25 Minutes To Go

Well, I actually have something closer to 18 hours, but the sentiment is the same. I'm about to leave Asia for a while and head back to Canada. I'll be there for an undetermined length, but I'm looking at trying to get from one coast to the other while the weather stays warm.

I'm sitting in the lobby of my hotel in Bangkok and trying to pass the time. The city itself smells like a combination of feces, urine, and anger. It's an impatient city with a driving pulse and fortunately it's really raining hard which may or may not wash some of the stench away.

I've talked to a lot of Japanese people on this trip who make a point of visiting only Bangkok when they're in Thailand, and I absolutely cannot see why anyone would do this.

The internet clock says that I have three minutes left before I'm cut off so I'll say only this: I miss all of you who are reading this, whether I left you behind in Canada nearly three years ago or met you along the way on my Asian adventure. I'm coming home and looking forward to it, especially considering that the travels won't end until I decide that I have to come out of retirement. I'm going to try and link some photo albums from Facebook to the blog, but if you're really antsy sign up over there and explore all you like.

I'm coming home!

A Taste of Laos

Each morning at around 5:30am in Luang Prabang, hundreds of monks set out to receive alms from the locals. Here's a quick taste of what that's like.


Sometimes the merchants of SE Asia can be pretty demanding.


After staying a night with a band of villagers, the four of us set out on a quest to find a waterfall and a remote Lao village near Muong Ngoi Neau, but didn't have any luck. Instead, we made a short nature video!

A Post You Can Read

Well, I've gone bananas with Google Video, haven't I?

The joys of technology have allowed me to broadcast an intermittent reality to all of you, thirty seconds at a time. I've avoided putting up pictures on the blog because there are just too damn many of them, and until I discovered Facebook I wasn't able to find a place that would host all of my thousands of photos without charging me for the extra space that they take up. I opted to compromise my own privacy because I like the attention and it's been really useful in allowing everyone I know (or nearly everyone, surely) to see me in a picture as soon as I put them up. It's also great that the people I know can tag me in photos and then everyone sees every photo of me that's ever been taken. I boycotted MySpace for so long that when Facebook came around I just assumed it was the same network of child-sex offenders acting in a predatory way. Facebook is actually just good for stalkers, I suppose.

At any rate, it's proved useful for me because I don't have to email a single photo out to anyone, except for those who are still burning the stubborn candle in protest. Those of you not on the Facebook train are welcome to check into this blog periodically to see the videos I throw up on Google Video, though now that Facebook has a video option as well I may start neglecting that as well.

So where am I? I've returned to Thailand after nearly a month in Laos. I'm nearly at the end of my Southeast Asia adventure, as I've booked a flight to Vancouver on June 19th and will be landing there just in time to attend the wedding of Alex and Liz, a couple I met while I was still living in Japan and teaching English. From there, I plan on spending a few weeks in British Colombia before starting the long journey back to Toronto, where I will attend yet another wedding that's not mine - this time of my oldest friend, Sheri Jackson. August will be all about Ontario, I think, and from there I'll continue my cross-Canada tour through Quebec and the Maritime provinces, stopping along the way to take in all the great sites in Canada I've never seen. I'm especially excited for New Brunswick, where the lovely and talented Michele Morrison (who I met during my first leg in Thailand) will attempt to prove that there's more to that province than simple bilingualism.

This trip has really been the best thing I've ever done. While it would seem inaccurate to include my experiences in Japan as part of this trip, I really look at that fateful day in January 2005 as the beginning of all of this; leaving Canada has reshaped my thinking and my personality in so many important ways that this trip really has been a two-and-a-half-year exercise in personal exile. I've seen more of Asia than most Asian people see. Counting Japan, I've visited seven countries since January of this year and couldn't be more pleased with the way I executed the journey. Jacob and I timed it perfectly in regards to the rainy and the high-traffic seasons. I avoided the notorious Full Moon party on Koh Pha Ngan and fell in love with each country along the way for different reasons.

I write this email now from Chiang Rai, a city in northern Thailand and the third-to-last stop for me on this crazy Asian backpacking tour. I entered Thailand with Scott Hetherington (a Canadian I met in Vietnam), Naasicaa Larsen and Treezie Moynham (two Australian girls who keep finding me along our mutual paths). It'll be tough to part ways with them, just as it was tough to lose Jacob in Saigon and Phil and Alex in Hanoi who both went their separate ways as we finished our Vietnam tour, leaving me to conquer the winding roads of Laos with just a 6'6" Canadian to keep me company.

