Kuala Lumpur

Well here is the extent of our photos from KL: Ah, Canon. How we loved spending hours and hours navigating the suburbs by public bus to find you.

Read the rest...

OK, OK, I did sneak in a few more photos, but only about three. And I got lost taking them. Josh was waiting at the bus station as we were leaving for Singapore, while I set off to get at least one photo of the Petronas Towers (I am an architect after all. Also, Bird needed a photo with this recognizable icon. For those of you who haven't met Bird, maybe I will introduce him later on.) Anyway, I set off on my own, forgetting that you can't just walk around the corner to get a better photo of a skyscraper when other skyscrapers abound. I pretty much ended up walking all the way there, but then taking a street heading back in a different direction without realizing it. I knew where I needed to be, but I just couldn't get there! Streets here are not like that loveable Manhattan grid... I also didn't have any Ringgit (Malaysian currency) since Josh was spending the last of it, so I couldn't get a taxi... my "30 minute trip" ended up being well over an hour. Enough to get both Josh and I a bit worried! I don't know if these photos are worthy:

As for Kuala Lumpur, we do have a few comments (with no personal illustrating photographs, of course). Mostly, we liked it a lot more than we were expecting! Most travelers we've met don't have much to say about KL. Here are some reasons why:

1. We weren't overly impressed our first night, but after walking around a bit, we discovered a suprising number of beautiful or interesting buildings. Like George Town, the city was full of shophouses and covered sidewalks (the required five-foot way). Along the river were some amazing colonial buildings and a number of buildings with a decidely Mughal look. KL is also full of beautiful mosques- especially the massive newer National Mosque and the small but quaint Masjid Jamek. We attended a service at St. Mary's Anglican cathedral, which looks like it came out of an English storybook. We also liked the art deco Central Market, which was almost torn down before some concerned citizens saved the day! I also randomly recognized a Ken Yeang building as we went past in the depths of KL suburbs (bus to Canon), on whom I gave a brief presentation in a sustainable design class a few years back. Just thought it was cool to think, hey, I know that building.



2. What an international city! The movie we saw had two different subtitles, and we saw plenty of Indians, muslim women in full berka, women just in headscarves, Chinese, Sikhs... you name it. We were impressed they get along as well as they appear to.



3. Thank goodness for air conditioning. We spent an afternoon "decompressing" at the mall at the base of the Petronas Towers and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The bathrooms were clean and free, and everything was shiny. Amazing!



4. Finally, an absurd amount of our time was spent running errands- fixing the camera, our water purifier, getting documents about the camera for insurance... it's unfortunate, but after some islands and the rainforest, thank goodness for cities!

Taman Negara- National Park National Park

Taman Negara is located right in the middle of peninsular Malaysia and literally means "National Park" in Malay. So last week we went to National Park National Park. Taman Negara contains one of the oldest rainforests in the world, a place popular for hiking, bird watching, boating, caving, and other forest-y things. Josh and I only spent a few days there, as the humidity lowered our hiking motivation to, well, low. We had a very nice time, though, and saw some strange and interesting things.

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We took a lovely 3-hour boat ride up the river to Kuala Tahan, a small village across the river from the park. We saw some otters playing along the river on the trip there and back, although no crocodiles as we were hoping. Each morning, we would catch a boat taxi from Kuala Tahan across the river to Taman Negara.A definite highlight was the canopy walkway. Supposedly the longest one in the world (I am not sure how much competition there really is), this series of nets, metal ladders and wooden planks makes it up to the top layer of the forest, the canopy, for some great views and forest-y sounds.While we were hoping to see a rare tiger, elephant, or rhino (all at once, preferably; in a big fight also involving monkeys and bearcats, even better), instead we saw some interesting plants, bugs and birds. The tualang tree is the tallest tropical tree in the world and even makes its own layer in the rainforest. Rather than stopping at the canopy, it goes a few meters above into the "emergent" layer. Here Josh is contemplating if this is one of the famous 30-story high types... This is the weirdest bug I think I've ever seen. A Malaysian man told us it was a Lentin fly?? I call it the Pinocchio Bug, Cousin of Rudolph.
More strange plants
Apparently this leaf couldn't decide whether to be one big one or lots of little ones.
These bright red flowers grew straight out of the ground.

