Travel Log 2 or More Pretentious Travel Log II

Sri Mariamman Temple

My world view was destroyed. You see I thought I had this missing day thing down; this isn’t my first rodeo overseas. Yet for several days I lived in an alternative universe. I was living days that either had not happened or were in the past. I was never in the present in Savannah or Singapore. So where was I? I got in a heated discussion with my companion (she whose name cannot be spoken) over what day it was.  She was confused too. I declared it was the twelfth in Singapore because my computer said so in the date and time. For four days I was viewing my computer calendar as being on Singapore time.  Now you may think you are on vacation what does it matter? She had an appointment with a curator at the National Gallery of Singapore on the 13th and needed to know for sure what day that was. Well I, eternally trying to be helpful, told her today was the twelfth and therefore tomorrow was the thirteenth. And we went back and forth over what day it was and I quite confidently told her I had been using my computer calendar and time since I had been here and it was the twelfth. So we discussed the endless possibilities of what day it really was for a good ten minutes.

But then she did something unfair: she asked the internet for the date and time in Singapore. It was then my whole understanding of the universe was demolished. It said it was the eleventh; apparently my computer clock had not changed and I had been in a twilight zone of no time for several days. I could have denied the facts as our President is want to do. But I faced it like a man and said I was wrong. But now I did not trust anything I previously had known. The world was different and I had unsure footing of even the basics of what day it was.

Yet I had to continue to drag myself through this foreign country with sultry steamy weather. So I trudge through natural history and history museums looking for answers. I visit churches, Hindu temples, and mosques hoping for a light to be shown me. I learn about different cultures such as Peranakan, Indian, Chinese, Malay, and Muslim struggling to find my place, to live in this moment and not a moment I have contrived. And slowly the answer came to me: time is a construct. The prophet Kenny Rogers said if you can’t love the one you want then love the one you are with. So I have decided if you can’t be in the time you want then love the time you have.
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Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum