A Heart Growing Fonder

The holidays are over and it's back to work now. I went to Singapore and Kuala Lumpur with Rohaizad.

Because we are so cheap, we bought tickets on a discount airways, Tiger Airways, from Manila to Singapore. But we paid in other ways.

Tiger Airways flies out of Clark Airport. We had to fly Continental Airlines into Manila and Continental lands at the International Airport in Manila. Because our Continental flight was delayed, we didn't get a relaxing night of sleep in Manila as we planned. Instead, we had to bolt out of Manila, grab a taxi and hustle up to Clark on Christmas Day.

Well, Clark is in the middle of NOWHERE!!! Two-and-a-half HOURS of driving to get to this tiny and seemingly abandoned airport. Once we were there, there were not buses, restaurants or ANYTHING! We couldn't get into the airport and had to wait outside for an hour.

But after the infernal check-in lines, security checks and horrifying free-for-all of running across the tarmac and grabbing whatever seats were available, Tiger Airways proved to be a pleasant trip.

Being in Manila, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur really made me miss Pohnpei. It is amazing what people who live in cities put up with: being stacked up, honked at, ignored, told when to cross streets... The pace was overwhelming and the amount of choices was ridiculous: which restaurants, which stores, which bus, where to go, what to do. I've become spoiled by the simple island life.

But we did get to hang out with quite a few of Rohaizad's Singapore and Kuala Lumpurian friends. We also met with Matt and Sarah Sahr, friends of our from Baltimore (being called the Sahrs is pretty unfortunate in Singapore), and Todd, a friend of mine from when I was the assistant director of the Gay Men's Chorus of Washington DC.

The whole Clark to Manila run was much better on the way back. We e-mailed our hotel and got a ride from them from Clark. Whew. But we still had to deal with Manila Airport. CHAOS!!! It was packed wall-to-wall with people. Within that sea of humanity, we had to find our way through security, check-in, departure tax and immigration. Wow.

On the flight back home, we ran into 9 other Pohnpei expats during the layover on Guam. We pulled tables together and caught up on our travels all over the globe. Between us, we had been to Myanmar, India, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia.

So I'm happy to be back. Even the sunshine seems mellow and friendly over here.