Winter Wonderland

A quick update from the other side of the world.  After a long, long trip home consisting of 3 roughly 8 hour flights it's been great to settle back into the cold and snowy Midwest.  My journey home was fairly uneventful, I managed to score a row of 3 empty seats for my Dubai-London leg, which I paid for dearly when I got stuck next to a woman who was 7 months pregnant and travelling with an 18 month-old for the London-Chicago leg.

Compared to Ian however, I got off easy.  This is what happened at Heathrow a week later:

Seriously, that's a jumbo-jet they are trying to dig out.

So yes, I lost dear Ian for two whole days.  He was in the air when they closed Heathrow and I later found that he had been diverted to Paris. He slept at the airport and then Emirates tried to send him back to Dubai!  Refusing, he bailed and queued for 6 hours at Gare du Nord in hopes of getting onto the Eurostar.  After a six hour wait, in which thousands of people (some even ticket holders) were turned away and the French army (who later surrendered to the passengers) came in to sort everyone out - Ian made it on the very last train that was not fully booked until Boxing Day.  It took him 58 hours to get home.  When I asked him if he felt a bit like Odysseus, he replied, 'yes, only more heroic.'

So here's to hoping that return journey is kinder to us both.  I've got just under a week left in the USA and then have just under a week UK before returning tropics where I can resume my regimen of swimming and food poisioning and shed this layer of winter fat that I've accumulated since arriving.

Holiday Hiatus

Well this will be a quick one just to announce my temporary hiatus.  I begin the long journey home tomorrow evening and unless I have anything particularly exciting to report regarding the packing process, this is likely all for the time being.  Hopefully I'll have a few updates from Chicago, but I've got lots to do with the impending wedding in April - and I really don't want this to degenerate into a wedding blog.  With that being said, no news is probably good news.

It's a bit grey today which is annoying as I was hoping to give my glorious tan a quick top-up before it starts to fade.  Beyond that I'll spend my remaining time tidying up the flat in the vain hope that it will be as tidy as I left it when I return.  (Ian's on his own for week before he heads to the UK, so there is pretty much no chance.)  Yesterday had what I hope is my last round of food, or rather water poisioning for a good long while.  Going to be extra picky about what I eat between now and when I get on the plane - 3 x 8 hour flights + food poisining is just not in the cards.  Otherwise hoping for smooth travels  - no lost luggage, snow or monsoon delays, missed connections etc. Catch you all on the other side.

Monkey Business

Taking advantage of clear skies and an urge to get out of the city we packed our sunscreen and bug spray and decided to check out FRIM (Forestry Reasearch Institute of Malaysia).  Located just 20 minutes away but what feels like a million miles, FRIM is essentially a 15 square kilometer piece of semi-maintained jungle.  It's main attraction is a jungle canopy walk

Now I'll be honest, I wasn't exactly heartbroken to find that this was closed for maintenance.  You can't tell from the photo how high up this is, but getting to the place where this photo was taken was a 1/2 km hike that was more or less vertical.  It's also narrow, wobbly, and largely constructed of rope.  The sign at the landing includes a multitude of warnings including: don't jump, don't run, don't sway and by the way we aren't responsible for any injuries.  Yikes.  There is a little note that says this bridge 'was constructed with the help of the Germans.'  This momentarily made me feel better, but I decided that sentence lacks a crucial component, 'was constructed and is maintained with the help of the Germans' would have made a world of difference.  After further reflection, I also decided that it's entirely possible that statement isn't even true, it's just to make chickens like me feel better.  In any event, this canopy walk looked like something out of Indiana Jones and in no way compared to a similar and much safer treetop walk we did in Western Australia with the Giant Tingle Trees.

Spared the treachery of the canopy walk, we had a perfectly pleasant walk through the jungle and saw monkeys and lizards.  I have also never been so hot in my whole entire life.  My hair was dripping, my tank-top soaked, it was quite frankly disgusting.

Thus we completed our walk and in dire need of air conditioning hopped in the car.  As we were in the area we thought we'd stop by and check out the Batu Caves.

The caves are the most holy Hindu site in Malaysia and are essentially several temples and shrines set in these massive caves.  Now I imagine it is quite a sight to behold if you come when one of the big Hindu festivals is on, but the caves are really fairly uninspiring.  There is a lot of junk kicking about - cables running everywhere and aluminum fencing which really takes away from it.  There are also a lot of thieving, mangy macaques hanging about and pigeons enough to make even a hardened Parisian shudder.  I'd call it a tourist trap but as it only costs about 25 cents to park and is donations only for entry, one can't complain.  As a geological feature the caves are interesting enough and there are some decent food stalls - we enjoyed a delicious dosa each for lunch which came to a mere 75 cents apiece.  Ian also loaded himself up with a myriad of Indian sweets.  All in all a pretty good day; between our hike and then marching up the nearly 300 steps to the caves, there was little left to do but pack it in and head home for a dip in the pool.

