Now from Chennai

The world definitely is a small place. Afterall heaven, hell and earth are just a plane ride away.

On my return trip, I had the wonderful opportunity of flying over the breathtaking snow filled Alaskan mountains and crossing the Bearing Strait. Never did I ever imagine I would get so close to a pole. We infact traced the entire west coast of the US from California, over Seattle and onto Alaska to cross the date line and travel south over Siberia and then land in Seoul, to further take us to Singapore.

Chasing the sun wasn't fun though, with 16 hours of continuous sunshine threatening us to disrupt our biological clocks. I also had the good fortune of getting out at Signapore in transit. We had about 19hours of layover time. We were offered temporary visas to get out and see Singapore for ourselves. A neat bargain for the long layover. But the place was hotter and humid than expected. No doubt, with it being so close to the equator. I found a colleague of mine was in the same trip, so we hopped on to a taxi to get around Singapore City. We visited Little India (which was totally indistinguishable from Chennai!), Esplanade, Suntec city, Orchid garden etc. And my impression of Singapore was just a place full of first class hotels, shopping malls, apartments and pretty much thats it. Natural beauty was quite limited, and so I would rate Dubai higher overall. In my whimsical thoughts, I think one would develop into an incurable shopaholic if he/she is to live in Singapore for long. But the construction and architecture I must say was marvellous.

Well, seeing many places were only the minor takeaways from the entire trip. The spiritual lessons and occasional sparks of enlightenment during this period is what will benefit me in the long run. I learnt that a lifetime's perceptions, beliefs, fears, and notions can be shattered/changed by a single hop to a different place on this very earth. Different places have different problems. The simple gem of a lesson that I got was how to use my heart always, in destroying my ego, being polite and more importantly, being courageous to face life. Bon jour.