The short way 'round

The flight back from SE Asia is always shorter than the flight there, simply because you're not fighting the jet stream all the way back. Nevertheless, I was still dreading the flights, even if both legs were shorter than their outbound cousins. If you'll recall my missive about the flight there, you'll recall that my butt was in serious pain by the time we got to Singapore. I was determined that this wouldn't happen again. I'd seen an inflatable pillow designed to relieve the pressure on your tailbone in Skymall magazine on the way over and endeavoured to find one during the whole trip to little success. I had resigned myself to trying to make do with a couple of pillows under my butt to try to raise my tailbone up off of the seat pans of death on the flight back, and even experimented on our bus ride back to Singapore, with some success. My butt still hurt, but not as badly. Fortunately, my BIL Sun is a patient fellow and took us around to a number of malls, partly because Rita loves to shop, but partly just to show off pieces of his town. At one of these places there was a giant travel store, and they had a decent variety of inflatable pillows, but not the one I was looking for. In desperation, I chose one that was advertised as a lumbar support, but had sort of a moon sliver shape taken out of the back of it that I thought might do the trick. It was the only one that looked like it might actually last through both of the flights, especially considering that I'm not the smallest guy in the world. As it turns out, not only did it last through both flights, I came away from SeaTac airport feeling as good after a flight as I can remember. Yes, my butt hurt a little bit, but not enough to whine about, or even whimper. No, I didn't get any sleep, but that was no fault of the pillows', it had more to do with the Japanese elbow in my ribs and the cycling of the song "Afternoon Delight" for eight hours in my head. I have no idea where the song came from, although I do recall hearing it one day while driving around Singapore with Sun & Rita. It was driving me crazy, I tried to drown it out with songs that I like, The Entertainer, lots of Jimmy Buffet stuff, etc., but as soon as I wasn't actively trying to push it from my head, it'd pop right back up. Unbelievably annoying. The flight to Narita was only about half way full, so there was plenty of room to stretch out which was nice. This was not to be the case for the Seattle leg. I read about 500 pages of the book "The Hostage" by WEB Griffin, quite good, and finished it on the Seattle leg, about 800 pages in all. If you like his style (and I do), I think you'll enjoy this book.


As I walked down the jetway at Narita I noticed all the round eyes in front of me stopping at a crack in the wall of the jetway...you could see your breath, something not generally possible in the equatorial heat of Singapore. The cool air flowing into the jetway felt wonderful, such a change from the heat! I'd have stayed there longer if it weren't for the mass of people getting off the flight behind me. I took my time getting to the next gate because we'd arrived early, and it was more than two hours before I needed to be anywhere except a bathroom, which needed to be much earlier than that. A quick pit stop on the way through security (why do they not only run you through security, but take away your drinks, when you're basically locked inside the terminal with no way of getting access to anything you didn't bring with you in the first place, and you had to get through security to get there), and then off towards my next gate. I wanted to dash off a quick email to R to let her know I'd gotten there OK, as well as the success of the pillow, but I had no Yen, and there were no money changers around. It turns out that you can use US currency in the stores there, they just make the exchange for you with no problems, and give you change in Yen. So convenient.

Internet kiosks take 100 ¥ pieces for ten minutes of access time. They should refund you for the time you have to wait for the keyboard to catch up with your typing... I tried sitting out my layover at the gate, but it was right in between two of the automated walkways, and they had a continuous loop of "the end of the walkway is approaching, please be careful" playing with women's voices, one version in Japanese, immediately followed by the English version. That lasted about five minutes before I couldn't stand it, so I wandered off in search of a good people watching place that wasn't aurally annoying. I found a stand of seats that were directly in front of the end of the walkway, which has the sound playing in the other direction, so it was pretty quiet. I really wanted to read my book, but I knew if I did, I'd end up finishing it about the time the flight boarded, and I'd have nothing to read on the flight.

The flight to Seattle, was nearly full, but I'd "upgraded" to "coach with a tiny bit more room" for about $200 US, so I was up against the bulkhead, close enough to see business class but far enough away that I had to walk aft so I wouldn't use the wrong head because of "security concerns". Who says that the US is a classless society? In any case, I finished my book, and donated it to one of the stewardesses who'd chatted with me about WEB Griffin for a while. She hadn't read the book and I didn't see any reason to carry it any more, I rarely if ever re-read paperbacks. Sleep was elusive as usual, but I catnapped a bit, at least on this flight I didn't have to keep wiggling my butt just to try to stay out of pain, I simply couldn't sleep. Then there was the Japanese guy with his elbow in my ribs...

