Another Christmas has come and gone. Like last Christmas, I spent this one in Singapore. The celebration was small. It was just my wife and I, but we had a good time. We had ham, veggies, toasted bread, a log cake and champagne. We have enough left overs for a week’s worth of sandwiches! We also spent some time watching Christmas movies and laughing over (or eating) presents we’d received.
We didn’t get to spend this Christmas with either of our families, which would’ve been great, but we have each other, and it’s nice to be able to spend the holidays with someone you love.
It’s also great to get a huge box of goodies from home in the mail on Christmas Eve!
The box has 3 Musketeers, Skor, Snickers, Quaker Instant Oatmeal Fruit & Cream Variety (80 packets), 2 boxes of thin mint cookies, two stocking-stuffer mini Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup packs, and some Chips A’hoy.
3 Musketeers is hard to find around here. The only place I’ve ever seen it is in the duty free store on Clark Air Base in Pampanga Province, Philippines. They had a few packs of the mini-bars. I’ve also never seen Skor or those thin mints over here. Skor is chocolate covered toffee. There is Quaker Instant Oatmeal here, but only the plain kind. That stuff sucks. The flavors in the box we got are ‘Peaches & Cream’, ‘Blueberries & Cream’, and ‘Strawberries & Cream’. It has little bits of fruit in it and has a sweeter, creamier taste. You just dump it in a bowl and add hot water. Cheap (in the US anyway), affordable, and a perfect breakfast. Good for a dessert too.
Some of this stuff is available in Singapore. You can get Reese’s Peanut Butter cups in import shops but they cost quite a bit. I doubt if those two stocking-stuffer packs cost more than 3 bucks apiece in the US. Here it’d probably go for 6 or 7 bucks. As for the Chips A’hoy and Snickers, I think they must use a different recipe because the ones I get in Singapore (or the Philippines) just don’t taste quite as good as the ones from the US.
So, I got a box of American goodness that should last us for months. Oh, and I got a pack of underwear.
I hope everyone else had a Merry Christmas as well! Next up, New Years!
Bradley Farless 