Globetrotting Around the World

It is in deep solitude that I find the gentleness with which I can truly love my brothers. The more solitary I am the more affection I have for them. Solitude and silence teach me to love my brothers for what they are, not for what they say.
- Thomas Merton

Having arrived back to Malaysia from Indonesia, I was content on jumping on a convenient, easy plane back to Thailand. But as I stood in Georgetown, Malaysia chatting with a Dutch couple before rewatching the movie Talladega Nights, (a movie I missed the beginning of the last time I saw it, and I did have a free day, so why not watch it again), when they mentioned something to me. "Why don't you go to Koh Tarutao National Park and to the island of Koh Lipe? Noone is there", they queried.

That is where the next week took me, Koh Lipe, in the far south of Thailand. Koh LipeI decided to skip the easy traveling and get off the beaten path. I had previously thought of going to Koh Tarotao National Park, but figured, ah, it will be too inconvenient and after Indonesia, I'm ready for a break. But my conscious wouldn't allow me to take the easy path, when I could have an adventure into the unknown and possibly a few interesting stories to tell.

Money changer anyone?

Making my way from Hat Yai on a public bus to the coastal town of Pak Bara, the jumping off point to the Koh Tarotao National Park, with another Dutch couple and their two year old daughter, we talked about the supposed solitude and quiet of these islands. Next morning, I was placed on a longboat with a local family for the 4 hour cruise across the Andaman Sea to Koh Lipe. The ride was a great trip of sitting back and watching all of the small islands pass by and flying fish flying along the longboat. Our boat was directly in front of some mean looking rain clouds, so we had a time constraint, get there before the rain does. Just as we were floating towards the coral and beach, another set of storm clouds came by and hit us directly head on.

For the next three days, I was on the island of Koh Lipe enjoying the tide go by, eating at the only open restaurant, Pooh's, and doing a little work on Pooh's website. For the first time during the entire trip, I completed some work that I was paid for. In exchange for updating Pooh's website, I was paid with beverage and dinner. I can now say that I am working my way around the world. In between that busy schedule, I managed to squeeze in some snorkelling time on four of the beaches surrounding this tiny island.

Morning view, I could get used to that.

Unfortunately, there are a few problems occuring at Koh Lipe. It used to be an isolated island in a protected national park, but it had been opened up for construction years ago. As a few sparce travellers discovered the place, this led to a steady flow of backpackers, and now the island is becoming one set of bungalows. Combine this with the fact that the water and coral surrounding the island are treated as a garbage can. The result is dead coral and trashed beaches. But as travellers do begin making their way to Koh Lipe, the beaches are cleaned. Clean in the tourist season, trashed during the off-season. It's a sad reality.

After a peaceful and relaxing 3 days at Koh Lipe, it was time to jump on a ferry and head back to penisular Thailand. With bright blue water gliding by, our boat engine stopped, and the ferry came to a gradual, floating stop. For an hour, we just sat there as very large jellyfish made their way by and people worked in vain on the engine. Finally, another ferry came to our rescue and towed us into harbor at a snail's pace. This little roadblock allowed the storm clouds from three days ago to call their distance 2nd cousin Bob to storm on us just as we were pulling up to dock.

Finally, a reliable ferry

There's nothing like a long boat ride, and a set of wet clothes and backpacks to cause a group of 8 farang (foreigners) to bond. As a result, we all jumped in a shared van passing around snacks and drinks, and travelled to the town of Trang. There, like the floating jellyfish from earlier on the boat, we floated around Trang's markets and streets searching for a restaurant. We then found a nice outdoor Thai restaurant where we shared various local Thai dishes. It was good fun.

Tiny local transport

Tomorrow morning, after a 2 week hiatus from traveling, to be with her family, Nadine will be flying back to Krabi where I will meet her at the airport with, yes, a kool-aid smile. It's hard to believe that we have already been traveling, to the day, 4 months. Like always, life is good, real good, and it's about to get better.

Last week's trivia question dealt with the fifth populous country in the world, and the answer was Brazil.

This weeks question:
The second and third longest reigns for a monarchy are Queen Elizabeth from the United Kingdom and the Sultan from Brunei, who holds the longest current reign among reigning monarchs and what country is he or she from?

Life is good. We hope all are doing well and happy.
Peace
J.W.

When you have once seen the glow of happiness on the face of a beloved person, you know that a man can have no vocation but to awaken that light on the faces surrounding him; and you are torn by the thought of the unhappiness and night you cast, by the mere fact of living, in the hearts you encounter.
- Albert Camus

Les souvenirs s'agrippent a nos ames comme le lierre se cramponne a la pierre.

