a thing about Singapore is that we’re a homogenous nation of Chinese ethnics and therefore have some relation to China and by extension speak mainly Mandarin. To set the record straight, we’re in Southeast Asia, quite a distance from China and our national language is actually MALAY. That’s pronounced more like “mer-lay,” not at all like “may-lay.” The historical reason for that is, way back when Singapore was only a little fishing village, the natives were…Malay! (Also, we used to be a part of Malaysia) Anyway, our official languages are English, Mandarin, Tamil and Malay (the last three to represent the major races in Singapore, the first is thanks to our ex-colonial masters, the British).

At School, English is our first language and everything is taught in English. All my friends and I speak it at home, to each other and basically all the time. Of course, that’s only half the story and I’ll have to elaborate another time. But for now, don’t be surprised if you meet a Singaporean and they can speak “proper” English and say “cute” things like “lift” instead of “elevator.”

I’ll continue my third point in my next post. So stay tuned folks!