Malaysia and Cambodia August 2010

Wham, Bam, Battambang

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 01:12:00 +0000

What is it with travelling and these early mornings? A 6am pick-up for the slow boat to Battambang, Cambodia's I say a 6am pick up, but the minibus turned up about 45 minutes late, and was already full of people. We managed to queeze in, then it stopped again to pick up another two, so now I know exactly how many people will fit in a Toyota van (it was 14, in space for 10).

We rrived at the jetty nd immediately this friendly chap oicked up one of our bags to carry to the boat, then promptly asked for a dollar when we got there. Cheeky sod! The boat got incerasingly full, and I knew it was going to be a long uncomfortable day, having heard the trip could take anything between 4 and 10 hours, depending on the river height. The boat was a long vessel with two rows of thinly padded seats facing eachother. Most of the other pasengers were European, with a few locals, and there wasn't a great deal of space on the seats or to stretch your legs

Setting sail we went down the river, we went onto Tonle Sap, the largest freshwater lake in SE Asia, and this was easy to believe looking at it on the map as it appears huge. We were on this for at least an hour and were only traversing a small corner of it between river inlets. The wind was relatively high and caused a lot of spray from the bow, so we had to put down screens to try and stay dry. There was a poor local lady at the prow who was catching the worst of the spray, though people on that side of the boat refused to move down to spare her the worst. One English guy was heard to say "Toughshit" when this the idea of moving down was mentioned. I had visions of pushing this miserable tw@ into the Tonle Sap to leave him at the mercy of whatever might belurking beneath the surface.

Past the lae we went up river (getting increasingly uncomfortable due to the cramped position) where the spray lessened meaning we were able to raise the screens and get a bit of a view of the passing countryside. We sailed past rice fields, through low level bush and the occasional dwelling. We waved at children who waved back, often shouting hello.

After about 4 hours we reached a place where the boat was refuelled, and we could stop for food. We hadn't brought any food, besides a couple of small croissants we'd nicked from breakfast, so were quite hungry. We bought some bread and I ate some warm food, not sure what. It had aubergine and some sort of omelette with plain rice, which was brave of me because I refused to care about the alimentary consequences. We loaded back up and set up further up river

The next part of the trip was along a windy section of river which reminded me of scenes in Apocalypse Now with added cramp. We kept running aground which meant the guy who wasn't the pilot had to keep getting a stick-cum-oar to push us back into deeper water so we could get going again. It was a very long trip. It started raining maybe an hour from our destination so the screen had to come down again which mant we couldn't see the scenery. Worse still, the screens were red which made the boat feel like you were sitting inside a huge womb with nothing to look at.

Eventually, as in 8 hours later, we arrived at Battambang and were immediately assailed by a horde of drivers touting for business and trying to get you to go to the hotels they had a kickback from. It was no good for us as we had a booking, so we got a tuk-tuk man to tke us to La Villa on the river. We also arranged to have him take us on the obligatory tour the next day. His name was Chin Chin, which is a name well worth drinking to.

We checked intot the hotel, and it was stunning. A boutique place with only a small number of rooms, but decorated in the most elegant colonial French style. Our room had a four poster bed, and a bath which was big enough to drown a camel in. While large chain hotels may trump them for luxury and consistency, small hotels such as this almost always offer so much more in character and atmosphere, and this is what makes a trip all the more memorable.

We freshened upo after our ordeal and wandered out into the town again. we passed the promoenade where the locals did aerobics, and played football, and wandered a bit over the river. It was getting dark and it was surprising exactly how dark it gets in a town with very few working street lights. This makes Battambang a dificult town to navigate at night, especially with poorly maintained roads and pavements. We stopped for dinner at a place called the White Rose Restaurant, recommended in Lonely Planet, which turned out to be a bit of a backpackers/locals cafe. The food was passable, but given that this was apparently one of the best there was to offer in the town, it wasn't much of an pinnacle in culinary achievement.

We went back to the hotel for a drink to find the bar was closed, so wandered down a nearby side street where there seemed to be some activity and ended up in one of those bars you only seem to get in tis part of the world. I'm not sure what they are to be honest. The place has a lot of girls who seem to be hostesses but if it is some sort of knocking shop, it's a very family friendly one as the crowd is usually mixed. Also, the girls take it in turns to go up on stage and sing some local songs. The point it though that they are quirky, friendly, cheap and most importantly, a local thing. We were the only white people in there, so it's nice not to be surrounded by backpackers.

We went to bed after this

Ancient temples and ruined Villas

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 12:08:00 +0000

Breakfast and out for a 9 o'clock pick up for another day temple site-seeing. Again, they do kind of merge together, especially since today's offerings were less impressive than yesterday's. There was one that was a little overgrown, and a companion temple to the Tomb Raider temple. Thi was relatively quiet, so had more atmosphere, though wasn't as overgown. There was one which was originally a large complex of fountains (including ornately carved heads of various epcies as water spouts), and another we remember was the very old Hindu temple in brick which had elephants at each corner of the outer walls, guarding the building. Probably might have trouble if invaders came riding mice-drawn chariots. I shall add more detail later once I correlate pictures and the guidebook

Lunch was at the same tourist trap place as yesterday, and fairly unremarkable.

We were back quite early as we had done enough templing by 3ish, so Tee got an early finish. He did offer us the chance to go to the Angkor Wat Museum in town, but this didn't seem to be a good deal as the temple pass (which gives you three days' acess from seven) costs $20 each, whilst the museum (which, according to the guidebook) has little to show, though quite well presented and costs $12 each. We headed back and just vegged by the pool for a couple of hours.

Thi evening we were in town in time for dinner at 7:30 locally at a place called Soup Dragon which serves good Vietnamese food. but also has a large screen to watch football on as Newcastle's first home game of the season versus Aston Villa. So we had good beer, good food and the spectacle of the Toon disassembling the Brummies 6-0. What a truly magnificent start to the evening. We wandered further for a couple of more drinks including bars called Angkor What? Banana Leaf and the Warehouse. Then it was back to bed for a fairly early night as we were off the next day to Battambang by boat for apickup at 6am!