In one of our previous entries, You Can Have Your Apple Juice -And Eat It Too!, I mentioned that three major religions coexist in Malaysia peacefully. It's actually 4, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu. Makes it even that more impressive. Thanks to Hien for pointing it out to me.

I am currently here in Penang, Malaysia, having just returned from Sumatra, Indonesia, while Nadine is back in Omaha, Nebraska spending quality time with her family and obtaining some necessary commodities, one can of Dr. Pepper and a package of Reeses cups. Not too prevalent in SEA.

As soon as Nadine departed from Krabi International Airport heading back to Omaha, I was officially on my own to explore. Immediately, I went down to the highway and hailed down a sawngthaew in the rain. A sawngthaew is a small truck with two benches in the back that serve as a sort of taxi. I did arrive back to my hostel safely. First trip on my own completed safely!

Next morning, I jumped on a van that would take me back to Penang, Malaysia via Hat Yai in southern Thailand. This is the same van that we took less than a week earlier. What made this trip even more special is that I was sharing my seats with two really large Kazakastan guys living in Thailand learning Thai boxing. I am pretty sure that they aren't going to find anyone in their weight range as Thais tend to be pretty thin.

From Penang, I was going to jump on a ferry and scoot over to the sixth largest island in the world, Sumatra, answer to last weeks question, thus Hermano Domingo and Pepper's names in the title, and go visit a few orangutans. The entire reason I was going to Sumatra was see some orangutans in the wild Sumatran jungle.

Indonesia happens to be the fourth most populated country in the world with a population of 250 million people trailing only China, India, and the U.S. Indonesia is 90% Muslim, thus making it the largest Muslim country in the world. Ironcially, Sumatra has a large Christian population making it roughly 50/50 division between Muslim and Christian. Sumatra is one, and the largest, of 17,508 islands in the Indonesian archipelago. Sumatra has experienced alot of tragedy in the last 3 years though. In 2003, a flood ravaged the town of Bukit Lawang. In a span of 10 minutes, a large wall of water released from a broken mountain lake swept through taking 325 homes and 280 lives with it, 6 backpackers included. In December of 2004, the Christmas Day tsunami hit the northern Aceh region and killed many more people along the way. Combine this with the Bali bombings on the other half of Indonesia, and tourism has suffered. As a result, the island of Sumatra is practically void of tourists and backpackers. Thus, that is what held the appeal for me to go there, lack of people. Nadine was never eager to visit Sumatra, because of the possible presence of malaria, according to government websites we checked. Thus, while she was her family, that left me the opportunity to go to the "island."

Seated on a ferry for 6 hours, I looked around and noted that I was 1 of two tourists. Ironically, the other tourist was American. We haven't encountered many Americans in our travels, so finding one of this ferry was surprising. Arriving into the port of Belawasi, I was ushered, as the random tourist, to the front of the line to get my Indonesian tourist visa. From that point, I would be subjected to a very common discomfort, Indonesian public transport! I boarded a heated bus packed full of other passengers. The result was instant sweat, a sticky body, and a feeling of fatigue and exasperation. That wouldn't be the first time. Our bus took another 2 hours to get to Medan.

On the bus, I was approached by Adam, a friendly enough guy. He joked with these two unique foreigners about orangutans, the traffic we were stuck in, and Indonesians. Adam was a tout. Being a travel veteran, I never saw it coming. I went with him to visit a nice hostel, exchange money, buy a mosquito net, because there wasn't any mosquito nets where I was going (there was!), and a place to eat. In the end, I was ready to get away from him. When I woke up at 7:30 in the morning, guess who is waiting for me down in the lobby, yep, Adam. If you see Adam in Sumatra, don't ask him to sell you a mosquito net.

Finally away from Adam and his buddies, I was on my first, of way too many on this 5 day trip, mini-van to Bukit Lawang and subsequent orangutans. Let me explain these mini-vans. These mini-vans stop often to pick-up and drop off passengers along the way. These mini-vans are not air conditioned, that's not really expected, but they are crammed full of people. Just imagine your small Chryselor van with an extra row of torn plush seats. Now put an extra person in that row for the amount of seats, hang a few from the door, and a couple more on top for safety, and now you have an accurate picture of this mini-van. Just add 4 hours and quite possibly the worst road ever, and you have the making of a good story. I can't say for sure that it is the worst road ever, because on our honeymoon, Nadine and I rode with Gonzo to the village of Cusmapa in Nicaragua and bounced around the entire time there too. At least then, we didn't have 18 people in the van. This road ressembled an area where several bombs fell recently. Our van jumped around it like had some pumped up hydros combined with a love for pop music and disco.