Mothers Ruin

Well we were due for an excursion to Penang this weekend, but for a lack of a single hotel room in all of Georgetown (Penang's main city and attraction) we'll be sticking to the greater KL area.  We could chance it, but our backpacking days are well behind us and ending up in a grotty, noisy hostel with shared bathrooms is just not in the cards these days.  In short, we're old and require a good sleep.

There is plenty to do in KL that we've not got round to yet (Islamic Arts Museum, Chinatown, Bird & Butterfly Park), so a good weekend is still promising.  That being said, the sky is looking pretty ominous at the moment and since we didn't get our usual afternoon monsoon yesterday, I suspect we're due for double today and that could turn out further hamper our weekend plans.  If all else fails, I suppose we must suck it up and make what is god-willing our last trip to Ikea. 

If you think Ikea is popular in the rest of the world, you've seen nothing.  It is packed morning, noon and night all day every day.  The majority of people don't appear to even be buying anything, it's just a hangout.  Hordes of awkward teenages swarm the place like they do any mall in America.  Our first week here, we went to Ikea on a Friday night thinking it would be fairly quiet and a good chance to grab some essentials.  WRONG. What do you do on Friday night in a country where half the population doesn't drink?  Go to Ikea.

And whilst on the topic of alcoholic beverages (sort of), Ian, in true colonial form has been in search of the most affordable gin and tonic in Malaysia.  Thus far we have found this:

It's Malaysian and not very good, in fact it's rather terrible and doesn't really taste like gin.  However, if you absolutely douse it in lime, it's drinkable.  And at a mere $3.50, it's very drinkable. You'd think that for all the Brits did in Malaysia and for as long as they were here, they could have taught them how to make a decent bottle of gin, but alas, that was apparently not a priority. Oh well, in this part of the world I consider a good gin and tonic to be a health drink, it's cold and packed with quinine.  It's essentially liquid medicine.

The Lizard King

Well our little lizard has stuck with us and a good little lizard he is.  As far as I can tell he has been very respectful of boundaries.  He seems to stay in the living room sticking the the ceiling and walls and hiding out behind light fixtures and pictures.  He seems to come out mostly at night or when we aren't home - we occassionally see him scampering away as we come in the front door.  Mostly I am pleased that he seems to stick to the living room.  Little as he is, I think he would give me a bit of a scare if I found him in the bath or clinging to the shower curtain or worse on my pillow or something.

More than anything I am to the point where I will welcome with open arms anything that helps keep the mosquitoes under control, I'd quite happily have a dozen little lizards.  I have a stockpiled an arsenal of spray, citronella candles, and coils to get rid of the little buzzing bastards.  I keep the windows closed as much as is practical without having to run the AC full blast all day everyday and spray myself every 5-6 hours. Regardless, I reckon I'm still sustaining 1-3 bites a day and walking around with at least 6 bites at any one time.  One actually got me inside my nose this morning. 

We are probably going to go bankrupt on anti-mosquito contraptions but I suppose that is the price you pay for living in the tropics.  I think a mosquito net for the bedroom may become a necessity in the not too distant future.  We're off up north to Penang this weekend where I'm sure there will be plenty of mosquitoes lying in wait for me.  Beyond that, I'm homeward bound a week today via Dubai and London and just dare any mosquito to follow and survive that journey, if that doesn't do it, I'm sure the Chicago cold will.

Also, I've decided our lizard is worthy of a name. Suggestions?

Fruits and Veggies

Despite having had my fair share of food poisioning over the past month (we've been here nearly a month!) the food, as expected, has truly been one of the highlights of the move.  I think my favourite find thus far has got to be what is alternatively called water spinach, morning glory and kangkung or kangkong.

As far as I can gather it is technically a Vietnamese vegetable, but it's everywhere around Malaysia both in the supermarkets and restaurants.  Below is my favourite way of preparing it, but it can also be added to curries or stir-frys etc.

