This is a first-person travel vlog by Kara and Nate Buchanan documenting their urgent return from Singapore to the United States during the early COVID-19 pandemic. The video narrates their emotional experience (uncertainty, relief, brief moments of joy) and the logistical challenges: visa denial, a US Embassy notice about limited repatriation flights (21 flights over four days), a CDC Level 3 advisory that affected insurance coverage, multiple transit legs (six-hour flight to Tokyo, onward to Dallas, then Nashville), health screenings while transiting, and a planned two‑week quarantine upon arrival. The footage emphasizes near-empty airports, sparse flights (e.g., ~40 passengers on a triple‑seven), lounge access during transit, and gratitude at safely arriving home.
Questions this video answers
21 flights over the next four days.
CDC Level 3 advisory for Singapore.
Six hours.
About 40 passengers on a triple‑seven that can hold over 300 people.
They said "11 and a half hours later, we have landed in Dallas."
Chapters
Even though the airport is strangely empty, which was expected, it still feels so weird being in a public place for the first time in over three weeks.
We are Karen, Nate. We've been traveling the world full time for the last four years and like many of you, the coronavirus has completely changed our day to day life. A few weeks ago, we barely escaped a lockdown in Manila that could have prevented us from leaving the Philippines indefinitely. In mid March, when the virus had just been declared a pandemic, things felt even more uncertain than they are today. What are we thinking? And given the information we had at the time, we decided to take a short flight to Singapore and just stay put, which is where we have spent the last three weeks in voluntary self quarantine.
Since arriving here in Singapore, it has been a roller coaster of emotions. On one hand, we've been super grateful for this time to slow down because our lives have been so fast paced for the last four years. But on the other hand, we feel like we've been living in this weird limbo where every single morning we wake up and have this super long conversation about whether or not we're making the right decision by staying here in Singapore, which typically leads to us consuming way too much world news.
Up until this week, the decision had seemed pretty obvious. Our international health insurance covered us here in Singapore. Cases were spiking back in the US and Singapore was being used as a model for how other countries should deal with the coronavirus. However, things have been changing. This week the CDC issued a Level 3 warning for Singapore, which means that our health insurance no longer covers us here if we were to get the virus. Plus, in recent days, Singapore has seen a significant rise in the number of cases and the country has entered a period of lockdown. We had already been questioning whether or not we were making the right decision by staying here. And then yesterday we got an email from the US Embassy which basically said there aren't going to be any repayments, repatriation flights back to the US and if you want to make sure that you can get home, you need to be on one of these 21 flights occurring over the next four days.
So given all the changes yesterday, we were forced to make one of the hardest decisions that we've ever made. Today we're flying home.
We were fully prepared to stay in Singapore indefinitely. We had accepted that. So we tried to extend our visas and they were declined, which meant that we were going to have to leave Singapore sooner rather than later. And we figured while there were still commercial flights available, we would Go ahead and make the journey home now.
That's pretty crazy. There are five flights leaving out of Terminal 1 at Changi Airport for the next seven hours. There's nobody here.
Nope.
Even though the airport is strangely empty, which was expected, it's still still feels so weird being in a public place. For the first time in over three.
Weeks, we haven't left our hotel room except to go to the grocery store and exercise. So anything outside of that just feels completely foreign at this point.
Surprisingly, we found a lounge that's open and not surprisingly, we are the only ones in here.
This all just feels so weird and wrong, but oddly familiar at the same time.
Wow.
We were joined by a couple other people, but it's still weirdly empty.
All right, we have officially started the challenge of not touching our face for the next 30 hours.
It is so much harder than it seems.
This will be one major takeaway for me from this period of time is just how much I unnecessarily touch my face constantly.
My nose and my eyes always itch. Always.
Our first flight is six hours to Tokyo, Japan because it is one of the only Asia hubs that is still allowing transit passengers.
From what we can see, every single person on this flight is wearing a face mask. Everyone has their own route and there are even some emp.
To put that in perspective, we are on a triple seven that can hold over 300 people and there are about 40 on this flight.
Leave your baggage when you evacuate.
It is.
11Pm we're going to try to get some sleep.
So we started to get off the plane, but then they made everybody go sit back down.
A flight attendant told us that they're doing health checks for everyone entering the airport and a flight of 200 people landed before us. So we're just waiting.
Also, it's 4:30am on a positive note, this is the best I've ever slept in. Economy. Having four entire seats to yourself really helps.
Our second niece was just born.
You know what baby that is? It's Hosanna. It's your baby sister. Do you want to kiss her? Oh, best hug.
We're currently at the two hour mark, two hours since we landed. So this really isn't a big deal. It's either sit on the plane or sit in the airport. But we have three hours until our next flight leaves. We should still have plenty of time. It's just the unknown.
Let's go.
All right, two and a half hours later, we're getting off the plane.