Is this bridge really safe to cross with my big pack?

Life in Bukit Lawang was slow. Noone was around. All there was to do was watch the river flow by. AND sign up for a morning trek into the jungle.

Next morning at 7, I took off with Siyan into the jungle. We had made an agreement that if I didn't see any orangutans I didn't have to pay. As we walked, I heard gibbon monkeys in the distant, saw gray mohawk monkeys passing overhead, and the calls of birds, but no orangutans.

This is the friendlier female Sasah

After an hour and a half Siyan found what he was looking for, a set of orangutans. In order to actually see these animals, we had to part from the trail and tramp through the jungle floor. There in front of us, a female orangutan was hanging from a tree branch in all its hairy glory. Siyan told me that there were two orangutans. Oh, the other one was a male. And it's mating season. After my first photo of the female, I then saw the male. Suddenly, Siyan told me to run as the male was coming after us. You can imagine this situation, excitement of seeing my first orangutan in the wild, alarm in having to flee from the "jungle people" with a backpack across my chest and camera fumbling in my hands. As we backtracked, now on the trail, we saw the male in full form with his arms hanging the length of his torso. Once again, he began making his way towards us and once again we backtracked. As this all transpired, I have to say that I had immediate respect for this creature. Amazing, yet powerful. Unique and at the same time similar to a few people I know back in New Mexico. We continued this cat and mouse game until Siyan took out three of the mangos he picked up along the way and threw them to Abdul and Sasah. This kept the male at bay for the next 20 minutes.

So that is Abdul

After the male was pacified, it was time for the female to show off for two hairless monkeys. She climbed up trees, swung from branches, slid down tree trucks upside down. I just sat there and soaked it all up and tried to get in a few decent photos. That was until the female was 5 feet in front of us and hanging from a branch. Suddenly the branch broke and this female orangutan fell on its back and sulked over to the male while Siyan and I had a good laugh. A couple of minutes later, Sayah came back towards us and hanging from a different branch took a swipe at my head. Fortunately she missed. Alright, 30 minutes of studying the actions of the orangutans and noting thier physical similiarities to us humans, feet, hands, arms, head, and for a few, a body covered in hair, we began our track back to town and the chance for another mini-van to Berstagi. It was definitely worth the money Siyan earned and much more.

Abdul coming towards us the second time

Along the way back to my hostel, we saw 3 more orangutans. A mother with a young child and an infant orangutan. By the way, if you didn't know, the word "orangutan" comes from the Bahasa language. Orang means person or people while utan means jungle. Jungle people. The whole experience made the trip to Sumatra, Indonesia worth it.

On the 4 and a half hour mini-van back to Medan, at one point, I counted a total of 25 people in, on, and around our mini-van. Once in Medan, I was on another crowded bus to the town of Berastagi and its large green statue of a cabbage dedicated to their ability to grow this vegetable. I'd be proud too. I also attended mass at one of the most unique looking Catholic churches I've ever seen. At Saint Francisco Assisi, this church was a combo of Muslim, Buddhist, and Christian architecture, while the interior had wooden pews on the far left, plastic blue chairs on the far right, and mats down the middle. I pulled up a seat next to locals directly on the mat.

Our confused transport to Tuk Tuk

From Berastagi, I rode 3 mini-vans to the port town of Parapat. From Parapat, I would jump on a ferry and leave the next morning to Tuk Tuk, a small town on Samosir Island in the middle of Lake Toba. Of note, Indonesia has an alarming rate of man made destruction of their forests and there are forest fires that are currently blanketing parts of Indonesia and well as countries east of Indonesia. It has been in the international news. Because of that, the sky was gray. In the morning, aboard the ferry, our ferry captain got lost in the cloudy atmosphere. He was literally swerving across the lake trying to find land. Eventually he saw it. Tuk Tuk gave me a chance to relax and swim in the gray horizon for a day.

Where does the sky end and the water begin? Take the plunge! I dare ya.

My time here has come to an end and I can characterize my solo adventure to Indonesia with three unique items, grandeur of seeing orangutans in the jungles of Bukit Lawang, solitude of Lake Toba, and the horrible act of taking public transport daily in Indonesia in 5 rushed days. I finished my time in Indonesia by scrapping my return ticket by ferry to Malaysia and splurging for a $35 Air Asia plane ticket. Well worth the price.

