Not even the Irish have this much luck. March 21, 2008

You’ll understand the luck title after you read a few of our stories. Yes it’s been a long time since I’ve written a blog because we have been in the middle of a rain forest followed by a tropical island adventure, both having neither the time, motivation, or access to computers. So without further ado, here’s a long blog. Some days I’ll keep short so I don’t get carpal tunnel from typing so much, but I’ll try to keep in the interesting bits!

09.March.08

Our three friends left today to go to other parts of Malaysia, so Jess and I were left with a sunny day to explore. We took a jungle trek through unexpectedly vicious terrain filled with mud and steep uphill slopes. At the peak was a tall tower that we got to just in time for a decent view of the rolling hills and distant city before the fog rolled in. Turns out it was more than fog, but heavy rain, and under cover of our ponchos we hiked down a road to the ‘Boh’ tea plantation. When we arrived a couple hours later (it looked like only a few inches on the map!) it looked like it should have been gorgeous, but was covered in fog. Then, like a divine miracle cast from vishnu/allah/buddah above (remember it’s a very diverse culture) the skies cleared within minutes and we had a splendid view of green fields. The tea plantation was pretty, the factory was mildly interesting, but packed with kids. Not wanting to walk ALL the way back we hitchhiked and got picked up by a super friendly Muslim family who drove us back and we went to bed.

10.March.08

We said a sad farewell to the puppies and Tanah Rata in the cool Cameron Highlands to take a long bus ride to the sweltering hot and humid Kuala Tahan in Taman Negara rainforest. We picked a hostel quite a bit out of the way called Durian Chalet and got our own room which was quaint…maybe a better word is basic, I don’t know. We randomly bumped into Darren and Richard again (we knew they were coming here, but the fact we chose the same hostel as them, the farthest out of town was really weird!) Along with them came to dinner Anja; Norway, Claudine; New York, and some weird German dude who’s best description could be old fashioned; nice, but, well…weird and sometimes maybe too nice, it was a bit creepy. This was our crew for the next 2 days. We ate and hiked through the dark village a bit. It’s a really unique little village as all the restaurants float in the river and little wooded boards lead up to them. Beer however is nearly nonexistent.

Trying to fall asleep this night was absolute hell! Huge bugs called Cicadas surrounded our room, one even in our room for a bit and made a noise best described as someone screaming from physical torture for 15 seconds ending with a cute little ‘beep’ sound, and then screaming again, like some sick, twisted lullaby. It went on for hours into the night, stopping so we could sleep a bit, then starting right back up again; we decided at some point we must change rooms.

11.March.08

Claudine left this morning, Anja felt a bit sick, and German dude was…doing weird stuff I guess, so we hiked just with Darren and Richard which was among the most grueling hikes we’ve ever done. Not so much that it was physically demanding, but the heat and mud was like walking in a wet clay oven wearing boots made of thick molasses. It rained intermittently which didn’t phase us as we couldn’t get more wet from sweat. Overall however it was a great experience. There was some gorgeous fungus, unique and spiky plants, followed by a terrific view from the top.

At some point on the way back to the hostel Jessica realized she lost her wallet containing lots of cash, cards, ID, etc!!! We all went back to the village to search. She thought she dropped it while at the dock on this side after crossing the river so we looked there. Being few English speakers in the area I kept pointing at my wallet and any color blue I could find. One guy seemed to have an idea of what I was talking about, said something indecipherable and pointed in a direction we then followed asking people along the way. One guy at a restaurant nearby talked to me and pointed in the water saying more indecipherable language. He called his friend over who said that his friend had the wallet and would like to keep it, “but no” we retorted “it is her wallet,” “oh” he said, “well he’ll be back later with it” seeing our worried looks he told us he’d call his friend and told us to meet at some random place in the middle of the village. Sure enough a guy rode up on his motorbike and grudgingly handed Jessica her wallet. He got to keep a 50 Ringett reward, but I think he wanted the whole wallet, but knew his friends would give him shit for not being honest! Disgustingly lucky! We ate well and slept comfortably in our new dorm room shared with the others (ah peace and quiet).

I also spent a lot of the day having Anja teach me Norwegian (almost the same as Swedish) which is really quite easy since very similar to german/english and has less complicated grammar. This was a theme as long as we’ve been traveling with Anja. I should have been learning Malay, but had no proper teacher, plus it is a LOT more difficult and could only learn the necessary words to be polite in the time we’ve been here.