While we were in Malaysia, we'd bought some nice paintings that the framer had packed up for us into a single large but fairly light bundle. I expected to have some trouble with it at the customs desk when I got back to the US, but this was not to be. The customs officials were far more interested in the bak kwa which I'd made a point of declaring since I figured I was going to secondary for the paintings in any case. Bak kwa is a sort of pork jerky that's one of my favorite things, and my SIL Ho Li had made a point of bringing a bunch down from KL for us. Unfortunately, none of it made it past the customs folks, and most likely ended up in the incinerator, although one of the ladies working the counter looked like she was Chinese, so maybe she took it home. I hope someone got to eat it, but it's not likely, the guy I was talking to told me that they could lose their jobs if they ate it. Too bad, I was looking forward to having some... Oh, and the paintings that were about $500 over my allowable limit for free entry? Not a word, and they never even asked about the half drunk bottle of booze I'd forgotten to claim. Odd, huh?

Durians

Rita loves durians, if you've never had one, and you're a westerner, you don't know what you're missing, and you may never want to find out. The day after Chinese New Year, we went shopping on Arab Street and drove past a number of stalls selling the fruit. We stopped so Sun & Rita could get out and find "a good one". They eventually came back with two, a couple of different kinds. Apparently they're graded by their relative stinkiness, and if you're wanting to introduce someone to them, you want to start at the low end of the organoleptic scale before going to full scale warfare on someone's senses. They secured them in the trunk of the car, but you could smell them even from there. Sun made a point of walking up the stairs to his place instead of taking one of the elevators so he wouldn't expose anyone to the smell while enclosed in them. They hustled them through his apartment and out onto the balcony so they could open them and get to the flesh. Here are my impressions:

• Smell: broken sewer at a rubber processing plant. At least this is what it smelled like to me on the outside. The inside isn't as bad, and up close it's almost pleasant, sort of the inverse of how gasoline (petrol for my readers in SE Asia) & skunk can both smell sort of pleasant at a distance, but nasty up close.
• Taste: not so bad (see linked article above for more opinions), I'd eat it again if it weren't for the:
• Aftertaste: well, not so much aftertaste as the burps. They seem to go on forever, and you get the dual pleasure of both tasting and smelling it all over again, long after you though it was over. ugh, naaasty.
  
• Texture: creamy, sort of like a thick pudding with a giant seed in it, not bad actually.
• The edible parts of the fruit are encased in a thick spiny shell, and then some surrounding membrane, so they end up looking like beige lumps in white cocoons. You simply pop the fruit out of the cocoons. To give you an idea of what they look like, here's the Esplanade in Singapore that resembles a durian.
  
• After eating it Rita had her mom pour some water in it. I was curious about this until I read this article.
  

The flight to Langkawi

In order to fly to Langkawi we first had to get to KLIA LCC terminal to pick up our flight on Air Asia. KLIA is about 45 minutes or so from KL, and the LCC (low cost carrier) terminal is sort of out and around the back side of the main international terminal, out in the middle of nowhere.

We were set to just take a cab or a bus, but Rita's sister Ho Li insisted that we have Isa, their driver of 18 years, fetch us there. I felt sorry for Isa, but apparently he gets double or triple time when he does things like this so he doesn't mind. Ho Li instructed him to drop us off, but to wait around to make sure our flight was on time, and to let us sit in the van with him in the AC until the flight was ready to go. This seemed over the top to us, there was bound to be AC in the terminal, so we got out at the curb, called him after a few minutes, thanked him for the ride and told him we were on our way. This would come back to bite Isa because he hadn't actually checked for himself that our flight was on time, we'd just told him he could go, there was no way for him to know our flight had been "re-timed". Apparently Isa is terrified of Ho Li, and goes out of his way to avoid her wrath, so we (or at least I) had no idea we were setting him up for a scolding when we let Ho Li know that the flight had been delayed (or "re-timed" in AA's quaint way of letting you know you weren't going to get where you were going in the time frame you assumed you would). We had borrowed Kathryn's (Ho Li's youngest daughter) phone for the trip, so there was constant SMS messages going back and forth. We let her know that the flight was delayed and that we'd be getting into Langkawi late. This apparently set off a small firestorm with Isa getting his ear chewed for not checking on the flight himself, poor guy. There was no way to apologize to him for this because we were never out of earshot for the rest of our time in KL. On our way back, we simply took a bus.

