The first time that I went was a complete tourist experience - we stayed in a hotel, went sightseeing at Harvard, shopped along Newbury St., walked the freedom trail, and visited Quincy Market and North End. It was a sizeable group of UConn exchange students (9 of us), and we were on our 1st weekend since orientation (school hadn't begun). I loved it then due to the ease in which old sits alongside new and culture juxtaposes modernity. Skyscrapers lead effortlessly into old intricate architecture; I saw most of this while walking the freedom trail through downtown and up to Boston Common (an open park area).
On my recent trip to Boston, I was lucky enough to gain another perspective of this city. I met Reg's exchange friends Brian and Sze Ming for the 1st time, and we stayed with Tzu Liang - a Singaporean who has lived in the US for more than a decade (7 years in Boston). He lives in a comfy rented basement area and was in the midst of preparing to leave Boston for good as he's returning to Singapore next month. So boxes everywhere.
I spent my 1st night having clam chowder at Neptune Oysters then dinner at Ten Tables, an atas but cosy restaurant that he recommended, and had an interesting 4-course dinner. I'd expected to be feeling out of place since I didn't know any of them (except for Reg of course), but surprisingly enough it turned out to be easy enough to get along with everyone. After dinner Tzu Liang drove us to MIT where the Kopitiam event was to take place the next day. We spent the night (till 2am) helping him make and knead prata dough from scratch! What an experience; can train biceps =P
The next day was Kopitiam, where we had chili crab, goreng pisang (fried bananas), bandung, iced milo, carrot cake and bubur cha cha. There was also laksa and chicken rice. All the dishes were made from scratch by the MIT singapore society students, alumin and volunteers... It was pretty cool to be in the midst of such a Singapore atmosphere more than 10,000 km away from Singapore itself. And I just have to add this: everyone in the room looked SO SMART. haha! we walked around MIT by ourselves after the event with Brian pretending to be an MIT student, bumped into a couple of Singaporeans who recognized our accent when Reg asked them to take a photo for us, and took pictures left right and center. Then Sze Ming had to catch her flight to Ohio so we sent her off at the airport in a kind of frenzy.
The 2nd evening was spent in Cambridge Side shopping mall where Reg wanted to take a look at the Apple store for her purple case, then we walked around the clothing stores, found Cheesecake Factory and da pao-ed Godiva, Strawberry and Caramel cheesecakes. This was after we took beautiful pictures against the backdrop of the Zakim Bunker Hill Memorial Bridge, which is one of those landmark architectural pieces of the cityscape that any decent city should have. The bridge was slightly out of the way so we were already considering giving it a miss, but as Brian (engineering student that he is) had been hankering about seeing the bridge, Tzu Liang graciously drove us over despite seeming pretty shagged from the day's prata-flipping. The bridge was absolutely beautiful; I wouldn't have thought I'd ever call a bridge beautiful, but then again I didn't use to think I could fall head over heels for a city.
After the shopping mall, Reg recommended Atlantic Fish for dinner. Turns out, the restaurant is located right along Newbury St., so i got to see the place at night. It's kinda like Singapore's Orchard Rd... mainly a shopping district and the people who take residence around there are "you qian de ren". However, after taking forever to find a parking lot, we realized the restaurant was very full and abandoned it, much to Reg's reluctance. So her clam chowder / scallop pasta / lobster dream @ Atlantic Fish didn't materialize. We went to a French restaurant for dinner instead, and they had rabbit on the menu - my 1st time seeing too. I had a risotto which was really good, and shared Reg's scallop meal while she attacked our mian bao and ogled the handsome French waiter (i hope she doesn't read this lol).
The last bit of Boston involved a rush back to Tzu Liang's place to shower and pack our stuff for the bus ride. Tired but happy sums this trip up neatly but oh so insufficiently.
To Boston - Nerd City!
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