Twas the night before Uzbek when all through the stan,

not creature was wheeling, not even a man.

Claudia’d been sent back to the States in a plane,

Meanwhile gifts from Santa and Elf had just came.

We ran to the door to see what could it be,

It was our dear friend Alp with a package for me.

T’was a big cardboard box, wider and fatter,

We shook it around and heard intriguing clatter.

By Santa and Elf we mean Allan and Tan,

The Speed Matrix Depot and My Bike Shop Man.

See, our tires were worm from eons of wheelin’

And our rear ends were chapped up and down right near peelin’

So we tore in with delight in our eyes,

To find joy in our hearts at savage surprise

For what to my wondering eyes did appear?

But new handles, new saddles and tires (front and rear).

Rido seats how they twinkled, Big Apples how merry,

If the trip were an ice cream, twas surely the cherry.

Thanks Speed Matrix and My Bike Shop!

And Merry Christmas, every one!

When Scott asked if I could write a post on Islamic Finance for the blog, I nodded with enthusiasm. To be honest I am a relative newcomer to this topic and a non-Muslim, and though while supremely curious I feel I run the risk of offending others on a subject that can be sensitive. Nevertheless, here we are.

The first thing that caught my attention about Islamic finance is its recent origins. Although religious scripts governing Sharia law have been around since Prophet Mohamed’s time, Islamic finance only emerged after the Second World War. It didn’t emerge as a result of new, groundbreaking economic principles, but as a response to a series of clashes between western and Muslim nations, which led to a rise in pan-Islamism.

Among the consequences of this movement was a change in the ways of commerce among Muslims. As Gulf nations withdrew petrodollars they held in the West and began dumping them in their own backyard, cities like Dubai and Kuwait emerged as hubs for the practice and display of Muslim financial piety. By the 1970s, Islamic scholars, economists, and intellectuals were busy studying and interpreting passages of the Quran for the creation of a framework for Islamic finance.

Theological Underpinnings

There are several factors that appear to make modern day Islamic finance different from conventional finance, the most important of which is the prohibition of interest. Wikipedia amply lists all these traits.

Al-Baqarah 2:275 Those who consume interest cannot stand [on the Day of Resurrection] except as one stands who is being beaten by Satan into insanity. That is because they say, “Trade is [just] like interest.” But Allah has permitted trade and has forbidden interest. So whoever has received an admonition from his Lord and desists may have what is past, and his affair rests with Allah . But whoever returns to [dealing in interest or usury] – those are the companions of the Fire; they will abide eternally therein.

But this prohibition isn’t unique to Islam. The Old Testament also regards the charging of interest as immoral. Exodus and Deuteronomy specifically regard lending to the poor as a sin.

Biblical Parallels

Exodus 22:25 - You shall not give him your silver at interest, nor your food for gain.

Deuteronomy 23:19 - Thou shalt not lend upon usury to thy brother; usury of money, usury of victuals, usury of any thing that is lent upon usury

Leviticus 25:37 - Thou shalt not give him thy money upon usury, nor lend him thy victuals for increase

It was only during the European Renaissance when Protestant reformer John Calvin changed the status quo. He argued that not all rules in the Old Testament set out for Jews (who were permitted to lend to gentiles) were applicable to Christians and that one must not interpret these passages in a literal manner. The bible should simply serve as a guide. But Calvin’s real concern was the exploitation of the poor through high interest rates. In Calvin’s letter to Oekolampadius, he writes that he is unwilling to condemn usury so long as it is practiced with equity and charity. Whoever borrows should make at least as much, if not more, than the amount borrowed, meaning that as long as one is fair and reasonable, charging interest should be allowed.

Calvin’s words were such a blow to the Church that interest became legalized across Europe. This was a major turning point in history. It is interesting that Calvin’s view, which forms a basis for modern day capitalism and bank lending, was effectively reversed by Islamic scholars in the 1970s. Is this to say that Muslims, who did business like others in corporate America up until the 1970s, were all of a sudden subject to the new rules of Islamic finance? Yes, in a sense. But there is a twist to it all.

According to Sharia scholars, a guaranteed rate of return on an interest rate is prohibited because the lender and borrower typically bear an unequal level of risk. For example, Sharia scholars prohibit the issuer of a bond to default on an interest payment and then go bankrupt, because those at the bottom of the pecking order virtually have no claim to their monies. Therefore much of Islamic finance is about creating a mechanism that reaps the benefits of bank lending with the appearance of profit sharing (Mudharabah).