I should mention that Laos, while I only really saw the northern half of it, holds a quiet charm unlike any place I've been on Earth. Famous for being one of the most-bombed places on Earth (U.S. Forces led a carpet-bombing campaign over the course of nine years that killed over 350,000 people), Laos is a peaceful and gentle country with a delicateness to both its people and its grand landscapes. I felt as though I needed to tread lightly wherever I went as not to disturb the magic of the place. It remains one of my favourite places, and will sit near the top of my favourite places and be included in my best memories from this trip.

There are so many things to talk about, and I could dedicate all sorts of long-winded blogs like this one to each country I've visited. But for now, I'll say only this: If I had to do it all again, there'd be some changes but absolutely no regrets. I'm looking forward to coming back to Canada to continue my travels on home turf. It's a dream I've had since I landed in Japan, and I can't wait to do it. If you're in Canada in the next three months, drop me a line and I'll pay you a visit.

Until the next one...

Beer and Gravity

This is the best and only way to drink beer. Taken in Vang Vieng, Laos.

Jacob Heads Home

Cookie

Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Prasat Preah Vihear

A musical scene at one of the oldest Angkorian temples in northern Cambodia. The entire temple complex is perched high on a mountain overlooking a beautiful valley.

Urban Cambodia - Phnom Penh

Phnom Penh as seen from the rear of a tuk tuk cart.

Angkor Wat

From Cambodia

Some photos from Angkor Wat. Go ahead. Have a look.

What a Month in Thailand Will Do

I'm not dead. I think I may have come close a couple of times. But for the record, I'm all right.

I think that I've avoided doing this thing because, well, I was in Thailand. Sorry. Things kind of came up.

I arrived in Thailand on Valentine's Day and then just disappeared into the swing of island life.
I spent some time observing the madness of lunar cycle parties, disappeared into the hammock-surfing life of northern Koh Pha Ngan. I spent hours a day living underwater and achieved my advanced diver PADI certification. I watched my travel companions get tattoos. I arrived in Bangkok and declared it Hell on Earth. I survived it, but I died a little bit inside every time I saw Khaosan Road.

I disappeared. But I'm okay, and there are tons of photos to post here. My Thai visa ran out and we headed to Cambodia.

I watched the sun come up at Angkor Wat. It changed my life.
I've become a vegetarian. It may not last, but something told me it was time to give it a shot.

Our number reached six travellers, but we parted ways with our Norwegian friend Lars in Siem Reap and today we arrived in Phnom Penh. Life is very, very good.

Stay tuned. Internet access in Thailand was sketchy because we were always on the move, but I'm going to be doing some volunteer work with the local Cambodian children here in Phnom Penh and I think I'll be sticking around long enough to get some photos uploaded.

- UPDATE -

Georgetown, Penang - Malaysia

Our final stop in Malaysia is here in Georgetown on the island of Penang in the north, close to the border with Thailand. We checked into the Western Oriental hostel and managed to grab the last triple room in the place. We're only halfway through February at this point, but the heat and humidity are really starting to set in and all three of us are eager to get back to the water. Once we get to Thailand, our first stop is going to be in the Surat Thani province where we're going to get our scuba diving certification so that we can explore the underwater worlds of Thailand and Australia. Here in Georgetown we've been exploring the historical sites as we did in Melaka, as Penang is important for the colonial implications it had in both Malaysia and Thailand.



Most of the population in Georgetown is of Chinese descent, so we were hoping to arrive in time for Chinese New Year, but it turns out that the real celebrations won't get underway until the 18th, and we can't handle another week away from the beach. An appreciation for the sights and sounds of Georgetown notwithstanding, we're going to pack it up and move on tomorrow. We did get out yesterday to visit Fort Cornwallis on the edge of town as well as some different Hindu and Buddhist temples. The ladyboys are out in full force here along Love Lane, the street that runs perpendicular to our road. Some of them are more convincing than the actual women! We're trying to avoid eye contact.

The Cameron Highlands - Malaysia

We decided to escape the balmy filth of Kuala Lumpur for a little while to kick back and relax in the mountains - a cool retreat into the Cameron Highlands was a nice reminder of what life was like before the humidity set in. We realized that we had stumbled into a retreat geared towards couples seeking a quiet time away from the city, and a lot of the couples we met up there looked surprise to see three single dudes and no female counterparts. It was a nice place and we had our first experience sleeping in a dorm situation. The longhouse dormitory slept twelve people in total, and we had to take a bit more caution when leaving our personal belongings behind.