Now. Let's just hope we pass our Health screening and don't get quarantined in Tokyo.
It's the little victories in life these days, like just embarking a plane.
There were six of us on that flight who had a connecting flight, so who weren't staying here in Japan. And we're currently all being escorted through the airport and I'm not exactly sure where. We haven't been screened at all.
I guess since we're just transiting through the airport, we didn't have to go through the health screening process. And I think we're going to a lounge, first class lounge, because it's the only one that's open.
Today has been so weird. We just went from waiting on a plane for a health check to being escorted through the airport to the first class lounge. The business class lounge was closed, and so we got access to the first class lounge. Today has been a mixture of so many emotions. Like, it goes from sadness to fear to these little moments of joy. I'm so happy right now. This is so crazy. We had no idea what we were missing sitting on that plane.
Thank you.
This is so sad. That was a great last lounge. Like, I don't want to be traveling right now, but at the same time, I don't know when we're gonna get to do it again. So I'm trying to just like, soak up every moment of it.
I really can't imagine a better, like, last experience in an airport. I mean, for who knows how long. I just don't know how to feel today. It's so good to use the air.
All right. Eleven and a half hours till we're back in the U.S.
There are a lot more people on this flight than the last one, but I think we're still each gonna have our own room, hopefully.
11 and and half hours later, we have landed in Dallas.
So we had a two hour layover here in Dallas and I was worried that we weren't going to make our connecting flight because, like, we sat on.
The plane for two hours in Japan.
It's been the exact opposite experience. Nobody checked our temperature. There was nobody in line at customs. There was nobody in line at baggage, and we made it into the country in, like, two seconds. This is just not what I expected.
No. They asked us if we had been to China or Iran or Europe, but that's it.
I feel like it's like, have you stepped outside? Oh, okay.
We could have easily been, like, very sick and nobody would have known. All right.
We have about an hour and a half till our next flight boards. Our last Flight.
So all the lounges are closed. Understandably so. This is another one of those super joyful moments in this weird day.
Tickling.
It has been so long since I've had this.
There are so many planes parked out on the Runway.
Last flight, two hours to Nashville.
So I don't normally travel with a fanny pack, but I've been carrying it because I wanted access to to my wipes, my Dermix, and my vitamin C at all times. That's been really nice. I think this is the quietest plane we've ever been on. Tissue, we need coffee. Please reframe from placing used cleaning, wipes, tissues and other disposable items in the detach pocket.
And we are back in Nashville. Everything went surprisingly smooth given the current situation.
I feel like we've said this a million times today, but it just feels so weird, especially being back in the Nashville airport because we only come home like a handful of times a year. And so anytime we're here, it's like really exciting because like our family's here waiting for us.
Or it's Christmas or like a family trip.
Now we're going to quarantine ourselves for.
Two weeks and we don't know when we'll be back. Like we have no idea how long we're going to be here.
I was getting a little sad as the plane was landing, going, who knows how long it's going to be before we can do this again. With all of that said, we are very, very grateful to be back in Nashville.
So our goal is to physically interact with as few of people as possible over the next couple of weeks. So instead of having a family member pick us up or getting in an Uber or something like that, Jordan dropped off his truck for us.
Thanks, Jordan.
Like beauty.
There's soap in the car. Toasted vanilla chai.
Let's go home. Kind.
We'Re back in Tennessee, listen to country music, driving my pickup truck.
Wow, this is great.
Oh, sweet home.
This is our home for the next month. It felt so weird booking an Airbnb in our hometown. But we usually stay with our parents when we come home. And since we're quarantining, we needed our own space.
But now we're literally five minutes down the road from both of our parents.
Houses and it's huge.
It's probably the biggest space we've ever had to ourselves during our six years of marriage. I'm just, just so grateful that we made it here. I figured there was a pretty good chance that we got stuck in Tokyo, a small chance that we got stuck in Dallas.
I was certain one of our flights.
Would get canceled and it all went so smooth. And ever since we booked this, I've just been so excited about it and I just didn't want it to be taken away from me. Don't take this huge space in the woods away from me during a pandemic. Our bodies think it's 3am so. Thanks.
Will Just get weird from here if.
We keep the camera rolling.
We made it.
I swear my nose itches right now.
Ah, you brave.
I love Japan.
I thought there were going to be people in hazmat suits.
Like.
Yeah.
I mean they asked.
That was a temperature gun. Listen to country music, driving my pickup truck.
That made you laugh so much.
Because we are.
I thought it was kind of funny.
I didn't think. I think I'm delirious.
How long has it been since we spent a month anyway? Here.
Anywhere? At least a year.
I think. It was two Christmases ago we were here for a month.
Wow. But even when we come here, it's not like we're settled. Yeah. Because we're moving back and forth between our parents houses and here we're like, this is ours. Yeah.
