Tadaima!
(roughly - 'I'm back'- in Japanese)
Back from a wonderful break in my favourite part of the world - S.E.Asia!
It is that happy time of the year when getting the right money out of your wallet can be a challenge. Back in Tokyo now, it takes me several accidental encounters with Singapore dollars, cents and Vietnamese Dongs before I can dish out the exact amount of Yen at the cash counter.Mildly disorienting but hey - it comes with the wonderfully light headed feeling of a holiday hangover! So why complain.
Curled up contently with the tan back in my cheeks, a tipsy holiday grin on my face and all that Vietnamese baguette on my hip, I know the break has worked well for all of us.
'Singapura' welcomed us in her arms with a gush of warm tropical air on our faces as we stepped out of Changi Airport (Singapore) close to midnight. This felt normal.Cruising down the East Coast highway - on the drive from Changi airport to the city - I felt all the challenges in my life disappear slowly, one by one. My brain was going into snooze mode - no more 'figuring out' things, no more trying to make sense of the world around...just being...like slipping into my skin...when was the last time I had understood everything around me! The feeling was almost weird.And the cabbies familiar trill of 'Singlish' worked like a soothing lullaby...
So a heady one week was spent just reconnecting with old senses and friends. Lost pleasures regained - to be able to talk English,be talked to - a normal human interaction in every sense, having able to pick a shop at will (a lot to be said about those one- stop- shop malls) and shop for what you want,when you want and even turn them into intellectual experiences by asking clever questions to the shop assistant.Just loved the feeling of so many words rolling out of my tongue at a shop! While in Tokyo my 'shopping words' generally fit into one breath with more air to spare!
The spit and polish of Singapore assailed me. Pleasantly. It actually felt like home. Never thought I'd say this.
The lush tropical trees , well laid out grassy kerbs, colourfully restored Perankan (Chinese-Malay) and Colonial buildings - were just the balm our eyes - sore from the cheerless, rough edged Tokyo landscape- needed.
Were these the exact same 'antiseptic' things we had sneered at when we lived here a year ago? It must be relative.
Did I ever mention what a great base Singapore makes to travel from. A travellers paradise. Just a short flight away from any of the delightful SE Asian countries around. Crammed with unique cultures,people and places.All warm welcoming and utterly fascinating..
So it was tic tac toe and our fingers landed on Hanoi, N.Vietnam. One of the parts in the region we hadnt set foot on before...