More temples than you can shake a stick at

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 03:39:00 +0000

(edited to correct the timeline. The bamboo train was a couple of days later)
Our first full day in Cambodia. Breakfast was OK: buffet with eggs cooked to your request. We had arranged a tuk-tuk the night before and met our driver for three days whose name was Tee. He was to take us around the temples,

We headed off to our first temple. This was within the massive complex of Angkor Thom, which is utterly massive. The whole area is bigger than downtown Siem Reap. The first one was Bayon with its enigmatic smiling heads on each pinnacle. The temples of Angkor Thom, Angkor Wat and the others in the large area around Siem Reap date variously from the 9th century to the 11th, essentially when we in Britain were worrying which shade of wode was going to be in this season. The temple at Bayor was amospheric, despite there being a fair number of tourists around, and the amount of detail carved into the roack from which they were made is stunning, even now almost a millenium later. We saw more structures within Angkor Thom including the Terrace of the Elephants and the Terrace of the Leper King before moving onto another couple of temples. We managed to fit lunch into this at some tourist trap restaurant that our driver took us to, no doubt receiving some kickback, but this is normal for this part of the world, especially in areas so popular with tourists.

The temples through the day did kind of merge into one, and I can add further details when I upload pictures and cross refer with the guidebook. It's not that the temples didn't all have their own distintive haracteristics, but it's that there were so many. One temple that does stick in the memory is the one that featured in Tomb Raider, with its buildings and walls infiltrated by roots from big rainforest trees which look like rivulets of liquid rolling over the sandstone more than vegetation

Our final destination of the day was the wonderful Angkor Wat. This temple you cannot forget for many reasons. It's the building that's synonymous with Cambodia. Indeed, so proud are they of it that they actually have it on their national flag. It's also the largest religious structure in the world. It was heaving, as might be expected, but we had a good look around. The bas reliefs are stunning, with scenes from Hindu mythology (the Ramayana and Mahabarat) and local legend. This runs round the outside of the inner wall, further inside there are the famous towers to look at, and you can climb up and into the higher central one. Like a lot of these things, pictures speak louder than words and we do have some pictures to upload. However, our main camera ran out of power as we arrived here and we aren't able to upload pictures from the other camera as it's an Olympus which have a non-standard sized memory card so we have to wait until later to do those.

We got Mr Tee (pity the fool who didn't get to see Angkor Wat today) to drive us back. We were in desperate need of a shower and change of clothes. It had been a very hot day, and we had been climbing up and down pyramid-like temples (all that shape to represent Mt Meru again important from Hindu myhtology), drenched in sunblock (factor 50, of course), and DEET, caked in dust from the crumbling roads. A dip in the pool was fantastic.

That evening we headed out again to sample the delights of Pub St. We ate Khmer again, this time having the local delicacy of fish amok (not a haddock riot, but fish cooked in spicy coconut milk and served in banana leaves). We also watched some live football beamed over from the UK. Globalisation has a lot of downsides, but sometimes the global village is a good place to be living. Well it is if you are a privileged Western European at any rate

The Road to Cambodia

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 08:12:00 +0000

What kind of time is 4:45am to get up? I had a McBreakfast at the airport, sad to say (and it wasn't even that nice!).

We boarded our Air Asia flight to Siem Reap in Cambodia. Two hours, plus lost an hour as Cambodia is one hour behind Malaysia, despite being further east, paradoxically. The arrival hall is gorgeously done out in Khmer style, complete with statues of gods on various transport methods (elephant is the one you see first). It was good they had some nice sculpture to look at as they took some time to sort out your entry visa.

We were met by a driver from our hotel who tried to giveus the hard sell to get him to drive us around the next day. We weren't having it as we wanted a tuk-tuk (see later). The hotel was reached down a dirt track in the heartof the city, but what a gorgeous and idyllic place it was. A lush garden surrounding a swimming pool, with the most wonderfully friendly staff. Though it was little later than 9am we were able to check in straight away.

We dumped our stuff and had a wnader into Siem eEap, having breakfast at a French-style patisserie, dodging the offers of tuk-tuks wherever we went. This is a feature of Cambodia, offers of tuk-tuks, offers of a massage (legit type, often involving fish nibbling your feet), or ragamuffin children trying to sell you postcards or bamboo bracelets. It isn't major pestering, as a simple "no thanks" does the job. After this we wandered further into the city to get an idea of the orientation. We found a couple of wats to have a look around, similar to Thai style, though maybe a little less ostentatious.

Back to the Central Boutique Hotel for a breather then out for some lunch at a small cafe nearby where we had noodles/fried rice. Chatting to the owner, she had a American husband, though we didn't figure out the whole story. I did, however, win a free beer as my ringpull (one of the old fashioned ones you pull off) had a symbol for some competition where you could win up to something like 500,000 riel.

This is something to mention: currency. Cambodian currency is the riel as I just mentioned. However, they commonly use the US dollar such that, when you get money from the ATM it is in dollars. There are 4000 riel to the dollar, and when you buy something that isn't in full dollars, you get the change in riel (so a 1000 riel note is 25c).

We got back to the hotel and had a bit of a swim in the lovely pool. Then, doing a quick bit of research, I also found that there were aerobics classs at 5:30 in the evening which was something I was determined to have a go at, so I set of to look for them, just finding them in time. It was fun, if hard in 30deg heat and very high humidity, but only cost the measly sum of 1000 riel (or about 17p). Most of the clientelle were women, many of them quite old, but that's nothing new as far as my fitness regime is concerned.

I got back, and we got ready togo out for the night, and see what the begining of the weekend had to offer in Siem Reap. There are no shortage of nightspots, with the main drag for nightlife being called Pub St. We ate at a place called the Khmer Kitchen, which did the local specialities, not that there is any shortage of this around teh place as you might expect. The main dish was Khmer curry which was fantastic. Not disimilar to Thai style curries, but less hot, and with less obvious lemon grass and coconut milk.

We drank a few more drinks (mostly beers, but they d a good selection ofcocktails too) at a variety of places. Best of all the place is very cheap, with it being low season, and most places offering a happy hour all the time with draft beer being often 50c a glass. Cocktails too are usually chap to start with or on 2-4-1 offers.

We got a tuk-tuk home. Cambodian tuk-tuks are different from those you see elsewhere in that they are in effect moped-drawn chariots. That is to say, the passenger compartment is a trailer (sitting 4or 5 people) hitched up to a moped. It's a good way to travel, and relatively cheap. A quick one dollar ride home and we were in bed

A nothing day

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 15:28:00 +0000

Day 10 Pelangi Beach resort

Today was a day of travelling and not much else. Upin time to catch the boat back to the mainland. This was a fast shuttle and the journey was actually quite hairy as there was a bit of wind which caused a bit of a swell, made worse every time we went past the wake of a boat going in the other direction. Rain started as we reached port as well.