1. Blanch a bundle of kangkong in boiling water, just long enough for it to come back to the boil (this is really imporant, we skipped this step once and the stems ended up a bit on the crunchy side.)
2. Whilst boiling, toss a couple of crushed cloves of garlic into a hot wok with a splash of oil and brown them nicely.  Also, chop finely another couple cloves of garlic.
3. Drain the kangkong well and add to wok with chopping garlic.  
4. Stir-fry for a minute or two and add a good splash of fishsauce and mix to combine.
5. Devour. (I don't think a bit of chopped fresh chili would go amiss as a nice topping or even some crisp fried shallots . . .)

I'm sure this can be found outside of Southeast Asia fairly easily, especially in Asian supermarkets in bigger cities.  That being said, I would bet this was not available in Galesburg, Illinois when I was growing up and would be suprised if it was even available now. 

I still have a whole treasure trove of leafy Asian greens to work my way through and been enjoying the availablity of things like fresh kaffir lime leaves and curry leaves - no more dried leaves for me!  Herbs like holy basil and coriander have a completely different (better) taste to those in the UK and things like lemongrass and galangal don't cost an arm and a leg.  That being said, for every up there are a few downs and I'm sure at some point we will very much start to miss things like asparagus and proper English peas.  Tomatoes are a bit on the expensive side and mostly taste like those horrible Tesco Value Dutch greenhouse grown ones you get in the UK.  I'm holding out hope though as our local grocery stores seem to cater mostly to the Chinese and Malays, if I can find a good supermarket in Brickfields on Little India I may find that the Indians have horded all the good tomatoes for themselves.

It's the same story again for fruits - pineapple, starfruit, mangoes, bananas, papaya, limes and durien (YUCK) are widely available and incredibly cheap.  Strawberries appear to be widely imported from the US (Driscoll's) and raspberries I assume simply can't even survive the shipping process.  Lemons also don't do particularly well as it is a bit too damp for them and blueberries go the same way as the raspberries. 

Fruit and veg does also go off incredibly quickly due to the heat (and for not being genetically-modified I suspect) so it does mean a daily trip to the store, which is fine while I'm not working but I suspect we'll be eating out a lot more when I get a job.

Melaka

On Saturday we packed our bags and headed south to here:

Melaka is certainly one of the more famous and more popular tourist destinations in Malaysia.  Our Rough Guide gets a bit down on it for being touristy (and then devotes 20+ pages to it), but despite all the tourists we found it quite pleasant and a nice break from KL.  Melaka (also sometimes spelled Malacca) is one of the oldest cities in Malaysia (14th century) and at one time was certainly one of the most important both in cultural and economic terms.  It was originally founded by a Sumatran prince in exile who got on well with the locals and Melaka quickly became an affluent trading outpost between India and Indonesia.

Thanks to its strategic location and wealth Melaka proved irrestible to the Europeans and as a result Melaka has a particularly long and varied colonial history.  The Portugese cruised in about 1500 and then 100 years later the Dutch relieved the Portugese of their duites.  The Dutch hung on for nearly 200 years but they were no match for the Brits who, save the Japanese occupation during the Second World War, hung onto it until Malay independence in 1957.  On top of this the Chinese have been flocking to Melaka for a couple hundred years as well.  The result, is a bizarrely coherent yet wonderfully diverse little town that deservedly (I think) achieved UNESCO World Heritage status 2 years ago.

Aside from the wonderful architecture, Christian churches, Buddhist temples, mosques and Hindu shrines sit quite happily next to each other, the food and the markets are the real highlight.  The standout food of Melaka, commonly referred to as Nyonya cooking is based on Chinese ingredients and cooking techniques with local Malay and Indonesian (and occassionally Indian) herbs and spices.  The result is amazing.

As for the markets you can buy all the usual tat that you can get at any market anywhere in the world but there are some standout shops particularly in terms of furniture and antiques.  It is a reprint, and after some mediocre haggling Ian picked up an amazing map of British Malaya ca. 1834 for about $15.00.  Borneo appears almost entirely blank with the following note:

'Borneo produces gold, tin, diamonds, camphor, spices &c.  Interior unknown but inhabited by the aboriginal Dayaks, & the coasts by Malays & Chinese.  Borneo is three times larger than Great Britain & divided into several independent states. Probable population 3,000,000.'

Our House

I sit writing this entry from here:

Today Ian and I made our first proper (ie non-Ikea) furniture purchase as a couple.  We bought a very lovely teak table and chair set for our patio.  Since moving here I have discovered just how (comparatively) cheap beautiful teak furniture is in this part of the world and I'm determined to kit our whole house out in it piece by piece. Sadly, this is going to take awhile, but it does give me plenty of time to shop around and so Ian knows what to get me for Xmas and birthday the next couple of years. 

