first off, sorry this has taken so long... im a putz.
so me, my friends julia and brenda arrive in singapore directly after leaving indonesia, to meet peggy and wait for my good friends kenny and thomas, who unfortunately slept through the alarm to come late and we all missed the bus. 3 hours later, we arrive at the bus station which will take us directly to the old capitol of maylasia. it is here that i realize that i can juggle for money, so i throw down a hat and give it a try. i get nothing, and my friend peggy gets her water stolen due to the fact that im not paying attention haha. maybe not too funny. needless to say , we got on the bus, and after a good, long bus ride on one sketchy vehicle, i am ready to get off immediately. we arrive in a small, historic town called malaka, which used to the the capitol of maylasia, and contains massivly old ruins from the earliest settlers of every race. the most prominent is the dutch arcitecture. it was a very strange thing, and still is when i think about it, to see infinite amounts of crosses on all parts of the streets, architecture, and especially the churches. this is due to a massivly large immigration of dutch colonists and missionaries in the 16th century, of which you can see the the first night. we checked into a farily legitimite hostel, with good bathrooms, large rooms. maylasia at first sight reminded me much of a rich version of thailand. clean streets, not so clean buildings. the majority of the women were fully visible, regardless of it being a completely muslim country, ( its illegal NOT to be muslim) and only a small minority were completely clothed in black, and usually had eyes which seemed happy to my best understanding. i suppose ive been lead to believe that in a patriarchical society women would be rather despondant, but i never got that impression. whereas in thailand, family relations, often violent and verbal, is a fairly common occurance, of which ive seen more than a few times. we went out the first night we were there, to a lonely planet reccomend, called the "satay house"
named after an maylay food adopted by vietnam, in which you dip all types of food (fish, chicken, egg, celery, morning glory, shrimp, bread, etc) in a boiling vat of peanut sauce and spices. this night we met a traveler, as we always do, a single girl goin around maylasia and indonesia for 4 months. after alot of talking, eating, drinking, we all parted, and i quickly found my way back to my bed, quiet and appealing.
named after an maylay food adopted by vietnam, in which you dip all types of food (fish, chicken, egg, celery, morning glory, shrimp, bread, etc) in a boiling vat of peanut sauce and spices. this night we met a traveler, as we always do, a single girl goin around maylasia and indonesia for 4 months. after alot of talking, eating, drinking, we all parted, and i quickly found my way back to my bed, quiet and appealing. 
the next day we traveled more in malaka, visiting alot of the old dutch churches, all filled with old headstones from the 16th century, where the names and dates of all the deceased were perfectly engraved, and rarely exceeding 40 years of age. this is something i cannot imagine, to be so far away from europe in a time where multi month ship journeys were the only means of long distance travel; in a tropical rainforest, where headhunters were still a fearsome and very real threat. all to try to bring a foreign god into a seemingly godless country. we quickly got through all the churches, which were scattered with histories of constant religious flux inhabiting the same buildings, and eventually settling as historic monument, to statues of forgotten saints of different faiths. the next day, we got on a bus to Kuala Lumpor, and a short while later, arrived in a bustling hub of clean streets and infinite food vendors. it was a 5 minute walk from the taxi cabs to the Red Dragon hostel, 
which is by far the nicest hostel ive stayed in, and if anybody is in little china of kuala lumpor, id say its a must. with massive rooms, large clean beds and sheets, a common room downstairs with a pool table, massive internet hub, and a free widescreen tv with too many movies to count. we settled in, internetted a bit, then went out to celebrate kenny's 21 birthday in a crowded food street, ordered too many beers and too much food, and spent a couple hours going crazy with ourselves, a group of older ( but shockingly young-hearted) dutch couples, and the wildest waiters and waitresses ive ever seen. all i learned from that night is that i love hong kong chicken, maylasian "anchor" beer is better than any thai beer, and speaking in completely different languages dosent destroy the barrier of the parasitic american pop culture; which creates more than enough of a connection to have fun. the next morning, we spent the first half of the day in the city, 
visiting the famous petronas towers, which are the self-claimed highest towers in the world ( i dont know if its true), and the various temples. the most shocking of this was the islamic art museum, which is by far one of the best museums ive ever visited. it contains relics from longer ago than i though possible, all possible versons of the koran, and infinte weapons, jewlry, religious artifacs, and muslim texts. the most impressive of these were by far the korans. this museum has the largest collection of them in the world, and many of them were inlaid with gold leaf, silver, pearl, diamonds, jade, and rubies of too many kinds for me to classify them all and took over 10 years to create. since all of these had to be done from hand, there were hundreds of books with different translations, all of which were worth more than i can imagine. unfortunately, there were no pictures allowed in the museum, so i can mearly say this is something that should be seen at least once in your lifetime. we made our way back to the Red Dragon, and rested for a few minuets before we learned we had to quickly jet to get to the busstation in order to make it to our next destination.we quickly hopped to a bus to a fairly indescrite place called the cameroon highlands, a high altitude town known for its infinite tea fields, and mossy forests, one of the only remaining forests in the world. we took a depressingly curvy, and long road to get to the highlands, which was soon forgotten once we stepped out of the bus, and into near 50 degree weather, in which all my companions greatfully just shed out clothes, breathed deep, and shivered with happiness. we soon got a ride to Fathers guest house, the reccomended stay, and met a driver there who worked for Father's, and started driving. the intersting thing about this drive, is the immediately impressed us with his fluent english. shortly thereafter, impressed us with taking long drag from a whisky bottle out of the glove compartment, and saying 'you dident see this' . needless to say, our driver, paul, became a quick friend, and spent alot of time chatting with us when it got too dark to go trekking. we played drinking games that night in the event of my friend kenny's birthday, and went to sleep freezing cold. it was wonderful for me, maybe not so much for my californian comrades. we awoke for the 6:00 morning madness tour offered by the guest house, which we attended with only the guide.
