AsiaOne speaks to Singaporeans who are overseas during the Covid-19 pandemic and see how they are coping. Know someone with an interesting story to share? Let us know!

We are speaking to Isabel Leong over a Zoom call and it's 7.30pm, LA time (11.30am Singapore time). Home for now is at her friend's place in Inglewood, California.

How did a young Singaporean find herself halfway around the world and in the thick of a Covid-19 pandemic when she didn't really have to be there?

For someone who makes a living from hitting the road, sharing her experiences and once wrote that travelling makes her a better person, the whole circuit breaker period was a disquieting time for Isabel. 

For some context, the 27-year-old travel blogger spent only two weeks at a stretch in Singapore for the entire year in 2019.

And she'd been stuck at home since Jan 2020, when she returned for the Chinese New Year.

"Being home for eight months was kind of taking a mental toll on me," shared Isabel.

"I didn't like the fact that I felt lost and unmotivated and not driven, watching Netflix all day and waking up late, which is something that is disastrous for self-employed people."

The pandemic had also undeniably impacted the freelance digital marketer negatively, with her income dropping by 50 per cent from last year.

But being a digital nomad also means that how much she earns doesn't depend on where she is. This made her seriously consider her US friend’s offer to travel across the country with him in an RV (recreation vehicle).

"I don't rack up as much expenditure while travelling as most people think I do, travel insurance included," Isabel says.

"I usually stay with friends, so I don't pay for rent or accommodation. The idea of slow travel means that you're not constantly on the go. That means that I cook, and I don't spend much on transport since I'll be home most of the time.

With her innate wanderlust tickled and on the encouragement of other friends here who could see how badly she was struggling, she decided to take up the offer.

Isabel wasn't blind to the fact that the Covid situation was a major concern, and not surprisingly, when she brought up the idea of going on her months-long trip during such an uncertain time, her family were "super against it".

She must have worked her magic somehow, because with some reassurances, they gradually softened their stance.

In October, Isabel was all packed for her three-month journey Stateside, with a suitcase loaded with sanitisers and disinfecting wipes that her parents packed for her.

"They even bought a face shield for me to wear on the plane, but I didn't use it because nobody else had them on."

But within hours of her journey, Isabel hit a speed bump after getting detained at the Tokyo airport, her transit stop, for 24 hours.

"It totally slipped my mind that my visa was tied to my (expired) passport, and I had to reapply for the visa immediately".

"I was panicking because I was thinking do I have to buy another ticket and where was I going to stay."

She was told she had to pay close to US$700 ($933) for a security guard to keep a watch on her overnight at the airport.

"It was a shock to me because it was exorbitant and ridiculous, to spend that amount for one night on like a clinic bed."

Being out of pocket by close to $1,000 was "super painful", especially when her trip hadn't even begun.

When she finally arrived in the US, she was grilled by three "very mean-looking customs people" about what her plans were and how she would have enough money to survive the three months.

"They probably didn't want people to overstay and become illegal immigrants," said Isabel.

Over the last two months, she has gone from Washington and Colorado to California and observed different pandemic behaviours across states (Colorado being the least strict), but people generally still wore masks.

We checked in with Isabel on Dec 7, a few days after the number of infections in the US crossed a record 200,000 cases in a day.

However, she maintained that the health crisis was "no issue" for her in Los Angeles, California, one of the hotbeds of the pandemic in America. One contributing factor for how she feels may be that she's mostly holed up indoors during the week, only going out for runs in the evenings.

Not advisable

While she has no regrets over her derring-do, we were half-expecting Isabel to throw out "YOLO" ("you only live once") as a word of advice to those wanting to follow in her footsteps. To our surprise, it’s not something she would advise, “especially for those who just want to travel for travel's sake”.

"Because honestly if you’re a tourist, the attractions will be limited, and there are still restrictions in place, so you wouldn't get the full experience.

"In LA where I am, they've closed all outdoor activities and even at restaurants you can only do takeouts."

"Actually apart from being on airplanes and at the airport, I've been either on my own or with a friend, pretty isolated from the rest of civilisation,” added Isabel.

One of the more interesting experiences she’s had so far besides travelling in an RV was taking a road trip out to Slab City, an off-the-grid hippie colony about a three-hour drive from LA.

And in Colorado where the temperature dropped to negative 10 degrees due to an overnight snowstorm, "I went out and my phone died immediately because it wasn't used to the cold," she laughed.

Next up on her itinerary is to travel to Costa Rica or Mexico "for some tropical weather" and to do a visa run before her 90-day pass expires, in order to extend her stay in the US.

So for now, heading back to Singapore is not on the cards. And one thing's for sure, no way is she going to pay $2,000 for the mandatory two-week quarantine.

"It's ridiculous to pay this amount just to be quarantined for 14 days. Unless there's an emergency at home or I've encountered an accident that requires immediate medical attention, I'm happy where I am for now."


candicecai@asiaone.com

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