izkariote | Singapore 2009

IN B4 I CHECK EVERYTHING because if I checked everything first I'll likely crash before doing this properly, which'll mean waking up and checking everything first and delaying this entry further. o_o

/incoherent

A-anyway uh so like I mentioned a few entries back and then some, I flew off to Singapore on the 27th with Khursten (

khursten), Yukeh (

yukitsu) and Lyn (

kye_kestrel). This was our first trip out as a group (and Yukeh's first trip abroad ever), and it was the most glorious adventure we've had together yet.

SORT OF DISCLAIMER: I'm extremely ~~lazy~~ unorganized, and I'm not too fond of doing a blow-by-blow account of things, so this entry will likely be the "abridged" version of our whole trip with lots of personal teal deer on my end. Shove off to the entries my buddies will make if you want something to, er, supplement this. XD

They will also have pictures, which means that their entries will totally top mine by default.

OCTOBER 26

Since I pretty much packed everything in advance, I got to roll around right up until the last minute at home before heading off. That meant, of course, staying home and saying Farewell Number One to my mom and dad, since I planned on stopping by the office before really going.

Dad was incredibly cute. Sometime before he left for work, he walked into my room, pointed to his cheek, and stared expectantly until I went over and kissed him. Then he pointed to his OTHER cheek and stared again until I went over and kissed him there too. X3

Left sometime after lunch, did a quick stopover at Katipunan ~~for great Gudang justice~~, then at the office for Farewell Number Two (mom looked like she wanted me to pack her in my suitcase and bring her with me), then I was finally on my way to Lynffles at Powerplant. Didn't wait for her too long because she's awesome that way, and we kicked around in the car all the way until we got merrily lost twice over on the way to Khursten's house. Khursten picked us up from the church. orz

Watched Gintama with Khursten once we were settled in (she has set her room up in the most marathon-worthy way possible), then lollygagged all the way until Yukeh arrived later in the evening, which meant more lollygagging for all of us. We also stayed up EXTREMELY LATE in spite of the early morning call time because none of us could really sleep anyway, and frankly? KH 358/2 Days and talking with each other seemed much more fascinating a prospect then uselessly rolling around.

Of course. Um. We sort of really paid for that come trip time.

OCTOBER 27
Khursten's mother was sweet enough to drive us all to the airport as soon as we were jolted awake and shuffled off to start our trip - she also took charge of sending us off with kisses and blessings in place of our own parents, who weren't there. I found that really nice. orz

Airport shenanigans were forgettable beyond us entertaining ourselves and me showing just how addicted to smoking I am with the fact that I always look out for and spot smoking areas with every new place we go to. Flight was pretty much forgettable too, beyond the nifty video display they had of our take-off (which was incredibly and uncannily smooth - smoothest I've had since, well, ever!), the pretty clouds and me getting through another mission in KH!

The view of Singapore from above was pretty nice - I knew pretty much zilch about the geography of the place prior to my arrival, so it was, er, enlightening, I suppose? And there's always going to be some fun towards taking the Sim City/Civilization-game sort of view to the world below when you're up in the air. Nothing compares to the landfall, though.

Let's get a few things straight: I've traveled to LOTS of places. It has, however, been years since I've been somewhere truly urbanized and truly cosmopolitan, and Singapore is both of those and then some. Let's also consider the fact that I live in Metro Manila, which is a place that should IDEALLY house 1-3 million people but it's the home of over ten million folks instead. Being a Filipino pretty much makes you used to the dirt and grime and poverty and traffic... it bleeds into everywhere you are, everything you see. Has its own sort of unique charm and unlikely beauty, but it's all out of a pretty ugly reality, in my opinion.

So imagine the shock that came with stumbling out of a congested and polluted city and off a cramped plane with ran out of food and water midway through the trip, and into Singapore.

I couldn't breathe properly for a while because the air was so clean.

No. I'm not kidding.

ALSO: AMAZING TRAINS AND LETHAL-QUICK YOU WILL DIE IF YOU TRIP ESCALATORS. \o/

Oookay so we dragged ourselves off to our hotel, the YWCA Fort Canning Hotel, and dropped our bags off before going to lunch at Liang Court since check-out wasn't going to be for another few hours. All four of us were pretty damned dead and quiet until we started eating, and then we woke up completely when we went to the Kinokuniya Branch in Liang Court.