12.March.08

Darren and Richard left for the Perhentian Islands and Anja, Jess, and I crossed the river into the National park again to hike to the Canopy walk; a series of bridges about 65 meters off the ground walking above the rainforest. Not as exhilarating as we’d hoped, then again nothing compares to that massive 75 meter tree we defied death by climbing in SW Australia, and this was safe and secure all the way through, pleasant enough. That night we packed with other tourists into the back of a pickup truck, Anja sat with a guide on the ROOF of the truck and we sat with four others on seats in the back with 5 more inside…mildly dangerous, but hey, no traffic and on mud roads mostly. We drove through a palm oil orchard to search for some nocturnals. Saw some cool birds, a small wild cat, a raccoon-like thing, and fireflies. The whole experience was fun and a little scary when the truck kept stalling in the uphill mud from being packed with 13 people’s weight, maybe not too smart, but we made it home safe.

13.March.08

Long day of travel with Anja as we made our way by bus and jungle train to Khota Baru; our final destination being the Perhentian Islands. The whole trip we read and slept, there were some pretty views out the window as well, and we stopped in Khota Baru for the night at a cute hostel run by a Chinese family with an adorable cat who had fallen and broken it’s paw (I didn’t think it possible!). Khota Baru was fun for the little time we were there. We had a nice dinner in a hectic Chinese market and finally had access to some Tiger beer.

14.March.08

Spent the first part of the day traveling via taxi to Kuala Besut then Boat to Kuala Kecil (the small island of the two Perhentian islands). The boat ride was wet and rough, but made for a memorable experience. As we landed we met Richard and Claudine again about to embark on a SCUBA journey. They pointed us in a 15 minute walk across the island to Long Beach where we met Darren! Darren told us a hysterical story about meeting the two British girls that our friend from Cameron Highlands (Jessica Thorpe) was talking about all the time (they split up because they got on each other’s nerves). Amazing coincidence that they were on this little beach on this little island where they had been bumming aroud for 2 weeks while Jess traveled elsewhere alone (meeting us along the way as well). Totally random! Anyway Jess and I got a VERY nice room with own shower, nice (western) toilet, comfy bed, and an awesome price of $12 a night! We hung out on the beautiful sunny beach with cool blue water and ate dinner with our now large group of friends (the newcomers being 2 Irish, a Scot, the two English I talked about, and 2 Swedes). We had a great dinner and headed after to a bar where we drank a bit, laughed and talked a lot. It is definitely nice being social in a big group for a change; everyone we hung out with has been really fun.

15.March.08

Anja, Jess, and I went on a snorkel trip to five different spots with a boat full of Swedes (lots of Swedish here). The snorkeling was terrific; at shark point we saw a couple black tip sharks, at turtle cove we saw…yup, a big turtle and at coral points we saw…CORAL (mingled with hundreds of clownfish, moray eels, wrasse, parrot fish, clams, and every other type of beautiful and colorful fish, anemone, and coral one could imagine. We finally were able to see true clownfish (Little NEMOS; in Australia we saw nearly ALL varieties except the true clownfish) and the Nemos we saw got hysterically aggressive as you dove down to their anemone. The alpha Nemo would swim away from his family right up to your face and sometimes rapidly attack the goggles to scurry quickly away to it’s safe, stinging anemone. Gotta respect that a cute little thing like that would pick a fight with something maybe 1,000 times its size, talk about small-man’s complex.

Back on the beach we met with everyone for dinner at a place advertising to play the new version of Sweeny Todd with Johnny Depp (but it’s not even out on DVD yet you say, well clearly you haven’t been to Asia with pirated DVD’s galore in nearly perfect quality, but often hysterically bad subtitles even in English when it’s an English spoken film; I still don’t really get it). Turned out the movie they purchased from whoever was the wrong version of Sweeny Todd; a non-musical from the early 90’s, yet still VERY entertaining and made for a gruesome evening of barbershop slaughter and cannibalism; my favorite things to go with a fine meal and conversation.

16.March.08

We did absolutely nothing during the day today and it felt great. We hung around the beach with all our new friends, talked, read, listened to music, ate, avoided the sun because snorkeling yesterday gave us sunburns, and that was it. It was Julia’s Birthday (one of the English girls) so at night we packed a table at the local bar for diner, games, and drinks. Due to generator problems the lights at the bar kept coming on and going off all night, but we were outside in the sand with candles, torch, and later a bonfire so it was all good. As usual the night ended in fits of laughter; a good time had by all, except Darren who due to a Ring of Fire rule (drinking game) he had to drink any time I was caught not paying attention to the game, needless to say he got exceedingly drunk.

