When I woke up, Kate was already at the desk clicking on her laptop. She was hard at it, working fervently at a career she loves. She used to be based in Singapore for work but she realized that there’s no place like home and eventually left the Singaporean company to go back to the Philippines. A few months later, the Singaporean company hired her back –this time, she is working home-based in the Philippines and the emails are her attendance at work. What a really great break! 🙂
She was almost done and she asked me my plans for the day. I said I had no plans and was thinking of a trouble-free last day in Singapore. She said she was going to IKEA and invited if I would like to join her. She wants to buy some stuff from IKEA and meet friends she made in Singapore. I was suddenly ecstatic!!! 😀
You see, I wanted to go to IKEA that I was harping about it the night before in the cab on the way home with Chrissy, Ivy and Jonel. Since I had no one familiar with the city to go with, I decided against it. I heard it was a bit far from Link Hotel. Thank goodness for an angel like Kate, my beloved roomie, and suddenly my Sunday was looking less bleak.
Another thing I like being bunked with Kate is, without having to speak, our movements are in such great tango with each other. She had her space and I had mine and timing in the bathroom between us was seamless –both productive and relaxed.
What made this departure day different though is I usually have my luggage packed the night before and clothes to wear and everything else ready. But after a fun night with the group much laughing and walking, I plunk-ed on my unmade bed with my water bottle. I wasn’t able to pack at all –a first in my book actually.
Good thing I was able to make haste and packed in 20 minutes (I usually take a leisure hour), just in time Kate finished packing too. We checked out and placed our luggage in the lobby. We were crossing the street when I checked my phone and saw Jen’s text message. I replied and said we were on the way out but will wait for her if she’s ready. She was all set and 5 minutes later the three of us were on a bus going to our IKEA date.
IKEA
IKEA was a good 30 minutes from our starting point. It wasn’t so difficult to get there by commuter bus since Kate was familiar with Singapore. At one point, it took a while to figure where the express shuttle is but both Jen and I were still at ease with Kate at the front. We took a train, 2 buses and we were finally at IKEA.
IKEA was like an enormous warehouse that offers a wide range of well-designed functional home furnishing products at prices so reasonable, both Jen and I did quite some shopping. We only had an hour before we meet up with Kate again so we really maximized our time –checking only items that really caught our interests and consulting with each other on the price and usability.
$1 Breakfast
I bought a few items (lamps, rags, photo frame, 1kg Swiss meatballs, chocolates, etc), while Jen’s big purchase was two white fur shrugs for her favorite chair at home. I ran out of Singapore dollars and my only complaint about IKEA is that they don’t accept US dollars. Jen and Kate had to lend me some SG money for my purchase.
It was time to relax when we had lunch at the huge IKEA cafeteria. Of course, both Jen and I tried the meatballs everyone was raving about. We also bonded with Kate’s friends from Singapore and asked them about life in the cosmopolitan country.
Going back was so much easier although we were running out of time because we were supposed to reach the hotel lobby by 3pm. Stopped by quickly at a money changer shop, had my US changed and paid my dues. We had a good 20 minutes to spare and since Kate knows I wanted to try Ya Kun Kaya, we looked for it at a nearby mall. Time is gold and I decided to just concede to trying Singapore’s Toastbox at the ground floor. Both Jen and I ordered food to go.
I also appreciate how easy I got along with Jen. I’ve been reading her Sexy Nomad site and like her steady positivism and travel spirit as well even before meeting and working briefly on a film project together. Just the day before, we bonded over breakfast and waiting time at Selangor.
We hailed a cab and finally reached the lobby on time. We were one of the early ones there. The bus actually left an hour later. No complaints since Jen, Kate and I had to repack our luggage and hand carry bags to fit in what we just purchased.
After repacking, we still had 30 minutes to enjoy leisurely the soft-boiled eggs and kaya toast combination we bought. Yummy!!! It wasn’t Ya Kun but it satisfied my kaya and egg craving!!! 😉
All aboard the bus, we hit our airport destination. Because of the items I bought from IKEA, I was over the limit weight by 7lbs! First time it happened to me too but since we were in a big group, I wasn’t too worried. Not until the ground officer said we couldn’t do a big group check-in, which was a bit weird. I was getting really concerned… Being quite independent, I was timid to ask people if I could share their weight limit 🙁 I checked how much it would cost me to just take in the extra weight -PHP 7,000! Gosh, I didn’t want to pay an extra 7 Grand for “pasalubongs.”
After much scurrying, (big thanks to Alodia, Ashley, and Jonel as well as Frances and Fran who tried to help out), Jonel shared my luggage weight and checked in my bag under his name. *BIG HUG to Jonel*
Whew, trouble-free huh 😉
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*BIG HUG* Back 🙂 weee!