Free?!?!

It has happened at last - I found something FREE in Singapore! The little boxes of funky instant coffee they insist on giving me at the convenience store across the street don't count, and not just because I don't drink coffee. No, what I found is infinitely better. In fact, it may have just made my holiday season. Erik and I stopped by the Thompson Road nurseries today in search of a Christmas wreath (knowing full well we couldn't afford the real trees). I saw a foreign woman pushing a cart full of pine branches. I stopped her and asked where she found them. She told me there was a big pile of them at the back, all for the taking.

I don't know if the Singaporeans there thought it was weird, but I piled a cart full as well and trotted off, happy to be smelling real pine for the first time in Asia. My house now has branches scattered wherever possible - I even gave half of them away to a friend because I ran out of space! I know they'll die quickly, but there's more where those came from, as long as word doesn't get out too fast. Merry Christmas to me!