17.March.08

We said goodbyes to nearly all of our new friends save Anja, Bob and Maddie (The Swedish couple, I said to him, “Bob doesn’t sound Swedish,” he said his real name is Tobias…still doesn’t sound Swedish. But man are they stereotypical Swedes, blonde hair blue eyes, the works). Bob and Maddie came with us on another snorkeling trip just the four of us to some nearby islands about a 30 minute boat trip away with two terrific guides. The whole day was spent hunting down Black tip sharks, though I only saw two, a baby and a big one. One of the guides even speared a fish to attract the shark with blood to no avail. The water at the islands was pristine because it is less visited and there are no resorts or anything near them, though the beaches still covered with trash that washes up from mainland and nearby island resorts. Some of the coral was unlike any we’ve ever seen and tons of cool fish, and B & M got some good underwater shots that we’ll steal from later and put online. We ended the day in a cove filled with massive sea turtles. Within 5 minutes of entering the water I had followed 3 of them around and we all gathered around one nearly the size of a person.

The four of us and Anja ate and chatted with our favorite waitress/hostess/hostel manager Sharon about life on the island before tourists, which was only like 10 years ago. We have been absolutely in love with Sharon since day one. She was always at the front desk/restaurant working, and she always has a huge smile, speaks perfect English, is super peppy, sweet, and adorable. She had lived on the island all her life, and until recently it had been only a small community of fisherman. Now it is quickly becoming a booming tourist resort, and we were glad to have visited before it becomes too over crowded/expensive.

18.March.08

Anja, Jess, and I hopped on a boat around noon to the mainland where we waited for a bus, but it never came so we took a taxi to Khota Baru. From there we said bye to Anja and just barely caught a bus to the Thai/Malaysian border. We walked through the border crossing getting our coveted exit and entry stamps, then, having no idea where to go and being surrounded by nothing but slums, we started walking towards a hotel in the distance. We definitely wanted to get through this area swiftly as people and our Lonely Planet guide mentions this area having Muslim terrorist problems (they want a separate state from Thailand and protest by bombing police and military stations, they have a no civilian casualty policy, but I hear bombings don’t always go as planned).

We briskly walked to the hotel and once there we exchanged 30 Ringett for 300 Thai Bhat and inquired about busses to our next destination, Hat Yai. The last daily bus to Hat Yai was to leave in 15 minutes; good we thought, just in time, but when asked the price she said 500 Bhat and she couldn’t change American currency. No problem all we needed was an ATM, but the closest one we found out is 2 kilometers away! Maybe we could get a quick taxi to take us there and back to get enough money and just catch the bus, unfortunately the only taxis in this town are motorbikes, so holding on for dear life I hopped on the back of a motorbike and sped through alleyways and busy streets to the ATM where I got the money, sped back, and caught the bus within mere seconds…not even the Irish have this much luck! Turned out later all the hassle could have been avoided since I still had 100 Ringett hidden deep in my bag…but then I guess there wouldn’t be a story to tell, or an exhilarating motorcycle ride. The bus was an uneventful 5 hours and we got to Hat Yai and checked into a hostel at a staggering 300 Bhat a night (actually only about 9 bucks, but it feels like we’re paying more). Our room on the fourth floor had the slight smell of cooked cabbage reminiscent of Jessica’s Oma’s house in Germany, it was a very nice room in a hostel filled wall to wall with pictures of the current king at every stage in his life. A bit weird, but as we find out the king is kind of a big deal in Thailand (I bet his home has many leather bound books and smells of rich mahogany…or incense).

19.March.08

Hat Yai is just another SE Asian city, except now the people speak Thai instead of Malay so we have to get used to learning the basics of a whole new language. We did errands today; got some much needed clothes washed for us at a laundry place, spent a good amount of time using the internet, mailed shit from the post office, etc. We went to the train station to book our tickets tomorrow to Bangkok, but due to holiday all 1^st class and 2^nd class sleeper seats were booked for the next four days and we have to meet Jessica’s parents in two days, we had to make a split decision because two 1^st class sleeper seats were available on a train leaving in two hours. We bought the tickets because we did not want to have to sit on uncomfortable seats for 14 hours and compared to ticket prices in western countries it was super cheap.

Before boarding the train we got some food from a street vendor near the train station. The lady wanted her picture with Jess and insisted that she was Jessica’s mother. She was just being funny and that’s exactly what it was. The room we got all to ourselves on the train was very luxurious. A set of comfy bunk beds, sink, clean sheets, and close to a squat toilet that I used quite a few times because the food didn’t agree with me too well (I later found out there was a western toilet right around the corner, but we’re rather getting used to squat toilets, they aren’t that bad at all, and at least your not essentially touching butts with hundreds of people). The train ride went smooth and after a few beers and some reading we fell fast asleep.

20.March.08

Woke up and finished the massive tomb I had been reading Atlas Shrugged which I highly recommend to anyone as a truly thought provoking piece of literature with some very interesting philosophies. I am now starting to read The Hobbit before it becomes a movie, and Jess is reading Shantaram which it seems every backpacker has read because it is an awesome story about an Australian convict living in the slums of India. I guess it’s sort of related to travel, if you’re going to be living in the slums of India; we keep hearing about and seeing this book everywhere.

