Back to Reality?

I had a chance to talk to my friend EC before I left the Philippines again. He also went on exchange in Singapore, same time as I had my exchange program. While I went to NUS, he went to NTU (Nanyang Technological University). I was telling him about how I have to face 7 modules each semester, and on top of that, I have my teaching/training duties for MTG and AMO, and therefore making it hard to head a project.

He sort of mentioned that now that we're back to the Philippines, we're "back to reality." I immediately agreed to his statement.

Thinking about it now, that statment might be flawed (no offese EC :p).

If we are back to reality now, then it implies that our Singapore stint wasn't reality. In a way this might be true, as we were there studying 3 or 4 (or 5 for NTU) modules, on a pass/fail basis. However, I refuse to believe that Singapore was yet another fragment of non-reality, for everything that happened in Singapore is real to me.

I was able to study for real, go around Southeast Asia for real, and more importantly, I was able to make real, genuine friends, which I won't forget "until the day that I die". I must say that in a way, going to Singapore is an escape from the Philippines (not reality in it's entirety).

Singapore was real, and reality is always happening, no matter where one is.