What Kind of Race Is It?

I woke up at 4:30 in the morning on Sunday  to do the Adidas King of the Road race. I was not particularly enthused because I was not prepared—to be honest, I have not been prepared for ANY road race I have done for the last few years! However, I really wanted to follow through and earn a decadent lunch with friends, so I grudgingly got ready. I had also just turned 34 a few days ago, and for some reason it always seems appropriate to do a road race around my birthday. My main fears were coming in dead-last or my muscles—which have been tight from my new strength-training regime–making the run a miserable ordeal. In a move out-of-the-ordinary, I decided not to bring any hydration and rely on the provisions of the course—I realize I am probably making some people cringe with this statement! I was just in a lackadaisical state of mind!

As I sat quietly in the runners’ tent at dawn, I decided that I had to reframe my thoughts to make the next few hours bearable. I fired up my inner-dialog—and asked why. Why was I running this race? Yes Yes—yummy decadent lunch BUT what else could I get out of this experience?  Was it going to be another run where I lamented my lack of training and the fact that changes in my life have not let me focus on running as much as I have in the past? Would I bemoan my slower pace and curse myself when my legs did not do what I wanted them to do? I continued along this train of thought as I strolled to the starting corral. As the announcers attempted to fire up the reserved crowd—it dawned on me—this is my first Singaporean road-race.  I was going to go into this race with the mind of a journalist, philosopher and sightseer. I was going to do what my body told me to do, and see what happened.

Life in Singapore

 

It is amazing how things change with time! Six months ago I was blogging about vegan banana bread and blending kale into smoothies and now I am laying in bed, balancing a laptop on my tummy, and musing about life….in Singapore. I have not had a green smoothie in months and I had chicken rice from a hawker center for dinner. I do not think anything raw, vegan, or intentionally organic has been in my tummy recently either…and I could not care less.

Yes….so I moved to Singapore. I got a job offer, snatched it up, packed up a few suitcases, and bolted without thinking twice. If anyone asked me why, my answers were vague and politically correct. “I want to broaden my horizons” or “to gain some international business experience” would cross my lips. I think I may have even uttered “ Asia is where it is at right now” in a flustered rush to keep the conversation going. Don’t get me wrong– Asia is a dynamic  place to be, but I probably would have taken a job offer in Siberia.

The truth is– I was bored…really bored. I was bored with life, bored with the consulting jobs I was doing, and feeling a bit disconnected from everything and everyone. My life needed a kick in the ass, and I thought maybe Singapore was the foot it needed.

So now I am in Singapore– I do not love it– but I honestly do not hate it either. My job challenges me every day– I am also having to acquire some new skills in a culture that is new to me as well. However, Singapore is an efficiently-run country where English is the official language– what kind of English-speaking weiner-dog would find it hard to adapt?

THIS weiner-dog! THIS ONE! Did I spell weiner-dog correctly?

My one room studio apartment is TINY…so TINY. I think fell into a stupid-expat trap. I must say though, my complex has a really gorgeous pool that I have not used yet– my heart swells with pride whenever I walk by it and think of the laps I will swim….tomorrow. I have not figured out how to turn the stove on in my kitchen– I tried! I even cracked open the manual, but I ultimately called for delivery in a fit of impatient hunger. There has been no cooking in Singapore….none.

VeganMoFo 2011 #4: Innocent Banana Bread

Last week I got a little overzealous at Whole Foods and bought an arsenal of organic bananas for my morning smoothies. However, my mornings did not go as planned and I ended up with some dangerously ripe extras on my hands– thus, some banana bread had to be made! However, I really did not want to take some perfectly healthy fruit and screw it up with a ton of refined sugar so I pulled out a recipe I have had success with before by Christine Frazier from the No Meat Athlete . I love this recipe! Yummy, moist banana bread with coconut confetti that does not make me feel like I just ate a brick– yes please!

One thing that makes this recipe unique is that is is sweetened with stevia. Stevia is a 0 calorie sweetener extracted from a plant and it is natural (unlike some of the other calorie free sweeteners that have been sparking controversy lately). Japan is currently the top consumer of stevia and has been using the stuff  forever (even Coca-Cola uses it over there) — it is currently approved as a dietary supplement in the US.