My parents think I'm mad, maybe a little strange sometimes; I'll be on the living room couch after a long day, (usually in a dishevelled state from a hard game of frisbee) in that peculiar state where you're tired enough to fall asleep where you sit, but also so tired that your legs are too lazy to carry you upstairs to your comfortable bed. Instead, they vehemently persuade you that the couch, perhaps a foot too small, and a bung spring less comfortable, is a far better place to crash for the night. The television is blaring, but the power remote is oh so far away... I'll just close my... eyes...
And yet, through your drooping eyelids, you can still see the flashing antics of E! News or reruns of Friends. Argh! If only there was a place I could get some peace and darkness! Committed to making my night's sleep as unaccommodating as possible, I push through the discomfort and try to sleep in the last place I probably should be sleeping, on account of the numerous times I've awoken from that couch with a sore neck or bruised back. The last obstacle in the way is that darn tv! Parents are asleep. Getting up to fetch the remote would surely result in my cognitive arousal. Fumbling in the darkness under the accursed couch, I find something - the Sky remote!
Now I could switch it off. Mute it. For some reason, I never do any of those things. If I had any sense, I'd have just walked 30 seconds up the stairs to bed in the first place. No. I always find myself turning to one channel. Real Good Life TV. Up in the stratosphere on Sky channels, I'm sure no one watches it. You see, it's a radio station. Just a black screen and voices coming out. However, it's a Chinese radio station. I don't understand a lick of what they're saying, and I'm not sure if I want to. There's just something easing about listening to some far away place, some distant culture. Something different. They have their own thoughts, their own dreams and problems. Your mind tries to fill them in. An effective wall of pleasant white noise.
So my parents will often walk in on me at 5am, 6am, sometimes if I get that pesky middle spring to rest juust right, maybe even 7am, with the television blaring Cantonese radio, me fast asleep.
That's how I felt walking around Singapore the first night of my stay there. It was as if I was alseep and awake, all at the same time. I felt like I was just a mere visitor, a spectre, walking amongst the people there, observing and invisible. Back home, I understand what's going on. I'm the centre of the universe. Nothing is foreign. But here, stepping out into the dimly-lit streets and smelling the burnt offerings for the Day of the Dead, it was exactly as if I was back on that couch.
I stayed in Singapore for ten days. Without question, Singapore is a strange place. Everything is warped there, most certainly, units of scale. A "long way" was a 10 minute walk in one direction. An expensive taxi fare was anything over $10. In New Zealand, you're lucky if you can go around the block on that, let alone a half-city crawl as it was in Singapore. And yet a cheaper abode in Singapore would be in the $400-500K range.
In that sense, and many others, traveling does give you a rare perspective into not only the lives of others', but also your own. Foremost in my mind, was how grateful I was for everything back home. When taking a wrong turn can lead you to getting lost for more than a few hours, you learn to appreciate the staleness that you thought your life back home had become. The excitement and the full-nature of traveling is amazing, and something everyone ought to do at least many times in their life, but it must be said that simply coming home and finding your room, still as ever, with its familiar smells, feeling and sights, is something very satisfying, and those who have traveled will understand. It's not that you're overwhelmed by your experience, or that you disliked the impact of your wanderings, it's just something unwritten that fills you with peace, and you learn to appreciate that simply because something is not exciting, does not mean that it is any less "good" or "bad" than something that is.
I know I sound very philosophical, but you can't help be changed by such an adventure away. As with all experiences, even if they're meant just as fun, enjoyable encounters, they do have an impact on you. You brush by them, and they brush by you. Especially when you've traveled as little as I, you do come back with a new perspective on things and see the world around you in a new way. In that sense, your adventure has not ceased, but really, continued.
On the flight back, I got very misty-eyed over seeing my home's lights peaking through the clouds below. It's where everyone I've ever loved was met. It's where almost all of my best memories have been. And even though the ground shakes, the wind blows and bus drivers are grumpy, it's my own home. My trip to Singapore was the longest I've been away from my family, indeed, it's the first time I've even been out of the country on my own, so I'm not ashamed to say I missed them a lot. Sometimes it does take a while away from what's closest to you, to truly recognise just what they mean to you. And that's really what traveling does: it gives you an amazing perspective on what life is, abroad and at home. Sometimes it does take going halfway across the planet just to realize what you feel in your own heart.
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