Financing Structures

Consider a car loan. If I were to take out a loan in the UK, the bank lends me money and I repay the loan at a predetermined interest rate. Should I become unfit to service the loan, the bank revindicates (repossesses) the car, collects what is owed, and refunds the remainder (if any). If I were to go to an Islamic bank, the bank buys the car, and then sells it to me at a premium, also to be repaid at predetermined intervals (Murabahah). Although I end up paying the same amount under both scenarios, Islamic scholars believe that the latter scenario is only fair because should I default, the bank simply revindicates the car with no further claim on me. In the earlier scenario, the bank may further pursue me for any remaining principal if the repossession doesn’t provide enough. Thus Islamic banks do charge for the time value of money.

Another popular Islamic investment product is a sale/lease bond, aka Sukuk. Suppose I am a property developer and wish to build an apartment complex. I would sell a piece of real estate to a special purpose vehicle (SPV), which raises the funds by selling share certificates. The SPV leases the asset back to the issuer (me), thereby collecting principal plus interest and passes the proceeds back to the sukuk holders in the form of rent. At the end of the lease, the SPV sells or gives the property back to the issuer.

Other types of Islamic financial transactions exist. But to me the above examples are enough to suggest that Islamic finance is nothing more than smoke and mirrors. Islamic finance uses complicated structures to achieve the same goal as conventional finance, but with added cost and decreased transparency. At the end of the day, profit and interest by any other name is still profit and interest. It is hard to imagine that this was the Prophet Mohamed’s objective.

Interest in Indonesia

Having grown up in the world’s most populous Muslim nation, I want to share my observations on Islamic finance in this part of the world. In my opinion Indonesia sees Islamic finance like a dot in the horizon. I can assure you that the majority of business done in Indonesia is definitely not Sharia compliant. Even more fundamentally, more than half the population, which lives in poverty, has probably never even heard of Islamic finance.

The problem with Islamic finance is that it has no global standardization. It emerged in the 1970s in the Middle East, which explains its varying level of demand in different Muslim countries. And as Islamic finance continues to emerge in different parts of the world, it faces the danger of generating greater differences and inconsistencies. A recent Bloomberg article calling for certification among Muslim scholars is further testament to this problem.

Don’t the Saudis own shares in Citi? Are wealthy Indonesian Muslims putting their money into Singapore or their own Sharia banks?  As the market continues to develop, time will tell how market priorities interplay with religious doctrine.

Singapore is famous for its capitalism.  In some ways, the state itself has grown and continues to function as a kind of corporation, with citizens playing the role of employees subject to strict policies and the role  of shareholders, benefiting from the success and prudence of management.

Separated from Malaysia in 1965, perennial statesman Lee Kwan Yew oversaw its rise from an underdeveloped colonial outpost to a first world Asian tiger.  It ranks 23 in the 2009 Human Development Index, above Hong Kong, South Korea, and Greece.  The de facto financial center of Southeast Asia, Singapore boasts enviably high rule of law, investment in education, and shrewd policies attracting the globally educated to immigrate.

A friend of AsiaWheeling and Harvard graduate plans to move to Singapore before the year is out.  Because of his high caliber education, he can receive a passport to the nation-state within two years.  With tax and regulatory concessions available for industries the government wishes to encourage, a growing number of alternative investment managers and global financial institutions are migrating their legal entities, their employees, and their (albeit low) tax dollars to Singapore.

Citizens of Singapore are healthy, courteous, and enjoy much greater income equality than Hong Kong or New York, alleviating many social class pressures.  A businessman in Hong Kong once told me, “If you ask a taxi driver in Hong Kong how big his apartment is, he’ll tell you it’s 389.27 square feet exactly.  If you ask a Singaporean taxi driver, he’ll tell you it’s somewhere around 400 square feet.”  Singapore’s social and economic policies have resulted in this relaxed, non-competitive attitude, which encourages community involvement and a sense of social responsibility.

On the MRT in Singapore, we saw a young man in a fitted baseball cap volunteer his seat when an elderly man boarded the train.  On the Tokyo subway, even the priority seats for elderly, disabled, and pregnant are filled with dozing salarymen during rush hours.  Singapore smacks of a utopia.

But Singapore has a dark side.  It’s a place where drug addicts are caned, rounds of layoffs can happen under the guise of a fire drill, and the government’s tactic for squelching dissidents is to sue them for sedition, bankrupting them with legal fees.  Multicultural harmony is advertised and prided, though the city still suffers from racial divisions and sports neighborhoods that double as ethnic enclaves.