So our train arrived in Bangkok and we quickly got on the internet to check responses to the CouchSurfing messages we sent yesterday. One guy Charles said we could stay and had me get a Thai SIM card for my cell phone so he could talk to a tuk tuk driver and give directions to his house. (A tuk tuk is like a motorized horse carriage, 3 wheels and you sit on a bench in the back all open to the elements, they drive crazy too, whizzing through the city and through little alleys). Charles is awesome and he has a nice and simple apartment just on the outskirts of town. He is from Cameroon and teaching French in Bangkok (some weird theme with French teacher/CouchSurfer hosts). He is very worldly and worked with Peace Corps in Cameroon for 7 years, he also DJ’s on the side for fun. He took us around town a bit and to Khao San, a really touristy street with lots of shops and street vendors. We bought a few things needed, namely I bought kerchiefs to wrap around my face while riding in tuk tuk’s because the street pollution is bad. Bought a new Rough Guide SE Asia because I lost the Lonely Planet we had (though Rough Guide is better). We ate at a tasty vegetarian restaurant (Mmm I can still taste the Shitakke mushrooms!) and then headed back to the apartment. We were ready to go back to sleep, but Charles came home and we all went out, but it didn’t last long as we were all tired. As we were leaving a pub we bumped into a baby elephant walking through the street with a guy selling sugar cane sticks for less than a buck to feed it. We kicked ourselves because we left the camera at home, but got a good amount of cuddle time with this beautiful beast! It was so unreal, and had such thick and tough skin with little spikes of hair, and feeding it was great because its tusk would reach right in your hands with a strong grip. I tried to get her to take one out of my mouth, but she wasn’t down with that. When I didn’t have any food left she kept feeling my hands for food, got annoyed I didn’t have any left and gave a little charge at me, it was cute.So far Thailand seems great. We’re starting to get the basics of the language; thank you, hello, goodbye, your welcome, etc. The people are super friendly, though you definitely have to bargain when shopping, I got ripped off a little, but also got unbelievable deals, all in all it is always cheaper than anything back home.

Sorry if the blog was a bit long to read! We always try to write more frequently, but don’t always get the chance. If you’d like to call my Thai Cell Phone dial +66806164015 (on a land line the + symbol can be a 00, and on a cell phone just usually hold the 0 button for a couple seconds and it turns to +)

We’ll be hanging out around Bangkok for a bit until Jessica’s parents come in a couple days. Just put the new pics on the Flickr page, check them out. I’ll try to find that baby elephant again and get pics.

Hotdogs, Donuts, and Tea. March 8, 2008

5.March.2008

Today we took a bus from Kuala Lumpur to Melaka to stay with a Couchsurfing Host, Yee Tea, who is a Chinese tea master. We arrived at his tea shop in the afternoon and he had a pot of tea on the stove for us in his very beautiful tea shop filled with a plethora of pots, teacups, Buddhist, and other Chinese relics. The tea was tasty and he took us to our place to stay which is actually a house he owns that he rents out to some random dutch guy who spends 6 months each year in Malaka. The room and house were nice and in the middle of a Chinese neighborhood where we were certainly the only white folk living. We dropped off our bags and Yee toured us around the city and to the quaint dutch church on a hill overlooking the whole city. I fell in love with these cute little paper kites some random guy was selling. I bought one and gaily flew it around the city, later giving me the nickname “big, little boy” by the Dutchman. Yee had some work to do so he dropped us off in the middle of Chinatown to walk through the streets teaming with red pagoda lights, see all the beautiful temples, and meet up later for some noodles.

We stopped by a Hindu temple for a quick little Pooja which are always fun with live music, fire, and great incense smell. Not as intricate a temple as the one in Singapore, but nice. Then we strolled next door to the Muslim mosque where we didn’t enter because we aren’t Muslim and the punishment is probably losing a hand or something. (Sarcasm people, sarcasm; the Muslims we’ve met in this country have been nothing but kind to us). So we meandered past the mosque, enjoying the beauty from the outside and to the next door Chinese Buddhist temple. The Buddhist temple took the prize with intricate carvings of black gold and red. We wandered back and met Yee Tea for noodles in another part of the city at a street vendor. Some of the best vegetarian noodles I’ve ever had! He then took us to a local bar with cheap beer where we chatted and drank the night away while being entertained by not just ONE TV, not TWO TV’s, but THREE TV’s, one playing Japanese “mortal kombat-like” films with Chinese subtitles, one playing cheesy Chinese karaoke with old men sitting down as they sang love songs in Chinese, and one TV playing Indian pop music and Bollywood films with Malaysian subtitles…yeah I know it was even weirder to be there than it must be to read about it! The beer was great import from Singapore ‘Tiger’ which is kinda of the local beer in Malaysia as well as I don’t think they can brew beer because the country is officially “Muslim” which I find curious as nearly NONE of the government officials are Muslim and the Muslim party is actually very small consisting of, what we’ve seen, groups of Indian bikers waving the green flag with white central dot honking around the cities at night as their motorcycles make spaceship noises from devices they attach in the exhaust…I’m telling you, this country is nuts, I can’t even properly describe some of the weird shit we’ve seen so far!

