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Unlucky 3rd

Saturday, December 3rd, 2005

I had a beastly few days, but it’s therapeutic to write about it 😉

Plenty of good times ahead!

That evening at the bar, we had a discussion about auspicious and unlucky numbers.

“The Chinese believe eight is a bad number…” Lisa began.

“No, no,” I said, remembering a recent TV commercial: “Eight is supposed to bring prosperity. But four—four is bad…”

“Yeah; four signifies death,” she agreed.

“So; there is no fourth floor in buildings and no groundfloor either because the ground floor is the first floor. And in Hong Kong, they don’t have a 13th floor—so let me see…” I began counting on my fingers.

“No 13th?” Ansil looked doubtful.

“Many Westerners believe it’s unlucky. Don’t you, here in Malaysia?”

He shook his head.

“It’s just superstition. Personally, I don’t believe it—but many people believe the number 13 brings bad luck; especially on a Friday the 13th.”

“Like in the horror movie!”

And so on. Personally, I don’t have a problem with 13— after all, there are people who think it lucky, like those who were born on a 13th, but I have never liked the number 3, ever since I was a kid. I have always wished for a fairy tale where the protagonist had just one wish,or two or four, but not three. Always three.

So perhaps it’s not surprising that December 3rd was not my lucky day.
[read on]

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Bug-attack!

Saturday, December 3rd, 2005

In the tropics, there’ll be bugs. Im afraid of bugs above a certain size—very afraid—but not so much that it will keep me from travelling. Here I am surrounded by people who know no fear, including the backpackers in my dorm who will leave the door open with the light on all day and night.
[read on]

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Island-hopping

Saturday, December 3rd, 2005

islets.jpg

[read on]

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Malaysia Morning

Friday, December 2nd, 2005

beach1.jpg

My first really amazing morning of the trip, here on Pulau Lakawi in Malaysia. The sun is out, but it did not get oppressively hot until noon. I spent the time watching the antiques of the ‘Gecko’ guesthouse’s tame monkey (it had managed to disconnect the television areal. It still startles me to see a monkey bound across the room instead of one of the ubiquitous cats) and eventually crossed the road to find some breakfast. And there it was: a glaring white beach with sand finer than caster sugar. A cluster of islands with coconut palms leaning lazily into the view. The sea was barely cool and as smooth as silk on my skin. Everywhere, tiny crabs obsessively shaped the sand into pearly balls which were so neat that it seemed a shame to step on them. Doing so felt pleasantly prickly on the sole of my feet.
crab holes.jpg

There is no USB in this town, so sadly the photos have to wait [fixed;)]. And I should really go and get some food now. This afternoon, I’ll be out island hopping.
beach2.jpg

Meanwhile, my attempts at learning Bahasa continue. I keep forgetting the word for ‘thank you’, the most important word of all. Eventually I had to memorise it by thinking of the Earth, a rimmed hat and a suitcase: Te-rim-a kasih—Terima kasih. Why is it so hard to say thank you?

Don’t ask me the time in Bahasa—yet.

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Troubles with Thai (language)

Thursday, December 1st, 2005

One thing I do not like about Thailand is the weather. It was raining in Satun—if not as hard as in Songkhla—and the sky was covered in uniform grey clouds. The weather in Thailand is like London, only stickier.
[read on]

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Land of Clean

Thursday, December 1st, 2005

When picking up my breakfast snack in one of the ubiquitous 7-11 stores this morning, I briefly felt my sense of reality shift—the ‘dim sum’ in the little oven were the same as in Taiwan. And also as in Taiwan, the friendly check-out girl will give you a plastic bag and a straw with every purchase; actually you might get two such sets when you buy a small bottle of water and an even smaller bottle of milk. The girl was about to put my little dumpling into a third bagand gave me a vacantly surprised look when I raised a hand and then pointed at my daypack. I smiled, transferred the thing into the milk-bottle bag and stuffed both inside. But whereas Taiwan and Sri Lanka are in danger of suffocating under a blanket of plastic bags, in Thailand the rubbish is miraculously whipped away and recycled. That is a pleasant surprise—everything is clean. I have yet to see a cockroach on the meticulously swept floors in the guesthouses, although it may be a different matter in the Ko Tao NMP longhouse accommodation. With cleanliness comes the absence of smells and meticulous hygiene extents to food and water. Get this: all the water offered in even the cheapest noodle bars is safe to drink, and even more remarkably, all the ice is safe—made under government control from purified water. So go on and try one of the carefully carved wedges of pineapple that are displayed on a bed of naked ice by the street vendors. They are fine and particularly delicious here. Even the salads are fine.
foodstall.jpg
Shame that these things are never around when needed. Back at the Hat Yai bus terminal, I was whisked straight onto the next bus to Satun, only managing to quickly pick up a bottle of water on the way. I glanced longingly at the fruit vendors across the street—no time! As the bus rolled towards Saturn, I looked down on pyramids of pineapple wedges, papaya and melon on their beds of sparkling white ice and then onto papaya treas pregnant with fruit. At least it reminded me to check food availability in the Ko Tao NMP: very little. I resolved to stock up on everything.

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Ditherings

Wednesday, November 30th, 2005

I retired to a bar ( ‘The Office’, owned by an Englishman) to compose an e-mail to Nitokorn Piwong from the Irrawaddy Dolphin Conservation Society in Phattalung, but did not send it. It might sound stupid, but I don’t want to stick my nose into other people’s projects. The Song Khla dolphin population is in decline, so there are very few sightings. I looked out of the door onto the rain pattering onto the street. Did I really want to go on another mission? It would be comparable to a jolly around Greenock. What made up my mind was the bar owner saying that there are plenty of ‘pink dolphins’ in an area just past the Malaysian border. There would be other opportunities on this trip. So I’m heading out to Satun, probably go on to the Ko Tao National Marine Park if it is sunny, cross the border otherwise, look around a bit and then head to Kuala Tahan for the Taman Negara primary forest reserve. Plans? Who needs plans?

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South

Wednesday, November 30th, 2005

Taking the bus to Hat Yai was marginally less interesting that taking the nightbus to Glasgow—and nearly as expensive. I could have had a better deal from Khao San Road, but in typical style, I left the rest of the Farang behind in about 5 minutes.
[read on]

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A winning day

Monday, November 28th, 2005

Some days just go right, even if I didn’t fall out of bed until past noon and the sky is as grey as ever.

I’ve got my 60 day visa to Indonesia and will leave tomorrow for Hat Yin, so don’t be sad if I don’t blog tomrrow (it’s a 14 hour bus ride).

And then there’s this:

10,000 words in 2 days. Phew….

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Intermission

Sunday, November 27th, 2005

Hey I know: I only just got here, but cut me some slag. John already knows that I’ve caught an infection or something that has made my left foot swell to about twice the size of the right and hurts oddly, as if the muscles down one side are cramping. This means that instead of whizzing around town I can only hobble along at effectively the walking speed of the locals. This actually does me some good. It meant, however, that I stayed in Rambuttri all today, had my laundry done and wrote over 5500 words of my (abysmal!) NaNovel which I want to finish before hopping on the bus to Hat Yai hopefully on Tuesday. Then I can concentrate totally on blogging. But check out my piccies of the Grand Palace on Flickr in the meantime 😉

As you can see, the weather still hasn’t improved. I need to catch some sun!

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