From there we were bussed to Kuala Terengganu where we had a couple of hours to kill. Difficult as this was Friday (their Sunday in this hardline Islamic part of MAlaysia) and Ramadan. We returned to the Chinese cafe we had had a drink at the last time we were here before we went to the beach and ate chicken rice and duck noodles.

We then got on a bus to Terengganu airport to catch a flight to KL. The usual airport thing applied where you hang around for ages, before3 boarding our flight which lasted the same half hour. At KL, where we arrived at KLIA, we had to get a shuttle bus to the budget terminal where we had a hotel reservation at a Tune Hotel. Tune is a hotel brand starting to spread globally (they have on in London at Westminster) which is owned by Air Asia, and follows the same Dallas South Western (or, more familiarly the EastJet/Ryanair) model of no-frills. You get a room for cheap, then pay fo everything else: towels, aircon. The room was tiny, but clean, though the sink was blocked and one of the bedside lights had a dead bulb. Dinner was at a cafe in the piazza next to the hotel at a restaurant which offered a post-fast buffet which turned out to be a litle expensive, though it was good food. We enjoyed couple of beers then had to go to bed as we had a stupidly early flight to catch (7am flight, so at the airport for a check in 90 minutes before hand).

Sharks, mouse deer, Tiger beer

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sat, 21 Aug 2010 06:19:00 +0000

Day 6-8
Pelangi Beach Resort, Redang Island

This morning we were up early to get out on one of the included snorkelling trips. They run 2 a day, one at 2pm as we did after we got here yesterday, one at 9:30am. Breakfast was another ufet of two types of noodles, eggy bread and something else I didn't like the look of. It was OK, especially the eggy bread which warmed up OK in the grills they have to make toast

We were shipped out to the Marine PArk Centre on another, smaller island a little way off called Pulau Pinang (not THE Penang) . Snokelling was good, with some great coral and plenty of colourful fish. I even caught a glimpse of a small reef shark. We rented snorkels and masks as well as the obligtory lifejacket which anyone who has been snorklling more than a couple of times (apart from Jane) doesn't need. I mean, you can jjust float there breathing through the snorkel as long as you want without one, and if you hve a life jacket on you can't dive down to get a closer look at stuff. We chatted to a young English guy who had a Malaysian Chinese girlfriend who was stuying in the UK

On heading back it was time for lunch again, more of the same cold buffet (this wil be a theme on the next few days, believe me). We decided to duck out of the afternoon organised sborkelling trip and instead headed off to gor round a local reef reachable from the shore near where we were staying. This proved a good move because there was some reasonable coral for so near show (though showing signs of bleaching as is the case globally which is largely agreed to be due to increasing sea temperatures). There were a fair few fish as well: parrot fish, seageant fish, the odd yellow angel fish. Carrying on around the headland we swam to what is called locally Shark Bay, and the title wasn't a lie as we saw small black-tip reef sharks pretty close to shore. This made missing the trip worthwhile.

We headed back to our room to shower and go out for a pre-dinner drink at the Coral again, then same old same old buffet food for dinner. We then headed out to explore some of the other bars on the beach. The furthest to the north is Reef which had some Chinese teenagers doing cantopop karaoke, LAguna Beach I decided not to drink at as it was RM13 a beer (normal is 10), Redang Beach Resort was good, and one of our regular haunts. Our own place wsn't much cop, and there was Coral whichwas our overall favourite, and we got to know the barstaff well. So we enjoyed a beer or two at a few places before heading back to our room for bed.

As I'm behind I'm doing all our beach nights as they all were similar. Next day we had out breakfast and headed out on the jungle trail over the island to visit another beach. This has a very exclusive (and expensive) Berjaya resort hotel, but the beach was suposed to be stunning. The trek was amazing. Over a hill on a well maintained trail through otherwise dense rainforest whichbecame mangrove at the other end. There was wildlife galore. We saw a chameleon, a few squirrels, lots of macaques, and a mouse deer. At least I think it was a mouse deer, as I only caught a glimpse.
Soaked on sweat we arrived at the beach, and it was indeed stunning with ice-white sand and turquoise water, but this wasn't the resort beach and was a little rubbish strewn. We wandered over to a handy cafe for a Coke, then to the Berjaya. It was very swish, full of Italian tourists and had an immaculate beach. We had a melon juice to drink then found some shade to sit and enjoy the view before heading back.
We'dmissed lunch at the Pelangi, and he afternoon snorkelling trip, but went back to Shark Bay and saw loads of small sharks. Really close to shore in really shallow water.

Evening was more of the same then to bed

Next day we did the morning snorkelling trip, and hired an underwater digital camera to take some photos. We went beyond the Marine Park we had gone to on the first day to another reef which was not too interesting as it happened. Also the camera didn't work when we got there so got no underwater pictures. That afternoon we just hung out on the beach, though our view from the Pelangi was obscured by a large banner put up for a rock festival they were holding at our place this weekend. Our rest on the beach was also disturbed by them setting up. Two days before the show, and they were doing sound cecks before packing their stuff away in case of rain. Muppets

Instead of the buffet at Pelangi we ate at the Redang Beach Resort and had Malay standards which were good, and, more importanty, hot. We also went to the Coral for a last cocktail (aware that our ringit was running low and here was no ATM) and to say goodbye to the two barmen here who we had got to know quite well, then went to pack and go to bed.

Boom! Merang!

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 05:41:00 +0000

Day 5 Hotel Continental, Kula Terangannu
(interim post, to be completed with photos and more details)

Breakfast here was entirely Asian, so noodles all round. We packed up and got into a taxi driven by a madmanwho did the hour trip to the jetty in about 30 minutes. Apart from the fact he was overtaking left right and centre, the trip was interesting, seeing suburban and semi-rural Malaysia. We arrived at the jetty in a place called Merang where we had a short wait until the boat arrived over from our destination on Pulau Redang in the South China Sea. The trip out was about 30 minutes or so, where we disembarked and checked into Pelangi Resort. The sight you arrive to is a long beach of white sand, fringed by palm trees with buildings nestling back in the trees, tree which cover the mountain behind the resort. Some of the other resrsts aren't quite so subdued, with one r twoof them going for the bigger is better is more exclusive look. True, it's not as bad as a lot of Spanish seaside resorts, but is very out of character with the rest of the scene.
Our room was in a wooden building, a decent size with sir con and an electric shower, so way above the basic level we have stayed in places like Tioman nd the Perhentians which had no hot water and only a fan to cool you.. We unpacked a few things and went out for lunch at 12 (the accomodation is full board, and includes two snorkelling trips a day if you so desire). Lunch was a buffet affair of local ood, but served cold. Or at least served up warm, but rapidly cooled as there was no way of keeping ithot in the trays. It is a little like school dinners, especially in the fact that you have to clear your own plates.