So we get to our place where we are greeted by the Dutchman who we immediately realize is maybe holding half a hot dog (a term Jessica and I coined from the Singapore ad we posted a pic of earlier that so randomly stated “If we told you that giving a handicapped person a hot dog would put a smile on their face, would you buy them one?” It has been a term of an immense hilarity from anyone we explain it to). So he’s holding half a hot dog we say, or in lay terms is maybe not quite “all there,” as a full Hotdog holder would fully handicapped. We obviously instantly fall in love with him and his repeating stories told in barely understandable crazy-thick dutch accent, it is reminiscent of Jess’ good ol’ days at Hope Services with our favorite handicapped clients. It’s all fun and games however until the Dutchman keeps me up an hour later than I wished, to explain to me just how cheap it is to live in Malaysia as opposed to Holland. He does so by showing me every object in his room saying exactly why and by how much it is cheaper here, and explaining with vivid detail how cheap and fun it is to make sushi, as well as his scheme of going to a tax-free island in Malaysia and stocking up on mass quantities of Scottish whiskeys and bringing them back in a bag, a feat he performs every couple months…well being too nice to just leave him, I stick around until I finally get a word in and say goodnight. Most of the other stories he told at the time I had no idea what he was talking about and later had to have Yee Tea explain them as they have known each other for 15 years and the stories never change.

06.March.2008

We woke up late and walked to Yee’s place. Along the way we had the cheapest breakfast ever. 2.50 RM (ringetts, maybe about 30 cents US) for two people at a local little shop on the side of the street. We had fried bananas, yams, potatoes, deep fried bread with curry; all delicious and when she said the price I was sure she was mistaken, so cheap to fill up two people with terrific food, gotta love it! It was about an hour walk and we hung about the city for a bit until our 2pm tea ceremony lesson. It felt like school again, he taught us how to do a proper Chinese tea ceremony from the Song Dynasty. It was actually quite beautiful and meditative, and Jess and I did very well. We tried 9 delicious teas in simple and beautifully elegant cups and pots.

(Yee teaching us about tea).

After the tea ceremony we went to the Buddhist temple we visited the day before for the daily chanting at 4pm. We lit some incense and enjoyed the chanting, then observed some of the more odd traditions like burning paper-made electronics, cars, clothing, etc, to send to deceased loved ones. The nearby stores sold the most random stuff to burn and we both couldn’t help thinking that if that stuff really went to the deceased in the afterlife, heaven is filled with some terribly dressed people in leopard print stilettos, hideous loafers, driving boxy vans (with chauffeurs painted in), and cell phones, yes cell phones. Who the hell are they going to call? The phones also come with a charger; but with a plug that would only fit a SE Asian and British outlet; I forget what plugs they use in heaven though. And I thought angels carried the messages, is their also wireless cell service that’s FASTER than the angels? There are so many things to learn about the afterlife, we simply feel so ignorant that we don’t even believe one exists! But surely if I die I want everyone to send me some cardboard bling bling…don’t forget, I don’t want to chill up there naked do I? All joking aside the temples do hold beautiful ceremonies and the things I’ve joked about are no sillier than southern baptists speaking in tongues and writhing wildly facing the good ol’ lord above, HA HA HA, oh silly religion, if we don’t laugh about it, we’ll probably cry.

(Yup, all made of cardboard).

We met again at Yee’s tea shop for a terrific home-cooked meal they had prepared. Some succulent pork, curried potatoes and eggplant, delicious mushrooms, baby bok-choy, and steamed spinach. A French couple joined us as well as the hot dog holding Dutchman, Yee, and his wonderful wife. Afterwards we headed to the local bar for an even MORE random night than last!!! We definitely walked in on a crowded night of some yet-unknown significance as the appearance of us whiteys sent a wave of whispers and funny looks from a huge crowd of Indians, Chinese, and Malaysians. Turns out; ELECTION SPEECHES!!! That’s right with the Malaysian elections just around the corner, the current parties city representative came tonight to make a speech, OH JOY! The speech was terrifically inspiring and solely in Chinese, though the pamphlets being handed out also held the same cryptic Chinese code, the promoters gave us the benefit of the doubt and still handed us the propaganda packets that maybe all of 10 white people in the world could read (that’s about how many speak Chinese right?) Jess and I got really into the rally and started chanting the representatives name when his speech finished, which got some awesome looks from the crowd; he even came to shake our hands (I refuse to wash it for a month now). The TV’s turned back on and everyone got back to their smoking, drinking, singing, and um…TV watching, while we devoured delicious Chinese donuts, peanuts, and more Tiger beer. We said our goodbyes since we are leaving tomorrow, and went to sleep.

