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Wednesday, May 27, 2009 - 08:39 SGT
Posted By: Gilbert

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Ten Thousand Kilometres

I'm typing this in the middle of Rome, but perhaps we should start at the beginning of the story. Fair warning: The style of writing used will be rather more clipped than the usual.



(Narrative will be accompanied by 9-in-1 photos, labelled from 1 to 9 from top left horizontally to bottom right) Leaving Mr. Ham [1], who was in a huff after failing to qualify as luggage, I hitched a ride with my parents and grandmother to Changi Airport (drinking fountain shown [2]) - memorable song of the drive there was 中国话 (felt chorus was nice).

Thanks to the miracle economics of the modern airline industry, it was far cheaper to take a Cathay Pacific flight from Singapore to Hong Kong, and only then from Hong Kong to Rome. The six 4O representatives took up two rows of seats somewhat behind the right front wing [3], with yours truly taking the window seat for the Hong Kong leg. Strangely I'm less concerned about aeroplanes than tall structures, despite my dislike of heights.

Cruising at an altitude of some 8km to 10km at a speed of over 800km/h [4], there wasn't much to do but watch inflight movies on the award-winning StudioCX system, where I happily counted many titles that I would have watched but never found the time to. Got midway through The Wrestler [5] before my screen got reset - the data/computing power probably wasn't distributed. Whatever, I switched to An Inconvenient Truth - they probably should have strongly suggested that we watch the full movie in the introductory Geography module. Assuming he got his facts right, Mr. Gore makes a compelling case for global warming, and all this after inventing the Internet! Random facts: Gore is a friend of Carl Sagan, and China's automakers have far higher emission standards than US ones (!)

The rest sat through their selections (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Ip Man, Red Cliff, Stardust, etc), and in about four hours (and dinner [6,7]) we [8] were at Hong Kong International Airport [9], which was still reminiscent of Singapore.


Elation at completing the first leg
(faces will be mosiac-ed for a little bit of privacy & blackmail opportunities)



(Original image source: flex888.com)




After languishing in transit [2,3] for a bit and using HKIA's wifi [1], it was back to the air. More meals [4,5] followed, and while the chicken was tasty, I had little appetite come breakfast. The flight to Rome took 12 hours (learnt that departure and arrival times are quoted as the respective places'), and I felt it appropriate to view Slumdog Millionaire as the plane skirted India. Managed to get a deck of cards and some eyeshades off the flight attendants (whom wore masks with the H1N1 scare continuing), and kept the toiletries bag and towel (they were complimentary, right?), resulting in a net gain of worldly possessions, less a ballpoint pen.

Landed uneventfully in Rome at 6-plus a.m. local time [6], a bit of a bother since we could only book into our first hostel at 2 pm. Separated with the slightly-more-gay trio [7], who were headed for Greece, after wandering about Fiumicino airport for awhile, while alvin, sel and I got on a train (the pompously-named Leonardo Express) to Termini Station [8]. One of my first impressions of Rome was the prevalence of graffiti [9].

Something to chew on: It is said that all roads lead to the Eternal City of Rome. However, consider that all roads are two-way. Then for any road (say the street I live on in Singapore), it must be reachable from Rome. But since all other roads reach Rome, it follows that all roads also lead to my street! In any case, I crossed a number of lines of longitude for the first time, and set foot in Europe for the first time too, so it should be a big deal.



Left most of our stuff [1] in the Overseas B&B, which was right by the train station, and marked by a sign reading 华侨饭店, appropriately enough for three former 华侨中学 students. Yes, the manager's a Chinese (from around the Shanghai area), and quite helpful. She managed to pull out a map and suggest some free attractions to visit, and also remarked on hearing that we had tickets to the CL finals that perhaps half of the English visitors here were looking for them - some of her other guests had asked if she knew of any tickets available. The going price seems to be over 1000 Euros a ticket, unsurprisingly.

Ate a burger and drank Coke (i.e. a Crazy Meal) at the nearby Cafe Crazy [2], and went on a walk [3] through the neighbourhood, where there were far more Chinese establishments than I would have thought; the storefronts leading to basement shops had some character, and so did the traffic, which was a finely balanced game of chicken between drivers and pedestrians that generally works out. Huge columns [4,5] were par for the course, with this one outside the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore [main pic], the grandness within being of the sort which could not be adequately captured by our lesser photography equipment.


Photo of alvin taking photo inside the Papal Basilica


Continued tramping onwards under the scorching Roman sun to the Colosseum [6], where the touring horses stood so motionlessly that I thought they were made of wax. A special Champions League display was by the side, where the trophy was on display. There were a number other booths, including a mini pitch where a few freestyle footballers were doing their tricks. Climbed the incredibly (and some say intrusively) huge Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II [7], where we managed to get yelled at by a police officer for unthinkingly sitting down on a ledge.

Lunch was ham sandwiches [8], more filling than it looks, after we were taken to our rooms on the seventh floor (of ten in total). The lift was tiny, and the furnishing sparse, but comfortable especially after our long trip. We had planned to go on a evening walk, but fatigue took its toll, and we ended up having a late dinner [9] at the Chinese restaurant downstairs and a bath, not necessarily in that order, before calling it a day as flag-waving Barcelona supporters marched down the middle of the road.


A room divided into two brings more revenue


What was that song, "...Lord I'm Six Thousand Two Hundred and Eighteen Miles Away From Home..."? And this is just day one...



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1 comment

m:) said...
6,218 miles away fm home. take more pics:D


May 27, 2009 - 14:46 SGT     

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