After weeks of navigating train timetables, temple etiquette and the quiet complexities of solo travel through Japan, I landed in Palau sometime around 2am. The air was thick with heat, even at that hour. There were no signs, no crowds and no sense of urgency. Just a soft breeze and the kind of calm you only find when the airport has one flight and everyone’s half asleep.

And that’s where I first met island time.

There was no rush. No pressure. Just the gentle hum of tropical stillness and the comfort of family waiting just beyond customs. It felt like a scene shift in a play: from introspective monologue to ensemble joy. Japan had cracked something open in me. Palau gave it space to breathe.

Days blurred in the best way: sun-warmed and salt-soaked. There were no packed itineraries, just questions like “Want to swim?” or “Feel like driving out to the coast?” answered with shoulder shrugs and slow smiles. We snorkelled in impossibly clear water, drifting over coral gardens that looked too colourful to be real. Schools of fish danced like confetti, and the silence underwater was somehow louder than anything I’d heard in weeks.

I remember floating there, weightless, thinking: This is the pause I didn’t know I needed.

Reconnecting with family was the real anchor. After being so completely in my own head for so long, just being… laughing at dumb jokes, piling into the car for food runs, sharing moments that didn’t need explanation. There was no need to translate, no effort to connect. It was already there.

Palau isn’t a place you conquer or “do.” It’s a place you let happen to you. A gentle kind of magic. One where time stretches, slows, and ultimately lets you return to yourself but with a little more sun on your skin and a little less weight on your shoulders.