Road crews and other blue collar jobs appear to be dominated by the Tamils, whose script is invariably last on the multilingual municipal signs. Singapore’s multicultural composition can also spark conflict.  For Chinese New Year, McDonald’s released a set of the 12 zodiac doraemon, but had replaced the pig with a doraemon holding a heart.   Chinese New Year happened to fall on Valentine’s Day, and the pig was certainly not Halal.  In an attempt not to alienate their Muslim customers, they outraged the Chinese community,  and began producing a new toy zodiac pig, and posted the apology below.

Prostitution finds its way into a legal gray area, with the odd-number buildings of certain districts designated as mid-rise brothel/bar complexes.  Karaoke bars of ill-repute lubricate business deals by allowing expenses to be reimbursed by what appears to be a shockingly high bar tab.

With punishments for petty crimes so high, desperation seems to reign, as human nature enjoys a bit of sin.  Singapore’s underbelly proves that the city is not fully the nursery rhyme it purports to be. Dig deep enough and you’ll find plenty that smacks of a dystopia.

Many of those to whom we explained the experiment of AsiaWheeling admitted they would have loved to have engaged in such a project in their youth, but even with the means, it was simply not in their consciousness.  The education system, which churns out highly analytical graduates, coupled with the mandatory military conscription, which teaches hierarchy and teamwork, somehow misses out on equally developing creativity.

Frank Lloyd Wright said, “Give me the luxuries of life, and I will do without the necessities.”  In the increasingly interconnected global economy, analytical minds will be the backbone of competitive development.  However it will be this analytical firepower, coupled with creativity and passion, that will really define innovation to come.  Without developing the creative faculties of its people, Singapore may find itself in an unexpected state of imperfection.

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

Our goodbyes to David had to be made through the fog that accompanies undersleeping. It was 5:00 am again, and the Rucksack Inn was still filled with the same six – eight zombie-like Internet users that had been there when I had retired for bed some four hours ago.

As David climbed into his cab to Changi airport, and we climbed into ours to the train station connecting Singapore with Malaysia (mysteriously not connected to the subway system…), we bid farewell to the strange and wondrous chapter of the trip that David had ushered in, with a phraseology that David and I had used in college: “Goodbye forever,” I told him, knowing full well that I would see him in the next year or two. “Yeah, goodbye forever,” David replied.

And then we were off. Our cab driver was extremely polite and efficient, sporting a cab full of flat screen monitors advertising Chinese New Year’s gifts to us. We lugged our shiny new bikes into the crumbling white colonial behemoth that was the entryway to Malaysia, and I sat on the steps playing Mama Rock Me, watching the sun rise on Singaporean Tamil men unloading goods from lorries, and  machines scrubbing the street with rotating brushes.  Inside the railway station, we took stock of our surroundings and confirmed the tickets.

Scott dozed in the giant waiting room, and in no time we were working our way through a system of inspections, detections, and checkpoints, making our way to the train.

The train itself was old, but comfortable, with plenty of space to store the bikes.  The lack of a window near our seats, played a supportive role in our sleeping through the majority of the 14-hour ride.

At one point, we were awakened by a loud, but unintelligible transmission coming from the overhead speakers. All transmissions on the train were ushered in and out by a rising and falling set of tones, which must have at one point or another been quite similar to those used on the metro systems of Hong Kong and London. However, due to some malfunction in the innards of this behemoth of a machine, the train’s announcements were subjected to a kind of radical Doppler shift, creating disconcerting parabolas of tone that were quite effective at rousing both one’s attention and the hair on the back of one’s neck.

From what we could tell, this transmission was commanding us to exit the train and go through customs, which we did, exiting Singapore, and receiving a number of stamps on our Malaysian entry cards. Eight hours later, when we next awoke from our slumbers, we were deep in Malaysia. It seems somehow, we had missed the official entry into Malaysia, and had made our way into the country without getting a stamp. We said a short prayer to the gods of immigration and customs, in hopes that this would not cause us trouble down the road, and fell back asleep, rocked by the rails, snaking our way through the Malaysian jungle toward Butterworth.

Butterworth was the end of the line, and the sun had already set when we packed up our things and climbed off the train. We followed our fellow passengers toward the ferry to Penang Island. So far, peninsular Malaysia felt very comfortable. The presence of moderate amounts of rubbish and less well maintained structures was comforting after the sterile polished exterior of Singapore. We were quite surprised to meet a school teacher from North Carolina, traveling with her two young children. It was one of our first clues that Malaysia would prove very safe and manageable. Most everyone we had yet encountered spoke very good English, and even public signage was almost always translated.

