The flight from London to Singapore left just after 10 p.m., and soon after that we crossed over to the next day. After eating a great meal (at about midnight) I watched a couple of documentaries then actually went to sleep. I am generally a terrible sleeper on planes but Singapore Air had the most comfortable seats I had ever experienced on a plane. I managed to nap for a couple of hours until a screaming baby woke me up (there’s at least one on every flight). By now it was broad daylight, although it was only 3 a.m. on my watch. So I returned to watching TV for a while, and I almost fell back to sleep when all the lights came back on and the second meal was served. No more sleep for me. 

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After picking up our bags at the airport we passed through security, which detected something large and metallic in my bag. I dug around in my backpack and discovered that it was my bag of key rings that I had collected over the year setting the alarms off. The security guards told me they thought I was trying to bring in knives. Once they were assured I was not a threat, they let me go. 

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We found a left luggage facility at the airport so decided to leave our large backpacks there for the next few days and only take our small suitcases. It took us about half an hour to sort out what we needed to take, spreading ourselves out across the airport floor. Our summer gear was stuffed right down the bottom, and we discovered items we hadn't seen in months. It was like gaining a whole new wardrobe (of well-worn, wrinkled, probably-needs-to-be-thrown-out clothing).

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With the bags dropped off we caught the train to the centre and went in search of a hostel. Everywhere we tried we were told there were only dorms available, which was the last thing we were after. In the end we settled for a 4 bed dorm, but at the time we had no roommates so it was sort of private. 

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By this stage we were ravenous, so we headed out on the streets to find something to eat (it was about 10 p.m. local time). The humidity and food aromas immediately transported us back to the beginning of our trip – hot, smelly, familiar Asia. It was great to be back. The only difference was that there was no traffic and almost no people around. We found a cheap local restaurant and loaded up on tasty street food, one thing we had missed since last being in Asia. Once back in the still-private room Danny fell straight to sleep, while I didn’t doze off until about 1 a.m. My adventure with jet lag begins.