Now I don't want to paint my SIL as some sort of monster or something, she went out of her way on this occasion and many others to make sure we were comfortable, taken care of, etc. She also was instrumental in not only finding this flight for us, but our accommodations as well on Langkawi. She runs a strict household, managing four kids, two maids, a career as a stockbroker, social hosting, tutors for the kids, coaches for the kids, sports for the kids (seeing a theme here?), etc. How she keeps it all straight is a wonder. She demands a lot from her kids and staff, but they're well taken care of, and need for nothing.

While waiting for the flight an American couple sat directly behind us, actually bumping us with their arms as they tried to snuggle up to each other and smooch. Malaysians frown on overt displays of affection, and these were on their way to needing a room. Overall we weren't too impressed with them, and I feel embarrassed when I see fellow Americans making complete Americans of themselves. All of AA's flights are cattle call, you find your own seat when you get on board, similar to SouthWest Air's flights. When they call for you to queue up to get on the plane, they make a point of taking disabled, elderly, and people with kids, or pregnant onto the flight before the rest of the passengers, a policy that I have no problem with, although it irks me to see a family with a bunch of teenagers getting on a flight before me simply because technically they have kids, but the kids are perfectly able to take care of themselves. Anyway when they called for the queue, the two snoggers I mentioned earlier got into that line almost certainly because it was far shorter than the line the rest of us were in. By no means were they the only westerners who did this, but they were the only ones who managed to get through the queue, almost certainly lying by saying she was pregnant. Now, I suppose it was possible that she was three or four hours pregnant, but her belly was as flat as any models. The humorous part came when the Malay women in front of us started giggling about it, and we were behind them rolling our eyes with them. Several other western couples got on the flight, but they either had small children and strollers, or they were elderly and could use the extra time and assistance from the crew. One couple in particular caught our attention because they could be us in 20 years or so. Western guy, Asian woman, obviously very comfortable with each other, enjoying each other's company.

The plane was a new-ish 737-300, perfect for island hopping, and other than them doing a hot refuel while we were on board, everything seemed hunky-dory. They boarded the flight pretty quickly, and not surprisingly, the snoggers were up against the forward bulkhead, feet up on the bulkhead closest to the forward exit so they could get off the plane first. Once the buttoned up the plane and it started to cool down, I relaxed trying to wiggle a bit more comfort out of the not-sized-for-my-butt seat. Pretty soon we taxied out onto the runway, and it was throttles up for the takeoff. We got about half way down the runway, the nose just starting to feel light, and...throttles down, emergency reversers, smoking brakes as we came to an emergency stop. Whew! First time for me and a bit nerve wracking. They taxied back to the ramp and started fiddling with the starboard engine, running it up and down. The co-pilot explained that they'd gotten an emergency warning siren and "standard procedure called for an aborted takeoff" and "everything was under control, don't worry". Needless to say this worried me. However, an aborted takeoff is far better than the alternative, so I calmed myself down, and explained what was going on as best I could to Rita because she wanted off the plane. As it turned out, the actual flights (re-timed to three hours later) went off without a hitch, and they firewalled the engines to get us there in 45 minutes instead of the normal 60 or so. We got to Langkawi in the middle afternoon, lots of little islands & boats underneath us as we approached, so it was a very nice end to the flight.

Smashed duck, suckling pig and other delicacies

While walking around China Town in KL the other night, one of the stalls we stopped by was selling smashed ducks. Basically this is exactly what it sounds like, ducks that have been plucked (but not beheaded), and then smashed flat. You can see some of them behind Rita's head in this photo. Pretend that her eyes are open...



That same night we drove past a watch repair shop that had a giant sign that said "Kedai Jam 25", this roughly translates to "shop open 25 hours a day". How'd you like to get your watch repaired there?

