bomad.com™

Friends!

Eden recently asked: "Do you guys ever meet anyone on the road? You never talk about other people on your blog!" So Eden, this one's for you.

It's easy to make cool friends in Singapore! For one, the expat population is extremely transient, which means that folks are totally open to meeting new people (what a difference from Paris!). What's more, the people we meet are all remarkably global citizens, which means they're insightful and open-minded, easy to chat with and a lot of fun.

Take this gang of ladies that I was hanging out with the other night at Pierside Kitchen. To my right is Ming. She's an Indonesian/Chinese Singaporean with the elegance of Catherine Deneuve. Ming grew up in Jakarta, went to high school in LA and definitely knows how to have a good time. Upper right is Yu Rhee, a self-described "Korean housewife" with a killer sense of humor who grew up in the US, Bangaladesh and Malaysia, and is now married to a Brit. I didn't get May's (above me) exact bio, but it equals that of the other two. Makes a Hong Kong-born, DC and Hawaii-raised gal like me feel positively provincial!

A horribleness...

I assume everyone has heard of those Nigerian scams perpetrated by email. You know, the ones where you get an email (spam) saying that there is $14,500,000 locked in an account in Nigeria and "all they need" is money for "legal fees" in order to "free up the funds." By fronting a few hundred or thousand dollars for the legal fees, you are promised millions in proceeds. Of course, it's a scam. And sadly many people have fallen for it. But what happens when the best of their scammers meet the best of our scammers? Read on...

Road Trip Nation

Our li'l Molly Pie sent us this one:

"I just ran across this cool documentary and phenomenon called Road Trip Nation. Have you heard about it? It's RCGs (ed: that's Recent College Grads) roadtripping across the US in a neon green RV to interview fascinating people about how they came to pursue alternative lifestyles and careers. It's now a PBS series, a book, and there's even a sequel.
http://roadtripnation.com/

And best of all, they interviewed Warren Brown (the ex-lawyer from DC who made Tad and Emma's wedding cakes)! http://roadtripnation.com/interviews/87/ Oh, and they also interviewed Madonna's head stylist.

Something for the Bomad Blog, perhaps?"

Something indeed, Molly. Thanks!

Tribe

When we came up with "Tribe" as the clever name for our little group of friends in SF back in 1998, we thought we were being *so* original -- until Ethan Watters went and wrote a whole book on "Urban Tribes." In it, he claims...