Beyond our patio, this is about as furnished as our condo is at the moment:

But nevermind, our stuff from England should be with us in a few months and in the mean time I'm sure I can nag Ian plenty about using coasters and not scratching the new table.

On another note, we booked tickets to Borneo today for Ian's 30th.  We are going to Sarawak for 10 days at the end of February and early March to see the Probiscus monkeys and other wildlife in Bako National Park, visit some indigenous villages and hopefully not get malaria. But more on that as the time gets nearer.  Needless to say, both I and American Express have had a very good day.

Creature Comforts

Well we have had our first (uninvited) houseguest.

No, it's not Ian.  He's housebroken and allowed indoors these days.  It's our little lizard friend in the top left corner.  You see these little guys all over the place and they get indoors all the time.  Aside from leaving little poos all over your house they are quite good as they eat all the bugs.  I've reconciled myself to lizard poos over mosquitoes and flies.

We also have a cat that has been paying us a nightly visit.  We can't tell if he's stray or belongs to someone in our complex.  He doesn't have any tags but looks cared for . . . he comes and goes from the neighbours and has seemingly adopted us as well.  He's allowed onto the porch for the moment.

8 days a week

Phew, it's amazing how busy one can remain when you have to squeeze in plenty of sun-bathing, swimming, cocktails and shopping into each day.  We are officially installed into our new condo, pics to come but waiting until we get some furniture first.  In the mean time, this is where I enjoy my daily swim, a mere twenty feet from our front door.

Shopping in KL puts any American city to shame.  There are so many malls I can't keep them straight, they have all blended into one.  And it's never just one mall, it's usually about 4 malls linked together or at the very least is a 'megamall' which includes grocery, hardware stores etc.  It's nice that you can get anything your heart desires (I have already located Banana Republic as well as blue corn tortilla chips and chipotle en adobo) but there is no such thing as a quick trip to the store.  Parking and then weaving your way through these places takes ages.  This is not at all helped by the fact that they have scattered the stairs, elevators and escalators all over the place so there is no direct route up or down - the idea is that this make you walk around and therefore shop more.  It makes me irritable, not want to shop and one can only hope one of these places never goes up in flames because there is no way out.

Fortunately, we have now acquired just about enough of the bare essentials so that we don't have to make daily shopping trips.  We did our first big grocery shop yesterday which literally took hours.  It's going to take me a while to crack the logic behind supermarket organization in the part of the world, because as far as I can tell there is none.  There also seems to be an irritating setup in which you have to get all unpackaged fruit and veg weighed and priced before you pay, cosmetics and medicine often must be paid for separately as well.  Food prices however are a real treat.  We got just over a kilo of fresh clams for about $1, Dover Sole was going for $6 a kilo, fresh Tiger Prawns are basically free ($0.80 for about 4 meals worth) and we got 8 squid for about the same. 

I also got a huge kick out of what we like to call the 'sin section' of the supermarket.  They have stashed all pork and booze away in a corner away from everything else.  Beer and bacon, yum.  Unfortunately, beer prices are roughly what they are at home - even slightly more expensive, and wine (a lot of it terrible wine) is outrageously pricey.

Highway to Hell

Driving in Malaysia is not for the faint of heart.  People here have compared it to driving in Italy, I think this is terribly unfair to the Italians.  In any event we have bravely taken to roads, well Ian has and I've been his panicky passenger.  The biggest hazard is by far the motorbikes of which there are many and all are reckless.  I was informed by a colleague of Ian's last night that you will see an average of one dead motorcyclist a month on the highways.  There is zero regard for pretty much all rules of the road - we've already witnessed someone driving down in the interstate in the wrong direction.  I'm in serious doubt that turn signals even exist in  this part of the world.

We went car shopping the other day and I was shocked to learn that airbags are an optional extra (so is ABS).   We know someone else who bought a secondhand car and had to install seatbelts himself.  Cars here are quite expensive particularly when you compare the cost of them to the relatively low incomes of the vast majority of people.  Duty fees on imported cars are positively exorbitant, it is not unheard of to hear of people taking out 25 year loans for cars.  Needless to say, we will be buying Malaysian and this is what we have settled on:

People who own these seem to be pleased with them and they have a Toyota engine, so at least that bit should work.  We will of course be going 'Premium' with ABS and airbags.

Colonial Pastimes

Having recovered fully from my first round Asian illness, yesterday we had High Tea at the former British Governor's Mansion, Carcosa Seri Negara.