To complete my adventure and stories from Indonesia, as I waited at the Medan airport, a security guard walked over to a souvenir shop and picked up a chess set. As he was walking back to his security station, I offered to play him. I sat there playing chess with a security guard while people passed the security checkpoint unchecked. There were more important things going on. We finally played to a draw and he was able to return to work and insure the safety of the airport terminal.

Life is good. Nadine is still in Omaha until the 24th when she comes back to Thailand. I am going to make my way back to Thailand, so I can be waiting for her with open arms and a big kool-aid smile.

Question - What is the fifth most populous country in the world?

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardships as the pathway to peace.

Peace
JW

The title of this blog probably has you wondering, "what the heck is John talking about?" Just wait until the end of the blog and I will drop a little knowledge on you.

Since the last entry, Nadine and I have traveled north from Georgetown, Malaysia to Krabi, Thailand. Our time in Malaysia was great, but after 3 weeks of easy traveling there, we were ready to head to Thailand for a bit of a change. We booked a mini-van that would take us to the border and then on up to Krabi. Our van turned out to be a smallish van, thus the name mini-van, but much smaller than those other Mercedes-Benz mini-vans those other people were taking. Finally arriving into Krabi 10 hours later, my long legs, especially compared to the Malaysians, were ready for a bit of a stretch and freedom.

I say to this ad in Malaysia, No, you bite me Munchies!

One thing becomes apparent immediately in Thailand, things are cheaper! Food is cheaper. Beer is cheaper. Transport is cheaper. Lodging is really much cheaper. And these are all good things. Our first night, instead of hitting a restaurant, we sauntered over to the night market and the couple of dozen of stalls serving some mildly spicy to man I'm sweating spicy Thai food. We saddled up to the table, ordered some noodles and soup, and enjoyed the cool evening weather. At the end of the night, our meal and beer set us back a good 160 baat ($4). Needless to say, every night we've spent in Krabi has included a nice little dinner at the night market.

FRREEEEEEDDDOOMMMMMMM!!!

After visiting the windy Ao Nang beach, we jumped on a longboat destined for Hat Rai Leh (pronounced in a Texas accent, Hat Ray Lay). A longboat is just what it sounds like, a skinny boat that is, well, long, and carries 10 to 12 people somewhat safely. You could probably only fit 4 to 5 chubby New Mexicans though. The propeller is located at the very end of a long pole, thus allowing it to motor through shallow waters. We followed our travel rule for Hat Rai Leh, and stayed there 3 days. We stay somewhere 3 days to get a good feel for it unless it stinks. And Hat Rai Leh definitely did not stink.

Rai Leh is renowned as being a spot for rockclimbing at all levels. Nadine, being the excellent climber that she is, had been looking forward to Rai Leh for a long, long time. She was at her rockclimbing Graceland. We found the King still alive, King Climbers that is, and set aside a day with our smiling guide Chau to climb 1-2-3, the three climbing areas located on the east side of Rai Leh Beach. Being a little lax with instruction and all those unnecessary safety rules, Chau was eager to have us climb. We jumped in our harnasses and climbing shoes and started crawling all over the limestone surface of, I believe, area #2. I could be wrong on that though. We finished the morning with 4 fun climbs each at an average of 10 meters (30 feet) in height. After lunch, a quick power nap and a shower, we returned to 1-2-3. It was during the afternoon that we took on the tallest climb that either one of us had ever attempted. In the end, we both conquered the 100 foot mammoth climb with an awesome view of the area to boot. It's at that point as you take in the beach, jungle, cliff, and sea views from 100 feet that you realize that you are putting alot of trust in a thin rope, a small piece of metal, and that small little human down there at the bottom. Since you are reading this, relax, I did make it down safely AND I didn't wet my pants. Nadine did though.

Is that Nadine stuck between a rock and another rock?

We did more than rock climb at Rai Leh, we ate lots of pineapple, watermelon, and bananas. We tasted the absolute best fried cashew and chicken noodles we'd ever tasted. So if you are in Hat Rai Leh anytime soon, go visit The Rock cafe, you won't be disappointed with that tasty dish. If you are disappointed, I will finish it off for you. In addition to eating, we've had a busy schedule of strolling along the beach. The one personality that I am going to remember about Hat Rai Leh, other than the people and amazing geography is this one wet dog we nicknamed Sardine the Dog. Everytime we went somewhere, morning or evening, we'd look out towards the water and see this blond dog jumping and chasing sardines. We never saw him dry once in three days. At least for his sake, fleas don't have a chance living on him, they would all drown within an hour.

