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"I want to go home" was the predominant thought in my head today.

On an average of 10-minute frequency, "I want to go home" "I miss you" "I miss your" "I miss Melb" rotated at high speed.

The homesickness hit at about 2am, me in a cluttered room with two hard-case luggages, a haversack, a laptop bag, a sticks bag and stuff already here all standing in the centre of the room with me while I looked with a certain hopelessness into the mirror. I felt some bit of depressed, rather low and decided to crawl into bed.

Woke up at 9am-plus and laid on my super single bed staring at the ceiling for a while wondering at the strangeness of it all. A morning ago, I was having brekkie with Ray and now, here I was. It all seemed strange.

Melbourne and Singapore are seven-hour flight away, on two continents at something like 3,500 miles apart (I checked the flight info continuously during my flight), a distance which costs SGD1,000 to bridge but knowing and knowing is different and I started to feel the distance.

I spent Sunday missing Melbourne, and as if my mind was detached from this body tied down by time and space, it automatically calculated Melb time, a process accompanied by mental footage of I would be doing in Melb if I was there.

Except I was not.

At 11am/ 2pm, I would be finishing QT and getting ready to meet Ray at 3pm at Bouverie Close so that we could go for prayer meet.

At 12noon/ 3pm, we would be walking to Storey Hall for prayer meet before church.

At 1pm/ 4pm, City Church's first service would have started.

At about 3.15pm/ 6.15pm, the first service would have ended and we would be sticking around for the second. That Sunday, they would have been going off after service to have dinner with Ken, who was flying off that night.

At about 8pm/ 11pm, they would have been at the airport.

At about 9pm / 12midnight, Ken should have gone in/ be going in.

And I felt the distance of it all. Like parallel universes and another life, every thing goes on. Except I am now here and your are there.

To get some essentials stuck in my other luggage, I walked to Causeway Point 15 minutes away and felt like an alien in my own country. The sun shone brightly, I put on my shades and realised I was attracting some stares. Consciously became aware, with a mute shock, that interaction with service staff here is not "hey, how ya doing" "heya" and smiles, not "ta" and "cheers", just pure silence and some expectation to be served and for silent transaction.

I caught myself holding myself in, consciously not saying "ta", and as time worn on, it was as if every greeting or thank you I naturally offered became softer, a response to the non-reciprocation.

Twice or more, I shook my head walking away and whispered "so weird" with some frustration, not at the service staff but just at the disorientating difference.

More than twice, I whispered "so weird" to myself.

Walked through supermarket Cold Storage. Seeing pummets of Australian peaches going for $7.90, where you could get them at a kg a dollar back in Melb. Or button mushrooms going at $3.90 per 200grams, where they go for $4 to $6 per kg back at Vic Mkt.

I see pictures of my empty house, of the lonely drumset, of the balcony I won't step out on again in my head.

I see Safeway, I see my friends, I see church.

I see the final image of my room in my head - my futon stripped, my side of the wardrobe half opened to reveal the empty metal hangers, my white table and duvet at a better place.

When I am in my kitchen here, or my mom's kitchen, I see in my head - again - myself at the sink at home.

Every difference shouts at me.

And I keep wishing you are here, your are here, or I am there. Even as I do enjoy being here again and love the night air that Sg offers.