Some other un-photographed items we saw were huge beans growing out of tree trunks that were a brighter hot pink than a tokyo girl's miniskirt, lots of weird pink mushrooms, an Asian Fairy Bluebird that I thought was a piece of blue plastic in a tree it was so bright, and a number of otters on our boat trip. We also wiggled our way into a very damp and smelly cave, but the camera was being finicky at that point. Thus, we cannot prove that we really were in a small cavern with a couple hundred sleepy bats. But we were.

We enjoyed Taman Negara, although I am sure we didn't do it justice with our little day-hikes. The boat up the river to the longer ones was just too much money, and we were just too lacking in desire! From the park, we took a boat back to "civilization" and a very pretty bus ride to the capitol, Kuala Lumpur.

Diving a.k.a. I couldn't come up with a more original title for a post about diving

So, as we've commented on before we have now entered the ranks of certified divers, an activity that I think we've both always had a passing interest in. Anyway, since we are in SE Asia and diving is relatively cheap here when compared t the rest of the world we thought we should give it a go. Its an interesting sport/activity and something we both enjoy but not quite in the ways that we (or at least I) expected.


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Most of the sports and activities I've done throughout my life have one thing in common, that being there is a sense of rush or thrill in doing them. I've been climbing, kayaking, I grew up playing soccer and played Ultimate Frisbee throughout college and all of these have some sense of a rush to them. That feeling of adrenaline that pumps you up and clams you down all at the same time either through physical exertion or through a little bit of fear. In many ways it is this rush (I think) that makes these sports/activities fun and exciting. As an example, in climbing there is a continual sense of fear and a knowledge that you could fall and possibly hurt yourself, not to mention that falling is always a little scary even if you know you're safe. This same kind of rush happens in most organized sports, the rush after a goal is scored or a touchdown is made and/or the feeling you get after winning a close game. A rush has always been part of my mindset and I entered diving with those ideas kicking around in the back of my head, for better or for worse.

However, diving has proven to be unlike that at all. Diving is an activity where the goal is to move with a little effort as possible to save your air(e.g. as slowly as possible). So where as before I would huff and puff and get a rush from the exertion, now the goal was to move slowly and to remain calm... almost like meditation. The goal is to feel peaceful and happy as you gently "bob in the water looking at fish" as our instructor was prone to say. This is inherently quite different than someone who normally has been looking for that thrill to simply "swim around and just look at fish."

And to be honest I was a little disappointed by this at first, the whole process felt a little anticlimactic. On my first few dives I enjoyed myself but I just felt that something was lacking. I had a great time swimming, I saw some interesting stuff but when I was back on the beach I mostly thought... "well was that it?" It was fun but there was just something extra missing, later I realized I was missing the rush I was used to.

Now what I've discovered that diving has instead of the traditional rush is a sense of wonder and exploration. Diving is an activity that focuses mostly on exploring, finding a new shelf here, or looking under the coral over there, sticking your head into a crack looking for eels, or some other such move. It is a slow process, a deliberate process, (once again always trying to save your air) where in you simply try to exist and watch everything swim around you. Its peaceful, its calming, its watching with a sense of wonder at the things I never thought I'd see with my own eyes. And so the more I dove the more I learned to appreciate this part of diving, I stopped waiting for a rush ans simply learned to "bob in the water looking at fish" and I had a great time. A soothing time, a relaxing time, but still something that was fun and exciting (or as exciting as bobbing can get) that I look forward to doing again. I'm not going to quit my job and go dive for the rest of my life but there was something particularly rewarding about diving.

Well, enough of my reflections on diving and what I think of this weird activity and time to show some pictures. We are still working on the whole underwater photography thing and we weren't allowed to take our camera on our first few dives, so there are some pictures I wish I had. Mostly a large green turtle (probably about a 4 foot long shell) that we got close enough to I could have touched him if I wanted to. Anyway, pictures!

