Welcome to the US

18Hrs fligh, many time zones away, 3 connecting flight and I am finally in Texas, Dallas. I am pretty lucky. After a 6 hours flight from Singapore to tokyo for transit, I got back to my same window seats and found that the two other seats beside me was empty. That was improvise into a "business class" bed where I could sleep for the next 10 hours of my journey to L.A. Great, Economy class airfares with business class comfort. The domestic flight connecting L.A to Dallas was worst than SIA economy class. The galley was narrow, my lugguage compartment was hijacked by some inconsiderate passengers and the female flight attendants looks like she needs to retire. It was not even a Boeing 7oo series but a DC-80 (if I don't remember wrongly). Little do I realise that those creature comfort I have been experience if all my previous international flight are a rarity on domestic flights and U.S couldn't be the worst. No passport identification is required for domestic flight in U.S thats why almost everyone treat it like a taxi. The only saving grace was the very friendly and humourous flight attendant who never fail to both promote and inflict sarcasm on American Airlines, much to the pleasure of the passengers in the business class section who think he is a clown.

Yesterday was totally hectic, the moment we landed at Dallas, Fort Worth Airport we were immediately greeted by our counterparts from the Peace Prairie Detachment in what was considered to be a "VIP" treatment. Hua Chuan and Leng Chuan (not natural brothers in relationship) assisted me with both my heavy luggages to the awaiting Base Military vehicle which turn out to be a Honda Oydessy 6 seaters! Wow, RSAF is pretty advance right here in U.S... able to afford driving such official vehicles. Back in our home base, we have to settle for lorries and 2 tonners.

Long trip to our Apartment located near the beltline. Me and my room mate were staying on the second floor of the apartment, if not for the physical help from our comrades, I doubt my jet-lagged body could drag those luggages up the steps. Doors open and I am pleasently surprise to find the apartment was very well furnished! We are only short of the TVs and Telephone but the apartment is equipped with Microwave oven, Dishwasher, Washing Machine, Dryer, Electric Stove, Fridge, Oven, queen sized bed plus a fur carpeted flooring... etc etc. I was expecting an empty house but this was better than HDB! Best of all,

Next stop, Walmart, the popular supermarket chain to get anything you need under the sun. Someone got me takeaway dinner from Mac Donald, the popular fastfood brand originating from US become my first U.S Meal. The rest of the night was all on shopping for essential items and unpacking my luggage. Grocery are pretty cheap right here but eating out will be pocket crunching. My MacDonald chicken sandwich meal cause me US$6.

Today is the second day of my stay... nothing exciting happening. Its just another day of shopping and long distance driving to supermarket distances apart. Just took my lunch at a Chinese Tim Sum restaraunt in Richardson county, 30mins drive away, where most of the local Chinese population reside in.

I hope I could write more at this times but I currently do not have Internet access in my apartment, yet. There is one friendly Afro-American waiting in the Q right now to use this PC, its pretty "paiseh" to let him wait since this is a public computer terminal. Americans are really friendly especially those staff working at the Supermarket. Other than the language accent barrier I encounter, its not difficult to strike a conversation with them or vice versa... thus Supermarket Q usually move very slowly as a single "How do you do" greeting could lead to a1 or 2 mins of babbling. Will update more on my stay here in U.S in my next blog along with Pics... bye...