After this we headed back to prepare for our first foray snorkelling which was to a nearby island. This had some decent coral and a fair few fish, though nothing spectacular. We were here for about an hour before heading back for afternoon snacks: curry puffs were especially good.
Now we lounged aro9und for a couple of while before having a wander along the beach to see what else was available, and alighted at a bar at a resort called Coral which was very pleasant to enjoy a beer, but it's aeach bar, so what else can you expect?

Dinner was BBQ night, so served up in buffet style we had chicken wings, fish (mackerel I think), lamb and vegetables including baked sweet potato. It was passable, but again quite cold by the time we got it.

That evening we explored what the beacjh had to offer in terms of nightlife. There are 10 resorts on the stretch of beach, and probbly all but one or two have somesort of bar. One of them is a very expensive place that we didn't even bother going in. As it transpired we went to three or four, ending up at the Coral where we had cocktails. It's defintiely not a holiday without the od cocktail.

Fast and Loose

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 05:08:00 +0000

Day 4 Equatorial Hotel, Melaka
(updated with photos)

Today we were off to stay in Kuala Terranganu, a town on the NE coast of the peninsular which is handy for the beach. On the other hand, it's also a very strict Muslim state so we were aware that we might have trouble obtaining food before sundown or in getting hold of the odd beer at all. We did have a few possible options though. More waffles for breakfast before packing up, checking out and getting in a taxi to Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) for our short internal flight up the KT. The taxi driver was a friendly chap, explaining that his family were from India. He didn't drive too fast but did ride up the arse of cars in front.

We reached KLIA in one piece and tried to check in, even though we were about 4 hours early for the flight. Jane insisted as she worked out it could take 3 hours to get to the airport and we needed to be there 2 hours in advance or more. Say what you like about her, but she does err on the side of neurosis. Anyway, there was some issue with names on the tickets or something so we waited 20 minutes for checking in. The girl doing it was a trainee so that probably didn't help.
We had lots of time to kill so wandered about, ate a burger again (there isn't much in the way of eating in the domestic terminal), this time at Burger King to our shame.

The flight was ridiculously short as we were in the air less than half an hour, during which time the crew managed to serve up peanuts and juice (pink guava. Yum!).

We landed and got a cab to our hotel. The place we were staying was the Hotel Continental which was a rather tired looking place and had signs all over the place saying how much the stuff in your room costs "if you wantd to buy it" and how they would prosecute for nicking stuff (really, a threadbare, ragged towel wasn't the most tempting booty). It could be a great hotel if they tarted it up.

Heading out to explore we wandered past where they was a Ramadan bazar cooking all sorts of fantastic food, though we weren't hungry. The idea is that the people buy the food, then take it home and eat it after sunset. We wandered further into Chinatown here we found places to buy beer. Bless Chinese communities the world over for providing places to drink, whatever the predominant local attitude to alcholo is. They also serve Guinness Extra wherever you find them, so you can always have that taste of not-quite-but-not-far-off home. We stuck to the local nectar that is Tiger. The Chinatown is very atmospheric with drab shophouses and its own arch.

Chinese arch
Chinatown, Kuala Terangganu

Wandering back into the town we came upon a well known traveller's cafe called Ping Anchorage (sic) which also has a travel agents on ground level. Again we could slake out thirst with fermented hop juice. Walking back we passed the local mosque which is very impressive, and walked back thro9ugh the bazar. By this time it was approaching fast-breaking time, and this food was just too good to pass by so we bought chicken biriyani, BBQ chicken wings and beef murtabak

The Town Mosque
Kuala Terangganu

Making satay at the Ramadan Bazar
Kuala Terangganu

Not wanting to be rude or disrespectful we went over to the grassy area by the water front and waited, along with lots of locals and joined them eating when they broke their fast at about 7:30. This was the sort of thing that makes holidays memorable, even though we hadn't been fasting ourselves, it was a shared experience that we will always remember.

Sunset falls

Preparing to join the locals breaking their fast as the sunsets in Kuala Terangganu

That evening we wandered over to a Chinese owned fish estaurant and had steamed grouper with fried rice and vegetables (containing meat, prawns and squid). Way too much food for the two of us (especially having been porkerly early on with the fast breaking). This lot with a couple of large bottles of Tiger came to about £15.

After this there wasn't a great deal to do so we just went back to the hotel and played cards while drinking out duty free vodka with some coke we had bought earlier. Then we went to bed

Get it on, bang a gong

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 05:04:00 +0000

Day 3, Equatorial Hotel, Melaka

(revised and updated with pictures)

Up with the lark again, if the lark had been out drinking until gone 1am and needed to get up to get his breakfast before they stopped serving the buffet at 10:30am. More of the same food except this time I had discovered the waffles. Fresh waffles prepared before your eyes with plenty of butter and maple syrup. Oh, yes. Food of the gods.

Today’s itinerary was to explore more of Melaka town starting with a Chinese cemetery which we managed to reach despite the horrendous traffic (where the hell was everyone going on a Saturday?). This isn't as morbid as it sounds as it is beautifully peaceful, contrasting with the aforementioned traffic, not to mention the fact that it was noteworthy for being the largest Chineses cemetery outside of the People’s Repulic. Wandering through here we came out at the Melaka River, near a preserved Malay village or Kampung called Kampung Morten. If the name doesn't sound particularly exotic, that is because the name is from the last British Governer of Melaka before Malaysia gained independence.

The main house is called Villa Sentosa which means House of Peace. Strangely enough, in Singapore, the former British naval base on an island to the south of the city, where the Brits signed the surrender to the Japanese in WWII is also called Sentosa, and is now a buzzing resort complete with casinos, so I wonder which meaning of the word "peace" this was in WWII or now. Another family arrived just as we did and we were then met by an elderly Malay man called Mr Abdul Rahim Haji Hashim who owned the house and had converted it into a living museum. He proceeded to show the six of use from room to room, each one soaked in history about Malaysia, the Kampung and his family for several generations. There were artifacts from over the last hundred years including old cameras, old versions of the Koran and many pictures of his family and ancestors. There were pictures of when the king of Malaysia had visited, as well as various other dignitaries from all over the world. We saw his guest books going back many years with entries by all sorts of people from all over, and even included an endorsement from Winston Churchill himself. The tour ended when we were invited to bang an ancient gong to bring good luck.