(The Dutchman at the bar, the only time he does not have a HUGE smile, Jess snaps a picture, but a cool one at that).

07.March.2008

We walked with our bags to the corner 7-11 where we were to wait for the bus (though no signs existed we assumed the bus driver would simply see whitey with bags and stop for us). Instead a random Chinese man in a nice car stopped and offered a ride. We thought at first it was a taxi, but no, just some nice dude. As we drove he asked a lot of questions and was excited to meet us Californians. He asked if we were hungry and took us to get the best Pau in town (Pau = Awesome Chinese meat buns with pork or chicken, veggies, inside a fluffy cloud-like bun). Not being used to such extensive kindness we were very on guard and worried someone was going to take our bags while eating, or everyone in the restaurant was in on it and we were going to eat poisoned Pau and be robbed, to wake up in a bathtub of ice naked with a kidney missing (supposedly Jessica didn’t think that this was likely to happen, I guess I’m the logical one). Not only did we make it out of breakfast with kidneys and luggage intact, but he refused to let us pay for breakfast or the ride to the bus station! The whole experience was awesome, and all the guy asked for is us to take his card and to make sure if we are ever in Malaka, we must stay with him and his family! Super, super, super sweet Chinese man, it seems to be a common theme so far.

The bus ride to Kuala Lumpur was fine, but Kuala Lumpur bus station was like a complete zoo. Everyone was going home for the weekend elections and Muslims going home to be with family for Friday ceremonies. It took some time going from bus company window to window (there are literally hundreds of companies all competing for your business, it definitely ensures you will get a ride to where you want to go and for a very decent price). We got a bus going to Cameron Highlands (Tanah Rata city), it was about 4 hours, but they played Rambo: First Blood on the TV so it went by fast.

At first sight, Tanah Rata is gorgeous!!! At second sight, even more gorgeous! We read in our Lonely Planet a place to stay; Fathers Backpackers, and as we got of the bus, BAM right there, without us even asking for one, was a free shuttle to the hostel…dammit we love this country! The hostel is completely stunning; a family run place on a hillside surrounded by jungle and overlooking the city, with a well groomed garden of all colors; tons of flower/orchid/hibiscus varieties, 2 cute and playful dogs (Mutt and German Shepard) and the Shepard with 4 adorable puppies from an unknown father. We instantly befriended two guys and a girl from London in our super clean and simple dorm room. We all went out for steamboat dinner (a massive platter of all sorts of food you boil yourself) and later some beers. The night was filled with hours of mad laughter and sharing travel stories with one another. The two English blokes were traveling together, and the girl alone, and all five of us were like peas in a pod. They had been many places we were going and vice versa so we shared a lot of advice. We discussed everything under the sun and spent the whole night in absolute hysterics. Unfortunately all good things must come to an end and we headed back to the dorm and slept well.

08.March.2008

Finally we get a long and lazy day today because it is pouring rain all day. The five of us woke up to get breakfast at the hostel living area and put on the movie “No Country for Old Men” which I was terribly disappointed won best picture. It was good, but really, that’s the BEST Hollywood can offer in a whole year…give me a break. We got lunch at a great South Indian place that steamed the food in banana leaves. More laughter and story-telling ensued. Afterwards, I went to use the internet and put up the rest of the Kuala Lumpur photos onto Fickr (check them out, link to the right in case you forgot) and type this blog. Now I’m sitting in the living area finishing the blog as everyone watches “Rabbit Proof Fence,” a true story about white oppression to aboriginals.

Ukelele at 2am…seriously? March 5, 2008

27.Feb.2008

We went to the Singapore zoo which was definitely among the greatest zoos we have ever been to, and we like to consider ourselves zoo connoisseurs. The zoo was very well run and nary a cage in sight. The animals were free range in large enclosures surrounded by moats and such. It really was on a par with the San Diego Zoo (except maybe the many varieties of monkeys put it a few points over). We spent nearly 2 hours on trains and buses to get there, however it was well worth it and only cost about 2 bucks per person! I love the public transport here. So the zoo was great, but talking about it is lame so check out the Flickr pictures I put up (link to the right). We got back to the city and spent some time on the net uploading pictures and trying to fix Jess’ finicky iPod, then got back to our humble abode and fell asleep exhausted.

