It’s a night I’ll never forget.
After spending 24/7 with each other for 40 consecutive days in 11+ countries, it was finally time to say goodbye: my travel partner, Annah, just left for Korea. For the first time in 40 days, I’m alone.
But hold on, not really — I get a Facebook message from a friend that’s in the area.
Not even an hour into my newfound solitude, I’m grabbing drinks with my friend from NYC, Sajni, on the 70th floor of the New Asia Bar overlooking the Singapore skyline. We catch up for a bit and then we grab some mint-jasmine shisha at Arab St. Afterwards, I drop Sajni off and I return to my hostel. I think my night is done.
But hold on, not really — A message is waiting for me at the front desk.
10 minutes later I’m karaoke’ing Backstreet Boys with BX, my college friend (sitting on the left in the photos below), and Erin (sitting next to me in the photos below), a fellow American I met at my hostel only yesterday. Afterwards it’s once again back to Arab St. where Erin and I enjoy mint-rose shisha on the sidewalk. When the shisha café closes at 4:30am, the two of us are not deterred. We continue the night gallivanting around a city that isn’t used to seeing such gold + white American diversity (and we proudly wear it on our sleeves, holding hands, dancing the dawn away on as if a scene had been stolen from Lost in Translation).
We laugh. We dance. For a night, we make Singapore ours.
We didn’t get back to our hostel until 6am in the morning. Usually I would sleep now, but I have to leave right this moment to catch a 9am flight to Calcutta (India!) via subway.
So much for sleep. But for the first time in a long time, I don’t miss it quite as much.
No need to dream anymore; it’s already happening.
- At time of posting in Singapore, it was 26 °C - Humidity: 100% | Wind Speed: 2km/hr | Cloud Cover: mostly cloudy