Tranquility in a Chinese Cemetery

Colourful mushrooms growing on a log in the cemetery.

There's more than a little "On Ilkley Moor Bah 'tat" about this

Kampung Morten, with Vila Sentosa proudly decorated in the Malaysian flag.

Merdeka is the name of their National Day

King and Queeen for a day.

Sitting on bridal thrones in Villa Sentosa, Kampung Morten

Gong with the wind.

Banged for good luck, this gong is ancient. Whether whether it works or not, it seems not to have done Mr Hashim and the other residents of Kampung Morten any harm.

After this we headed along the river via a new boardwalk, walking past mudskippers, kingfishers and monitor lizards. This wound its way back into town, apart from one place where the area was dug up forsome new road or other. We went back along the river in Chinatown and stopped at a place called Riverine for food. This was wonderful. I had a delicious spicy laksa washed down with Tiger. It was full of all sorts of stuff like prawns, boiled egg, beansprouts. It’s also very yellow so stains like hell, but the splatters you may get from loudly slurping the noodles (when in Rome..) is worth it.

A monitor lizard
Seen en route from Kampung Morten to Melaka town

Back to the hotel for a swim, a freshen up then out to paint the town merah as they say in Malaysia. We went past a kung fu expert whose party trick is jabbing his index finger into a coconut. He took ages to go about actually doing it so we couldn’t be arsed to stay and watch for another 30 minutes since it culminated in some sale spiel for some miracle oil and we were hungry. However, here is a Youtube link of him doing his stuff. We instead went inland to get something to drink, going back to the Eleven bar from the previous evening for a Tiger. This allowed me to watch some of the football, though I had a bit of an alimentary attack, but survived relatively unscathed.

Being tourists, the next thing we did was go and get a boat cruise along the river. This was fun as all the other passebgers were Malay teenagers who whooped and hollered at every other boat passing and at a lot of people we passed too. We went back along the route we had walked earlier in the day past the Malay village, then back again. The waterfront of Melaka is undergoing a lot of deveopment and it will be a popular destination when it's finished, though it might also tarnish the soul of the town in the process if it's not managed well.

Villa Sentosa at Kampung Morten as seen from river cruise at night

We headed back for more drinks, and had been thinking of grabbing some food, but I wasn't feeling that well up for it, so we just stuck to beer instead. Ahh, the curative properties of Tiger. We stopped off at a couple more places before we weent home. Being in a particularly tourist frame of mind we got a ride back on a trishaw, or cycle rickshaw to the hotel. This is a fun way to travel, even if you do feel a little guilty for the poor man having to pedal you the distance home. Still it's a living for him and keeps him fit. Not sure I'd fancy doing it during Ramadan though when you can't eat or drink during the hours of daylight, especially in this climate.

Melaka by pedal power at night
Our cyle-rickshaw driver slogging away to our hotel while we reclined and took photos. I can defintely see the appeal of being a colonial master

Our driver for the night
Note how gaudily decked out the trishaw is. This was by no means especially heavily decorated compared to others

Sad but true ,, ended the day with a McDonalds burger, because we were hungry and my stomach was still playing Twister, and this sort of near-digested pap is just the sort of thing an ailing gut can deal with. Then it was to bed.

Noodles to Hitler in one day abroad

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 10:03:00 +0000

Day two

Up with the lark. Well, up in time from breakfast at least (not sure they have larks in Malaysia anyway). Breakfast was a massive buffet with the full complement of cooked (no pork, but chicken sausages and ham, not as bad as they sound, and eggs prepared at the egg station to your liking), continental, pastries and of course the Asian selection. You ain’t never been to the Far East if you never had fried noodles for brekkie. I have so far drawn the line at the congee porridge though.

Full up and ready to go, we retraced our route from the last night to take in some of the sights

The first place we came to was St Paul’s Church which has been used by St Francis Xavier to do some miracles, and his body was kept here for a bit and you can see what was his tomb The church occupies an imposing position on a hill overlooking the river and out to sea, and is reached by going on a long slog up a flight of steps after entering through a gate at ground level for. This is called Porta de Santiago which was part of the original town fortress the Portuguese built which was almost destroyed by the Dutch until Stamford Raffles (the one that founded Singapore and gives his name to the most famous hotel there where the Singapore Sling was created) got them to stop. Parts of the old fort and town wall are excavated all around this area.

Jane at St Paul's Church, Melaka

Walking up into Chinatown and the atmosphere you could feel the previous night was no less for the daylight. The shophouses and narrow streets are incredibly evocative, especially those that are preserved in their authentic state. You can easily imagine what it was like in the early part of the 20^th Century or earlier when Melaka was a vital port on the way to the Spice Islands. We came across one shophouse that had been restored to its traditional state as part of a heritage project. It’s simply called 8 Heeren St (see the Dutch history with that name), after its address, and wandering round this it was incredible to think that these places weren’t being snapped up to convert to houses as they would make great modern homes. Talking to the chap who was oversaw the project, and he said they have something like 100 of these places on the go to restore them to their original setup, but it isn’t cheap. They have grants from various sources including the US Embassy and Ford, but it amounts to something like £500,000 just for the restoration. Many more are gutted to convert into modern shops, or are demolished, but it’s good to know that there is someone fighting to maintain the heritage of this historic area.

A view up Heeren St, Melaka. Note the Chinese style shophouses

We went out from here and wandered a bit more, coming across Eng Choon Association, an incredibly well preserved guild house and Chinese temple, with gilt decoration and dragons carved in to the roof and supporting pillars. The amount of work involved in this is amazing, with the columns carved in stone with the most intricate detail. We stopped for another drink at the Geographer’s Cafe before wandering onto Temple Street, as this road is known due to the fact that it has the oldest Chinese Temple, oldest Mosque and the oldest Hindu temple in Malaysia all harmoniously co-existing side-by-side. There were several other Chinese temples and shrines and a Buddhist temple also. The oldest Chinese temple is called Cheng Hoon Teng and built in honour of the Kuan Yin, the Chinese Goddess of Mercy . This was in much better taste than a lot of Chinese temples as it wasn’t really gaudy, but mostly in dark wood and gilt. It dates from 1646 and is still in use as a place of worship.