Another store we drove past a couple of times (along with lots of other places...), was a stall that sells Hokkien Mee. These words are said with some sort of reverence, but with force, as if saying it loud enough will make it even better tasting somehow. I have to admit that it's pretty good once you get past the smell and look. The smell is an oily melange of pasta, sea food, and thickened soy sauce (I think), and the look is like dark slimy worms with bits of vegetable and shrimp, cockles, etc. This particular stall has been referred to innumerable times while I've been here, apparently it's one of the last ones in KL that still cooks on an actual charcoal brazier instead of propane, and it's been in the same place for decades. Each time I eat it, I have to steel myself to get past my initial revulsion, because I know that it actually tastes pretty good, and it's just my Western upbringing that makes it revolting. I find this to be a theme here, especially with the Chinese food for some reason. The Indian and Malay food in general doesn't get this reaction from me, but some of the Chinese food is hard to get by my initial reaction. Of course, I'm married to a Chinese lady, so this has repercussions, although she takes it in pretty good humor, and I'm always willing to try stuff at least once, even though my gag reflex is in full swing. Ask me about shark fin soup and black chicken sometime..."tastes like chicken" takes on a whole new meaning...

At our Chinese New Year dinner with Dato' Soo and his family at Noble House, we had a ten course meal, of which I would only order maybe three or four courses again. My favorite was Yee Sang, which is sort of a shredded salad with raw salmon & what looked like yellow tail, with a plum sauce and crispy crackers over the top. Really-really good, but I had the same reaction, "ugh, do I want to eat this?". One bite convinced me that I did, and I had several servings. I'd go through this same trial for each of the next nine courses, with the exception of when they served "thousand layer cake", which looked good to start with, and tasted better. The suckling pig was pretty good, as were the shrimp, but since I couldn't eat with my hands, I ended up not eating much of the shrimp because I don't have the polite skill of being able to shell a shrimp in my mouth while not offending anyone. What I was able to sort out with a fork and spoon was pretty good, but if I'd have had my hands to work with, I'd have been able to get more shrimp down my gullet. Shark fin soup was nothing like I expected. They only use the "good" part of the fin to make "the best" soup, so the fin is basically a shredded meat that reminds me of pickled ginger both in look and texture. Of course everything you've heard about the shark dying after the fin's been harvested is true, and they even have radio commercials in KL encouraging people to not order the soup to try to curtail the fishing practice of simply trimming the fin and throwing the shark back to die because the meat isn't worth anything. The taste wasn't bad, but the textures and feel in my mouth was hard to get by, and the black chicken that was served in it looked like rotten meat to me. Visually this was a tough one to get by, but knowing that each bowl cost roughly $100US (there were easily 16 guests at this dinner, you do the math) made me want to at least give it the college try. The chicken actually wasn't bad, and the black flesh is simply, um...black flesh, which tastes...just like chicken. Apparently, the chickens are grown this way without any special effort by the farmers, they just have black flesh. Very weird to look at, but I'd eat the chicken again. The soup? Not so much. My least favorite was the dried blood & liver sausages along with some other highly salted and dried foods. I don't remember what this was called, but perhaps it was because I was getting pretty full, and the prospect of more oily salty food just wasn't sitting well, I had to do my best to get this course down. It didn't help that my BIL was serving for me, so I got more on my plate than I wanted in the first place. All of the dried food is eaten with arrowroot, which by itself is pretty bland, but tastes good, so I made a show of taking more (you're very encouraged to take more) by taking more arrowroot and eating that by itself, of with tiny chunks of the dried meats. I've had some of the dried sausages in other places, and I liked them, so I think my problems getting this down could be related to the heat, and my relative fullness. I find that I don't have much of an appetite over here, and I ascribe it to the heat for the most part. This doesn't bother me too much, it's not like I don't have some extra to go around, and dropping some tonnage isn't going to hurt me.

Hey, big man!

After we ate dinner in downtown KL the other night, my brother in law Gan wanted us to see some of the city, so we drove around for a while checking out the sights. One of the stops was China Town. It was nearing 11pm when we got there so some of the hawkers were starting to close up, but there were plenty left. The photo to the left gives you an idea of how tight the press of humanity was, I took it in a rare gap in the crowd. As we walked along, there was the occasional other gwai-lo walking around like me, but for the most part, only Chinese folks. Every DVD you can think of was for sale, and they weren't shy about trying to get you into their stalls to look. Shouts of "hey big man!", and "yes sir, right here" rang out from all sides. I quickly learned to just shake my head, which usually worked to dissuade them. Failing that, you pull out the ubiquitous right hand shake that means something to the effect of "nothing, no, can't find it, don't want it". You do this by extending your hand out in front of your body a bit, with your fingers splayed, and your thumb & forefinger sort of towards each other (I think). This seems to be a universal gesture. While waiting for a plane to Langkawi several days later, I watched the airline staff using to to indicate that they couldn't find a missing passenger.