We were able to purchase tickets on the Penang ferry for about USD 0.35 and spent the ride over to the island gawking at the very developed, well lit island on which we were to spend the next three days and down at the brownish sea, which was quite visibly crowded with large white jellyfish, pushed aside by the hulking ferry. On the other side of the water, we mounted the cycles, and rode into the city. Penang was well lit, and festooned with red lanterns and banners in preparation for the upcoming Chinese New Year. As we had seen in Singapore, most everyone here appeared to be of either Han Chinese or Tamil descent. The sharp cheek-boned islander ethnicity  we had seen so much of in Indonesia, Borneo, and even on the train ride to Butterworth seemed absent here. Perhaps this is what our Malaysian Bureau Chief, Smita Sharma, had meant when she described these as Chinese straights towns?

Thanks to the ease of communication in Penang, we were easily able to find our way to the Hutton Lodge, an establishment that had been recommended to us by our most esteemed Malaysian Bureau. As would prove the rule, the recommendation was stellar, and the Hutton Lodge welcomed us with a clean room, a nice view of the courtyard, friendly staff, and promises of free breakfast with infinite coffee.

We dumped our belongings on the beds and quickly unfolded the speed TRs to head back out into the fray in search of food. Since we had slept all the way through the train ride, we were operating on just a few biscuits in the stomach, and even without having wheeled that day, we were starving. Luckily, as Smita had outlined for us, Penang was a food lover’s destination, sporting a new style of restaurant, which AsiaWheeling had not  yet experienced. It was a kind of emergent restaurant, where the many cooks establish small kitchen stalls around a central seating area. Patrons are then issued a table in the seating area by some central authority and invited to peruse the surrounding stalls, from which the many cooks quite vocally tout their wares. Diners select foods that look appealing, order, and the food is brought to the table.

We feasted that night on fried chicken wings, a local fried noodle dish by the name of Char Koay Teow, and some strange medicinal soups from a Chinese vendor. With the exception of the soups, which were just a little too medicinal for our liking, the meal was delightful, and we climbed back on the bikes, ready to get a little shuteye after our long day of sleeping on the train.

Our last morning in Borneo began at once again in darkness. It’s true our room was windowless, but at 4:45 am, it was also dark outside, so we had cheated ourselves out of nothing. We rolled around in the dark as the theme to SIM city 2000 sounded out through the depth and blackness of our room at the Sipadan Inn in Semporna, Sabah, Malaysia.  Over the course of our time in Borneo, David Miller had proven a truly capital member of the expedition, improving our experience immeasurably. He had, subsequently been promoted, and his responsibilities expanded to Chairman of the AsiaWheeling Risk-Management Desk within the Bureau of Health and Safety.

In one of his first announcements in that new official capacity, David classified that morning’s cab ride to the airport as by far the most dangerous thing we engaged in in Borneo, though we had been breathing like cyborg fish underwater, boating in dubious and leaky craft, and wandering the hardscrabble city at all hours of the night. For you see, dear reader, in our estimate, Borneo is not so dangerous a place, that is unless the man driving your cab is three-quarters asleep.

He was a small man, and drove an unmetered (and therefore, I believe, technically illegal) cab. He had been summoned for us by the front desk at the Sipadan Inn, and at 5:10 sharp, he made quite the arrival, pulling his small Proton hatchback around and backing into the spot right in front of the lobby door. The moment he engaged the reverse gear, some apparatus inside his car began to broadcast a custom sound effect perhaps best approximated by the noise made by X-wing and TIE fighters as they zip through that curious reverberate vacuum of Star Wars space.

After he had successfully docked, we managed to squeeze ourselves into the car, which has been modified significantly from its factory fresh state to include custom wheels, glitter-filled paint, a miniature steering wheel, and a thumping sound system.

The style of customization might be familiar to fans of films such as  The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift . This style was no stranger in Semporna. In fact, it seemed, quite popular among the local youth as a pastime, with many engaging in a sport I first encountered during my youth in the town of Grinnell, Iowa, known there by the self explanatory name, “Scoop the Loop.”

Meanwhile, loaded in this fellow’s street racing Proton hatchback, we were tearing down the empty roads of Sabah, as the sun began to rise over the endless fields of oil palms. The soundtrack was incredible. Song after thumping song, we enjoyed a tasteful survey of the early 2007 electro-rock and synth pop as featured on the music blog FluoKids and even a nod to the tunes pumped by our friends at LoveLife.