28.Feb.2008

Today was mostly uneventful. We wandered through the city, exploring new places and pondering our next course of action. I tried getting malaria pills for when we head to India, Laos, Cambodia, and such, but Singapore is way to expensive to buy here and the doctor we talked to said Malaysia has the same pills, but much cheaper. There are three pills, Larium, which is dirt cheap and often makes you hallucinate, but is very effective (not taking those), doxycycline, which is equally effective, only slightly more expensive, and has few side effects (I am allergic to it because it is a tetracycline, but Jess can take), and malorone which is equally effective, nearly no side effects, but sadly very expensive (but we hear it is better available and cheaper in other parts of SE asia). Anyways we had our goodbye dinner with our Couchsurfing host, went back to our place, watched some funny British shows and slept.

29.Feb.2008

We boarded a bus for a couple bucks to take us to Johor Bahru, Malaysia; the border city. It was a short trip and only eventful when we got off to stamp passports and Jess had earlier mistakenly taken an important document left in her passport when we entered to scrapbook with it as a souvenir! It was funny, but the Singapore customs agents didn’t think so and they took her back and made her fill out a few forms and she was free to go. We got in Malaysia and were swamped by taxi drivers offering rides everywhere. Being confused and shocked by our new surroundings, we got duped by a taxi driver to take us to the main bus terminal for 20 Ringgits (6 dollars more or less, EXPENSIVE for a taxi here as we later learned). We paid 50 Ringgits (18 or so dollars) for the comfy 5 hour journey to Kuala Lumpur. We met a nice Malaysian who spoke great English and taught us a few words of Malay during the ride.

When we arrived in Kuala Lumpur it was pouring rain. We had no idea where to stay as our Couchsurfer contacts were hazy about whether we could stay or not. Turned out no, we didn’t have a place. So we wandered the busy streets looking for a decent hostel. One seemed nice and cheap, but turns out they charged by the hour (Get it? We did, especially when we noticed a few respectable ladies outside just hangin’ around). Some guy brought us to nice looking Hostel, but it was full, so he took us to a crappy looking hostel that was not so surprisingly empty. It wasn’t too bad of a place, mostly clean, and we had a TV where I started watching Road to Perdition for the first time (a bit fuzzy too) until the midnight news kindly interrupted it and ended my movie like 20 min before it actually ended! I tossed and turned trying to sleep, having to know how it ends, but I didn’t even dream an ending…I guess I’ll never know.

01.Feb.2008

We met up with Thomas and his Couchsurfer Wen for breakfast. Thomas is from France and teaching French in Malaysia and Wen is Malaysian staying in Kuala Lumpur with Thomas. We had a great breakfast of true Malay food and headed to Thomas’ beautiful apartment overlooking the whole city to drop off our bags. Thomas had plans for the day so we met Shah, another CSer, downtown for lunch and hang around the shops. We got picked up by his friend Joy who drove us through massive traffic to the CS party!
The CS party was awesome. All the Couchsurfers in Kuala Lumpur came with home cooked food and whoever was staying at their place. It made for a massive crowd of 60 or so who came from all over the world; Kenya, India, Hawaii, Sweden, Russia, France, Germany, Zimbabwe, England, Malaysia, China, Paraguay. Our first CS gathering, hope there will be many more to come during our travels!

2.3.2008

(This is Jess, I’ll take it from here while Dave works with pictures) We spent the day walking around the city, starting in China town. Wandering around the outdoor markets where fake watches, hand bags and much more are sold along side a myriad of street food. We then made our way into Little India where gold jewelry and colorful clothing are the main wares for sale. Very busy and lively place

We then made our way to the Lake Gardens, we started out in the Sculptures Garden and then made our way up to the national monument celebrating the independence of modern day Malaysia, which is very recent, 1957! News to me. At this point, I become aware that every single country we have traveled in since we left the U.S. (and including the U.S.) was a former British colony! Very strange, they really did own the world not too long ago

Our next stop was the Hibiscus and Orchid Gardens, cost RM1 (.30 U.S.)….totally worth the entrance. The Hibiscus garden was pretty nice but the orchid garden was spectacular…this isn’t Dave writing, so don’t take this lightly… I have never seen so many different types of orchids in my life and may never again. It was a explosion of colors everywhere. Beautiful walkways with orchids lining the sides, literally hundreds of different species and hybrids and you could buy orchids there as well and they were so cheap! $3 U.S. for amazing orchid plants….if we lived in KL our apartment would be full of orchids.

On our way out of the gardens we bumped into a family of monkeys making their way over some fences into the park, about 8 in all. They completely ignored us and went about their business…by this time we were so overheated from the humidity and hungry, we stopped for lunch at Kafe Hornbill, which has a balcony within the bird park. So we took a much needed rest and watched hornbills and some other pretty birds fly around and even swoop in for some food.