How deep is that trench?

We took a bus from Singapore (SG) to Kuala Lumpur (KL), which is pretty convenient, even the customs & immigration are not too difficult. The offices are on opposite ends of the causeway between SG & Johor Bahru, the most southern city in peninsular Malaysia. You simply get off the bus in each place, and breeze through customs, at least if you're gwai-lo / mat salleh (foreigner, white devil, etc. in Chinese / Bahasa Meleyu). I've only been searched once on this entire trip, which was in Narita, where I was actually searched 3x in about as many minutes. In any case, I simply walked through both, Rita, who's Malaysian, gets searched nearly every time.

We were seated very near the front, with only a middle aged Chinese woman in front of us, who promptly pulled down all the shades so we couldn't see out the front, and turned off all the AC in her section, then proceeded to cough and hack the whole way. I was irritated with her, and was waiting for her to fall asleep so I could go turn on all the AC again. Fortunately the AC on the bus worked very well, and eventually got too cold, something I thought was impossible in SEA. About half way through the trip, they stopped the bus for a piss stop, drink break, etc. She was the first one off the bus, and we followed slowly behind her. I was looking at the drinks & whatever on the little truck in front of the tandas (bathrooms). All of a sudden, I heard a yelp and a thud. This poor woman had walked right into a four foot deep concrete trench that was only 18" wide or so. I helped get her out of the trench and took a look at her injuries, which were slight, although she probably had some nice bruises on her legs judging by the abrasions on her pants. A silver bracelet had fallen off her arm, and one of the Malay guys working the truck jumped into the trench to get it for her. His head barely cleared the top of the trench and he needed an arm up to get back out. She was somewhat lucky in that had she fallen about two feet to her right, she would have almost certainly hit her head on the grating she was supposed to have walked across in the first place.

Was that the King?

So, our second night in KL, my sister and brother in law (Ho Li & Gan) decided to take us out for dinner. We drove into town, took the obligatory pictures in front of the Petronas Towers, etc. While we were walking into the front of the hotel where the restaurants were, all of a sudden people come storming out of the hotel, security guards, managers in suits, and then armed police, literally splitting our group in half. We ended up right next to the door blocked by security folks while a Rolls Royce pulled into the valet area with police escorts both in front and back. The hotel manager hustled out to the car, bowing to whoever was inside, hands together to his forehead like you'd hold your hands in prayer. Turns out it was the ex-king, now Raja of Perlis, one of the Malaysian States, and his entourage. He walked by us not ten feet away, I was stunned that security let us anywhere near him, I've shaken the hand of a US president, but it wasn't without dozens of Secret Service folks around, and in very controlled circumstances, I can't imagine GWB just showing up at a restaurant and walking by the hoi polloi. It hadn't occurred to me to take a picture, but it's possible we were on the news that night as we were directly across from the news cameras as they filmed him walking into the hotel. It was over as quickly as it started, and we continued on our way to dinner.

What cable do I need?

So, before coming over to SE Asia, I'd found a "new" GPS unit to use as a backup to my "old" GPS unit. In reality, both are older Garmin models, one a GPS 12, and the other a GPS 12XL, very nearly identical, and the price was right on the 12XL, only $55 in a pawn shop. I like having a GPS with me when I travel for a few reasons, one, it helps me find my way around, two, it gives me something tangible to bring back with me after my trip so I can say "I was there", and three, it gives me something to do while on boring road trips, like the bus route from SG to KL. Five hours of listening to a bus drone on while driving through rubber plantations on a freeway that's as boring as any in the US gets pretty old pretty fast, especially if it's at night and you can't see much anyway.