Nadine and I both attempt to respect the local culture by trying to speak a little of the local Thai language. We did a decent job in Malaysia and Singapore and an excellent job in the Cook Islands, New Zealand, and Australia, as our English was right on. Thailand has proved to be a bit more of a challenge. Taking a strategy my good ol' Dad taught me when I was younger, I associate words with different things. Teaching French and Spanish, I do a decent job with Latin based languages and you would expect that a little Thai wouldn't trip me up. But Thai has proven to be a bigger challenge. It is a language that contains 5 different levels of intonation and messing it up can easily change the meaning of a word. Thus, when I try, and this is a big try, to speak Thai, I use word association to help me. In order to simply greet someone and say hi, you say sa-wat-dii khrap. But when you pronounce it somewhat correctly, it sounds like "So what the crap." Thus the title of our little blog entry. So if someone yells at you "So what the crap." Don't be alarmed, they must be trying to speak a little Thai with you, simply smile and respond with "sa-wat-dii khrap." If they approach you without a smile, run!

Could this be the world's best beach?

We are both in good health, Nadine still healing from the bed bug bites, but we've learned of some bad news while in Kuala Lumpur. Nadine's grandma, Betty, passed away from cancer. She lived a good life. We knew going into the trip that she may pass away. We felt it best that Nadine return to the States to be with her family. She is currently in route back to Omaha for a week. My thoughts and prayers are with them all.

While Nadine is back with her family, I am free to run around for a week on my own and explore. I felt it would be appropriate to visit some of Nadine's extended family over in Indonesia at the Bohorok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center. www.orangutans-sos.org This also gives me a chance to get off of the beaten path and not many people visit this part of Indonesia.

They're both beauts

Life is good and full of adventure and we are grateful to be doing what we are doing. Life is short and precious. Travel makes me realize the importance of friends and family in my life. I also stay in written contact better with family and friends when I travel. So, feel free to meet up with us in South East Asia. We will teach you a few Thai expressions.

Question of the week: What is the world's sixth largest island?
Please read carefully: whoever gets this correct, I will put your first name, given to you by your parents, in the title of the next entry.

Peace
JW

If you're going through hell, keep going.
- Winston Churchill

"Peace to the country and the people."

Since our last entry, Nadine and I have crossed the middle of peninsular Malaysia going south and then turned around and went north up the western coast to Penang, just south of the Thai border. Tomorrow we are going to head to the beaches of Thailand and Krabi. A lot has happened since our last entry.

Today's title to the blog entry, with much effort and coercing, was courteous of Matthew Pepper. He correctly answered the question that "lima" is the number "5" in Malay as well as the capital of Peru. All those degrees are paying off.

How about a strawberry shake and strawberries and whip cream with your strawberries?

Upon our arrival in Tarah Rata in the Cameron Highlands, we were welcomed with cool temperatures. We took this time to clean our grungy clothes and enjoy the cool weather. The third day arrived, and we decided we should actually see part of the Cameron Highlands area other than the hostel and the main road. We joined a morning tour of the area. First stop was a Buddhist Temple and then the Rose Centre. Ahhh, the Rose Centre, how much fun can a bunch of flowers be? Well, the Rose Centre was actually worth the visit. It was a multi-leveled terrace with views of the underlying valley, thousands of roses and non-roses, and random Disney characters standing among the vegetation. Who would have imagined Snow White and the Seven Dwarves waiting for us, the White family?

Chillin' on my broken Disney bike.

We followed the Rose Centre with another masculine spot, the Butterfly Farm. Did we sign up for the sissy New Mexican tour? The Butterfly Farm did have some redeeming qualities, snakes, lizards, large black scorpions, turtles, toads, and, yeah, a few thousand butterflies. I went into it apprehensive, but the chance to have all of these nasty animals crawl over my body made it well worth the 3 ringgit entry fee. The final stop of any importance was a tea plantation which rendered some amazing views of all the tea plantations below. I also took advantage to taste all of the free sweet peach tea in the BOH gift shop.

That's where tea comes from?

From the highlands, we took the curvy and swaying bus down the highlands to Kuala Lumpur, and Nadine's stomach did return to normal. In Kuala Lumpur, we had an interesting time. First day, we made our way around, near, close to, but not quite to the fourth largest tower in the world, the K.L. Tower. You would think with all of our travel experience, that making our way to the fourth largest tower in the world would be easy, towering over the city. It took us a little over an hour to reach it. We could have walked to it in 40 minutes easily. And we never actually walked to the tower. Finally, a guy asked us if we would like to have a ride to the base of it. Sure!!! From the top, you could make out the hazy outlines of a building, a bridge, and something else. There was a combo of haze, clouds, and pollution blocking our panoramic view.

