In Singapore

So I was glad to run into Bayu, a 2004 Fulbrighter, in Detroit. We shared the same itinerary afterwards, which meant that I had a friend to share the 6 bland hours of waiting in Singapore. At first I planned on getting a place at the transit hotel, but I overheard a guy saying it was fully booked already. So instead we hung out at the rest area or I think it was called the “tempat rehat” where they put in sleeper chairs & stuff. Because all the sleeper chairs were taken, we sat at this cool looking chair and chatted a bit. Next to us were some computers and a long narrow table for people to plug laptops. So there was this guy, typing or browsing away at his computer, when suddenly a bunch (20-ish) of armed Singaporean policemen came by him. I was like… what? I wonder why they picked on this guy? Was he browsing or downloading some kind of restricted material? If that was the case, I’ve got to hand it to the Singapore PD, they sure work fast!

But no, that wasn’t the case. They were just checking for IDs and making sure the people hanging around at the airport at that unlikely hour were those who were rightly there. So that included us, who had to present our passport and tickets. Well I remember experiencing the same thing in a bus to a transit hotel in Japan, but it wasn’t that threatening as there were only 2 authorities. But this time, imagine waking up to of finding a bunch of policemen, more than half of them pointing rifles -long big automatic weapons- at you face. Believe me, it was not a pleasant sight.