Right now I’m alone in an Irish Pub in Ipoh, decked out in a Chang Beer singlet and bermudas with a Guiness in tow. Needless to say people are staring at me in an unwanted manner, but i just felt like i had to wrote this after hearing the eyboardist belt out ‘My Way’ by Sinatra.

Yet this is why I’ve come to love travelling alone, even if its only for 2 days in a year to a place not too far from home.

Sometimes you just gotta do it your way

My first time

The first time I really travelled alone was back in 2009 with my good friend Jon as we trekked our way through Vietnam & Cambodia, before mutually splitting up after the whole ‘I’ve stayed with my friend for too long’ syndrome.

As of now I’ve been alone to Manchester(work), Yogyakarta(Mar 2011), Ipoh(Dec 2011) and Viet/Cam(June 2009) by myself.

It is indeed scary at first, being totally dependent on your instincts, wit and adaptability in a foreign land but ultimately becomes a real life changing experience as yousee how everything works out in the end.

Through my travels I’ve seen the extremes of humanity, the one side that treats you as a cash-rich tourist and the other that side that makes you realise the world isn’t that bad after all.  Sometimes it’s just a simple smile, or the effort the locals make to help you even though they know not what you are talking about.

I think the best & most important thing about travelling alone is losing that fear and apprehension to ask question, to go to 10 different hostels looking for the cheapest place, bargaining 10 minutes for 1000 rupiah ($0.20 Sg), fighting off the sleeze and taxi touts, and most importantly be open to everything that gets thrown at you.

I always try to take the road less travelled, not plan too much when I’m over there, and I’m always amazed as to how I manage to find my way around in a rickety old bus, or how by sheer coincidence I get to meet new people and journey together with them.

Back in Vietnam with Jon (2009)

Wah you so adventurous ah!

That’s a question I often get when I happen to meet Singaporeans on my travels around the SEA region, and often I just reply to them ‘ I’m just here to take a break by myself ‘, and its through instances like this that I realized that in our metropolitan city, many of us still aren’t comfortable with just being alone let alone travelling alone aside from Studies/Business.

When you’re alone time passes by real slow and you begin to really find that time to relax and make sense of your life as a whole just by doing absolutely nothing.

Nothing can help describe doing absolutely nothing but that’s what makes it wonderful.

In fact when I’m alone I find myself being a strong representation of Singapore in the conversations with the people I meet along the way, which often revolves around your standard chewing gum ban, lack of democracy and cost of living.

But it’s through these general topics that I really find myself understanding not just the other person’s country, but also my home that is Singapore. More often that not I leave the conversation feeling lucky that we live in such a great state, but also wonder how I can make my life just that little better.

The things I’ve learnt

I’ve learnt that music in universal, that you should keep an eye on your wallet in a massage parlour and that I’ve become less cynical about what people do with their lives.

I’ve learnt to admire how our multi-lingual nation really helps you out even if its just asking where the ‘toilet (tandas)’ is, and that I have a bad habit of breaking into a really bad fake British Accent whenever I talk to westerners.

I’ve also have to admit that whenever I’m overseas I begin to miss the people that are close to me and often can’t wait to get back and share my stories with them (her).

But most importantly I’ve learnt that the only constant is change and that my goal in life is to just know more about the world no matter how ridiculous it may be, to learn about their political insitutions, the hassles/wonders that are a commonplace in the world and how people view myself and my country as a whole.

Here’s to 2012, to my first long haul trip to Europe and at least another holiday alone by myself

10.17pm Dec 18^th 2011

As it stands its been 6 hours since my first ever ride on the KTM train decided to conveniently breakdown in the middle of nowhere at the Bukit Anna station. Which kind of makes me wonder if I really spoke too soon about being fortunate to not have been affected by the SMRT breakdown.

As it stands here are some of the problems people on board people are currently facing
1.)  There is no bus station within a reasonable walking distance
2.)  Taxis are not coming and will not head to JB as some areas are flooded
3.)  No one really wants to share a cab with me when asked
4.)  There’s no more food and water
5.)  The only show they are playing, Goblet of Fire has been screened 6 times, without any audio.
6.)  The word refund is not found in their dictionary.

If you thought SMRT’s PR/Corp Comms was bad, one should understand that KTM essentially has what cannot be more aptly termed than No Comms. Basically no one is making any announcement, stationmasters are only informing people of the situation when asked with a mere shrug and they are actually bickering with their own engineers on fixing the train.

