The process seemed impossible. How could I navigate the maze of rules and procedures that comes with licensing anywhere? I had already pushed the limits when I had converted my foreign (California) license to a local Singaporean one. While I did not take any shortcuts, I was allowed to cut line in the testing backlog of appointments. The intervention of others, allowed me to take the test within the prescribed limits. The process highlighted that I did not have a proper motorcycle endorsement.
In the months that followed, I worked through the procedures to add an endorsement to my California license. Classes, examinations, and finally a new license were part of the process. An update followed with documentation for my international license to reflect the additional endorsement.
Now, over a year after my first intervention, I was back wondering how I could accomplish the impossible. As I drafted an email to those that had helped before, I wondered if they would remember me. Candidly, I had little hope.
The #51 bus ride was long and numbing. As I watched the neighborhoods past, I wondered what I would find. The weather did not help. The Singapore sun was in full force. It was hot, humid, and the air eerily still. In the short walk from the bus stop to the Centre, I was already dripping. The air-conditioning blast gave me a quick head freeze.
Would there be a positive outcome? If so, what would happen? Would my license show an endorsement that allowed me to ride a scooter or a Harley?
The warm smile I received as I knocked on the glass door of the supervisor’s office was the first glimmer of hope. An hour later, after exercising patience that I did not know I had, I expressed my profound thanks and walked out with an unlimited endorsement on my license.
I rediscovered hope’s energy.
The potential energy in a single moment repeats itself. “On that note, they left—Paul going one way, the congregation another, leading the boy off alive, and full of life themselves.” (Acts 20.12)
