The Price of a Little Taste of Home - US$10.75

This tiny bunch of rambutans cost us a small fortune. Never imagined that in certain parts of the world, these gross looking hairy red balls would be valued almost as high as their spiky ugly counterparts - the XO D24 durians...

But that spiky guy has a good reason for that - he's the King of the Fruit. What excuse does these guys have? They are the whacky looking jesters? Unfortunately for John, I love those sweet hairy balls, and he will pay any price to make me feel closer to home; he did after all snatch me from my cosy protected cradle!

We were feeling a little homesick on Sunday and decided to hit Chinatown to check out a restaurant we read about which serves Peranakan food. Like how it always happens in the movies, the place had to decide to be closed that day! Somewhat disappointed, we explored further to see what we could find. Stumbled across a hot, dark, indoor market which houses an international food court. Was put off almost immediately by the heat and crowd and was backing out the door when 2 words screamed at us to stop! SINGAPORE LAKSA Though presented to us through a little less-than-appetizing food stall and not the decent restaurant as planned, it was still what we came here for. We had to give it a shot!

Looking down expectantly at the precious bowl of his favourite noodles, John dug right in. "What's all this stuff they put in there? Where's the taupok? And they got the totally wrong kind of noodles in here!" Turns out that the gravy was just almost right and everything else in that bowl was completely wrong. Nonetheless, it was polished off in seconds.

After lunch was our mini shopping frenzy of asian products not found in local supermarts.

Rambutans - $10.75

Bottled mapo sauce - $8.60

Five-spiced dried toufu - $6.95

A taste of home - Priceless!