Update on the Singapore concert

Quite a raging flu and on the road to recovery. And the road to recovery does not leave me much energy to do great things. So I am here to blog and give you useless facts about what happened at my concert in Singapore.
So post my AKK on friday, I auto-ed straight to the airport to find that the flight was delayed by an hour. And we waited around and our humble troupe of five finally boarded. Once in, I was wondering whether I could get some shut eye but they were playing Machakaaran inflight, so decided to watch it. And somewhere at the 30-oddth minute it stopped and started right from the beginning. And then again it stopped. I was not gonna go through watching the same portions again and again so eventually we all started playing musical chairs. Not literally. But figuratively. We started yapping and taking pictures and videos and whatnot. And then I finally mustered enough courage to talk to Manorama Aachi who was in the same row as us.
It has always been the case with me. I can't muster enough courage to go and say hello to someone I don't know, or to someone I have been introduced once. She was sweet and very friendly.
Singapore, amazing the way they have planned that small city, and maintained all the greenery. After settling down at the hotel, the organizers met us, went through the song list and we settled down for the day. Most times mom and I look forward to my concerts out of town because that is when we get some decent rest. The following morning we had to get some media interviews done and we headed to the venue for a sound check. I had issues with the sound initially because for anyone, it takes time to tune-in to the my voice. Not an easy one to mix I guess. But the guy finally did get it right. After the concert we headed to the Night Safari and we took the last tram around the forest. Quite nice I would say. Saw some species I have not seen before. And decided I would have to take some kinda crash course on photography. With a Nikon D80 I had no decent pictures of the animals. Guess clicking away at night requires skill!
We headed to Mustafa shopping center to see what all the hype was about. Even in the dead of the night there was a helluva lot of activity. But then again, vegetarianism and the world, still seem to run on parallel roads.
Next day was the day of the concert. We just stayed in and prepped for the show and finally headed to the venue at about 5 in the evening. This concert had some 15 ministers and there was a enough and more protocol to be followed. I was supposed to get my make up done at the venue. So when we reached there, I am told that I have 10 minutes to go up. Did quite a job of applying the war paint quickly and went on stage without brushing my hair. Ah well! And after that came down and did the needful. Krish was the next to perform and saw that he has a way with the crowd. Naveen was next and with "aadungada enna suthi" everyone was raring to go. Sowmya performed "chandralekha", it got her a lot of plaudits on Super Singer and here it was no different. She really does a great job with that song. We danced, sang, performed and the four of shared great vibes on stage. And it was non competitive :) The mutual admiration society and fun was what was top most in our minds. And it showed. The crowd was about 8000 strong and that was supposed to be quite a feat because the concert was outside of the city and there was too much security due to the Ministers attending the concert.
Once the show was over I headed backstage and I must say that I had one of the best dinners in the recent past. Maybe because it was the third day and both mom and I hadn't really eaten anything of great taste. That way, I must say, Malaysia is much better as long as food is concerned, than Singapore.
The next morning we packed up, loaded the bags in the cars and headed out to Sentosa. We were longing to get to the Fish spa at Underwater World, what with so much said about it.
Once at Sentosa, we went on the Luge, Skyrail, The Skytower, Underwater world and the disappointment was when we knew that the Spa was fully booked. Our hearts broke. And they are still not mended :( We also saw a museum chronicling the history of Singapore. That was quite brilliant.

We took the cable car back to Mount Faber and the car came to pick us to drop us at the next destination - Sim Lim tower. We met a group of wonderful girls in Singapore who helped us around. Sheetal, Nandini, Smriti, Shrti, Wanitha. Nothing like hanging out with happy-go-lucky girls. And one thing they all shared was their expressiveness. They all go wide-eyed and theatrical in a nice way when they talk. Not something that we see too often with all the play-it-down kinda attitude that we are stuffed with as we grow up. I ran around that place to get some things, and eventually ran out of time. I also spoke to some long lost friends who had settled down in Singapore. And headed to the airport.

Let me add a quite word about the discounts here.. Underwater world has a 20% discount on the ticket if you hold a citibank card, and Night safari will give you, 30% off on the tickets if you flew Singapore Airlines. And yes you needed your boarding pass.

The flight was an hour late again. I picked up some M.A.C cosmetics at the airport, me being me, I am always running out of war paint. And nothing quite works like the M.A.C.
I have always complained about the way people tend to misspell and mispronounce my name. It has been everything from Sinmai, to chinna mayil, sinna mai, chiang mai (yes of thailand!!). My name was once split, quite conveniently by my Chinese translator, to Chin-May-Yi and she wrote to me in Chinese. I had to write back to say Hi lady, I don't Chinese yet.
But the best I would say was Krish. No one quite got the hang of his name. From Kreeees to - Hold your breath - Grease :D

Once we reached our terminal, he said from hereon, Finally!! I am Krish ..
Naveen though generally quiet, he is the silent damager. And Sowmya had her own antics up her sleeve. Her style of speech was enough to get us all started. And she safely kept quiet throughout the trip. Once she 'lost' her phone and we called the number and it went to a local singaporean. Paavam that girl got lambasted. And it only dawned on us later that Sowmya's phone was not on International roaming. And the girl found the phone in her bag. *Sigh*

The flight back home was mostly uneventful except for the fact that I was queasy and the whole flight seemed to notice that. Someone handed be an air-sickness bag and until I got into the restroom it was quite something. Probably I was tired with all the running around in Sentosa or what I have no idea. I have never been air-sick before and there were some 'kind' souls who kept asking if I had thrown up 'well'. It continued all the way to immigration when random people asked "did you throw up well?". I for one, was quite flummoxed and had no idea how to respond to that. All I could do was just nod. And then there was advise on what to do if I did get air-sick. I thought I was quite unobtrusive when I did walk up to the restroom but then it seems I was not good enough.
Once home, mom and I fell sick and Aahaa Kaapi Klub has an RJ who sounds like her nose has been run over by a road roller. Voice modulation is the spice of life!