iwannagohome

iwannagohome is the name of a store here in Singapore that is in just about every mall we go past and I hate it. Because that is exactly how I feel and it is just a reminder to me that this place is literally as far away from home as I could possibly get without leaving the planet.

Singapore is a beautiful country with so much to offer.  Just this past week we visited the zoo (best zoo I have ever been to), the botanical gardens (gorgeous), and the National Museum of Singapore and we have barely scratched the surface on the list of things-to-do here.  People are nice, the city is clean and relatively easy to get around, everyone speaks English, and I feel safe here (as opposed to the panicked, hold-on-to-your-purse feeling I have in most American cities). So why exactly do iwannagohome so badly? I don't really know, I guess it's not rational, but I can't help the way I feel.

I think a lot of it has to do with being pregnant:

I have had terrible insomnia this pregnancy.  As in, I don't sleep more than a couple interrupted hours per night without drugging myself, which I don't like to do considering the baby. But after a few days of virtually no sleep, I really have no choice if I want to be able to function.  Exhaustion definitely isn't helping me to enjoy our new home or embrace new adventures!

Nausea has made eating here a challenge.  I do not do well with Asian food when I am pregnant (learned that the hard way when I was pregnant with Q) and I am not a big fan of not knowing exactly what is in my food and I have no idea what mystery concoctions much of the local food is made of. Sam on the other hand gobbles the stuff up. But every time I decide to try something local, I take maybe two bites and then end up wasting the rest (and eating half of Q's happy meal as dinner instead- yea, healthy...). Unfortunately it is more expensive to buy groceries and cook yourself than it is to eat out, and though you can find many typical American ingredients, many of them do not taste the same at all. So, the majority of my time and energy here goes towards trying to find acceptable meal options and figuring out how to take public transportation to get to them.

Aside from my pregnancy-related issues there are a few other things I am pining for:

I miss my car. Public transportation wouldn't be too bad if you didn't have to lug a stroller, diaper bag, and baby around with you everywhere.  I probably fold and unfold the stroller about a million times a day to carry it up stairs and into cabs/buses/subways. I definitely don't know why anyone would choose to continue living in a city like this with young children!

I miss our washer and dryer.  I am very grateful that we have a washer/dryer in our apartment, but it holds probably 1/3 of what our washer/dryer does at home does and it takes probably 3x longer. This is especially fun considering we use cloth diapers... At home we wash diapers about every 5 days and they all fit in 1 load.  Here I can only do about half of our diapers at one time and they come out dripping wet so they take forever to dry.

I miss my dogs.  I miss B and W so much it literally hurts! There is nothing that I want more when I am not feeling well (which is pretty much everyday) than to cuddle up with my sweet pups.  They can always put a smile on my face.  Q saw a Boston Terrier out in town the other day and though he knew it wasn't B, he threw a screaming tantrum when we carried him away from the dog :-(

Well, this list could go on and on, but I should stop before it sounds like I'm complaining too much (probably too late for that...). Basically, I am trying to have a good attitude, but iwannagohome.