An outdated software engineer with the attention span of a fruit fly explores the world.
Before COVID-19 forced countries to close borders and only allowed the entry of citizens and residents, I just arrived in Colombia for a 12-day trip without a Yellow Fever vaccine. Don’t get me wrong, I had it planned way ahead and the confirmed cases were only few then. And in retrospect, I barely talked to anyone and constantly sanitized my hands from time to time. #defensive
Before you can say “expensive”, let me break it to you that if you want to fly to Europe for less than ₱20,000, it’ll take an error fare for that or a really mad seat sale. In my case, I scored my round trip tickets from Manila to Athens for only ₱22,518.66. “Only” because, c’mon, it’s the Schengen area, which means you can hop to other countries without needing additional visas. (Bloody visas!) Despite the long layovers in Singapore, it was definitely a no-brainer when I saw the deal for a week in Greece. Besides, I got to meet and shoot with my postgraduate folks there. Social as usual, brotha!
“Denied ba?”
“Approved po.”
And the smile never left my face. That was the only question and answer I wanted to hear when the travel agency called to tell me that my passport was already ready for pickup. After being denied of a Japan visa and even after acquiring one for Taiwan, the fact that you can never really can never can really can tell ever (okay, that was a long one) if you will be granted a visa seems to have traumatized even my hardest bone. In an ambitious plan to give Japan another shot the soonest time possible, I thought of collecting other visas first. And with that, winter in Korea became inevitable.