The Eng Choon Asociation door on Heeren St

Interior of the Cheng Hoon Association complete with dragons on roof

Carved pillar inside Cheng Hoon Assoc

Heng Choon Temple

Detail on roof of Heng Choon Temple

The mosque is called Masjid Kampung Hulu and different to most mosques you see as it was designed in the style of a Balinese temple, and the minaret built in the style of Sumatran mosques, with a tiered design (so the plaque said anyway, as I’m not really much of an authority on Islamic architecture). The Buddhist temple was a fairly modern build and pretty large. It was very peaceful wandering around the statues of legendary monks in various poses, though the significance of these was largely lost on me sadly, but I could see how people could be moved to meditate in this environment.

Masjid Kampung Hulu Mosque

Next on our route we went through Chinatown and to an Indian foodhall called Selvam for some curry which was staggeringly good. This was a banana leaf restaurant where you have no plates, just a large piece of palm foliage to eat off, and no cutlery. The food was rice and vegetable curries, plus dahl which is dolloped onto the leaf , then another man came round to give you rice, and another came to ask if we wanted chicken or mutton, so we opted for chicken which was again curried. It was, as I said, excellent and tasted all the better for eating with fingers. Not that Jane did, she asked for a fork. I on the other hand looked like I’d been snogging a peat bog by the time I’d finished. Of course, the locals are much more adept at this way of eating than I am, but they still provide wash basins which is a good thing or else people would be thinking I’d had an accident with cheap toilet paper if I tried to shake their hands.

We then stopped at a place for a drink called the Discovery Cafe which is very much a backpacker hangout, but the cafe itself has some character despite this, with the bar open to the road but festooned with all sorts of memorabilia like old typewriters, records etc. We enjoyed a beer here to wash down our curry before heading back to our hotel to take advantage of the swimming pool before the rain came.

After a dip, just in time before the rain reached us, and by rain I mean RAIN, complete with thunder and lightning, we went back to our room before we came down to the drink reception we had gone to on the first day for another couple of beers and some food. I then insisted I get to the gym to try out the dance class that was advertised. Big mistake as it was a essentially line dancing, so I did some work on the treadmill instead. I mean where was the street dance attitude? All the finely tuned moves I’d learnt over the last couple of years to hot joints from the street? They wouldn’t go down to the instructor and the two local ladies who were the attendees of his class. Their loss.

Friday night is one of the major nights out in Melaka, where Jonker’s Walk, the area on which the Georapher’s Cafe is situated, becomes a thronging night market. We wandered around this before settling to have a drink in a bar called Ringo’s opposite the Geographer’s to watch the world go by, and listen to Ringo himself (not the drummer, or if it was he has changed an awful lot since his peace and love speech telling pople not to send him stuf for signing) murder a few Beatles numbers. The set up at these bars is odd in that the staff seem to be employed by the beer companies rather than the bars. There was an army of scantily clad girls in outfits from Tiger or Carlsberg serving the beer of that brand. Not that I was complaining as they certainly beat the barmaid at the King’s Arms, on a purely professional level obviously. We headed further up the same street and alighted at another bar called Eleven where we had yet more beer and some food. The speciality of this place is Portuguese-cum-Asian and again was rather good. The prawns in sambal was sphincter quiveringly tasty . As the evening went on it turned into a bit of a pub crawl as we returned to the Discovery where they had a band on , wandered back towards the hotel and to a bar nearby, called Friends Cafe and finally had one at the place belonging to the hotel making it to bed for 1ish.

On last thing. When we were coming back to the hotel to use the bar I spotted a cat that was the spitting image of Adolf Hitler. This meant I spent 10 minutes chasing it around a car park to get a picture. It's not brilliant (it as 1am, I was drunk and I don't think Hitler cat wanted to be photographed), but here it is. I already sent it to the website catsthatlooklikehitler.com so hopefully they'll post it there

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 07:21:00 +0000

We arrived in Melaka and were very tired, having been travelling for about 24 hours, door to door. We checked into the Hotel Equatorial which meant going up the 21st floor where the special check-in for Club Class was (sounds flash, I know, but as it happens it’s only a couple of quid more expensive than getting a regular room and paying for breakfast which isn’t included, whereas the Club Class does), We went to our room a floor below and were entered a room that is truly massive, with not one but two balconies overlooking the town. The bathroom is bigger than a few rooms we have actually stayed in. We dumped our stuff and decided to do our first proper activity in Melaka.

First thing’s first, we attended the daily reception for Club residents in the hotel which is a selection of nibbles (many of which being small local snacks), as well as drinks which, in a country with limited indigenous drinking culture and heavy taxation on liquor, is nothing to be sniffed at. This was a welcome repast since we had actually not eaten since what amounted to dawn, so we were in essence at the same level of fasting as the Malay population, but without the faith-based reason to be doing it. The food on offer certainly filled a hole. I enjoyed a couple of beers here.

We adjourned back to our room to freshen up, from the 24 hours of international filth we had accumulated, just about managing not to fall asleep, and headed out to see what Melaka had to offer of a Thursday night. We also caught a great sunset from the balcony.

Melaka sunset from the Hotel Equatorial

After a little misdirection until we got our bearings we headed off towards Chinatown to explore. This meant we walked past the old colonial quarter in the dark. The road was quiet and not terribly lit, though we never felt in the least bit unsafe. There are some interesting things along here, only jus visible in the dark. You can make out a (full-sized) train, a plane and some sort of truck as well as an ox cart, whilst on the other side of the road there are some old relics of the colonial era including administrative buildings some old Christian churches, unusual for SE Asia, and some remnants of old fortifications. We ran the gauntlet of the gaudily festooned bicycle trishaws tempting us with trips around the place, we did managed to withstand the temptation (though we will do one of these trips I think). We reached to river and went over the bridge into Chinatown. Here we were met with was an atmospheric network of traditional ethnic Chinese-style narrow streets with low-level shophouses on either side and a vibrant nightlife with dozens of bars and restaurants. The shophouses serve such purpose as things like travelers’ guesthouses, antique shops and art galleries, giving the place a real Bohemian air. We wandered further and came to a bar called the Geographer’s Café where we stopped for a drink and a snack. Actually I didn’t partake in the food, but Jane did and I nicked some of her mango chicken. Here we enjoyed our first Tiger of the holiday which definitely tastes better from the bottle when drank on the side of a Malay street. We wandered a little further and headed back on the south side of the river where we stopped for yet another drink at some cheap backpacker’s café where I might have eaten, but I refused on the grounds that one of the menu items was corned beef fried rice. I will not eat anywhere that produces such a Frankenstein’s monster of this making. Never mind food from cloned animals in the human foodchain, the person who dreamed up this aberration should be next on the list of war crimes after the one that Naomi Campbell is currently guest starring at. Still the beer was cheap at RM8 (so about £1.50, cheaper than the Geographers at RM10). Obviously this place was targeting backpackers, the cheapskates of the tourist industry, and herein lies one of the downsides of Melaka, the number of backpackers, but maybe that’s just me because I’m such a travel snob. I do have an aversion to anywhere that has a transient population of over-privileged teenagers who are hippies now but will be earning more money than me in 10 years time.

