The begining

22.04.12

The excitement is finally creeping back into my consciousness. Im learning a little ritual I have before travel. Of course while its still in the distance its all very exciting, then as d-day draws nearer a more mundane me comes to light. One which forces most thoughts from my mind before anxiety takes over.

Now I’m on a rather bumpy flight to Singapore. My darling Kelly will no longer be joining me at the airport and my flight is 4 hours longer then I realized, I got a shallow 2 hours sleep last night at the most and well, I’m flying with Jetstar…need I say more?

BUT the excitement of the people I will meet who will change my life. The people who will meet me and in turn have their lives altered. The idea that every single face I see will be a new one with a new opportunity. Around every corner a new adventure. That is keeping me going. Oh yes the excitement is back!

Later… (into the 23^rd)

I am now 12 hours in to my stop-over after an 11 hour flight to Singapore. The bright orange sunset that reflected onto the ocean spotted with islands and boats as we flew in last night was beautiful! As we neared the land the matching red rooved houses and tall white sky rises shot up in every direction as far as the eye could see.

My new friend from the plane and I said our goodbyes and wished each other luck. I never even found out her name, but she had become my little Indonesian grandmother temporarily. I then entered the glass maze of Singapore airport. A lovely taxi driver battled away at my bags and burnt the wrap off with his lighter since the only knife we could source was inside the encased bag. After I proceeded to set about finding my bearings, some good food and internet but the glass boxes had me at a loss.

I could see where I wanted to go but getting there was another issue. I was starting to get a wee bit frustrated with all the dead ends. After doing my third lap my little friend came bustling out of a fancy Chinese restaurant embracing me, taking my hand and gushing that I must come in to meet her family for dinner. The idea of today’s failed budget flew across my mind before I agreed. How could I turn down such an offer?

We sat at a large spinning wooden table and her son-in-law picked and ordered in Chinese for a confused me. Now anyone who knows me, knows picking food for me to eat is not an easy feat. I fumbled with my chopsticks chasing food around my plate trying to act like I knew what I was doing. The food I did actually get in my mouth was pretty amazing! And dairy free! Or so I was told after I insistently badgered them about every form of dairy that could be in each dish the put in front of me. Delicious long bean omelette with preserved turnip and no milk or cheese! Stewed peanuts and some kind of steamed greens mixture with a garlic, ginger and tofu sauce, which was not only amazing but I had to make a mental note to tell the grange crew how many greens I had just digested.

After goodbyes, again, I set about finding a posie as far away from the “no sleeping” sign as I could find. After about two hours of dropping in and out of sleep on a horrendous bench in a cold and empty viewing room I found a pal and we set up camp on the tile floor instead, this time I was tired enough to crash for longer, after muttering crap to Chad from Phoenix Arizona (I thought that was quite classic) for a few hours, to drift off into an unsettled snooze.

Later Chad jumped on his flight. Since then I have failed to locate the airport pool and slept a little more instead, got lost in the airports cactus garden, treated myself to some stupidly fancy spa for a shower (spoilt huh!) and I have about 9 more hours until I touch down in Bangkok. I really can’t wait to hit those streets with my camera. x