It was a very colonial affair and Ian felt right at home.  It was indeed very civilized and mostly tasty - but even after 5+ years of living in Britain I still have serious doubts regarding the sandwich tastes of the Brits.  Egg and mayo on Wonder Bread is not classy, no matter how much you try and dress it up.  And further, eating dainty finger sandwiches with all the crusts trimmed off as if the patrons were all 4 years old and then eating said sandwich for a fork and knife is also remarkably silly.  I have nothing to say against the quality of the tea, croissants or scones, full marks.  At the weekends they serve a Malaysia High Tea which is served in the same fashion but instead with Asian savouries like spring rolls and Thai crab cakes.  We'll be back.

We are booked in to look at several flats today in Bagsar which is frequently referred to as an 'ex-pat ghetto.'  It is superb area with excellent restaurants and shopping but still has a nice residential feel despite being in the city.  Hoping for sucess and curious to see what Malaysian estate agents are like, I suspect as useless as everywhere else in the world.

Also, we saw our first urban monkey yesterday.

Day 3

Dysentery - 1,  Me - 0

We made it!

We commenced our journey from Heathrow about 36 hours ago on one of these

I've flown on plenty of big planes in my day, but this was my first experience with A380 superjumbo jet.  It has a capacity of 555 and being seated in the last (88th) row it took well over half an hour to get off (even with 2 exits).  In general, I am of the opinion the bigger the better when it comes to aircraft but Quantas has grounded its entire fleet of A380s at the moment after an engine failure and emergency landing in Singapore the other day . . . so between that and the time it takes to disembark, I was pretty happy to go back to a trusty Boeing 777 for the Dubai - KL leg of the journey.

Otherwise it was an uneventful journey.  We arrived under cloudy but dry skies and it was a blamy 82 degrees.  We were greeted by Flora, the nanny and all-round PA for Ian's boss.  She makes a mean Singapore Sling.

Peter took us for dim sum and beer in Chinatown and we returned full of delicious food and happily exhausted.  Getting ready for some proper exploration of KL later today.  Peter and Rika are off to Thailand for holiday on Thursday and leaving us with their flat, car and even Flora to give us a hand and cook and keep us well-watered with a steady supply of cocktails.  I think I can just about get used to this.

So, the whole dvd/cd debacle isn't quite so tragic as it may seem.  It is the only way to get Ian to part with these:

Unfortunately, the dvd's are already packed, but suffice it to say, I'm thrilled that Starship Troopers is staying behind.

I've also been studying up on the basics about Malaysia.

1. Malaysia has a population of about 28 million and covers an area just larger than New Mexico.
2. The average life expectancy is 73 for men and 76 for women (the US is 76 and 81)
3. The ethnic breakdown looks something like this: Malay 50.4%, Chinese 23.7%, indigenous 11%, Indian 7.1%, others 7.8%
4. Roughly 60% of the population is Muslim and there are separate laws that apply only to them (ie no booze) but are enforeced to varying degrees in different regions.
5. There are Sharia Courts for Family and Civil cases (if you so choose) but choose carefully as if you don't like that decision you are unable to appeal through the 'regular' court system.

Okay, must pack.

After weeks of trying to get this started (and many false starts), I have at last completed 2 full days worth of packing washed down with plenty of champagne so I can just about relax enough to take a few moments to get this blog underway.

We are now 4 days from departure, roughly half-packed and still completely unable to wrap our heads around what is about to happen.   Aside from one lost box of Christmas ornaments (that Ian hates and I'm sure he threw out last year) we've made it without any fights, tears or injuries - just a lot of swearing.

Our dvds and cds are being largely abandoned thanks to Malaysian law which states that all dvds and cds are subject to screening and any that are deemed offensive to Islam are destroyed.  It is (I suspect deliberately) unclear as to what the term 'offensive to Islam' officially entails, but I think it might hinge on how that particular customs employee is feeling on any given day. Despite the fact that about the raciest dvd we own is 'Sideways', we aren't taking any chances just yet - the real kick in the teeth is that it costs $3 per imported dvd/cd.  As we are already a two-person stimulus package to the Malaysian economy, I am going to withhold further donation for the time being.  Also, this rule does not apply to computers, books, or vinyl records (video games are currently a grey area) - make sense of that.

Well that is all that I can squeeze in for the present (so much to do!)  Please leave your comments, thoughts and suggestions.  Plenty of fun facts (and photos) about Malaysia and our little adventure to come soon.