P.S. I should also say that we saw alot of fish... many of which I still don't know the name of. So please roll with any names like, "fish that like swimming in tight schools and enjoyed eating the crackers that get thrown in the water" as they are all I could come up with.

P.P.S. So far we have been diving 13 times in both Koh Tao (Thailand) and the Perhentians(Malaysia) and have spent about 10 hours under water. Nothing great, but still kind of cool. We made friends with a guy in the Perhentians who has done a decent amount of diving, who said he was on about his 175th dive!

P.P.P.S. Pictures!
Clown Fish.. aka "Nemo" This are easily my favorite fish so far, they juts hang out in the anemone and swim out to say "hi" or "get lost" when we came by.

Lets call this one a Trumpeter Fish. I think that's right even!

An aptly named Wife Fish.

A picture of a wreck we dove at. The visibility wasn't that great (meaning not many pictures) but it did create a great effect of the wreck emerging from a inky blue.

A school of Silver Bat Fish. I don't know if you can get the idea of them in the picture but at times there were so many they would block out an entire view, as in "I can't see anything to my left but Silver Bat Fish.

A moral eel. There were several of these we saw some were about 6 feet long and about as wide as my bicep (for those of you not so familiar with my physiology that's about as 5-6 inches across).


A banner fish.

A bunch of "Like to hide in crevices as a school fish." I think whoever named them was onto something.

This picture is actually three different schools of fish swimming into one another. Pretty cool but not as cool as the Black Tip Reef Shark that came out, ate one and swam away right after this!

A solitary batfish, a photo with part of the school of them is above.

P.P.P.P.S. Brad Nydam (if you read this) I think you'd really enjoy diving...

Entering Malaysia

What to say about Malaysia? It's difficult to know where to begin because I think we both entered this country with few expectations, not knowing much about the country or culture. What we've found is an amazingly diverse people living amongst beautiful beaches, jungles and mountains and, unfortunately, slightly higher prices than we've been experiencing on this trip thus far! (Oh, and a stretch of bad luck... but we are hoping that's over with.)

Read the rest of Megan's babbling...

Certainly the item that sticks most vividly in my mind is the mix of cultures here. I am writing this from the capitol, Kuala Lumpur, and I think of some of the things I saw today: colonial buildings next to new skyscrapers, an English movie with both Chinese and Malay subtitles, Hindu temples near mosques near Buddhist or Taoist temples, women in full burka (the first time I've seen this in person! A whole other range of thoughts goes with my first sighting of these fully covered women) standing in line with women in Indian sarees and Sikh children with their hair done up high on their heads in cloth-wrapped buns. I know it's a muslim country, but I am also still suprised at the head scarves- most women wear them here. Our neighborhood in Manhattan was fairly diverse, but we at least all dressed similarly. This is something else entirely! An example from George Town: this old Chinese temple is next to an English colonial building, complete with skyscraper in the background (and a mosque up the street)!

Malaysia itself consists of the southern tip of peninsular SE Asia and parts of the island of Borneo (which we will not have time to visit). We entered Malaysia from Thailand on the West side of the peninsula and headed straight to the old colonial town of Georgetown on the island of Penang.

Mostly I was amazed at the incense the size of my calf in front of this temple...

Let's just say George Town grew on us. At first we saw a busy, dirty city where we were expecting a quaint, colonial town. But after a night of great food from hawker stands and a day walking around some of the old sections, our opinion changed. George Town was founded by the East India Company as their Malay base, complete with a big stone fort and canons and all. As a major trading center, the city attracted all numbers of foreigners, and now lovely English colonial buildings are nestled in old Chinese, Malay, Indian and Armenian neighborhoods. I especially liked the "shophouses" that lined the old streets (see photo below), and Little India, with it's cramped but clean, noisy and colorful streets actually got us excited about visiting India!

