On Our Way – Again!

So since our tickets were for a Sunday departure we had the travel agent put us in a hotel for a couple days until we left. It was easier to be closer to the airport and then we could take the shuttle to get dropped of. We stayed in a hotel right by DIA in a weird little enclave of big chain hotels and a few restaurants. Actually, it was literally a few- a Village Inn, a Ruby Tuesday, and Dicicco’s. With such limited options, we ended up eating at all three. Our last meal in the US was dinner at Dicicco’s- which really gave us a memorable send off.

Dicicco’s (http://www.diciccoscolorado.net/) is among the most ridiculous places we’ve encountered in a while. Inside is a mess of stenciled grape vines on the walls, fake sculptures, weird balcony seats and every lame attempt to try (and fail miserably) and look like a nice restaurant while still maintaining a full on over the top theme park feeling.

The crème de la crème though, was Jerry. Jerry was positioned on a massive stage, wearing white pants and a navy blazer, seated at his Casio-tone with a two story projected digital fireplace behind him. He was playing pop hits on the piano at abut one third of the usual tempo. It was so slowed down that it was a puzzle to try and figure out what the song was even supposed to be- it was maddeningly familiar but basically unrecognizable. Some hits we did decipher were Killing me Softly, All by Myself, the James Bond theme and that song from Titanic. The absolute best part though was when the fireplace image ended and it was just Sony digital player screensaver behind him. The food was predictably plain and all in all it left us ready to get on our way to new horizons.

We had no problems at the airport, and everything went smoothly- even security was fast and uneventful. We flew to LA and then caught our connection to Singapore (which had a stop in Tokyo). After a long flight we stopped through the Tokyo airport- we just had to disembark and wait about an hour and re-board. It allowed us to experience a tiny piece of Tokyo though- the digital toilet!

The digital toilet (as named by Sam) had a control panel on the side of the seat and allowed you to choose buttons for options such as water spraying on your bum (illustrations included on the buttons – this was a round W shaped line with a spray of waves and arrows going somewhat violently toward it), flushing sound (this had a musical note on it) and others with less amusing illustrations.

After re-boarding we flew the rest of our 18 ½ hour journey to Singapore and arrived at Changi airport about 1 am.

Changi airport is in many ways indescribable. http://www.changiairport.com/ It is a completely planned and artificial experience.

We initially wanted to to stay in the transit hotel for a few hours and then take the free Singapore tour the next morning. Our flight left at 8pm, so we figured we had plenty of time. The hotel was full though and after wandering the airport for about an hour we decided to just suck it up and pay the high cost of a room at Crowne Plaza, also attached to the airport. The Crowne Plaza required us to go through immigration though. ‘Oh well,’ we thougt ‘we’ll be going into Singapore tomorrow anyway, so let’s just go through tonight.’ Stamp, stamp, stamp – we were through with our Singapore visit pass and headed to our fancy pants hotel.

The hotel was really nice. Our room was fancy and comfortable and it came with a free breakfast! We didn’t sleep too long though because we had to make sure we got back into the airport to sign up for our free Singapore tour.

After a couple of hours we went to get our breakfast. It was a glorious spread of fresh fruit, pastries, eggs and accompaniments, coffee, juices, cereals – a much needed break from the Indian-vegetarian airline special meal choice we’d been eating for a day and a half. We had a nice relaxing breakfast and then proceeded to go sign up for our tour- the desk opened at 7, and we wanted to 9 am tour, so we decided to go sign up and then come back to our room until it was time to go.

As we went through immigration to re-enter the airport a small nagging voice in her head told Sam she should have checked out first, but she dismissed it and just waltzed back through immigration. Stamp, stamp, stamp – back in the airport.

We were informed by the lady at the tour desk that we couldn’t go on the tour because we had already gone through immigration the night prior and re-entered that morning and you can’t just go in and out that often in a day. ‘Crap!’ we said, but we need to check out of our hotel. ‘Oh no,’ she said, ‘you’ll have to go tell them you made a mistake and see if they will let you through.’

Sigh. Not only do we get no free tour, now we have a stressful thing to deal with. If we had known, we wouldn’t have come back in and would have slept more at the hotel, or gone in to see Singapore on the bus ourselves, or checked out of our hotel (which we were paying cash for so we had left a deposit) but alas, now we had to plead our case to the beauracracy and see if we could get through again. The men at the desk were really nice though and agreed to walk Sam over to check out while Jon and Atticus waited.

We walked over to an area where there were a bunch of army guards with assault rifles and he told me to wait there. He then disappeared for like 15 minutes. Finally, he came back and the lady at the counter (next to the disturbingly young and heavily armed guards) took my passport. I had to walk with the immigration guy over to the hotel. On the way he says “If anyone stops us, just tell them you left important papers in the hotel.” Fabulous- not only have I surrendered my passport to Singapore officials, but now I learn it is under some sketchy storyline in order to make it happen, apparently checking our didn’t seem urgent enough to make the exception.

I checked out of the hotel and got my deposit and got my passport back (it is freaky to give up your passport abroad) and got back to Jon and Atticus. Meanwhile, those two had apparently been becoming best friends with the workers and Atticus ended up getting an enormous bag of hard candy out of the deal.

So it was now about 10 hours until our flight and we took in the sights and sounds of Changi airport. These sights and sounds are no small affair. We saw a cactus garden, a butterfly garden with over 100 species of butterflies, free foot massages (Atticus’ favorite), bamboo garden, koi ponds, art stations, free internet, resting areas (but no alarm clocks- dumb). It was still difficult t fill the time but I guess it was probably easier than any other airport on earth. We'll post a photo montage of our time in Changi once our connection is a little stronger.

We finally boarded our flight and arrived in Dhaka at about 11:30 at night. No luggage was lost, our ride was right on time an things went well. On the way home Mr. Tanvir, our landlord, said the person in the apartment before us stayed a few days more (we were late, remember) and so he put us in an apartment down the street until August 28th. We all slept a much needed sleep and then woke up early due to jet lag.

Next entry: First days in Dhaka!