Second day in Kuala Lumpur, K.L. to locals, we got out early and headed towards the largest set of twin towers in the world, the Petronas Towers. To visit the towers, you get in line in the morning and you are given a time in which you can climb 41 stories to the bridge connecting the towers. In high season, it can be tough to get these free tickets, but since we are here in the shoulder season, it wasn't tough at all. Once on the bridge, we could see more clearly the area surrounding us, compared to K.L. Tower. Better look quick though, to keep the flow of people moving, you only have 10 minutes. Fine with us. Back on level ground, we obtained two more tickets for the afternoon. Hey, it's free, great view, and it's quite popular.

But what is it that they really know?

As any good traveller knows, you need to have a roll of toilet paper with you at all times in case the situation arises that you have to go, confronted with a squat toilet, and have no t.p. We went to a local store to purchase a roll or two, but the smallest package available was only with 10 rolls. What are you going to do, go without? No way, we walked out with the 10 roll package. Now we have to find somewhere to put it in our bags.

To complete the day, we headed to Chinatown and the festivities there. Walking around among stiffling heat and the constant requests to buy a watch, haven't bought one in a decade, we decided to hide in a t-shirt store. It was here that I saw the absolute best t-shirt that I have seen on the entire trip. Up on the wall was a yellow shirt in light brown print, Oklahoma. That's not so great until you know what was on the shirt with Oklahoma. It was their picturesque ideal of Oklahoma, sunsets over a secluded beach and palm trees everywhere! Ha, that was great. In my five years living there, I can't recall a single spot of land that was directly by the ocean lined with palm trees, but I guess that must be the image of Oklahoma by Malaysians. I would have bought several of these shirts, but there was only one left, and it was a small. Must be a popular choice. I know I loved it.

Our first night in K.L., we stayed at a hostel that was a little shabby. At night, we saw several cockroaches scurrying across the floor in the hallways. One night was enough there. After our next night, maybe we should have stayed there. Second night in K.L., we moved to Le Village, a hostel with good reviews in our guidebook. We arrived and thought this place was going to be nice. That was during the day, at night completely different story. At night, the bed bugs came out to play and feast on all of the residents. As we attempted to sleep with loud noise coming from our deaf Japanese neighbors packing, we felt crawling on our legs. All of that was enough to wake us up and do a proper search of the place. It was then that we found these small bed bugs all over. From then on, Nadine didn't sleep and spent the night in the lounge area with a fellow female traveler who also couldn't sleep due to the bed bugs. This was all after an exhausting day in the heat of K.L. I showered, sprayed bug spray on my body, and jumped in my sleep sheet and got 4 hours of disturbed sleep. Promptly at 6 a.m., waking up a 6 a.m. on this trip!, we were out the door and finding a bus to Melaka. While in Melaka, we discovered the damage from the bed bugs, both of our backsides were covered in bites. We'll bring them with us to Thailand tomorrow.

After two horrendous nights of sleep in K.L. and 3 months of hostels, we decided we were going to stay in an actual hotel! We found a three star hotel on sale for 90 ringgits, $27 U.S., and stayed three nights. As a result, we loved Melaka. The highlight of Melaka, outside of the Emperor Hotel, was the night market in Chinatown. We strolled the market trying chocolate covered strawberries, pastries filled with exotic fillings, hopefully not too exotic, and some Tiger beer sitted by a road vendor. In all of our travels, we haven't bought any real souvenirs other than postcards and spoons for my mom. Here, we went crazy. We bought three things. A painting, a nightlite, and some placemats. They should now be on their way to the States via a very slow ship. Let's hope that they beat us home. Amongst our walking, food, and shopping, we stumbled on to the area where locals can try their best at kareokee. We pulled up a chair and witnessed a lady singing in Chinese in a very high screechy voice and an elderly man danced around with a red fan in his hand all while passerbys plugged their ears staring at the stage. This was hilarious. Too bad we forgot our camera.

The second time was just as good as the first free visit.

From Melaka, we have made our way to the busy and dirty city of Penang. We have met some interesting people. A couple who left England with plans to travel for 3 years around the world, but changed their minds and extended it to 5 years. Another pair of friends who are biking from Australia to Swizterland. It should be some rough going over water. Bonded and ran into randomly with the Dutch couple from the horrible hostel in K.L.

Life is good. We will go to Thailand tomorrow and the town of Krabi. I am feeling well, but Nadine has a head cold right now. She is getting some rest in a bed bug free, air conditioner colded room as I write.

