Happy Goats!

Happy Chinese New Year and welcome to the Year of the Goat! There are lots of goats in Chinatown, but the ones with the beards are clearly in charge.

There are also lots of coins, which makes Barry think he's Super Mario.

The Money God also gets in on the action. He brings wealth, here in the form of the badly needed Singapore $20 bill!

The thing to do is to pose with your horoscope animal.

You also read your horoscope. Barry's, shown here, suggests you should all help him not to get conceited. Also, Googling his suitable emblem of "Carps of Victory" provides good gift ideas.

Snacks were on hand. While I was at first concerned by CupCorn Chipmunk's manicure, it turns out the chipmunks do have very long fingers, so this is to scale.

Deep fried squid was available in convenient artery-sized chunks.

We instead had yusheng at home.

I suggested that God of Money consider branching out into Happiness as well, and it looks like he's taking my advice.

We checked out some Chinese New Year gifts at the plant store. Some looked unusual.

What you think this fruit looks like says something about you. There are many options, and I chose inflated rubber glove.

Barry was too busy with self admiration to notice either way.

---

Let's have a hashtag on the way

Don't worry, if you don't like picked catfish or Gouramy (sic), then these solar dried banana dudes come in many flavour styles.

The packaging kindly advises that the bananas may be "slightly" different than the pictures and provides a helpful hotmail address.

All these are available at the fabulous and sometimes controversial Golden Mile building near us, which features eclectic balcony styles and all things Thai.

Before we leave the Thai grocery store, let's consider the Bruce Lee fragrance poster. Barry was concerned about what a poster of someone whose been dead for over 40 years says about food freshness. Luckily, Bruce Lee perfume was released in 2011, fresh as a daisy.

Also in little Thailand, there are some #establishments.

If you can figure out what word(s) make sense in this window, then your mind does not work like mine.

In the bus stop area, you need roll out of the moving vehicle.

And the harmony has ceased.

But, oh, the food.

In other news, if you see this man emerging from a shipping container.

Well, that means it's almost Chinese New Year!

More on this later, but it should involve pink cats, dragons, hearts and teapots!

---

Nature and Poultry Lies

In our hyper urban environment, we seek green at the Kallang river/Marina bay, a block away.

There, we were confused by what seemed to be a grape tree, and wondered if, with the dry weather, these pink apple snail eggs were laid too high.

We realized that there are pine trees in Singapore which make miniature cones.

We saw herons.

And other amphibious creatures.

We have also recently rediscovered the street chicken. Being naïve, I had believed what I'd heard: that all agriculture was banned in Singapore (which is why we can import meat, fruit, cheese, etc.). All lies! Street chickens are not so legal, but one can own up to 10 poultry for personal use. That's right, in my apartment I can get me some birds - including peacocks or swans! There are a few limited farms in Singapore, and it turns out we can import Canadian mutton and chicken, but not beef. I hear swan meat tastes like beef anyway.

In related news, I got a rather local (Malaysia) chicken (dead). These have several features not known in western poultry.

Which begs the question - if we're all into healthy free range chicken, then maybe we want to check out their heads and feet. I can tell this little dude did not have his beak smashed and was able to walk around.

Yes, this freaks you out, as it did to me when the little guy opened his eye. But that's because we're crazy - headless chickens were no less alive once.

It turns out these wee "Kampong Chickens", which translates roughly to homeboy chickens, can be cooked in under 30 minutes!

---