We then continued on to the mouse deer, which are these tiny freakish deer, so cute, but very skittish! We then jumped into a cab (one that used his meter) and got a ride to the Central Markets in Chinatown. We wandered around those for a while and then walked back to Thomas’s apt around 7:30pm, where they were having a gathering of French people…or something like that. We all went out together and had an amazing meal down the road from his apartment complex, even tried some stingray. At Thomas’ apartment we headed up to the 38 floor roof, I don’t know if we were supposed to, but we found a way, and it was stunning. There was a nice electrical storm to take some fantastic pictures of. All in all a great evening.

3.3.2008

We checked ourselves into a hostel today, because our host was going out of town…so we packed up and caught a cab over to Chinatown to Le Village and got a room for RM30 per night. For lunch we went to a great little Indian restaurant and then hung out and relaxed at the hostel for a bit

For dinner we met up with our CS friend Prakash and he took us out to one of his favorite food stands in Little India…with a Kollywood (yes Kollywood, not Bollywood) blaring in the background, it almost felt like we were in India. He then took us to the Eye of Malaysia, a giant ferris wheel, with great views of the city. We went up for a ride and mid way through our ride it started pouring rain, which was slightly terrifying especially with the strong winds and lightning… the ride seemed to go on forever, it kept spinning and spinning, every time we passed the bottom we thought for sure it would stop, but it just kept going. We then had to hangout under an overhang and wait for the torrential rains to stop.

Before saying goodbye we had one more drink at a Restoran (that’s Malay for Restaurant) right next to our hostel…hot chai and Milo (hot chocolate), delicious.

That night we were awoken around 2am to some completely insane hippie chinese lady poorly, and loudly playing the Ukelele and singing.  The walls are paper thin and it sounded like she was right in our room.  Being too nice to say anything we let her play a couple “lulliby’s” then Dave finally shouted “Alright you’re done, it’s 2am!”  She stopped, but the sound will forever be etched into our brains.

4.3.2008

The plan was to wake up early and get tickets to go up the top of the Twin Towers but sleeping in felt so good, so we did. Instead we had breakfast around the corner, my usual Egg and Onion Roti and Dave gets whatever looks good. We then got on a bus and waited for half an hour while they waited for it to fill (not the best public transport around) and then half an hour later we were at the Batu Caves.

A very dramatic entrance, with a huge staircase of 272 stairs and a 140 foot golden statue of Murugan, a Hind diety. On the stairs up we encountered some monkeys, who were slightly intimidating, we made sure not to look them in the eyes, because we heard they don’t like that, and hold on to your camera tight because they do enjoy stealing as well, bad monkeys. We made it to the top and it was a very impressive cave, with a huge mouth and lots of greenery growing everywhere. There were a number of differnt shrines to different gods throughout the shrine.

At the main shrine there were so many monkeys and the first thing we see is a couple of tourists get attacked by the big alpha monkey, pretty funny ! Especially when it is not happening to you….there were so many monkeys and even some tiny baby monkeys latched on to their mama’s back. They had the place trashed, there was garbage everywhere, and I am sure it was them because it was all up on the rocks and I saw them digging in the trash, more bad monkeys.

We watched the monkeys and enjoyed the cave for awhile and then headed back down the steps and went to a vegetarian restaurant for lunch. We walked around to the other temples and watched a short documentary about the shrine and a specific festival they hold every year there. We then caught a bus back to town and then grabbed a monorail for the fun of it to another part of town. I finally got malaria pills….6 months for $90 U.S., glad I waited, loads cheaper then if I had bought them at home.

We walked through downtown and came across something of a Kuala Lumpur icon, the cat man. He’s a guy who takes care of all the stray cats in the city and hangs out with them snuggling on his motorbike all day while he plays them music and leaves the bike running to soothe them. He’s taken care of over 72 cats and I believe he lets people adopt them when he makes them healthy enough. The cats were really cute, and after a small donation for cat food and medicine Dave got to cuddle with the cats.

On a whim we stopped for massages at a nice looking place, so nice they didn’t have hawkers outside advertising…I took that as a good sign. I got a 30 minute foot massage and Dave got a 30 minute arm, neck and back massage, all for a staggering price of RM60 ($20 U.S.). Walking out I felt like I had new feet, so relaxed and ready for dinner.

For dinner we checked LP and found a good looking vegetarian chinese restoran near our hostel called Fatt Yan Vegetarian Restoran. Dinner was delicious, especially the sweet and sour soya pork and fried rice. We then went to outdoor market in Chinatown for drinks and went to a place with a buy two get one free beer deal. So we got our bucket of Tiger beer and watched the hawkers sell their wares…nice night.

Dave’s Edit: March 4th was Jessica’s B-Day even though she didn’t mention it. We didn’t have a party, but it was still a fun day! Happy B-Day Jess!