a native indian named Kumar, whom is one of those fantastic people you meet in life, with no proper schooling, but massive intelligence regardless. this man had been offered a position at the guest house at the age of 19, where he still works at the age of 36. in a place like the highlands, i cannot say i disagree with Kumars career choice of hiking, offroading, and drinking free tea every day. we drove from the guest house directly higher to the peak of the highlands, where the famous mossy forest was at its forte, and hiked a rather muddy path to the peak where we could see the sunrise over a sea of calm , cold high-altitude clouds, and the few green peaks making islands in the cloudy expanse. we spend the next few hours crawling around on the ground, which was actually a 4 foot growth of dense moss. this was especially visible when you jumped, and every tree in a 20 foot radius shook and rained dew. kumar went to great lengths to explain everything about the mossy forest, from the vegetation, to the animal life, to survival techniques of highaltitude rainforests. so if anyone out there gets lost, drink monkey cups, strain the moss, pack it in your shirts, and look for some yellow, bulbous grubs to eat. hell, go ahead and try it if your not lost, kumar made it sound pretty fun. we spend the next few hours going back to the car in a massivly muddy, roundabout trek around the mountain, and finally arrived with black feet and grins, to head off to the tea plantation. this particular plantation consisted of about 200 fields and massive numbers of workers, whom would cut the baby leaves off of the shrubs, pack it in wicker baskets on their backs, and repeat the action the whole day through. we spend a long time driving around the fields, 
taking in the impossibly green landscape and constantly gnawing on tea shoots and baby leaves. we soon got a quick lowdown on how to make chinese, indian, and malay tea from kumar, which consists of differnet techniques of drying, cutting, straining, boiling, etc. , and each of which produces a different flavour of tea. we drove to the central sales hub of the plantation, and had massive amounts of fresh tea. we soon headed to a local strawberry plantation, but found that it was close, and told kumar that we would stay for a while. a while passed, and soon we decided to hitchhike back to the guest house, and kenny grabbed an open bed truck. needless to say , when the realization hits you, flying 60 miles an hour around mountainous turns, that youre hitch hiking in maylasia, its a pretty distinctive feeling. we arrived about 3 miles out of town, and the driver would not accept any money, so we started hiking back to the town. it was a good walk, and we arrived happy, and ready for indian food, which was given to us that night in abundance. im always excited to write about indian food, and this particular place had a open pot tandoori, in which naan dough was melded to the side of the heated clay pot,
and taken directly from the pot to your plate. best naan ive had in my life, im proud to say, along with some killer barbeque chicken curry, and too much dhaal to eat. we headed back to our room and some freezing cold showers to pull the mud off our bodies. the next morning i woke up far too early, and spent a few hours writing and getting breakfast from the hostels restaurant, which made some great toast, great eggs, and great tea. it was quiet, cold, with a very bright morning sun on top of a small hill opon which the hostel was built. i experienced a deep happiness here, i dont know why, but it felt like the right place at the right time. my comrades woke up, and we caught the 11 oclock bus to kuala lumpor, and decided to stay the night there before we headed back to singapore. we arrived, and went directly back to the red dragon, and ended up throwing down our gear, and splitting up to see the city. i went with thomas and brenda, to go find a good indian restaurant, which we did, and wandered the streets afterword in search of something to entertain us. this was soon found in the form of a karaoke store, where tons of little soundproof rooms are each decked out with a tv, couches, an infinite music selection, and a couple of mic's. i was more than hesitant at first to go, but after a while i gave in, and ended up having a blast, and threw a pretty good round of gangster's paradice, as well as a nice duet of Frosty the Snowman with thomas. we came back to the hostel after that, and met up with the others to fall asleep. next morning, we took a bus directly to singapore. we finally got through a ridiculously long customs line, and got on our plane back to the states with little trouble. it was a relif to get back into bangkok. it always seems to be. its hard to think now what seemed the most ridiculous hub of street madness and pollution could be so comforting now. i've written this blog 3 weeks too late, i apologize, ive been staying in bangkok for the past weeks doing muay thai, doing farily well in a few fights, and going on a couple school trips. ill include a blog with these experiences in a few days, and this time im serious about writing them. hah. i will post more pictures tommorrow