It reminded us of our recent favorite song “Century” by Tiesto and Calvin Harris, introduced to us by the prolific and brilliant Rex Pechler.

[audio:http://asiawheeling.com/music/TiestoCalvinHarrisCentury.mp3]

His good taste in music was almost enough for us to forgive the fact that every few minutes, the fellow would viciously shake his head from side to side, blink dramatically, and yoga breathe in an attempt to regain lucidity. I eyed him carefully, and planned what I would do were he to actually conk out at the wheel: First I would need to grab the wheel and stabilize the car. Once I had gained control, I would, while holding the wheel with my left arm, execute a kind of combo move with my right, elbowing the sleeping driver back to consciousness and grabbing the emergency break slowing the car to a stop on the side of the road.

Luckily, gradually raising the volume on the stereo,seemed to do have the same basic effect, as our man’s struggles for consciousness seemed to turn in his favor, and soon we were safely arrived at the sleepy gray Tawau airport, checking in for our flight. The place was just as ghostly as we remembered it with most of the shop fronts empty. We sat in the waiting room and I played Amy Winehouse tunes on my ukulele while we waited for them to open up security.

The coffee served scalded the mouth, but with enough practice, we were able to cool it by sipping vigorously.

Exiting Malaysia was a piece of cake, studded with big smiles, and very gentle security inspections. Three tiny chicken foccacia sandwiches later, we landed, quite hungry, in Singapore.

Unfortunately, the gods would not smile food upon us until we had exited the airport, which proved massively difficult. After many wrong turns, one attempt to exit through the wrong immigration desk, two wrong airport trains, and one long conversation about overpriced cakes, we arrived at the MRT station.

The man at the desk directed us toward the machines that promptly refused to regurgitate tickets. Though the man was skeptical, we finally convinced him to leave his post and come investigate the machine. One look at the thing and he muttered in a dark Singaporean accent, “Man vs. Machine? Machine will always win.” And with that he dove into the innards of the beast, removing trays, interacting with panels, and finally, producing for us the much needed tickets.

After a very long train ride, much lamenting over our having not simply taken a cab, and  a walk through a labyrinthine underground shopping center, we finally feasted at a local Chinese restaurant, digging into a few plates of dumplings, steaming bowls of spicy noodles with duck and crab, and stir-fried greens. Our waitress was quite a gem, and indulged in some schtick with us about AsiaWheeling and our shared affinity for a particular Chinese vegetable (包菜), before putting a rush on our order.

David and I had just enough time to stroll the city for about an hour, while Scott napped, showered, and drank a RedBull shot. We got the chance to try a very interesting Singaporean style of ice cream, from a street stall. The ice cream itself, was cut in vast chunks from a foil wrapped log and wrapped with a slice of cheap white bread. The combo was quite tasty, and David indulged me by sampling the Durian flavored ice cream which was tasty but maintained a certain flavor of old gym bag that I found endearing and David found at the very least interesting.

Back at the Rucksack Inn, we had only a few moments to freshen up before we had to climb back on the MRT for our much-anticipated meeting with our newest AsiaWheeling partners, Speed Matrix, at the My Bike Shop in a part of town called Clementi.

Speed Matrix was throwing an event to celebrate the launch of its new folding Kayak series in conjunction with announcing its new relationship with AsiaWheeling. Members of the local folding bicycle community were to be there, and your humble correspondents were to be interviewed by some chaps from a local cycling magazine by the name of To Go Parts. All that aside, we were going to get our Speed TRs back, returned to us, no doubt, nipping at the bit for the rest of our riding in Malaysia and on into India. Needless to say, we were thrilled.

We arrived at My Bike Shop where our Speed TRs were waiting for us, gleaming and looking better than ever before. The wheels had been trued, transmission re-tuned, and a quick spin around the block promised superior wheeling ahead.

Thrilled at our good fortune, we spent the next couple hours sipping ristrettos, and hobnobbing with Singapore’s finest folding bike heads, many of whom proved to also play prominent roles in the international business community.

The hunger was just beginning to hit when Tan began closing down shop, and we retired to a nearby cafe by the name of “Leaf” for a scrumptious meal of Indian-Chinese-Malay fusion food, served on large banana leaves.

After dinner, we bid farewell to our new friends and were just about to hail a taxi, when the owner of Leaf came over to us and invited us to sit down for a drink with him as well.