Siiiiigh doujinshi. Why can't I quit you.

OH WE ALSO GOT TO MEET LUVI (

pineapple_samba) FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER, WHICH WAS JUST MADE OF WIN AND AWESOME. ♥♥♥

After some more lollygagging, we dragged Luvi back to our hotel for a bit because we are suspicious creepers that way, and I can't stay much on that because I sort of crashed as soon as I managed to shower and snag one of our EXTREMELY NARROW beds.

Evening was reserved for some more walking around, namely at the Esplanade (trufax beautiful place, I tell you) and then a glorious hawker food dinner at Glutton's Bay, which signaled the beginning of my now never ending craving for chicken rice.

Chris (

thelovemafia) came around to meet us sometime after we had finished dinner, with two of her friends tagging along - it was lovely meeting her on my part, because I had seen her around our common fandom, but I had never really managed to poke her! ♥ She and Yukeh, though: they hit it off like whoa.

I'd find it frightening, except I think I've grown used to Yukeh being a creeping creeper.

We parted ways with Chris' company at the station, and later on with Chris on the train we were riding since her stop was a little after our own. Cue bedroom shenanigans on our first night, but all of us crashing pretty damned quickly because lmao, first wild day in Singapore is very wild!

OCTOBER 28
Lyn, Yukeh and I were pretty much dead for the most part the next morning, so we were too slow to really be able to go with Khursten when she went off to meet with her uncle Raymond. This left us with the responsibility of tracking KB (

tasogareika) down for our own morning meet with her.

...We all kind of really failed at meeting up until Khursten came around, yep. OH BUT THAT'S NOT IMPORTANT. What is important about how shocked we were to see how KB really is a boy! A very tall and low-voiced boy! D:

TAKE NOTE OF THIS, TST PEOPLE ON MY FLIST: KB IS A TRUFAX MAN IN THE MAKING.

/avoids facekick

Oh and somewhere there we went to Lucky Plaza, which is apparently Filipino Central in Singapore. And it really did feel like it. My countrymen are everywhere, and I think that is glorious. |D

AFTER ALL OF THAT and lunch it was off to Sentosa! Weather was kind of foul, which was kind of annoying, but we were all out to see the Underwater Park SO WE WERE UNDETERRED. Sentosa looks like a pretty nifty place, and I'm probably going to go back and really go around properly if I ever get another chance to go back to Singapore~

NOW FOR THE UNDERWATER PARK. I could be terribly biased when I say this, but the place was really amazing and so much fun... I'm a huge aquarium fag, got used to going to the Vancouver Aquarium like at least once a month with my mother when I was a kid, and so it was a real treat, coming back to one as nice as Sentosa's with friends. THEY HAD PETTING STATIONS AND FEEDING STATIONS, HOW AMAZING IS THAT? B-but I swear if you're not into that thing everything else is totally worth the eye candy.

There was also a cute seal on the way to the dolphin show, which was also very cute. That's the first and maybe the last time I'll ever see pink dolphins in the flesh. o_o

Sentosa day ended with us eating at the Imbiah section of the park, where I had the most amazing hot dog that I have ever eaten. And we got to fag over peacocks.

The day REALLY ended with us doing more shopping, more oggling, and food coma before we shipped KB off after giving her possibly one of the longest nights out that she has ever had in her teenage life.

We love you too, KB. :3

Right before retiring, I asked the group who each one of us would be among the Jooishishi boys in Gintama, since there are four of us and the number kind of really matches. It was agreed that Khursten is indeed Gintoki, I am indeed Takasugi, Yukeh is indeed Sakamoto and Lynffles is indeed Zura.

There will be no end to the fun timez jokes on that end.

OCTOBER 29
AMONG ALL OF MY DAYS IN SINGAPORE THIS DAY WAS THE MOST LETHAL FOR MY WALLET. NOW LET ME TELL YOU WHY.

Khursten took us all off to Orchard Avenue, and our first stop there was Takashimaya. I totally loaded up on Pocky and the sort of pure floral tea that you'll likely never find down here in my country, and Lyn and Yukeh went wild over pork jerky and some other things. THAT WAS JUST THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG.