Our final beer on the first night by the Melaka River. Note the jet-lagged, glazed expression. I looked worse!

Over to Jane....
To summarise we are having a great time,its hot and humid, we've taken in all the cultural sights, strolled through Chinatown and tried the local food.
Melaka is a very different place to it was 13 years ago, there's a lovely new walkway along the river and plenty of places to enjoy a Tiger Beer (Paul you wouldn't recognise it)

The coffee episode

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 07:14:00 +0000

Day 1-ish (difficult to determine given jetlag and stuff)
Dubai Airport

OK, I said I needed to rant at the end of the last entry, so here goes. We arrived at Dubai International Airport, very swish and the terminal building is truly immense. I had vowed to punch famous racist Jim Davidson if I saw him, but I had no luck on that score. So we wandered up and down a bit, bought some duty free vodka for those nights when you’re stuck somewhere the bars aren’t open (trust me it does happen). We decided to get a drink, so opted for Costa, faithful coffe shop they are. Jane got a can of pop, I wanted a nice iced coffee. The menu wasn’t very explanatory, so I ordered an iced Americana and we sat down. It was brought over and what I got can only be described as iced coffee, by which I mean a plastic cup of cold coffee with ice in it. No milk, no sugar. It wasn’t the delicious coffe milkshake I expected, the one you get at Starbucks or, yes, even Costa in the UK (and, surely, every other country in the world). Of course I needed to add sugar to it to make it palatable, but it was cold so SUGAR WOULDN’T DISSOLVE IN IT!!!!! I mean, HELLO!!!! What’s the point of a diluted espresso with ice in it? It’s not even got the hit of a proper espresso. It’s what would normally be described as dregs. Are these people stupid? Actually , probably not as I was the one to pay £5 for the two drinks (seems expensive, but I paid in sterling and any change would have been in UAE Dirams or whatever).

OK, rant over.

Normal service is resumed. We boarded our plane at Manchester smoothly, despite other passengers not actually understanding the idea of boarding according to zones. We were at the back of the plane so should have been one of the first on board (apart from Silver club members and people dragging sprogs on board), but we still had to queue.

We reached our seats and were amazed how comfy they were and how great the entertainment system actually was. Hundreds of films to watch, and video games to play. We both had to swap our headphones for new ones as neither one worked, but they we had new ones straight away, then we (and by “we” I mean”me) were plied with alcohol throughout the flight.

The food was really the best I think I’ve eaten on a plane, a curried main with a great strawberry cheesecake for dessert. Better than I recall in the two times I was lucky enough to get an upgrade to business class on Singapore and Lufthansa respectively.

We touched down in Dubai, pearl of the east, or whatever they call it at about midnight. An Emirate of massive wealth, enormously phallic buildings and home to various UK tax exiles, including Mr Davidson (see above). Despite the time we landed, the place was absolutely thronged with people in transit. The terminal building is huge and has any number of retail outlets where you can get your fill of burgers, coffee (also see above), sportswear and duty free, but can’t buy a beer. Actually, that’s not strictly true as they do have a very expensive looking bar and restaurant, as well as an even more expensive looking seafood restaurant, but your usual traveller’s bar wasn’t there. Most disappointing. Still we managed to kill the couple of hours we had here before embarking on our next leg to KL. It was here that the incident mentioned above, and which I will now refer to as coffeegate, occurred. Really, iced coffee with no milk or sugar, what planet are they on?

So we went to the departure lounge for the flight on which was unremarkable, apart from the fact that there was a woman wearing the baggiest harem pants I’ve ever seen, in purple, queuing for our flight to KL, which raised the question of whether she had a major incontinence problem.

On board we dd the same stuf, I played more games, watched Shutter Island but only drank a couple of beers as we were both feeling tired.

We landed in KL, disembarked and proceeded to look for where to get the bus to Melaka. We eventually found the place to discover it actually wasn’t the place, so we ended up having to get a taxi for about 4 times the price, though this was still only about £30, and this was door to door as he dropped us off at the hotel directly, so no need to get a taxi or walk the distance from the bus station wherever that may happen to be.

Day 1. Manchester Airport

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 22:11:00 +0000

Day 1 Manchester Airport
Mosquito bites: 0

And we’re off. Last minute packing of a few bits, securing the luggage, calling a cab,checking the train information online to see if there were any delays on the train line over the Pennines. An earlier train had been delayed 40 mins between Leeds and Dewsbury which was a bit worrying, but it as only that particular train so we were OK. The taxi and I was a bit worried that we wouldn’t be able to get our backpacks into the boot since it as largely occupied by a large bass (by which I mean the deep registering sound, not the fish) speaker unit. Pretty dumb idea if you want to use your car as a taxi to be honest. Generally speaking, a Toyota Avensis is not really a great car to go impressing the chicks in with the bass pumping, especially if it’s in the livery of Bridge Cars Private Hire of Horbury.

We arrived at Dewsbury Station with about 20 minutes to spare. The train arrived well on time and was quitr busy, in contrast to the one 5 minutes earlier which was going to Manchester Victoria and was dead, though it was stopping at every lamp post en route according to the display. My God it’s gloomy when you get towards Manchester. Certainly living up to its rep. No different to when Ilived here though. A guy had the loudest headphones ever in the seat in front of us. I mean, I could hear the song, give you the artist and hear the artist’s manager counting hs money in the background, it was that clear. Still he turned it off later on so we didn’t have to endure it for the full trip.

Manchester Airport is one of my favourites. Big enough to have plenty of shops to keep you amused, but not too posh. Manchester doesn’t really do posh. Where some airports have shops selling caviar, Manchester has a tripe shop. Well, they prefer to call it a Manchester United shop, but you know what I mean.

We were in T1, so no chance to go to my favourite pre-flight watering hole of the Bar de Voyageures where I have drank many a 6am Grolsch (hey, I’m on holiday, why not?).

