Mission improbable: My race to Saipan for a date with history

I know this because I’m on the small island of Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, a remote archipelago and US outpost in the far western reaches of the Pacific Ocean.I’m not usually one to seize the early worm on a day off. And so it was that I was still dozing at 9am on Tuesday at my home in Singapore when I woke to my phone buzzing from a just-missed call from my editor.and en route to a little-known island in the Pacific for a plea deal court hearing in 24 hours.

As a small business owner, Mathew hadn’t been able to make the move with me when I relocated from Australia a couple of months ago, but his dedication to supporting my dream of being a foreign correspondent had brought him to Singapore for a few days’ R&R. When I’d taken the job of North Asia correspondent, we had committed to seeing each other in person at least every two months, and this was our first rendezvous since I’d started – cut short, but thankfully only by a day.

Three flights, connecting through Manila and then Guam, and almost 24 hours of transit later, I touched down in Saipan at 8.50am. Assange’s hearing was due to start in 10 minutes. What if my flight is delayed and I miss the whole thing? What if Assange walks free from the court to a phalanx of international media cameras and I’m stuck in an airport queue?

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