Mar 19, 2026

Thursday was finally the big day! I have literally waited MONTHS for this day to come, and today would be the day I packed and left for Seoul, South Korea! I couldn't be more excited, but also anxious at the same time. I started this morning just on a call with someone and I just ordered take-out. Nothing noteworthy happened and I didn't stay up for long because I had to sleep and get some rest eventually. In the morning and afternoon, I made sure to have everything prepared and packed. I had a little bit of help from my sister in packing my luggage. We made sure everything was prepared and I even had her clean an old jacket-thing that I bought years ago. I had my entire outfit settled: the new polo shirt that Mom got me recently. While I was packing my stuff, I read online that liquids should be stored in some quarter Ziploc bag. I didn't have it on me, so I had to spend an additional 1,000 Pesos buying other stuff from a faraway SNR and it was kind of a time pressure since I had to leave now. But I eventually get the bag, wrap some essentials in there like my perfume, and then Mom sends me the money that I lent to her back in January. I also get some messages from someone about cats. I use the remaining time I had to just pay some credit cards and settle bills because I didn't want to be bothered while I'm on vacation. After all was said and done, I booked an InDrive ride to NAIA Terminal 3 and had a little talk with my uncle before leaving for the airport. While on the way, I realized that I didn't bring my noise-cancelling headphones with me, which was a shame, but whatever. I was already on the way to the airport. When I got there, there was a line for Jeju Air and the people manning the booths weren't there yet, so I waited for a bit and played with the selfie stick. I also took a few photos of Bing Bong since I brought them out. Eventually the staff lined up and gave a loud Korean greeting, which had me shocked because I've never experienced that before. But that was so cool. After I checked in my bag and items, I also had to pay some travel tax which deducted some of my money, but it was fine. I then went back to grab my boarding pass and it looked so cool. I then headed off to immigrations and the line took a while, but I was eventually able to reach the counter. I couldn't hear the IO at all, but I got the gist that I needed to sign up for an eTravel thing in the eGov app, so I just filled that out and went back in line as a show of respect. I eventually got to the counter with another IO and they checked my stuff, I also showed them my company which I thankfully had on me, and I was stamped and good to go. After that, I had to get myself and my bag scanned. After all that, I was breathing a sigh of relief because all I had to do was just wait for the plane. It felt super nice clearing the major airport hurdles and now all I had to do was just wait for the plane. I took a pictures of the departures board and went back to an old blog post because I genuinely could not believe I was going to South Korea. I posted a few pictures to IG before leaving and left someone a few photos of me going to the plane before taking off. Honestly, I was super glad to get a window seat. I honestly could not believe my luck, because I got a window seat. I went to the bathroom a couple of times and the flight was delayed a bit due to air traffic, but I'm glad we got to take-off safely and leave on time. It's always such a shock to me to see an airplane takeoff because this thing goes fast. Fast enough to leave the ground. And that's where I spent the last few hours of my day: off the ground headed for some other country.