We checked in rapidly thanks to the joys of online checking in, but weren’t upgraded. How could they not do that, the two visions in linen that we are? Yes, linen, the perfect holiday fabric. I was wearing long trousers and everything. Anyway, since we weren’t upgraded I vowed to eat my food very loudly as a protest, lip-smacking after every single mouthful and pestering the crew for top-ups, extra impact as it's Ramadan.

Security was a breeze, though I still managed to get pulled out and searched. I say searched, it was one of those bodyscanner things. There are people I’m not married to in this airport where I type this that have seen an image of my penis.

Terminal 1 has had a bit of a revamp though and it is quite flash looking now. We stopped to enjoy our sandwiches. Yes being the peasants we are we brought our own food to eat in the airport (and here’s me hoping for an upgrade).We did have a long time between breakfast and the first meal we got on the flight. I had a pint to wash it down though.

OK, I'm uploading this at Dubai, and I just had an experience at Costa Coffee that I need to rant about. See next post!

Day -3. More prep and musings on British life

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 12:56:00 +0000

It's the home straight. Three days before we fly, two days before I officialy go on holiday from work at 5:30pm on Tuesday. All the main tasks are sorted: getting a haircut (yes, both of us), having the car serviced and MOT'd, buying a couple more useful gadgets like an MP3 speaker. So now it's just the packing to worry about. That, and preparing for what we will be missing and what makes coming home worthwhile.

Football is something that is a consideration when we are away. The Championship officially began this weekend, and the Premiership season opener, the Community Shield, was on today. This was previously called the Charity Shield, but I suppose, given that the charities probably had less to spend at the point of need than the collected players earnt that week, it's probably a bit of a misnomer. Saying that, the philanthropic trust that is McDonalds were crowing, by way of advertising hordings, about how many coaches that had been installed for youth and grassroots football. I'l bear that in mind that next time I get a Big Mac whilst musing over how shit we were at the World Cup thanks to the intervention of the American obesity merchants.

One of the things about this sort of holiday is how you get to a place and think it's idyllic (apart from the massive poverty, healthcare problems and deprivation of the local populace, obviously), and you think how cool it would be to live there. As an expat, obviously. I mean, I'm not stupid, you do want to maintain a living standard close to that to which you are accustomed. Anyway, the point is, you know that it's pie in the sky (not much call for Clinical Biochemists in Batambang, Cambodia, where the healthcare system is pretty strained), so it helps to keep a sense of what you are looking forward to when you get home.

Reasons to come home:

British beer
The football (at a sensible time)
Television
Sunday roasts

Of course, dark, bitter beer isn't really missed when it's 37 deg outside and you need something ice-cold and wet; when you can get the football easier than ever online, with Satuday games on telly at 10-11pm, so when you're at the pub; when you have Youtube for any programmes you miss; and the fact that they do actually roast meats in a lot of countries. Really, though, without the dour British weather and the shortening day as we lurch towards winter to make all those things feel better, they are worthless. Obviously.

Two gym days left, following a step class this morning I managed to drag Jane to Huddersfield Total Fitness. That's her last activity before we go, that's for sure. Me, I don't want to hammer things, but I do want to do a couple of sessions. It is what I do, after all.

Anyway, we had our last Sunday roast, which was a fantastic piece of lamb with new spuds, broccolli and roasted butternut squash, as well as home-made mint sauce. It was something wonderful, something you don't get in SE Asia. Meh, who am I kidding? There's nothing we are going to miss from our Brit life being away, be it for 3 weeks or 3 years. There is so much to love about British life, but there are as many compensations for living elsewhere.

Next post wil probably be made en route to SE Asia, at the airport (though never say never) which, as far as I am concerned, is when we really are ON HOLIDAY!

Day -8, just over a week to go

noreply@blogger.com (Iain) — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 17:01:00 +0000

PROLOGUE
Location: Horbury, W Yorkshire

No, we aren't off just yet, but it will be soon. All of our accomodation is booked, as are all our internal flights, as well as our long haul flights (naturally, since our holidays are usually based on wherever we get a flight to). Jane is responsible for itinerary whereas I'm in charge of logisitics. We are up to date on jabs, have malaria meds which we probably don't actually need. I will try to ease off on the travel nerdism, especially about equipment, but it is something I like about planning a trip. A lot of the fun of the buildup is getting the stuff together you need to take but I can become a bore on the subject. I mean, I'm not sure anyone really wants to know about our new camera with a huge zoom (Panasonic tz7), or that the new shoes I bought were Nike Alvord VIIs which are trail running shoes, even if I did want something that was good for some light jungle trekking, but light enough for some jogging or even aerobics which they are suppsed to do al fresco by the Mekong in Cambodia. Yes, I do have a hankering to do some aerobics in foreign climes, especially after seeing an outdoor class underway in Laos a couple of trips back that I missed out on taking part in.

Anyway, there's little else to do now, but wait and get our stuff together before we start packing. There's mundane things like haircuts and getting the car in for its annual service and MOT. We have a spare weekend to go after two when we were playing host to both our parents (don't get me wrong it was fun as any excuse for a meal at a decent restaurant is always welcome). There's a lot of lists to make: what to pack - which has sublists of things like toiletries and documentation, lists of thing to do in the house, like watering plants. Fact is, this is just marking time until the holiday actually starts. We aren't likely to forget anything major, and the act of packing takes little more than half an hour, but the fights have been booked for 7 months, so it's not unreasonable to be pretty excited by the impending adventure.

We have to bear a few things in mind already. We travel on the first day of Ramadan, which might be considered not the wisest time to visit a Muslim country, but they have a significant Chinese community where we will be able to eat any time, no to mention get booze. One of our previous trips we spent a day in Kota Bahru in the NE coast of the peninsular which is a pretty devout area, and it was only in the Chinese cafes there that you could get a beer so it's not unprecendented. As well as this, the fact that people eat in the evening following a day of fasting means that the evening meal takes on a special significance so there are some fantastic places to enjoy Ramadan evening banquets. Still, it does mean that bacon will be pretty scarce on the Malaysian part of the holiday.

Jane has looked up the entertainment for our outgoing flights which became available online at the begining of the month. I see this as cheating, like peeking at your Christmas presents on 23rd december, though she did tell me they have Shutter Island and Iron Man 2 which I'm happy to hear. I'm surprised she hasn't looked up the food, or the names of the air cabin crew. I don't call them anything, I just press a button to get their attention and order a bloody mary (the only time I ever drink a bloody mary is on a long haul flight, don't know why).

OK, enough already. This is just a preamble, and I may post one or two more in the next week, and I know it's a bit dull because I haven't done anything or have any pics to display, but please stick with it.