Unbuilding the Grace and Pearman Bridges


For Sparky and myself, curiosity drives passion which in turn fuels our life's engine. Our passion was capturing the story of both unbuilding the Grace (1929 - 2007) and Pearman (1966 - 2007) Bridges and discovering the unbuilders. It takes a lot of passion to track a project from July 2005 until April 2007 - rain, shine, hurricanes or moving to Singapore. We discovered the joy of discovery learning. Ken Canty opened the front door for us - then Steve Testa, Ponch Billingsley and Mickey Rogers opened many side doors. Below are the highlights of what we discovered, who we met and what we learned.

And a reminder from T.S. Eliot (East Coker from the Four Quartets)

Home is where one starts from. As we grow older
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living. Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment
And not the lifetime of one man only
But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.

October 26, 2006: Lunch at GMS - Evaluating Culinary Therapy 101

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GMS is a special place, in fact, a very special place. For example, each day about noon - a variable number of GMSers gather for lunch - typically across the street at the Silat Food Court. We engage in what I call culinary therapy, which is often a very interesting adventure, secondary only to retail therapy. Bob Kamei has expressed such an interest in culinary therapy that the proximity of high density culinary options is driving his selection of a place to life. After 6 months of experiencing the end product of taking Culinary 101, many of us feel that this will be added to the 1st year curriculum, with segments included in Molecules and Cells and other segments included in Normal Body and a few remaining segments included in Body and Disease.

Here is Leah waiting and the group gathering

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We make our way to the street - and cross it (note the green walk light)

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We pass a Sikh Temple and continue walking

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We pass an interesting market and before us is the Silat Food Court

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Then cross over to the food court - ans past the Popiah stall

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Here is Yu Hui - looking for empty tables - while I am off ordering my mutton briani and paratha

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Then Yu Hui orders and the drink lady drops by

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Leah has noodles today and Gina is engaged in very deep conversation

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There were no adjacent tables so we split up - here are the ladies at one table and Tony, Yvonne and Edward at another table

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There are many food stalls - to the left and right

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Here are our ladies and here is my favorite guy - the man that makes Popiah

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Someone has to guard the fort - and it is usually Pat while the group returns back

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For the next day - Friday - Tony decided it was Guys-lunch-out - at a place near Far East Square

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Here is li Fook - and then on to Far East Square

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Walking back - we pass a number of interesting food courts - all engaged in group culinary therapy

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And so we continued - under the Fire Gate and back to Tony's car park

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

C. Frank Starmer

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