OK…. so here is the final state of play:

After messing around at Singapore Air Base for the best part of 6 hours yesterday, only to be told at the last minute that the “plane was broken” and we would NOT be flying out, we returned to the hotel. (I believe there is a bit more than meets the eye here. It is a convenient way of limiting the number of civilian personnel on the island in the event of an escalation of hostilities, and anyone watching the Iraqi stand-off right now would understand the military point of view regarding “unwanted personnel”) Read the rest of this entry »

Well, we received our ‘orders’ about 30 minutes ago: Be downstairs, with bags, ready to leave at 1:45pm. So it looks like we are off. I am not sure WHEN I will be able to communicate properly in the next couple of days, the Internet being what it is in Diego Garcia, so please bear with me. I am hoping to get online and let you know what is going on. Until later… Cm

August 6th – PART 2

How can I put this? We left the hotel at 2pm, boarded 2 buses Read the rest of this entry »

As I write this, I am sitting on a totally packed Korean Airlines jet, halfway between Seoul & Singapore. It is the biggest holiday weekend of Korea’s year, and most of Seoul has emptied (much of it seemingly onto this plane!). But let me start at the beginning.

Yesterday morning, we left Seoul bright and early, in a tropical downpour. At the airport, we had to negotiate the rules and regulations of Asiana Airlines, who decided we were all overweight. Quite how THIS happened when we have already taken half a dozen flights around the Asian Rim without a problem, is beyond Read the rest of this entry »

What an action packed couple of days we have here. After a relatively relaxing day off in Seoul (I swam in the pool at the hotel, had a sauna and a massage – much needed), the day dawned yesterday with monsoon rain beating against my hotel room window. Not a good sign, as there is no cover for the stage at the gig here! In the end, the skies cleared about mid-morning, and I was bussed down to our venue (baseball field at the base) where I discovered they were nowhere near ready for me (the rain having delayed it all by a couple of hours). So I took the bus back to the hotel, and had lunch. By the time I returned to the field, they had Read the rest of this entry »

On our way out of Tokyo, I was once again reminded of the sheer number of people in such a small area: a veritable anthill of industry. Of course, Japan has had its share of terror in the recent decades: nerve gas attacks on Tokyo subways, to name but one example. But they have also got security down to the finest art of all. From the preliminary inspection as one drives into Tokyo’s Narita airport, to the scanners in front of every row of check-in counters (ALL bags go through this BEFORE you check in, and this has been the case since I can remember), to the incredibly polite and efficient security staff as you head for Read the rest of this entry »

It’s boiling hot outside…… Merciless sun beating down on us all here. You just have to THINK about the heat, and you break into a sweat! Such is Japan in the summer time.

This journey began (for Lane Hoppen and me, anyway) on Saturday afternoon, with a flight from Orlando to Los Angeles. We stayed overnight in a rather ‘dodgy’ (poor?) Quality Inn near the airport. The only thing that can really be said about it was that it was close to the airport, with a 24 hour shuttle to the terminals. Other than that, the only food places nearby were MacDonalds, Read the rest of this entry »