What's aboard studying abroad - Part Two: Hostels, Hair and Singapore

So I took a trip to Singapore to escape the stress of graduate school and braid my hair. Actually, the trip was more about braiding my hair. But travelling to a different country also comes with stresses of its own from the unexpected surprises around every bend.

Background Info: I was traveling with a Caucasian American male student, Lenard from Utah. Traveling with Lenard in itself was an experience. I never realized how little we knew about each other; heritage wise (I am African-American by the way) or just even about hair ( and yes, our hair textures are very different). Another discussion for another blog posting.

Anyway, I got to Singapore at about 8:00 pm. And neither me nor Lenard wrote the address for the hostel . From my research I did to get a feel for the hostel, I remember  it was on a street called "lavender street". With that bit of information we surprisingly were able to find the street. The fact that Lenard studied abroad here also helped :). On the subway,  we found another backpacker going to another hostel in the same area and we ended up staying in that hostel instead. And all this was done in 90 degree swelting weather.

Either way I was happy to be at the hostel. Being my first time in a hostel, I wanted to be in an all girls room. Since there wasn't any, I resorted to staying in a mixed room. I really didn't care,  as long as I had my bed in an air conditioned room ( Trust me the humidity and heat was no joke) . and I needed to get my bag off my back and eat dinner. we get our keys and headed upstairs to our room. The room had four bunk beds and we introduce ourselves to the boarders there. Two males from Singapore and a couple from France. So in total 6 people in the room for the night.

After introductions, we stuck our backpacks in the assigned lockers and darted out of there to get dinner. Since Lenard had been to Singapore before he was mainly in charge of every thing. We ended up eating dinner in a local restaurant and I ate baby squid (Forgive me Momma Squid). But I also got to eat crab curry which by the way is super messy. Someone on the adjacent table took pity on our inability to navigate through the crab shells and gave us extra wet tissue wipes. Probably thinking, " definitely foreigners ". We got back to the hostel at about 11:00pm and all was right with the world. Compared to the"hard" chinese bed (No joke it is basically like sitting on the floor), I had a soft bed for the night and I did not have to deal with the great Chinese fire wall. Only down side, one of the Singaporeans in my hostel room snored like a bull horn.

The Really Really BAD Hair
The next morning, it was a race to loosen my hair. I had set my alarm clock the previous morning to 4:00am, so that gave me 2 hours to remove my crochet braids. Boy, was that a damn mistake. I had my crochet braids for about 3 MONTHS!!! I was so desperate to get the rat nest off my head that I flew 5 hours to a different country to get my hair done (To all my brown colored sisters who know the struggle). I will try my best to make this entire ordeal as picturesque as possible. So there I was sitting on the covered toilet in a toilet/shower style bathroom that could fit 5 people my size. I was trying my very best to get all my braids out in two hours before daylight in 85 degree swelting heat. With half of my knotted short natural hair out and no mirror, utter embarrassment seemed to be the only way out of this bathroom. After about three hours and five angry knocks on the bathroom door I was done, Praise the Lord!!!

But my bad hair does not end there, so I managed to hail a taxi to the ¨salon¨. So the taxi driver drops me off perfectly on time at the address, which was a complex with a a series of high rising apartment building. And ofcourse I had assumed that the salon would be in a shopping complex and will only write the address without the apartment no#.  My day would not just let up, I spent an hour and a half walking up and down the complex praying that I would get a signal on my phone to message the owner of the salon. And yes, Thank you God, I got signal. I got to the apartment/salon and I have never and I mean NEVER been that happy in my life to get my hair done.

When she finished, her braids were probably not the best I had gotten. But at that sun-lit moment, I was never more happy to have sat in a chair for 5 hours. But that does not end my bad hair day y'all. Since I had assumed it to be a formal business setting, I only had my debit/credit cards. So I had to get cash from the ATM and ¨apparently¨ there was a SG$200 limit on my account. Here I was standing in front of the hairdresser, who though I was about to swindle her. I literally gave her all the money I had in my wallet and almost gave her my passport as collateral. I somehow I convinced her to trust that I would return with the rest of the money.

So here I was standing miles away from the hostel with less than SG$15 in my wallet and I had to find my way back somehow. Lord knows if one more thing were to have happened I would probably have lost it. And I was also supposed to meet Lenard to tour the city ( No way in $%#@ was that happening). I found a honest taxi driver who got me to the hostel with SG$2 to spare. And ofcourse I am greeted by grin-faced-Lenard who seemed to have been having a real chill day. (Ohh, was I tempted to slap that grin off his face.) Ok, kidding.... but dang it....do guys have it easy.

Lessons I have learned from this experience

1. Living in a hostel is absolutely not for me. I like my hotel room where I am free to snore and fart as much as I want
2. Always have enough cash with me in a foreign country.
3. Write the address of a place I am going in a foreign country completely with the phone number of any individual at the location if possible.
4. About time I learn how to braid my own hair ( because that hairdresser ripped the heck out me)
5. From the majority of people I met at Singapore, I have to say I was quite disappointed. Not the happiest /help your neighbor bunch of individuals I have met. Even China knows better.
6. Two days is two short for a vacation in a foreign country.

Back to the graduate grind
As Always Live Life Righteously