We opted for an arranged tour that took us around the area of Brinchang, the town next to our base camp in Tanah Rata where Father's Guest House was located. Our first stop was Sam Poh Buddhist Temple. The sculptures looked a little bit like plastic, but I was impressed with all of the different symbols that were worked into the design of the temple as a whole.

Next, we visited a giant rose centre full of all sorts of different floral life. The best part of visiting the centre was the view it offered of the surrounding highlands if you were willing to hike up a long stone staircase. We then checked out a small strawberry farm where we each indulged in a fresh strawberry milkshake, some dried strawberry snacks and a batch of the fresh stuff. After that we visited a live butterfly farm full of all sorts of different creatures and a nearby local market.

Our second-to-last stop on the day trip was at the Boh Tea Plantation, where we learned all about the exploitative methods of employment akin to all plantation work. It turns out that the people working on the tea farm are paid a humble pittance to collect tea leaves by the kilogram. "An expedient worker," our tour guide explained, "can earn up to RM44 on a good day." That's close to $14 in Canadian dollars. Most of the employees are foreign workers from Indonesia or Bangladesh. At the gift shop they sell hot cups of tea, and Phil and I were wondering what it must be like for the people working to watch a family of tourists spend the equivalent to a day's wage on snacks in the cafe.

We concluded our day trip in the Cameron Highlands at a lacklustre bee farm where we saw no honey. The evenings at our guest house were spent watching movies with all of the other travelers. We watched a pirated copy of The Inside Man and half of My Super Ex Girlfriend, but I was so disappointed that I left to write in my travel journal. At least the beer was cheap. If I ever return to Malaysia when I'm married, I'll definitely head back up to the highlands, but I don't recommend it for people looking for a party scene, unless you need some rehabilitation after partying too much.

Atop a Big City - Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

While Kuala Lumpur is no Tokyo, it is a wide-reaching metropolis of glitter and lights. What makes it even more unique is that it's one of (likely very) few cities that can boast about having its own rainforest throughout its scattered urban areas. In order to get a really sense of what it was all about, the three of us ventured into the city for the day and took a ride up the 421 m Kuala Lumpur Tower to the observation deck and awaited the imminent dusk. Seeing a city of such grandeur in daylight was really cool, but to watch the sun set over a city and a rainforest was truly amazing. Adding to the spectacle was the nearby Petronas Twin Towers, which stand nearby and are the other major defining object on the KL skyline. From the angle of the KL Tower, you're really only able to see one of the two Twin Towers, but getting a birds-eye view of the entire city and the PTT's steel and glass framing makes for an incredible sight.

Like most of SE Asia, a trip to the top of the KL Tower was reasonably inexpensive at a mere RM 20, which works out to being around $6 in Canadian dollars. Compare that to the minimum charge of $25 to get to the main observation deck in Toronto's CN Tower and you can appreciate why it's a worthwhile day trip to make. And the photos we snapped from the deck during sunset alone were priceless.

The Batu Caves - Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

This statue of Lord Murugan is 42.7 m tall and was completed only a year ago.

Today we took a bus out of Kuala Lumpur to the nearby Batu caves, located about 13 km out of the city centre. Kuala Lumpur is a crazy city with lots going on so we decided to take a break from all the street hawkers and Islamic food stalls to visit this famous natural landmark which was discovered in the 1800s. At the front of the cave is the giant statue that marks the beginning of a 272 step climb into the mountainside. Inside we were dismayed to find that piles of trash had accumulated from the recent Thaipusam festival and the whole area stunk like garbage and sour milk. There were mangy roosters and cats lurking about the area. I was amazed at the natural elements of the caves but found some of the temples in and around the cave itself disappointing. It didn't stop us from taking lots of pictures, though I let Jacob and his superior camera do most of the work.

On the way out of the caves we were surrounded by hungry monkeys who were used to being fed by tourists and would snatch at anything you dangled in front of you. I nearly had my water bottle stolen right out of my hands.

The entrance archway on the road leading up to the Batu Caves

A view of the caves, the statue and the 272 steps we had to climb to go inside

Looking up from the inside of the cave to the extremely hot Malaysian sun above.

One of the hundreds of monkeys that live in and around the cave. You can buy peanuts or bananas to feed the monkeys, but they'll snatch things right out of your hand if you're not careful.