Suddenly i feel like Stings-Fields of Gold would a suitable song to listen to. Just replace Barley with Lalang.

Always look on the bright side of life

The strangest thing however is that I kinda feel alright about this, I’m and not exhilarated about being trapped in Bukit Anna, but I’m taking this breakdown as part of my little adventure to Ipoh and its probably thanks in kind to the way people around me are reacting.

Yes people are complaining and asking questions, but not in a malicious and demanding way and everyone seems to be more like ‘well, that’s all they can do so let’s just wait it out’ kind of attitude.

It gives you a sense that they are in no real hurry, that they have somehow become contented or learned to live with such situations in a country meagre miles away from us.

10.55pm

I’m sitting on the tracks waiting for the third engine to come (yes the replacement engine amazingly broke down as well- cue Malaysia Boleh chant!) and take us home and suddenly think about how this scenario would have been totally different if it happened back home.  Not a pretty sigh I might add.

I’ve now listened to almost all of Radiohead’s albums to date. This has to be the best lullaby song by Radiohead-Motion Picture Soundtrack.

11.38pm

Harry Potter is taking the Portkey to catch the World Quidditch cup, yes Goblet of Fire has now played 7 times.

They have finally given us some water and a bun to go along with and we’ve got another 3 and a half hours to go to reach Woodlands, I think I’ll try and listen to some of my newer songs from YUCK, John Butler Trio and if i’m not too late, No Doubt. Haha.

2.55am 19^th December 2011

I boarded the train at 11.15am the previous day, so it’s been 15 hours on the train for me, everyone’s cranky and everyone’s rushing but I can’t complain cause I’m doing the same.

Nevertheless it has been an adventure in many ways and I would like to examine more about our reactions to the SMRT failure when I finally get some rest and check the papers and forums out.

So this article by Jeff Goins (self proclaimed writer, idea guy and DIFFERENCE MAKER) has been circulating around quite a bit. Honestly it is nothing interesting nor impressive, just basically a one-sided argument by a guy who is very much insistent that travelling is the only way to understand the world/life as a whole and dismisses the idea of hesitation and a zero-tolerance for risk taking as a liability to one’s progression in life.

Now I do love travelling and wished I had more liberty and time to do it, you could say I’m 50-50 in terms of being a travel junkie and responsible corporatized individual.  Fact that i would rather travel then have a PS3 or queue up for an Iphone4s about sums it up.

National Service + Part time studying/working + finding myself amidst a recession etc. have more or less kept me occupied and grounded here, and effectively I’ve only had 8 months of complete freedom with no obligations (minus work of course) thus far.

I’ve gone to Liverpool, Tioman, Indonesia, Tokyo, Bali, Phuket and now… Batam in the past 22 months and that’s not too bad I guess.

My Argument against Jeff Goins

But that’s not the point I’m trying to make here, rather it was this comment further down in the thread that got me feeling that travelling hasn’t really made Jeff Goins really humble nor sympathetic to the feelings of others, and I wonder if this holds true for other travellers as well.

His simplistic one sentence, one-word responses and a really obviously sarcastic ‘WOW!’ at the end can easily be interpreted into a form of arrogance on his part, and sounds like a bot is operating his comments section.

‘That, and I guess I’m a little insulted by the insinuation that normal life is somehow less adventurous, risky, etc.’ – Jesse

It’s true what Jesse said, that a ‘normal’ life can be way more challenging and risky if we understand the lives of others, that some people just aren’t interested in travelling or that a big reason why people travel is to avoid the mundane stuff that is associated with the responsibility of growing up.

Perhaps, simply put some of these travellers really don’t have any liabilities at home to bother about, unlike a decent proportion of us.

One has to look at the societal structure of a country to understand the ideals that the people are indebted towards, and that life is more or less how you ever exciting you make it out to be.

You can take your touristy shots at the Niagara falls, but i’d be happy enough if it was at Punggol Waterfront fishing with buddies of mine.

Plenty of my friends here have moaned and groaned about how boring Singapore is and how they can’t wait to migrate overseas to the greener pastures where most have studied at before. Maybe it would have been different for me If I could have afforded doing what these friends did, I do feel envious without a doubt, but at the same time I do think that I would rather be responsible and not put a financial burden on my family and especially my dad who was worked his ass off for the family.

I do want to go away for a long stretch, say like 3 months at least within the next couple of years for a land trip around SEA just because I want to(and its economically viable) and I hope that when I do return that my perspective of life in general will be more positive and open to criticisms unlike Jeff Goins.