all good things must end - part 1

so the trip is over and i am already back in the groove of things....things i can relate and make me feel at home...even when they get a little crazy sometimes.....singapore is too organized...too nice...too impersonal...too much red chillies in everything and i wish they had muslim showers running cold water to take care of their aftermath

told my boss that my hotel room sucked (yes, the one with the view of the beach obscured by palm trees that i posted earlier) and he agreed that i switch to a hotel closer to the office as well as the city centre...the better spots for shopping and food....and the obligatory walk to orchard road which i have not missed during any of my visits...this road is the main shopping street although malls dot the whole landscape....

maybe i have posted earlier too...that orchard road has one of the largest music stores...the HMV and i just lose track of time when i go there...they have three separate floors and sound proof rooms for jazz and classical...talk about multiple orgasms...yeah yeah yeah...men cannot have them but we can fake one too.....

then my credit card is rejected for a small amount and i felt so embarrased....the thing is that my hotel bills are settled by my company but when i checked into the hotel...yes the crappy one which took three days to change a broken phoneset, they took an impression of the credit card and blocked an amount equal to the room rent + incidental costs...

so these freaks blocked USD1500 which choked my card and had not released my card from credit hold even 2 days even after check out.....then i find that what tipped the scales against me was the new hotel, which blocked USD600 for two days

i ask them why would they block an amount twice the room rent...and they say for incidental and minibars...now as much as i would have a drink ten times its street price and check out all the porno movies they had in their stocks, i would still be short of USD600.

i tell them that hotel stay has been prepaid.....but they "have a poolicy not to unblock till the guest checks out"....sometimes i think these singaporeans really do not know their collective asses from holes all over the singapore streets...

i called standard chartered visa in karachi was useless...they "would not take my verbal instructions to release the hold"...then i let it go...if this "maturer singapore market' could not show basic customer service, how can i blame this christian fellow working the night shift in karachi...all he did was point out the problem...which was more than what the singaporeans could do.....

got CDs by the pretenders, the cure, james taylor, nina simone for myself and phil collins for my son....i did find two albums by cake and plenty of incubus but i forgot which albums to go for...so the one reader of my blog...let me have the recommendation before my upcoming trip...

i would have loved to say this but it is too soon for comfort....i will be going back in a couple of weeks for more than 3 weeks and i am dreading the trip already.....

now the CDs i bought....chrisie hynde of the pretenders is awesome...i remember the one trip when i moved from one cold-gloomy midwest 'teenage wasteland' to another gloomy city upstate NY city...the whole trip i had the pretenders playing on my car stereo...very surreal...

(to be continued)