Happy 43rd Birthday Singapore - August 9th 2008!

As all of you know by now we call Singapore home (for right now) and we just celebrated the 43rd National Day of Singapore and wanted to share it with you as well... Our eyes have really been opened to what God has created outside of America. In the past 5 months we have grown to love our new home and we hope through this blog you learn a few things about SINGAPORE.
**********************************************************

Prior to European settlement, the island now known as Singapore was the site of a Malay fishing village at the mouth of the Singapore River. Several hundred indigenous Orang Laut people also lived along the nearby coast, rivers and on smaller islands. In 1819 the British East India Company established a trading post on the island, which was used thereafter as a strategic trading post along the spice route. Singapore would become one of the most important commercial and military centres of the British Empire, and the hub of British power in Southeast Asia. The city was occupied by the Japanese during World War II, which Winston Churchill called "Britain's greatest defeat". Singapore reverted to British rule immediately postwar, in 1945. Eighteen years later the city, having achieved independence from Britain, merged with Malaya, Sabah and Sarawak to form Malaysia.

However, less than two years later it seceded from the federation and became an independent republic on 9 August 1965. Singapore joined the United Nations on September 21 that same year. Since independence, Singapore's standard of living has been on the rise. Foreign direct investment and a state-led drive to industrialization based on plans drawn up by the Dutch economist Albert Winsemius have created a modern economy focused on electronics manufacturing, petrochemicals, tourism and financial services alongside traditional entrepôt trade.

Singapore is the 6th wealthiest country in the world in terms of GDP per capita. The small nation has foreign exchange reserves of more than US $177 billion. The population of Singapore is approximately 4.59 million. Though Singapore is highly cosmopolitan and diverse, ethnic Chinese form the majority of the population. English is the administrative language of the country.
**********************************************************
We celebrated here in our Condo downstairs at the BBQ pit... There was a group of us... one couple from Norway, one couple from Denmark, one couple from Canada and then us Americans. Prior to the weekend we we asking some of the locals where we should celebrate National Day and they all told us at HOME... supposedly it gets really crowded and a pain to get anywhere to see the action... so we followed the sound advice and partied at home and watched some of the celebration on TV.

We all brought some food... a bunch of meet and salads.... YUM YUM.

Pierce was chased around by his girlfriends the entire night (they really were a huge help in keeping him happy).


Our family wanted to support the Singapore colors (red and white) so we all wore red and white.


Here are some of our new neighbors (and friends) from Denmark... Jane and her little son August.



Neil pushed Pierce around in this buggy that some neighbors let us borrow... he loved it and he got so hot that we had to take his shirt off.




Of course I had to bring some fireworks for all the kids... we had poppers and sparklers.

One of these is not a kid... and yes it is my husband.... so much fun.

My boys.

Here August is seeing his first sparkler with his Daddy Martin.

We hope you learned something new about Singapore and Happy 43rd Birthday Singapore!