Such a warm welcome had endeared us to Singapore quite strongly and we were none too thrilled to wake up the next morning once again at quarter to five, bid farewell to not only this city but our dear Mr. David Miller, and catch a train to Butterworth. But, as you have no doubt already gathered, dear reader, AsiaWheeling is not a sport for the weak of heart, or those prone to lingering. New, untold wonders lay before us, and somewhere inside us was the rekindled awe of the road ahead.

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

Rucksack Inn Singapore Toast Graph

Toast Making at the Rucksack Inn

With stomachs full of rapidly digesting toast, we struck out toward Clementi station on the MRT, Singapore’s devilishly efficient metro-rail system. Scott and I made like locals and folded our Speed TRs, rolling them on one wheel through the crowded metro terminal.

On board we did our best to adhere to the posted signs and placards, demanding silence, respect, no transport of durians, no spitting, no eating and drinking, no panhandling, and stern reminders as to the proper way to escalate depending on one’s preference for standing or walking.

At Clementi station, we were instantly met with the problem of finding My Bike Shop. Strangely enough, the locals that we asked seemed somewhat baffled about the correct direction, though we thought we were using reasonably well known and large roads, such as the West Coast Highway.  Still baffled after a number of queries, we took a break to drown our sorrows in a kind of Shwarma that was being sold in the vicinity of the train station. The Shwarma ended up consisting mostly of iceberg lettuce and thousand island dressing, but hit the spot nonetheless.

With renewed energy we made our way, albeit somewhat circuitously, to My Bike Shop. Tan was once again thrilled to see us, and greeted David by name, having already familiarized himself with the AsiaWheeling advisory team using our website.

We were all set with a zippy little cycle for David and were invited to relax and cool off in the shop. We allowed ourselves to indulge in another delicious cup of coffee from the My Bike Shop Nespresso machine, and allowed the folding bicycle enthusiasm to wash over us.

Now positively bursting with energy, we laid into the day’s wheel. First order of business was teaching the esteemed Mr. David McKenna Miller the rules of wheeling and the field commands.

“The first rule of wheeling,” I explained as we meandered our way through sleepy Singaporean residential neighborhoods, “is to always signal your intent.” We practiced our Rausches and Lichts until David became reasonably comfortable following the bishop, and even taking the lead himself from time to time before striking out onto the streets.

Our first waypoint was a local park, where we meandered our way past the docks and over to a section called the “bicycle obstacle course.” This seemed a good place to cover some of the more advanced wheeling maneuvers.

Below, Scott demonstrates the “Rough Rider” position on a demanding section of bumps.  Such position requires the midsection of the rider to be placed behind and below the bicycle seat, as if to sit on the back bumper of the bike.

David follows, executing the command with a champion’s fervor.

The obstacle course certainly did not hold back. Most of the obstacles seemed to be variations on the theme of slaloms, huge bumps, and downhill segments that dumped the rider out into a sandy gravel pit where balance and steering were almost impossible.

Well, David, we’ve seen better and we’ve seen worse, but you’re not bad for a rookie .

We also had to call an extended waypoint and dismount when we discovered an interesting playground, filled with fantastic geometric structures, and Singaporean school children who appeared to be using the playground to learn some rudimentary physical principals. David, who is among other things a school teacher by trade, remarked quite positively on the use of experiential education in this strange and gleaming city.

In a rare occurrence, AsiaWheeling stopped at a McDonalds adjacent to the park for a much needed refueling.   The fare consisted of 20 McNuggets, two Milo McFlurries, and two glasses of ice water with ice.

Back on the cycles, we struck west, ducking in and out of residential neighborhoods, retirement centers, shopping malls, and the like. The more we rode, the more we became amazed at the sheer number of retirement communities that we passed. Each one was a large compound with towering housing complexes and sloping manicured lawns.

Next stop was a Chinese grocery store nestled into the side of one of these cookie-cutter concrete communities.

The grocery was chock-full of goodies that would have no doubt been thrown in our basket if the hunger demons had been rumbling.

We purchased copious amounts of water and cloudy apple juice, purported to be one of the great undiscovered natural wonders.

We continued on exploring the Clementi area, which brought us to overpasses and underpasses of the West Coast Highway.

Soon we found ourselves on a newly paved exercise path, which followed one of Singapore’s canals.  It was a surprise to find, and a joy to wheel.

The canal snaked onward as we passed the many healthy joggers of the city.

