Singapore Night Race

So for the occasion of the Pchum Benh festival (The festival of the dead) , I scooted over to Singapore (again) to see Mark and Tara and the gang. And low and behold i just happened to arrive on the weekend of the first Singapore Night Race F1 Street Race.

Now not being much of a rev head, i can't say i was really into F1 but it seemed interesting and hell its on and a once in a lifetime opportunity. And Tara was nice enough to foregoe her ticket on Saturday (and the final on Sunday) to let me go. And it turned out to be exceedingly awesome :)

So Mark and me went to the Saturday (which was qualifiers). It was blazing hot, much hotter than Cambodia but was fascinating. This was a street race so the track was made up of city streets with barricades and stuff. I think that makes it much more interesting than a purpose built track.

SO first we checked out the Aston Martin racing and the pits...

Then the Formula BMWs

and saw them moving someone who had crashed, which was highly amusing because none of these guys really knew what they were doing so there was a lot of standing around.



Our seats were pretty awesome . They were in the Bay Stand (which was a massive grandstand that held 30,000 of the 100,000 visitors, with a good view of several turns (which turned out to be quite eventful including seeing Fernando Alonzo [the eventual winner] conk out on that stretch relegating him to last place on the grid)

The actual final was very exciting, it went for two hours but felt like it flew by. Nelson Picquet Jr had a spectacular crash right in front of us, which was a real race changer.

At the end, due to the woeful crowd control, they allowed us to cross over the track to get to the other side. That was kinda cool. The bottom pic is what we think were Nelson's skid marks and where he collided with the wall.


So apart from that I spent lots of time with Dilan and Amali, and did a bit of shopping which is always fun. Dils was so cute with his dummy and blankie : )

So i returned to Cambodia on the last day of Pchum Benh, waking up at 3:30am (Yikes!) and was extorted on the taxi fare back but i was glad to be home. Everyone is on leave so this week has been so quiet. Even the cleaner set up a hammock in the office.
Life remains muddy and wet as usual but i am not nearly as mud splattered as i used to be. Oh and after almost two years here, the office guard comes up to me the other day and says "Matthew, what are you having for dinner?"...IN ENGLISH. Turns out he speaks a little but was too shy. Hilarious

Next week we have food-for-work training and the week after home-based-care for people living with HIV both of which in different provinces. Should keep things interesting!