A row of typical old chinese shophouses- long and narrow, the living quarters were below or above a store front. The first floor projects over the ground floor, so many Malaysian sidewalks provide protection from the sun and rain (if not completely full of motos and cafe tables and covered with tiles that are extremely slippery when wet!)

All these cultures make for interesting food. Our lunches in Little India were served on big banana leaves, we had grilled sting ray for dinner one night, and we ate lots of part Malay-part Chinese noodles, all of it cheaply available from stalls. These hawker stands are like a mall food court. You order what you want from the right person, sit down somewhere in the open air seating area (with the ever-present Asian plastic chairs) where you order your drinks and then pay when they bring out the food. We were never exactly sure what we were going to get...

The old English cemetery was very interesting and meloncholy. We saw the grave of the founder of Penang and the husband of the Anna who inspired the play "The King and I".

We arrived at this beautiful mosque just as Friday services began, so men with little white caps were streaming in. Just around the corner is the oldest Hindu temple in town and a famous Taoist temple is behind me as I take the photo!

My favorite thing in George Town was the tour we took of the Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion. This mansion was built by a very wealthy Chinese merchant (for two of his eight wives) according to Feng Shui principles. Our tour guide was extremely knowledgable about the building and its incredible restoration in the 90's. I was so impressed, I bought the book (despite having to carry it around in a backpack)!

The Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion, no photos allowed inside...

From George Town, we took an overnight bus straight across the peninsula to Khota Baru and the Perhentian islands on the East coast. Josh talks about the Perhentians in his diving post, but let me just quick cover some non-diving adventures, because it seemed for a while there that our Malaysian time was jinxed...

First, the Perhentians are home to a number of huge moniter lizards. We saw a few, but this was by far the biggest (~4'):

Not as big, but this gecko liked to sneak into our bungalow...

But on the islands it was the dives that kept going wrong. It's supposed to be non-monsoon time on the East coast, but a heavy storm our first night stuck around making rough seas. Our first dive sight was changed en route because the waves were too big for our little boat. As a new diver, the experience of dropping backwards off a tiny outboard into rough waves was a little disconcerting. The next day, the currents and waves made for poor visibility (making the shipwreck even more eery, we decided) and then our boat ran out of gas on the way in! Since it had been cloudy, we had no sunscreen on. Guess what happened to those grey skies while we hung out on the boat? Yup, nice and sunny (and nice and pink for a few days). We barely made it back in time for our boat off the islands.

grey skies.

And now for that boat... It was exciting and terrifying all at the same time. The 4pm "ferry" was about 24' long, maybe one and a half times the size of a Michigan ski boat. When we first left to make the 10 mile trip, we had over 20 passengers. The captian saw the big waves on the open water as we rounded the last island and gunned it... and it was scary. Even he must have thought so because after a few hard waves, he turned around and headed back for the fishing village. Then he did a typical Malay thing- he just hung around and waited, hoping someone would volunteer to take some of us or something.

Eventually, half of the passengers opted to remain on the islands for another night (this was the last boat back) rather than risk the sea. About 10 of us remained (mostly foolish Westerners), and by the time we made it to the mainland, we had all bonded, taken photos of each other, and were SOAKING wet! Just as we were nearing the mainland and (maybe) getting used to the hard hit of the waves, we saw a big storm rolling in complete with a spectacular lightning display. Now what was it mom said about not swimming when it's lightning? In my head, I kept going through the irreplaceble items in my pack and debating the best way to dry out a wet passport on a deserted island. We should have made it by 4:45pm. Instead, it was 7! But who cares- we made it!

You should not be this wet after a boat ride.

Thank goodness for plastic!

From the East coast, we headed South right through the middle of the country on the Jungle Railway. This 7 to 11 hour train ride goes right through mountains and jungles, ending in Kuala Lumpur or Singapore. We enjoyed the ride and the view except for one small thing: the heat. Our car was supposed to be air conditioned, but there was a panel between the cars that showed this (keep in mind that 30C is 86F):

10am: 26 inside, 30 outside

11:30am: 29 inside, 33 outside

1pm: 31 inside, 36 outside

Ugh. We were lucky, though, the trip only took 7.5 hours, and we made it in time for the boat into Taman Negara, the rainforest national park, of which I will post about later! Since there is only one track in places, it can take up to 11 hours to make the treck.