It was nice to be out of the traffic, and we followed this until the sun began to set, and the imminent closing of My Bike Shop called us to return.  We made our way back, through the many urban obstacles of Western Singapore.

After an unsuccessful attempt to cut through the United World College Singapore (the guard here was cold at first, but soon David was able to warm him up enough to chat with us, but not to let us onto the campus), we rolled back into My Bike Shop tired and sweaty, but happy as clams.

Allen, from SpeedMatrix, was waiting for us, and in an unexpected and humbling gesture, offered to fund the repairs to our cycles. He also provided Scott, David, and me with a set of fine biking jerseys sporting his company’s logo.  Looking at the forthcoming selection of folding kayaks really got the gears in AsiaWheeling’s heads turning.

We warmly bid Tan and Allen goodbye, and sadly parted with the Speed TRs, which would be repaired while we were diving in Borneo, and piled into a cab.

We were already quite late for a dinner engagement with some Indian colleagues of Scott’s from when he was living in Pondicherry. Rajesh and Pappu were in good spirits, and not put off by our tardy arrival.

We made our way toward a local fish head curry restaurant. It served a kind of Singaporean Indian food, which was delightful.

We feasted on fish head curry (of course), along with some fried chicken, a buttery curry, and some knock-your- socks-off biryani. By the time the jet lag began to hit David, we were all quite full and completely smitten by our wheel in Singapore.

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel

The sun rose in Singapore but was unable to find its way into our room at the RuckSack Inn, namely due to the lack of windows. But what it lacked in windows, it easily made up for in silence, cleanliness, and sweet smells. In preparation for our arrival, the management had placed a bowl of fragrant water over a tea candle, which kept the room smelling faintly of sandalwood. We slept like the dead, and when I awoke, I was quite surprised to the find the day well underway and the other residents busily making piece after piece of toast in the common room. We followed suit. And with stomachs full of toast and precious muddy Indonesian coffee, which we had imported, we took to the streets.

Traffic was certainly different in this country, and we rode between large shiny cars and buses that hummed by. As a general rule, we found the traffic to be very polite, changing lanes when possible to give us space, and providing us with little toots of the horn alerting us to their position.

The city itself was large and vertical. Huge structures of glass and concrete loomed all around us as we wheeled through the financial district toward our first waypoint: CitiBank. We were very excited to use some much needed currency services there, and were sorely disappointed when we discovered that Citibank in the U.S. is an entirely different operation from Citibank in Singapore. The very friendly women at the front desk were unable to even pull the current balance on our account. With regret, they explained that for the whole of AsiaWheeling, deposits would be an impossibility. And with meek apologetic smiles, they showed us to an ATM, from which we would be able to withdraw cash and do nothing else. Of some consolation, however, was the presence of complimentary cookies and coffee in the lobby. “Don’t mind if I do…” I thought to myself.  It will have to be HSBC for AsiaWheeling III.

Back on the cycles and freshly laden with cash, we were beginning to get the hang of this city. It was a place for highway speed calls, to be sure. Traffic was quick, and mopeds were almost nonexistent. Cycles were a little bit more common, but those too were rare. So we wheeled on through canyons of metal and glass amidst a light traffic of trucks, vans, and cars.

We were careful to obey traffic laws to the best of our ability, knowing that fines would be steep for any infraction we were convicted of. For instance, a simple case of jaywalking would result, if caught, in a $5,000 fine. Not to be taken lightly, dear reader.

Scott had purchased a Singaporean SIM card, and called a radio waypoint outside an overpriced Italian steakhouse, to get in contact with the local Dahon distributor. This was an operation by the name of Speed Matrix. We had been put in touch with it thanks to Dahon’s California headquarters, where we had picked up the Speed TRs.

We were badly in need of a tune-up, and Speed Matrix responded enthusiastically. It turned out that the demand for folding bicycles in Singapore had grown so much that Speed Matrix had recently transitioned to the role of wholesale distributor, supplying folding cycles and parts to no less than eight retail shops. The owner, a fine chap by the name of Allen, gave us directions to one of his top shops, and we immediately set it as the next waypoint.

Bottles of water in this city, unfortunately, proved very expensive — 10-20 times what we had paid in Indonesia — perhaps because here, in a land where one can drink from the tap, bottled water is a luxury, a form of conspicuous consumption. Regardless, our regimen of strict hydration was hampered by its burden on the budget.