Anyway, I was talking to my friend Chris, and he gave me a link to a freeware chartplotter software package, but I'd need a cable for the GPS units to talk to my computers. While searching for a cable online, I ran across a page called Pfranc, which is a site created by a guy in Oregon who sells data/power cables that he makes himself. I found a guy who'd franchised for Washington State, but decided to look in Singapore & Malaysia just for fun. Turns out there's a guy in Singapore, Daniel Mok, who makes and sells the cables as well. I contacted him, telling him that we'd be there last week, and could I buy a cable from him. No problem. After some exchanges of email explaining what I needed (I thought), then several phone calls between my brother in law Sun & Daniel, we met up with him to purchase the cable. Got back to Sun's apartment, and the cable didn't fit. Turns out that there is a voltage difference between the two GPS units, which doesn't make sense to me, as they both run off of 4-AA batteries, but apparently the 12 runs off of 5-8 VDC, and the 12xl runs off of line voltage, 12 VDC. Both plug into the cigarette lighter in your car or boat, but one runs at a lower power, and the other higher. The higher power cable is blocked by a pin in the center of the plug on the GPS so you can't plug it in. Of course, this is the one I have with me, so the cable I'd gotten wouldn't work with the GPS I have for this trip. And of course I found this out the evening before we were leaving for KL, so there was no way to make an exchange. I wrote to Daniel explaining my predicament, so he called Sun, asking about the exchange. This created a fire storm of SMS messages going back and forth from SG to KL, I think all the female members of my sister in law's family got at least one message from Sun, asking me for clarifications. Mostly while I was swimming in the pool with the boys. Eventually it was ironed out, and I will end up with two cables for less than the price of one in the US.

The breezes of Singapore

When we were planning the trip back to Singapore & Malaysia, I was dreading the heat and humidity. I remembered getting off the plane in Kuala Lumpur five years ago when I came over here to first meet Rita (another story), and seemingly walking into a wall of hot, humid air. This time, getting off the plane in Singapore, while the heat was palpable, it wasn't oppressive like I remembered, or thought I did anyway. After Sun picked us up and dropped us at his apartment, as we were standing outside, the wind was fairly howling by us, and it was surprisingly cooling. Getting up to his place on the third floor, I was pleasantly surprised how quickly his place cooled down as soon as we opened the doors & let the breeze through. Although I wouldn't want to sleep in the relative coolness of the apartment, sitting around and eating a quick dinner was quite pleasant. I was still very thankful for the AC in the room so we could sleep comfortably.

Chased across the pond by the sun...

We left Seattle around noon-thirty on Tuesday afternoon to have the terminator line chase us a third of the way around the world, only to catch us in Tokyo. We took this picture out the window of the terminal in Narita during our layover. The play of the sun in the clouds was fantastic, but it didn't dawn on me to ask Rita for the camera until it had dropped beneath them.

The flight over was uneventful, at least to Tokyo, the only problem was the seats as usual. I have no idea how an aircraft seat could be engineered to be so painful on your butt. I spent a fair amount of time wandering around the plane trying to stay out of the seat, but eventually you have to go sit back down, and continue enduring the pain. By the time we got to Narita, we both were feeling it, but not too badly. This was to change...

The flight to Singapore, while shorter than the Seattle to Tokyo run, was a bit bumpy at times, so you had to stay in your seat. Bumpy enough at one point to have R poised with her barf bag, but it calmed down to the point where her inner ear quit complaining, but not where the seat belt sign came off, so the torture continued. She managed to sleep for a few hours, I catnapped between trying to find positions where it didn't hurt so bad. I finally found a spot where if I wedged my right leg in the right position, my butt didn't hurt quite so bad, but there was a price to pay, the wedging action pressed the strap of my sandal into my little toe so hard I thought I was wearing a blister. Finally just kicked off the sandal and all was (relatively) better. I was never so glad to see Changi airport in Singapore. We called R's mom & brother to come get us, fortunately Sun, Rita's brother, only lives about five minutes away from Changi, so her mom was walking through the doors almost exactly the same time we got to them, while Sun waited outside at the curb. Boeing needs to talk to Volkswagon engineers about their seats. Sun picked us up in his Passat, and while I dreaded sitting down again, the ride to his apartment was thankfully (nearly) painless.

By the time we got to Sun's place, the sun was long since past us, and a nice moon was up in the sky. It took about twenty hours to get here, and I'm trying not to think about the trip back because it's longer flying into the sun...