At the Cafe Limau-Limau

We were searching through Melaka, an old colonial town in southern Malaysia, for something - anything - to eat when we stumbled across what at first appeared to be a bar. Noticing the specials posted outside, we decided to venture inside. We had found the Cafe Limau-Limau, and as we walked deeper inside the bar we thought we had found morphed immediately into a small art gallery with a sunny patio in the middle of its main room. Beyond the patio were chairs and a back room with moss-covered deco and incredible natural lighting. Switching our cameras to black and white, we snapped some awesome shots of the different elements within the room and decided, just as my battery was dying, to get some interesting head shots to capture our physical state. The food was fantastic and my photos turned out fairly well also.

Tioman Island, Malaysia

Life in the slow, slow lane. I'm surprised there is no beer anywhere in this photo.

Now here's a life I could get used to. Other that a nauseous three-hour tour across bumpy seas to get to the island in the first place, Tioman Island was absolutely paradise. We arrived pale and seasick after spending a night in the quiet Malaysian town of Mersing. Everyone who stops over in Mersing is usually waiting for a bus out of there or a ferry to Tioman, because it's otherwise not a destination for really anything at all. But the locals were really friendly and we played some cards to pass the day before our early-morning journey to Tioman the following day. On the island we went snorkeling, did jungle trekking and passed the nights away with the company of the Air Batang villagers and the local (and only) bar that was open on the island. Phil, Jacob and I shared a wonderful chalet right on the beach (the picture of me below was taken by Jacob from the patio of our hut) for about $30 CDN/night for all three of us. I can't really do the experience justice with words (and a limited time frame in this Kuala Lumpur internet cafe) so I'll post some pictures for now and append to the story in a few hours. For now, feast your eyes on the magic of Tioman Island, and go if you ever get a chance.

Tioman Island is considered by some to be one of the top ten most beautiful islands in the world.

This is the view from our hut chalet in Air Batang (ABC) village

This is the view from near Monkey Beach on Tioman Island

With free roaming monitor lizards, Tioman is its own little Lost World

Sayonara and Southeast Asia

Well, I realize that I owe everyone 8 additional December blog posts. They were written, I'll have you know, but never published. I have them saved somewhere on the laptop that used to belong to me but now belongs to my friend Dave. I sold off my belongings and left Japan. I'm tempted to start a photoblog or a myspace page so that everything I do will be centralized, but that would mean two blog spaces that I would neglect.

There's much to be said about January in Japan. There were more good-byes and good-bye parties and farewell photos taking place for a whole lifetime. And, in a way, leaving Japan was like leaving a very special life. My social footprints will fade eventually and it will be up to me to maintain the network of friends I've built up there. I'll not hesitate to say that I'll return to Japan at some point in the future. It was just too important to neglect.

But let's focus on the present, shall we? I left Japan on January 27th and flew into Singapore, where Jacob, Phil and I stayed for three nights before departing to Malaysia. Singapore is like a souped-up version of a Japanese city but with English, tropical weather and people from India, China and other major corners of the globe. The food is exceptionally good and relatively cheap. Singapore is the most expensive destination in Southeast Asia and was the gateway for our entire journey. Our hosts were fantastic. Yuliana and Voldi not only put us up for free but showed us around the city and took me to a clinic when I had a health issue. We enjoyed a night of eating and Tiger beer in Chinatown where we met some other travellers and made some friends. The next day we spent at the Singapore Zoo and Night Safari which was great because I got to witness the feeding of giraffes, which are pretty much my favourite animals.

After leaving Singapore we decided we would enjoy some island life on beautiful Tioman Island, but after crossing into Malaysia and arriving at Mersing (the port city gateway to Tioman) we learned that there were no ferry boats going that day because the sea was too rough. We spent the day in Mersing playing cards and drinking beer and unsuccessfully attempting to use the internet cafe through 3 separate blackouts. Fortunately Gin Rummy requires no electricity.

The Tioman Island trip deserves its own entry, so I'll post some photos now and leave it at that. I'll write a second post later tonight once we've toured around Melaka, which is where I sit now after a 3 day vacation on arguably one of the most beautiful islands in the world.

I'm happy and I have a tan. I could get used to this.

How Christian Lost Himself

I owe you all 9 posts from December. I know. There's a story for each day, so I will get around to it eventually.

I leave Japan on Saturday. I've had two going-away parties and two going-away nabe dinners. Thank you all for being so great to me while I'm here. Here's a few memories that my friend Take took with his camera. I received the CD of his pictures of me last night.

I'll continue to use this blog for my southeast Asian travels which begin on Saturday. First stop, SINGAPORE!