Shopping delayed us a bit with meeting Ang (

annotate) over at Ion, who is, by the way, tiny and cute and I want to keep her on my person at all times! We fagged lots together with Khursten over at Muji, where I finally got to buy something acerola-flavored.

...Uh, for those who aren't in on the whole Endtimes thing, acerola juice is the favorite drink of Aidan Clayce, one of my characters in the story. I made it his favorite flavor without ever getting to actually TRY the thing for myself, so seeing those mints and tasting them was a real treat for me!

[/writer geekery]

Chrissie (

theprerogative) came around sometime later, and she is as cute and spazzy and flaily in real life as she is on the internet. We all ate together at this cool soup place that Ang suggested, and after we had fed ourselves properly we proceeded to get utterly and totally lost in Uniqlo, then in Kinokuniya's main branch.

...There are no words for the beauty of Kinokuniya.

Just.

None.

Yes, I pretty much bought myself into poverty between Page One, Uniqlo and Kinokuniya by that point.

Chrissie had to rush off before we were finished at Kinokuniya but that was okay because it was far and enough that we got to glomp her and eat with her for the first time in the flesh as it is, and Ang left sometime after, but that was okay because I got to fag lots of lit stuff with Ang in between the shelves!

Dinner was trufax absolutely fucking amazing, and we got to meet Jane, Khursten's long-time fandom friend. Chris also got to join us again after work, so she managed to participate in more food coma time! Aaaand she and Yukeh totally mindmelded again, which sort of freaked Khursten out. BTW ANG THEY BOTH WANT TO PUT YOU IN THEIR POCKET.

Packing time was really funny late in the evening, since we were all SALDKHGAS;KHDHDSG WE BOUGHT STUFF NOW HOW ARE WE GONNA FIT EVERYTHING PROPERLY? Everyone kept offering me luggage space since we were all worried that with my book haul, I'd exceed the weight limit and stuff.

G-good thing I didn't. OTL

OCTOBER 30
Crashing was pretty easy the night before because of all the good shizzle that we ate, but things first thing in the morning were a little hassling because we were getting booted out of our hotel by lunch and the rains prevented Khursten and Lyn from coming back to us early for check-out. Nevertheless, after that was sorted out, we went to Holland Drive at a pretty leisurely pace - Luvi was kind enough to meet up with us again, and we kicked around before Chrissie came along to join the lot of us for lunch.

Quick segue: Holland Drive's area was pretty different for me from the rest of the places we had been before that point, because it was suburban-ish and had that whole neighorhood village feel going for it. I really enjoyed the feel of the place there, and the company made it even better.

Had my first taste of laksa at the laksa place that Khursten used to frequent when she was younger - it's pretty good stuff, even for a person like myself, who isn't really fond of the whole spice thing!

On other news, Luvi bullied Chrissie a lot.

Yeah, Chrissie, you're a prime target. :>

Chrissie saw us off at the station since she had some stuff to do, and Lyn and Yukeh took Luvi along with them to Chinatown in order to buy some stuff last minute while I accompanied Khursten on her rounds at Orchard. It was while she and I were waiting for KB and the rest to come back that we found out that our fucking wonderful airline service had canceled our flight home. Rather than get too stressed out about it first, though, we opted to wait for everyone to come around and join us for dinner, for some good food and laughs before airport stress.

KB arrived, and Chris and Chrissie both managed to make return appearances soon after, and Regina ([Bad username or site: amandes) came around as well! So that pretty much made our Singapore <s @ livejournal.com]harem group nearly complete for dinner shenanigans. Highlights included us dubbing KB "manling" (TST FOLKS PROMISE ME YOU'LL NEVER LET THAT NICKNAME FOR KB GO) and Yukeh and Chris tag-teaming on just about everyone.

Airport things were a hassle, because apparently our fucking wonderful airline service wasn't going to provide us with any food or lodging for our sudden delay - it's a miracle that we even managed to land a flight back home, with the way things were looking. Our friends were good and wonderful to us: they stayed around and helped us out tons while we were flailing about the flight stuff. W-we literally had to shoo you guys off. Thank you so much for staying with us. ;w;

OCTOBER 31
It was pretty much near midnight by the time we had everything smoothed out - we landed a flight with Singapore Air, which Khursten and Lyn got pretty excited about. I shared their excitement a moment later, after I heard from them about how awesome it was.

