Third week of August, I had the opportunity to travel to Colombo, Sri Lanka and attend the 8th International Congress on HIV/AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (and therein also organize a satellite meeting, but more on this later). This trip was a first in several ways for me. It was my first ICAAP, my first time to Sri Lanka, my first experience of a flight transfer, and my first flight that went for longer than four hours to a destination more than two time zones away.
It might sound not too significant for some - specially for those who have already crossed hemispheres and international datelines - but it was for me. I'm not a very "patient" traveler, I get restless inside the plane sooner than most occasional travelers I'd think. I was thankful that there's a layover in Singapore - spared of suffering very long hours of boredom in the confines of a tube hurtling in the sky. Oh, and this was a first as well: to land in Singapore… well okay, it's not really Singapore as the whole city-state, it was just the Changi airport for a little over an hour.
As my trip was essentially a "major outing" for me as official representative of Asia-Pacific Rainbow, and organizer of one of the satellite meetings in ICAAP (my first to organize an event outside the country), it was also my first experience of packing up tremendously for a trip, more "business stuff" than just clothes.
And it was my first time to experience going over the weight limit for check-in baggage. I couldn't recall how much over the limit I was, I only remember that I was quoted over 11,000 pesos for it. Having no money to spare for that, I decided to leave some of stuff behind. I had to thank Eon for being able to make an emergency trip to the Centennial airport and bring home the "excess" stuff. (And thanks to my hunny too, for being able to drop me at the airport on his way to work.)
I was initially anxious over the transfer flight deal. I had no prior experience of that, and from what I observed of transfer flights in NAIA, it seemed like a complicated affair. Anxiety bore down a bit more when I arrived in Changi's terminal - somehow, my mind had imagined that as I went out of the plane, some guy would be waiting, holding up a placard bearing my name and directing me where to go. Instead, I stepped into a carpeted highway illuminated with too many directional signs.
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