Also, this is where our camera broke. Again, unlucky. We're being extra careful now...

All in all, Malaysia is good: amazingly diverse, good food, cheap transportation unless you take the tourist buses, friendly people. We haven't been overly impressed with the choices in accomodation and I am so ready for my own clean shower adjoining my own room with a real, comfortable bed. But... you can't have everything!

P.S. Added on 6-26

Here is a photo from a fellow traveler when the waves were calm enough for him to dare take out his camera. The waves are smaller in this picture than they were normally but it at least gives you an idea of what the sky looked like.

Two Month Slump:The difference Chili's and "Pirates of the Caribbean 3" can make

We have officially been out for over two months now (I think we crossed that line sometime last week) and it seems to us that there are times when you just hit, well, a slump. These aren't utterly depressing moments; it's not as though we don't enjoy (and appreciate incredibly) what we are doing or that we think "We made a mistake coming here, let's go be back home." Rather it's more that everything isn't quite as vivid as we think it should be, as though we aren't enjoying ourselves as much as we think we could or should, as if there is some mythic ideal of how we should be feeling. These thoughts aren't new. I've had them back home and on this trip before, but they have recently been a little stronger than they have since we left New York.

I think the slump crept in when we had done alot of the same thing, staying in not so great accommodation, in not so great cities and towns and just feeling that something was lacking. It was hitting the hardest right before we got to Kuala Lumpur where we had spent about three weeks on islands, in small towns, or in transit and were just feeling wiped out. The forests and beaches were fine but they started to feel old, and I was beginning to long for a change. Since hanging out here for a few days, I think we are almost out of the good ol' slump. In Kuala Lumpur (a city I couldn't locate before this trip and the most exotic sounding place on our trip... in my opinion), we are catching up on some much needed Internet work and enjoying some western luxuries (recently we ate at a Chili's and then went to a movie- with chinese AND malay subtitles!) and I think that is pushing us out of this strange mood.

I'm not entirely sure why I'm posting this; it's not as though it's worthy of worrying about (that means you, Mom) but these low points are simply phases of life, including life traveling. I guess in some ways I find it ironic that I am on this amazing trip, this marvelous experience, and there are still moments when I'm bored as much as back home or when all I really want to do is get a cup of coffee and fall asleep reading a book hoping that tomorrow will come a little sooner. However, I also think it shows an important aspect of traveling, that you can't go to another part of the world to run away from yourself (a common goal of many backpackers, "finding themselves" and all that)... I am who I am, wherever I am. Consequently, I have the same problems, doubts, joys, and excitements that I have at home. They are just now about different things. If I was down before, I'll be down again; if I was happy before, I'll be happy again. Life is what we make of it, and it's my persepective that that gives it meaning.

Who needs a camera anyway?

So here we are in Kuala Lumpur! Today we visited the Petronas Towers, but unfortunately our camera has decided it doesn't like memory cards so this is someone else's photo. Thus, our camera is getting some much-needed R&R at the Canon Malaysia Service Headquarters (which just happens to be in KL), and we are stuck here for an extra day or two! We are working on writing a few quick posts about our latest adventures and should get them up in the next few days. Until then, know we are happy and safe and camera-free in KL!

Malaysia

An update... we took an amazingly quiet and comfortable night train from Thailand down to Butterworth, Malaysia yesterday. We are spending a day or so in Georgetown (Penang) on the West coast before heading across to the Perhentian Islands off the East coast of Malaysia because we decided 6 days in a row of diving last week wasn't enough! Koh Tao was beautiful and relaxing, and we are trying to get ourselves back into moving-all-the-time gear. All of that to say, we don't know if we can afford internet out there again, so it might be a few days...