Never flying PAL again, by the way.

Never ever ever.

Aaaaanyway we booked at this swanky hotel whose name I've completely forgotten - the room cost 100 SGD, but we cheated by going under the nose of the hotel authorities and sharing one room. And what a swanky room it was.

Also, guys, take note of this because it's extremely important information.

The bathroom had a glass window by the bathtub, allowing the people in the room proper to see whoever was inside unless the shades were pulled down.

I dare somebody to tell me that that totally isn't suspicious.

Everyone crashed pretty late in spite of the fact that we were pooped, which made waking up a few hours later somewhat difficult. Khursten joined me for breakfast downstairs while Yukeh and Lyn caught some more shut eye, and even though we had to pay for our meal it was totally worth it.

Beyond the omg tired, the journey to the airport and the airport shenanigans at Changi were totally not stressful! We split up to do some last minute shopping, in which I managed to secure souvenirs for my grandmother and my parents. We met up again before boarding time, in order to fag over how we were surrounded by pretty and oggle the carp swishing about in the north end koi pond.

YES THEY HAVE PONDS IN CHANGI, HOW COOL IS THAT.

On the way to our gate we totally took advantage of the travellators (yeah I lolled at the name too) and fagged over the rest of the pretty landscaping before we sat and waited for our flight to call us in.

After observing the boarding procedures and actually flying with SIA, the lot of us were left to gawk at PAL and realize just how trufax bad everything was over on that end of the fence. Overall, with all the gadgets and extras and spaaaaace and great food (it has been years since I have known what good airplane food ought to taste like) it was the most beautiful flight I never paid for. T_T

Felt so grateful about having all that fun in Singapore and making it out just fine in spite of things not going as planned here and there that I prayed a whole rosary in thanks to whoever it was who decided to watch over us while we were out and about.

Shut up, okay, I know I'm a dork.

We landed back in Manila on time, and ~~all those corrupt bastards didn't come out to tax us for stupid shit~~ we breezed our way through all the landing procedures. My mom and dad and Peter were all waiting for me already by the time I stepped out, so I had to head off ahead of the other girls.

AFTER TRIP THINGS
Babbled lots about my trip to my parents and my bro while we were in the car - it was really, REALLY great, seeing them again and being able to cling to them and stuff. They all apparently missed me, especially Peter, who later told me that Paolo is, as usual, not much for company with his religious angst and Blood Bowl-ing. :'D

We stopped over at Shangrila, since the parentals wanted to do some shopping. Peter and I wandered around together while we were following our dad, and I ended up buying more books in Powerbooks in spite of my poverty.

S-stop judging me, flist. ._.

Started crashing once we were really on the way home. Ahaha. orz

So now I'm back in my house, showered, properly fed, practically dead on my feet but feeling the best I've had in a while. I've missed home and I've missed my family, although I don't particularly miss my country with Singapore still on the brain.

I'll be frank and say that Singapore, while lovely, was probably a place that I'd like to visit again, but not live in ever. It's... got this weird feel to it. This neither-here-nor-there, lack of "cultural" ground ambiance that sort of gets to you if you're sensitive to that sort of things. I mean, it's safe and secure and really fucking pretty, but it somehow feels empty for me.

Of course, that's all an observation on my part. Whether it's fair or not, I don't know.

Nevertheless, I made some good memories in Singapore, and it will always go down in my personal history as the first place I traveled to in the company of friends. I am also likely going to go back there very often in the future if the economy is kind to me, because I've got some real friends there that I definitely wouldn't mind seeing time and time again, from here until whenever.

/takes a deep breath

SO NOW THAT THAT IS DONE it's likely back to the regular routine. Still got a few days of sem break left to enjoy, although faculty duties are bound to kick in for me, especially with the new subjects I'll be teaching. There is also NaNoWriMo to consider, and that open RP post that I'm supposed to do for everybody.

May also need some time to figure out how to get rid of the Singlish twang. I-it's even corrupted the narrative voice in my head, as I rather rudely discovered when I attempted to read some of my books during the trip.

And I still want chicken rice. Like, lots of it.

Sooooo, flist, what did I miss? :D

EDIT: WHAT THE SHIT FLIST 520+ ENTRIES?!

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: on Alistair!PC @ my bedroom.
Current Music: My neighborhood.