a native indian named Kumar, whom is one of those fantastic people you meet in life, with no proper schooling, but massive intelligence regardless. this man had been offered a position at the guest house at the age of 19, where he still works at the age of 36. in a place like the highlands, i cannot say i disagree with Kumars career choice of hiking, offroading, and drinking free tea every day. we drove from the guest house directly higher to the peak of the highlands, where the famous mossy forest was at its forte, and hiked a rather muddy path to the peak where we could see the sunrise over a sea of calm , cold high-altitude clouds, and the few green peaks making islands in the cloudy expanse. we spend the next few hours crawling around on the ground, which was actually a 4 foot growth of dense moss. this was especially visible when you jumped, and every tree in a 20 foot radius shook and rained dew. kumar went to great lengths to explain everything about the mossy forest, from the vegetation, to the animal life, to survival techniques of highaltitude rainforests. so if anyone out there gets lost, drink monkey cups, strain the moss, pack it in your shirts, and look for some yellow, bulbous grubs to eat. hell, go ahead and try it if your not lost, kumar made it sound pretty fun. we spend the next few hours going back to the car in a massivly muddy, roundabout trek around the mountain, and finally arrived with black feet and grins, to head off to the tea plantation. this particular plantation consisted of about 200 fields and massive numbers of workers, whom would cut the baby leaves off of the shrubs, pack it in wicker baskets on their backs, and repeat the action the whole day through. we spend a long time driving around the fields, 
taking in the impossibly green landscape and constantly gnawing on tea shoots and baby leaves. we soon got a quick lowdown on how to make chinese, indian, and malay tea from kumar, which consists of differnet techniques of drying, cutting, straining, boiling, etc. , and each of which produces a different flavour of tea. we drove to the central sales hub of the plantation, and had massive amounts of fresh tea. we soon headed to a local strawberry plantation, but found that it was close, and told kumar that we would stay for a while. a while passed, and soon we decided to hitchhike back to the guest house, and kenny grabbed an open bed truck. needless to say , when the realization hits you, flying 60 miles an hour around mountainous turns, that youre hitch hiking in maylasia, its a pretty distinctive feeling. we arrived about 3 miles out of town, and the driver would not accept any money, so we started hiking back to the town. it was a good walk, and we arrived happy, and ready for indian food, which was given to us that night in abundance. im always excited to write about indian food, and this particular place had a open pot tandoori, in which naan dough was melded to the side of the heated clay pot,
and taken directly from the pot to your plate. best naan ive had in my life, im proud to say, along with some killer barbeque chicken curry, and too much dhaal to eat. we headed back to our room and some freezing cold showers to pull the mud off our bodies. the next morning i woke up far too early, and spent a few hours writing and getting breakfast from the hostels restaurant, which made some great toast, great eggs, and great tea. it was quiet, cold, with a very bright morning sun on top of a small hill opon which the hostel was built. i experienced a deep happiness here, i dont know why, but it felt like the right place at the right time. my comrades woke up, and we caught the 11 oclock bus to kuala lumpor, and decided to stay the night there before we headed back to singapore. we arrived, and went directly back to the red dragon, and ended up throwing down our gear, and splitting up to see the city. i went with thomas and brenda, to go find a good indian restaurant, which we did, and wandered the streets afterword in search of something to entertain us. this was soon found in the form of a karaoke store, where tons of little soundproof rooms are each decked out with a tv, couches, an infinite music selection, and a couple of mic's. i was more than hesitant at first to go, but after a while i gave in, and ended up having a blast, and threw a pretty good round of gangster's paradice, as well as a nice duet of Frosty the Snowman with thomas. we came back to the hostel after that, and met up with the others to fall asleep. next morning, we took a bus directly to singapore. we finally got through a ridiculously long customs line, and got on our plane back to the states with little trouble. it was a relif to get back into bangkok. it always seems to be. its hard to think now what seemed the most ridiculous hub of street madness and pollution could be so comforting now. i've written this blog 3 weeks too late, i apologize, ive been staying in bangkok for the past weeks doing muay thai, doing farily well in a few fights, and going on a couple school trips. ill include a blog with these experiences in a few days, and this time im serious about writing them. hah. i will post more pictures tommorrow
No comments:
Post a Comment