Asia Cruise 2017

Happy New Year, let's go on a cruise.

Three weeks ago, I learned that my dad won a cruise in Asia. Now, you may be thinking, How does one win a cruise to Asia? By entering for one of course. When I got this news, and the invitation to accompany him, I thought, "Wow! Asia! I haven't been anywhere near there yet!" And then a second later, "Oh. Work. Right." But by some strange figurings of the universe which is a long story itself, I was allowed to get the time off to go on this cruise.

Just a heads up, I'll have very little access to wifi along the way, my blogging app keeps glitching, and it doesn't catch spelling errors, so I apologize in advance. I didn't want to bring any more electronics with me than my phone, so I'll be thumb typing everything. And the pictures I upload may be unusually placed within my posts.

Right now I'm on the airport shuttle leaving Bellingham, heading to SeaTac for my flight which leaves about eight hours from now. We are driving through snowy pine forests, but the sky is clear. It's only 30 out with a lovely biting wind. It feels like winter.

Arrival at SeaTac. Way way too early the checkin gate isn't even open yet. So I hunker down, tap into the wifi, and watch Netflix for a few hours.

~

As I'm waiting by my gate, I people watch. Spotted:

Two men and two women (in their 70s maybe) get wheelchaired to the boarding area. As they all arrive in a cluster and transfer to the seats, they start to laugh at the spectacle they're making. I make eye contact with one of the women and she smiles back at me. They're entertaining to watch, and I'm a few seats away. As I read, I keep hearing them say funny things. At first I didn't think they knew each other, but now I think they do. There was a whole five minutes where they kept goofing off and saying "thank you Dear" "can you grab that for me, Dear?" "Here's some food, Dear." Even the men to each other. It was like a comedy act. And eventually one of the woman has a water bottle in her hand and pauses in the middle of a drink, "well look at us like birds on a wire, first showing up in our circle of wheelchairs, now all ready to take our meds at the same time."

I don't know why, but these vibrant older people just made my day.

~ three hours into the plane ride:

I have a window seat, someone stuck their foot right along my window armrest and shoved their knees in my back. I was so astonished I didn't say anything, but it was a passive aggressive back and forth throughout my next sixish hours of sleep.

~

As I wait here in Taipei, I feel like such a foreigner. I forget what a luxury and comfort it is to be constantly surrounded by people who look similar to you...until you're suddenly not. This gives me another perspective which I don't think about too much. Side note, apparently I look Chinese enough for the flight attendent to start speaking Mandrin to me.

Welcome to Singapore, Singapore.