Road To Mysore

I've done this flight 4 times in my life and I don't think anything can prepare you for it. The flight from LA to Hong Kong was 14 hours, I had a 3 hour stopover at Hong Kong and the flight from Hong Kong to Cebu is another 2 1/2 hours. It is such a grueling flight especially the first leg...14 hours sitting on your ass. I was able to get 5 hours of sleep so the rest of the way I watched movies and TV. I'm glad that the planes now have individual TV's so you can decide on what you want to watch. Initially I had a window seat but midway through the flight I had to go to restroom and I woke up the mother and daughter I was sitting next to. The mother requested if they could slide in and trade seats. Twist my arm. I wanted an aisle seat so bad. The rest of the way was much easier coz I could get up anytime and let some blood circulate through my legs.

We arrived in Hong Kong at 5:30AM and I was so happy to get out of the plane. I think I'm claustrophobic. I was really impress with the Hong Kong Airport. It's new, clean and state of the art. They even had showers and beds to sleep in. I regret checking in my yoga mat coz I could have practice yoga when I arrived. The terminal was pretty empty and I could have picked a quite corner, practiced and taken a shower before heading for Cebu. Maybe next time.

The flight to Cebu was much easier. The plane was practically empty. I had 3 seats all to myself and could have slept horizontally. I chose not to sleep on this leg so I could get over my jet lag as soon as possible. On this flight I had a "blonde moment". I was sitting on my seat while some of the other passengers were slowly boarding. I noticed a small lady coming towards me dragging her hand carry about half her size. She stopped on the seat in front of me and was lifting her hand carry so she could put it up on the overhead compartment. The flight attendant was next to her helping her but was not that much taller. The good samaritan that I am, I reach my arms out to help and stood up. My seat belt pulled me right back on my seat. They both saw me, smiled and thanked me for attempting to help. They managed to put it on the overhead compartment without my help. I sat on my chair feeling like a total moron.

I arrived yesterday in Cebu at around noon and was greeted by the humid weather. I was happy to be home though. I haven't been here since 1999. I decided that the sooner I get used to driving here the more I can get things accomplished so I told the driver that I was driving home. Driving in the Philippines is totally different from driving in LA. The streets are so much smaller, people cross whenever they want to and if you don't know how to drive offensively, you'll never get anywhere. There is basically only one rule you need to follow...don't get into an accident...otherwise you'll be OK. It was strange driving though because they changed a lot of the routes and new buildings replaced the landmarks I was familiar with. Street sign are almost non-existent so if you don't know your way around...you'll get lost.

I had lunch with my mom & dad and after lunch, my mom and I had a haircut. While my mom's hair was being cut by the hairdresser, somebody was massaging my scalp. The hairdresser eventually cut my hair. My mom treated me and paid for my haircut. My haircut plus a generous tip cost 200 pesos or a little less than 4 US dollars (exchange rate is 1 is to 55). I feel like a millionare here. I still need to figure out what is considered cheap and what is too expensive because everything here seems cheap. My parents expect me to haggle because I'm a local but I really don't mind overpaying because the living conditions here for the less fortunate ones are really bad.

I think I got to bed too early last night because I woke up at around 3AM this morning. I sleep really well because this was the first time I slept horizontally in the last 36 hours. I started my practice at around 5AM. I was worried that I would get distracted because I didn't have the luxury of Noah & Kimberly staring down at me. Surprisingly, I had a pretty good practice. It's really warm here, even early in the morning that I could have gotten away with 3 A's and B's but I stayed with the 5 A's & B's. I used my black mat that I bought a couple of months ago for the first time. It was really sticky and it got slippery when my sweat began to drip. At one point, my left hand slipped as I was going down into chataranga and I strained my left elbow. I hope it's nothing major. I lost a little focus at the tail end of my practice but I finished it anyway. Maintaining a daily practice is going to be my biggest challenge while I'm here.