If anyone would like to spend a carpe diemish Thanksgiving, Christmas, or New Years break in South East Asia with some cool folks, you are invited to join us for a bit. Even if you don't think we are cool, you're still invited. We have a pretty relaxed schedule in that we don't have to be anywhere until Valentine's Day in Hong Kong, China, so we could meet up with yall anywhere.

Peace
JW

If you hear a voice within you say "you cannot paint," then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.
- Vincent Van Gogh

Greetings fellow bloggers! Nadine and I are currently here in Tanah Rata in the Cameron Highlands after a day of travel. What better to do at the end of a day than update our blog.

After our brief stint in Singapore, we quickly ventured over the northern border to Malaysia. I didn't know what to expect with Malaysia, other than the fact that the country is Muslim. What is unique about Malaysia is that it is a country that is able to successfully, and more importantly, coexist with THREE major religions living in close proximity, Islam, Christianity, and the Hindu religions. The 3 religions respect each other and acknowledge the others right to exist. Uncommon in our current times. In addition to that, I would never consider Malaysia a third world country. It is clean, efficient, orderly, people are very helpful and polite. I would rate it as a second world country if anything else. The underlying fact is that I would recommend Malaysia to anyone, as long as you are ready for a little heat and humidity.

Our first stop of our visit in penisular Malaysia was Pulau Tioman. Pulau Tioman is an island off of the south western coast. After a ferry ride across bumpy waters, we set foot on ABC beach. Yes, in order to stay there, you must be able to say your ABC's. New Mexicans are automatically excluded from this beach. They are allowed on Green Chile beach.

Pulau Tioman gave us a chance to sit on a beach and watch the monkeys, monitor lizards, and bats play. We stayed there 3 nights. What made it interesting was that every morning, we would stick our heads out, and find monkeys running around the grounds of our little bungalow. Beside them would be monitor lizards of varying sizes slowly walking across the grass. At night, bats were flying by our heads eating all of the bothersome mosquitos flying around our legs. It was all fun and games until one afternoon. Before our departure for the island, we purchased a bag of fruit. By the time the second afternoon arrived, we had consumed all of the bananas, oranges, and apples. The lone fruit was a large mango that Nadine had her beautiful blue eyes on for a few days. This afternoon, we went and had some lunch with mango being our dessert. Walking back from lunch, we approached our bungalow to find everything just like we had found it, EXCEPT, the mango was missing from the plastic bag. A monkey came by and swiped our mango while we were gone. If you find a monkey with mango chunks around its mouth, know that they ate our mango and they owe us one.

In addition to interesting monkeys, Pulau Tioman introduced us to new drinks. We're adventerous in trying new foods and drinks. Malaysia hasn't proved to be any different. Walking along the sidewalk one day, also is the major thoroughway between all beaches, thus has scooters, trucks, and people sharing the same road, we came upon a stall with a large list of drinks that we had never heard of. We tried some soy milk (good), 100 Plus (a type of Sprite), but the most unique was Grass Jelly soda. It's a drink with regular soda infused with small capsules of foul tasting grass jelly. Whew that was nasty! Just the sensation of having several pieces of jelly sliding through your straw just doesn't work for me. It was like eating dozens of jelly fish at once. Don't let me put you off, try it at least once, then move over to the apple juice with aloe bits. That tastes a little better.

I also took the chance to run, and run off that darned grass jelly drink. It was the first time to run since the Cook Islands. Combine that with the intense humidity, you'll never find that in Odessa, and proved to be a challenging run.

Leaving Pulau Tioman, we headed up the eastern coast to Kuantan, a stop on our way up a little village called Chetaring. But in Kuantan, is where we had some great travel tales. Being in a place we weren't going to stay long enough to catch the next bus, we didn't think much of our time there. Jumping off the bus, we walked through stalls of food being served. This was an authentic experience. No tourists, no backpackers, just Malays and their food. We settled up to the table at one stall, fumbled through our guidebook looking for the correct phrases to say, "we want good food, won't make us sick, and no chicken feet." It worked, we had a great little lunch with a bunch of Malaysian ladies giggling at us as we ate.

Completing lunch, we walked to the spot where the public bus leaves for Chetaring. Along the way, we ran into some local kids, trying our Malay, they tried their English, and we laughed. At the same time, we were passing in front of a huge blue mosque. Great photo.

On the bus, I was in a seat without a back cushion, just a metal skeleton to my seat, while Nadine was chatting it up with a local girl on the bus, acquiring about the one Malay food we have to try, and about life in general. Great interactions in Kuantan.

