I started my morning with a Skype call to Baltimore.  My original understanding was that one of my old Mock Trial Students, Zach Stern, was going to interview me for an English paper, but it basically ended up being a call with about half of Park’s Mock Trial Team.  It was just like old times: lots of smart joking, some good conversation, and eventually everyone talking at once such that I couldn’t get a word in edgewise.  I miss them!

After a long day at work and a meeting with a colleague in the Central Business District, I met Everett for dinner at Lau Pa Sat, easily the fanciest hawker center in Singapore.  It’s the short building in front of the skyscrapers:

Lau Pa Sat is so shiny and spacious and filled with white expats that it doesn’t always feel like a real hawker center.  But when you look at the people cooking and the food being served, you know you’re still in Singapore.  And apropos of nothing, there’s a stall with my mom’s name:

Everett was a political reporter in the US, and he and I spent a long time tonight talking about US politics.  We’re both still trying to make sense of the election and are worried about what might be in store ahead.  It can be easy to feel a little distant from the US political scene when you’re on the other side of the globe, but with the inauguration on the horizon, the US feels very much present and real.  Given all of that, I have no idea how we both ended up looking this happy: