Revisiting the topic one year later: How to integrate into a Foreign Place/ Culture?

It has been 11 months since I posted my first reflection. Ahhh.... How time flies! After 2 months of living in Brooklyn, I returned to Singapore, packed more stuff to bring over. Several months later, I'm back in New York. This time, I do not know for how long God wills.

The good thing about writing your thoughts down sometimes, is you can look back and read, and realise how much you've grown, and how differently you may be thinking now.

Firstly, i thought my friends and family would be crying buckets at the airport, and that parting would be difficult. It wasn't. Well, my bestfriend and I resolved the sadness of parting months before, so my airport departure wasn't too much of a problem. And as for the rest of my friends and family, nobody cried. Everybody seemed happy, everyone wanted me to make the best out of it, and everyone was keen to visit me in NYC - haha!

1. Location of my Home
Yep, I stay in a relatively safe place now. But man, it's a little far from Manhatten because my husb wanted to save little more on rent. It's like staying in Jurong West, when your office is in Raffles Place (but on a larger scale). And somewhat like Jurong West, I stay in relatively close to the beach - Coney Island. We live beside a street of Chinese supermarkets and restaurants on Avenue U, so that satisfies us as we see lots of chinese faces everywhere. So yup, we feel at home. For now. We are going to move, and I'll update you more on that some other time. What's important in searching for an apartment? Safety definately! And my new reflection is that taking the time to walk the street, and to talk to folks around the street about how they feel about the neighbourhood is a much better way than looking through forums and "bestplaces.net". Do you like the condition of how the houses in the surrounding neighbourhood? What is your gut feel about the people walking around this neighbourhood? Are the shops around there useful and sufficient for you? Are you near the Metro? If your answer is "Yes/Good", and the rent is within your budget, that can potentially be your new home.

2. Picking up the Lingo
To my surprise, there is no pressing need to speak in an American accent here. There is no need to 'blend in perfectly'. In Singapore, I witnessed that if you spoke fluently in English and included an accent, other friends who favour Singlish might tease you - "Wah! Your England so powderful ah! Dun let that leh..." But here, the city of immigrants, united by the common goal of making money, respect eachother's language and accent. If you think Singapore is quite a multi-racial society, then New York is super-duper-multi-racial-multi-national. Possibly 200 over nationalities/languages squeezed into this city. They try their best with their English, and try their best to understand the other person. People of common mother tongues cluster together naturally, but they always seem happy to converse with you. The one who is more cautious in conversing with others is usually me, the sheltered Singaporean.

3. Community Activity/ Service
Hmm...I have not much to say about this other than that there are plenty of FREE community activities here... mostly to do with the Arts. And yup, we've been attending Redeemer Presbyterian Church regularly, and have yet to start attending a regular group. Once again, I'm looking forward to that!

4. Sharing a Universal Love
Ah...recycling is hot here, and I've joined a recycing group called Freecycle. I'm not close to anyone yet, but I definately enjoyed the activities! I'm still looking for an amateur group to share my love of music. Sigh~ I need to get myself a music-keyboard to play at least.

I'll revisit all these thoughts again next year. ;-)