The journey to the shop, known by the unassuming name of “My Bike Shop” was somewhat longer than expected, in part due to circuitous routing reliant upon directions from pedestrians and the mistaken assumption that streets might continue in the same direction for any appreciable distance in this most logical but somewhat difficult to navigate city.

We found ourselves forced to call a number of waypoints on the wheel. The first was at a 7-11 kiosk outside a posh mall, where we purchased some barley lime drinks, swearing to refill the bottles with tap water. Outside the 7-11, we engaged in lengthy conversation with a Greek man. The Greek fellow regaled us for some 30 minutes with stories of Greece during the second world war, and his experience working in the merchant marine, visiting America during the 1950s, and other wild ports of call from his youth.

After we bade goodbye to the Greek fellow, we quelled the urge to spend the next hour reading about WWII on the Wikireader, and took to the streets. We had made some significant progress westward when the hunger hit. Luckily, directly on the other side of the highway we were on was a roadhouse type restaurant called the Union Farm Eating House. It looked reasonably down-home, so we parked the bikes and strolled in. The specialty, it seemed, was paper-wrapped chicken, and we simply asked our waitress to emulate the order of the adjacent table, which contained two Singaporean gentlemen, positively raging on their paper-wrapped chicken, oscillating between scarfing down large pieces, spitting bones, and slurping noodles from nearby plates.

Unfortunately, the food turned out to be lackluster. The chicken was flavored in a way startlingly similar to Jimmy Dean Sausages, and the greens and noodles proved to be cold and uninspiring. There was some slight redemption  in the fact that they provided us with a huge dented aluminum can to deposit our bones in, but then we were hit with the bill, which proved even more uninspiring. An important lesson about Singapore: things are not cheap here.

While we were finishing up the meal, Scott got a call from Allen at Speed Matrix. It turns out they were actively expecting us, so we quickly paid the piper and hit the road.

Here I must take a moment to disclose that SpeedMatrix and My Bike Shop are partners of AsiaWheeling and have underwritten the cost of bicycle maintenance for this leg of the journey. The views expressed below, however, are those of AsiaWheeling alone.

The remainder of the ride was straight forward, with frequent calls of “highway speeds.” We arrived at My Bike Shop sweaty and triumphant, and strolled through the door into a frigidly air conditioned wonderland. Surrounding us on all sides were folding cycles of every shape and size. From folding full suspension mountain bikes, to hyper-light custom-built folding racing bikes, they had it all. We introduced ourselves to the owner, Tan, a fine gentleman, Scuba instructor, and folding bicycle guru.

He gave us an indepth tour of the store, introducing us to the newest models and technologies, detailing his personal modifications of some of the bike’s gearing systems, and offering us coffee (he obviously knew the way into AsiaWheeling’s heart). Tan agreed to help us in realigning and tuning our cycles, and to provide us with a spare tri-tool, to replace one we had lost in Candidasa.

Tan provided best practices for checking the Speed TR in cargo when flying with it.  This included some low-cost foam surrounding the rear transmission, bound with cable ties.  Removing the black Sram component, which clicks onto the planetary gear shaft was also a brilliant innovation we had not yet considered.

We also arranged to rent a cycle from him to to be used by the illustrious Mr. David Miller, Dive Master for AsiaWheeling on the following day’s wheel. Feeling quite delightful after our warm welcome and nicely caffeinated after the espressos that Tan had quite graciously offered us, we took back to the street for a very high voltage return to downtown.

We covered the distance in about half the time aided by our renewed energy and Tan’s superior directions.

Back in the city, we slowed our pace, and gaped in awe at the immensity of the structures around us, while we patiently waited at stoplight after stoplight.

The sky was beginning to light up orange and purple and by the time the hunger hit, we were back in Chinatown. We settled on a return to the same market that we had explored the previous night. We indulged in a meal of street food, sampling items from the hundreds of food stalls that clogged the streets.

Our dinner consisted of fried squid on a stick, freshly steamed pork buns, sausages with pickle and mustard, and a few plastic bags of dried coconut and mango. Truly delightful.

Scott then left to meet some friends from his workplace in Japan, while I prepared for the arrival of Mr. David Miller. It was not until well after midnight, clogged with exhaustion from the day’s wheel and strolling back from the corner store where I had purchased some modest provisions, that I heard a familiar voice call forth from a nearby cab. I was quite surprised to find none other than Mr. Miller himself, waving me over. I was quite overjoyed at our reunion and for a brief time forgot completely about my exhaustion, filled with a renewed excitement for all that lay before us.

Loading image

Click anywhere to cancel