[PaW] Paris - Singapore

[golunvolo]

Good luck and lots of fun in your new adventure.
I spend some time there in the summer2015 and I´m looking forward to your view of the place.

   Lorsque tu mettras le cap sur Ithaque,
fais de sorte que ton voyage soit long,
plein d'aventures et d'expériences.

[Olivier]

Thank you again!
Akira: the school is pretty good, I am afraid the whole system is flawed and designed to produce uniformous profiles. Time to try something else.
Frank and Paco: it is going to be an adventure, hopefully not and odysseus! And I am going with my Penelope, definitely.

Week 2: Last cold birthday party before long
My daughter Julie is turning 12 today. She has lived all her life in the same house so far (for sale now!), but shows no fear of leaving it. She is rather excited. Leaving her friends is another story...
Here is C., she came for the birthday party and is sleeping over. Like Julie, she has developed a remarkable talent for piano, and she is surprisingly mature enough to understand that further progress will come through discipline and hard work. How reassuring for a father to see that his daughter chooses her friends so well! C. oscillates between exuberance and moments where she pauses and retracts from her surroundings. These moments can be interesting as they transform her eye's expression: she is not fully controlling her image anymore. It is a challenge to capture this transient look, I almost succeeded here.

[John Geerts]

Great capture, Olivier !!  Impressive and natural look.

[MFloyd]

Very beautiful portrait 😊

[armando_m]

What a beautiful couple of images, specially the portrait

Best of luck in your new adventure , I spent a month in Singapore and had a really good and interesting time

[Frank Fremerey]

This portrait really touches and moves me. What more can one say about a photo? it is technically and emotionally brilliant. What less can we expect from you? We have seen so many astounding perspectives from your production. Continue to impress us, we wait in Awe!

[Olivier]

Thank you very much for the nice words!

Week 3: Getting real

Today was a milestone in Julie's agenda: she got her passport, the last official paper we needed to get all the paperwork processed by the Singaporean authorities. The previous one expired a while ago, and the picture showed a 6 months old baby...
We are now overwhelemed by requests from different people at the relocation company.
Should the new appartment building have a swimming pool? Ask the kids!
Dou you expect to move with animals? No! With alcohol? You bet!
Will the children go to school? Don't ask them, especially if the answer is yes to the first question...
And so on.
We are not used to be taken care of so well, we always handled everything by ourselves up to now. It is somewhat reassuring, and on the other hand we are not fully in control of our destiny. Very strange feeling!

[Jakov Minić]

Olivier, the image of your daughter is priceless!!

[Olivier]

Thank you Jakov!

[Olivier]

The children gradually realize how much their life is going to change. We have been talking about this opportunity for months now but up to recently it was only a distant possibility. Now that it is materializing, they understand that they will go to a fully English speaking school, and they can't express themselves in English right now... One more good reason to go actually. They are very fast learners and we have absolutely no doubt they will succeed but it is always disturbing to understand that soon you will feel naked and outside your comfort zone.
So until we go, almost all movies they will watch will be in English, with or without subtitles.
We went to our very nice local cinema to see "la la land", a very charming story with good music. This is when the kids were informed it was not the French-dubbed version, but the real thing. They loved it in the end!

Week 4: la la land, wtf?

[Jakov Minić]

Their expression says it all

[armando_m]

I'm enjoying the narrative , thanks for posting it Olivier

[Hugh_3170]

English is widely spoken in Singapore - even amongst the locals.  Your children will soon become bilingual (or multilingual).

That said, I would be quite surprised if there is not a French speaking community somewhere in Singapore. 

(Besides, Vanuatu, Tahiti, and the Mauritius Islands are only relatively short plane rides away - all are very desirable spots for a holiday!)

[Erik Lund]

What a lovely portrait of C. Oliver! calm and full of expression! Same with the next two great contact! Thanks

[Olivier]

Thanks.
There is a quite large French community in Singapore indeed, more than 15000 people. Some appartment buildings are heavily populated with French families, near the very good French school. We expect the children to join this school probably after 2 years in an international school, when their English level is strong enough. This will facilitate the trip back whenever it happens.
When I was living in the US and working for a French company the gregarious tendency of of French community was very obvious and a bit annoying. Every conversation was about comparing the two countries and people were so convinced that everything was so much better back home that I ended up leaving the group. While I can understand that people miss some aspects (food!!) of the life they have left for a while, I think they should embrace the novelty of their situation rather than lament in groups.
Hugh: there are so many desirable holidays spots easily reachable from Singapore that we won't have enough time for everything. Definitely, Cambodia, Indonesia and Australia will come before the rest!