This is my life: Danang to Singapore, catching up with an old friend

Having slept next to nothing the night before I left Seattle, being exhausted because I didn't sleep on the airplane, then add in jet lag, and I was sure to wake up at 3 am in Danang (which was about 3 pm PDT). I eventually gave up on sleep, got up, played on my phone, watched some tv, did some ballet exercise, and walked around the front garden of the house. Risa and Mike got up at a sane time, we breakfasted, got our luggage together, and Risa and I departed for the airport. Our flight was headed for Singapore, but since Silk Air's flight path was a triangle from Danang to Siem Reap to Singapore, we had a 40 minute layover in Cambodia. I though we'd be able to stay on the plane, but apparently everyone had to disembark.

Siem Reap airport is the scariest little airport ever. There's only one runway, and I think I saw three airplanes total. Our layover was long enough to walk from the airplane to the airport, get a transfer slip, go to the restroom, check in at one of the four gates, and walk back to the airplane. Weirdest layover yet. But I guess since we got out of the plane, I can say I've been to Cambodia?

We landed in Singapore, got through immigration, claimed baggage, and got through customs without incident. I'm always nervous about customs in Singapore. The MRT has a line that meets the airport, and our hotel say directly above a MRT station, so luckily we didn't have to catch a taxi into the city. I can't say enough good things about the MRT-it's awesome.

Our hotel was the V Hotel Lavender, which on the whole, I'd recommend. It's very conveniently located on top of the Lavender MRT station. Around the corner is also a 24 hour kopitiam, which translate to coffee house, but in reality is a small food court. There's also a Wendy's, a small convenience store, a fried food stand and a bakery that are open during the day. It's also only a few stops from the downtown core, but far away enough that it's still pretty quiet. It's within walking distance of Little India and the Arab quarter. The room was pretty big by Asian standards. The downsides were the elevators were slow, there was only one outlet (but it did have a international adapter), and it was $10/day for wifi.

After a shower, and unpacking all the items I promised to bring her, we met my school friend, Anne and her husband at the Newton Circus hawker center (I forgot to get a picture). It'd been 17 years since I'd seen Anne, but she looked almost the same (seriously). In the intervening years, we'd both grown up, quit gymnastics (how we'd met), joined dance, gone to college, gotten married and had kids. Her little munchkin in nearly a year old. Her husband is a sweet guy with a soft South Carolina accent, something that surprised me because I thought he was from Asia, but I think he's just really, really tan. I of course forgot to get a picture of the two of them, so here's one from this article.

We let Anne order a variety of food from the various hawker stalls. Here are the pictures. Warning: I'm a terrible photographer and about 50% of the pictures I took on this trip were of food.