The goal of our trip into the small village along the coast was to hopefully see large female green turtles trudge up to the beach and lay eggs. Since we were arriving towards the end of the season, odds weren't the best, but heck, let's give it a try anyways. After a great dinner with a French postal worker in a restaurant off the main road, Jacques (his last name wasn't Strap), we jumped in a little van heading to some protected beach where green turtles are known to lay eggs. We sat there close to the beach with Chris, first American encountered in SEA, and played with a styrofoam box full of baby green turtles that had just hatched. Just as their instinct told them to get to the ocean, they were crawling all over each other to get out of the box and to an unknown wet future. They start about the size of your hand, their sex is decided by the temperature of the ground where they are laid, close to a tree, boy, closer to the ocean, girl. A notice came in over the walkie-talkie, there had been a momma turtle spotted up the beach. Like a bunch of ducklings, we followed our guide up the beach in the pitch black dark. You can only imagine him saying, "Guys, I was just joking, there is no stinking turtles out tonight, now you have to find your way back to the van." We knew we hit the spot when we saw huge tracks across the sand that looked like those of a monster truck. That little turtle had grown up into a massive block of turtle. We received another message on the walkie-talkie, there is another turtle up the beach packing the sand around the eggs and now about to make its way back to the South China Sea. We were there just in time to see this green turtle dragging its heavy shell and body 50 yards across the sand. That was a site.

Then it was time to head back to the other turtle. The other turtle was in the process of laying 120 eggs! We sat there guessing how many eggs she was going to drop, and this was around egg 80. By the time she finished up, we were all just like that turtle, a little tired. It was 2 a.m. (1 in the afternoon back in Odessa). This all started at 10, and four hours later, we were back on the road again back to our bungalow.

We continued our track north to the islands of the Perhentians. There are two of them, the smaller Kecil, home for 3 nights, and the larger and quieter Besar, home for 2 nights. We spent our time on these two islands as a chance to relax, read, hike, swim, and do a little bit of snorkelling. We did all of these activities really well. I even think we are getting to the point where we could master them. We've had enough practice. Pulau Perhentian Kecil presented us with a nice little cross island hike among monitor lizards and mosquitoes. Pulau Perhentian Besat allowed us to snorkel among some huge reef and colorful fish. Considering the amount of snorkeling we have done, we should have bought a mask long ago. On Besar, we did just that. It worked perfectly.

We left the beaches and are now sitting here in the cool rainy hills of Tanah Rata in the Cameron Highlands, home to many tea plantations that are exported all around the world. This is a welcome respite from the heat and humidity that we've encountered for the last two weeks. This will give us the opportunity to do a few travel errands and the most important one is to wash our clothes!!! You can only wash your clothes so many times by hand when they need a good ol' fashioned machine wash to eliminate the stink from three countries. They're downstairs right now as I type. Here is a view of downtown Tanah Rata. If you see a red or blue rainjacket, that would be us running around. http://www.heritage.com.my/cameron/index.htm#

As many of you may have heard, there was a coup d'etat in Thailand several days ago. This has created an interesting dilemma for us, head straight to Thailand or find an alternative route. Here is our conclusion. Other travellers and websites have mentioned that it is fine to travel Thailand, but maybe stay away from the capital for awhile. They will name an interim Prime Minister in a week. Soooo, we are going to head south down the eastern coast until Melaka, home of the once thriving world spice trade, head over into Indonesia and see some orangatans, cross back over to Malaysia and then go to Thailand.

We are enjoying our time traveling, hard to believe that yes, we are already a third of the way done. How time flies.

Some of you may notice that in every entry I write, I always take the chance to take a shot at New Mexico at least once. I do this at the request of 10 fingered Pepper. Honestly, what opportunity would I have to tell a Dutch couple about the education system, green chiles, or those crazy arroyos.

JW: "Yeah Hans, at least the education of this town is much better than that of New Mexico! You wouldn't want any child educated in that state's educational system."

Hans: "What do you have against Mexico?"

JW: "No Hans, its a state to the west of the great state of Texas."

Hans: "I didn't know there was a state called New Mexico."

JW: "Noone really does Hans. Noone."

Life is good. We are healthy. We still love each other. A concern of ours is that my brother, Charlie Ray, is being deployed to Iraq in a week. I definitely don't think he should be going there, but I do hope and pray that he remains safe.

Question #1 - What Malay number for 5 also doubles as the capital of this South American country? First person to get it correct will get there name in the title of the next blog entry.

If all my friends were to jump off a bridge, I wouldn't jump with them, I'd be at the bottom to catch them. Everyone hears what you say. Friends listen to what you say. Best friends listen to what you don't say. We all take different paths in life, but no matter where we go, we take a little of each other everywhere.
- Tim McGraw

Peace from Malaysia

JW