I’m finally starting to feel settled! Let me explain. After New Zealand, Ben headed back to L.A. while I carried on to Singapore. My flight was routed through Kuala Lumpur, so I spent a few hours at the airport chatting over an open wireless access point (which belonged to an airline, oops). I arrived in Singapore quite late at night, where a friend who had arrived earlier met me at the airport. I compared the price of a taxi with the airport shuttle and chose the shuttle.

Bus travel had never been so comfortable. The photos in my gallery provide proof: every seat had a small screen showing movies and music selections. The five- or six-hour journey flew by. I arrived in Singapore with no money and no map. Expecting to be dropped in a central location, I instead found myself outside a hotel on the edge of the city. I hired a taxi to take me to several hotels on my list, stopped at an ATM to pay the driver, and tried to check in. Unfortunately, all the private rooms were booked, but space was available in a backpackers’ room, with a private room promised for the following night. That suited me, especially at $7.50 USD a night. In the end, I stayed in the large shared room …