Goodbye Malaysia

Nearly three weeks in Penang have flown by and while it felt like I blinked and it was gone, I'm pretty sure my waistline would beg to differ...Near the end of my stay I gave up any pretense of seeing the city and focused entirely on food and I am proud to say I ate pretty much everything from my list of places to try. There were a few times I'd walk a half hour or longer and arrive to find out they are closed on that specific day or worse they had just closed or wouldn't open for hours and hours but persistence or stubborn food obsession nearly always won out.

Clockwise: Nasi kandar (takeaway), char koay teow, nasi kandar, oh chien (oyster omelette - greasiest thing ever but damn good!)

By the time I left Penang I'd gotten to celebrate Mid-Autumn festival with mooncakes and lighting lanterns at a Couchsurfing BBQ hosted at the hostel, I'd somehow blinked and realized I really knew my way around and rarely needed a map and best of all I'd made an amazing friend through Asha. I still never saw Danny (the only staff!) More than a 15 minute period total but Asha will now be working at the hostel so when I come back next time it will be great.

Char koay teow, nasi lemak, char koay kak, fish head - didnt try this but only due to price 

After Penang I headed north to Langkawi island where I met my new couchsurf host who I'd be staying with for 3 days. The first day we hit up the beach and then hung out with this great Swiss couple at the guest house. Unfortunately I was a downer for the first while since I had a bit of a fever/bug. We still managed to rent a scooter and see the waterfall, northern beach, and river but sadly it was pretty cloudy and cool most of the time. My last night in Langkawi there was an awkward/uncomfortable moment with my CS host so I followed my intuition  (and my friend Amber yelling get out!!) And checked into a nearby hostel. Its odd that at times while traveling I can feel very lonely but then at moments like right now as I type this in that shitty hostel, I am in love with my antisocialness. I'm starting to think couchsurfing is like durian. People keep saying it great but when I try it it goes badly (except with my awesome filipino host), however I will stubbornly keep trying it. Thats how I've ended up trying durian, durian ice cream, durian coffee, durian chocolate....good god what is wrong with me?!

Lesson learned: Alone time is a necessity.

Eating My Way Through Penang

This post is dedicated to my friend Micah who told me to stop posting pictures of me in exotic places and to start posting pictures of food because "your face looks the same in each photo, but delicious exotic food...that's revolutionary."

Coming from Cameron Highlands with cool air and remote nature was a big change from arriving in Georgetown on Penang Island where suddenly it was boiling hot outside and city building everywhere, though not the nightmarish concrete jungle of Kuala Lumpur. I had excellent luck arriving in Penang since there was a free hop on bus that took me from the jetty to the hostel I would be volunteering at for the next 3 weeks, my luck ended there. I arrived at the hostel when the heat was at its peak, my bladder was full, my phone was at 5% and nobody was there so I ended up locked out for 2+ hours. Eventually people staying at the hostel arrived and let me in and that is how I met Asha, Valerio and reunited with my friend Sergei who I'd met in Cameron Highlands. Asha said to me "so you're running the hostel?" and I corrected her that I was volunteering, not running anything! She replied by saying she'd been there weeks and nobody worked there other than the owner who was never ever around so I would in fact be running the place. It ended up being pretty true, in the last two weeks I've probaby seen him twice for less than 30 minutes total and the only instruction I've received so far is being given the masterkey. Luckily the work is beyond laid back and it's a small hostel so I've been getting to know everyone who checks in, and I'm free to leave for food or sightseeing whenever I want.

Clockwise: Char koay kak, Murtabak, Mee goreng, PB&Banana mang chang kui

The next day Felix from Germany checked in because some people from Cameron Highlands told him to come there, then the next day those two people, Marike and Charlie checked in too so for my first week there it was like a big Cameron Highland reunion with amazing people. We'd spend the days going to the national park, trekking to Monkey Beach and eating at the nearby night market while waiting for the bus back, going to Penang Hill where the hike uphill (it's always uphill) was nearly 3 hours, celebrating Marike's birthday by smearing cake all over her lovely face, seeing the Snake Temple, touring the street art of Georgetown, and visiting the Kek Lok Si Temple. In the evenings we'd usually head to Antara Bangsa, this slightly sketchy seeming but absolutely wonderful Chinese establishment where you can find cheap beer for take away or to drink in the alley with others. I'm extremely proud to say that I found it my first night there. A can of beer at the 7/11 is around 10rm (3.30CAD) however at this magical place it was 10rm for 3 beers so it's safe to say that I've been there multiple times and introduced multiple people to the place as well.

Now for the most important part of Penang!

Nearly all the sightseeing I've done in two weeks was done in my first 3 days, since then all I've done in Penang is eat. And eat. And eat. Penang is basically the food capital of Malaysia and I am constantly surrounded by cheap and delicious street food stalls and small restaurants where I can, and have, been gorging on Malaysian/Chinese/Indian food non-stop. My food obsession has gotten so bad that I googled and read so many food blogs about the Penang food that my offline map is nothing but restaurant and street stall locations sometimes with as little information as "Char Koay Kak stall in front of school, look for green t-shirt, may run out by 8pm". I'd wake up and start thinking of my next meal and while eating lunch I'd be wondering where to eat for dinner. This became such a recurring thing that the other friends staying at the hostel would jokingly (and some slightly seriously) say they were on the Christelle food tour of Penang. My favourite foods so far have been Char Koay Teow, Char Koay Kak, Wan Tan Mee, Roti, Nasi Lemak....okay basically everything except Rojak and Chee Cheong Fun! 

Clockwise: ???, Chinese mixed rice, Duck rice, Cendol

My Rules for Finding Food

1) If there are only westerners eating there, run

2) If the place seems to be crammed with locals/Chinese, force your way in a find a spot even if its with strangers because it is delicious 100% of the time

3) If people are waiting at a tiny street stall for a half hour for a plate of noodles, it is worth it. Get your ass in line. Especially if the service is horrendous and people are still queuing up

4) Eat everything

Clockwise: Wan Tan Mee, Egg&Cheese Mang Chang Kui, Char Koay Kak, Nasi Kandar

Clockwise: Pasembur, Thosai, Chee Cheong Fun, Moocakes

Lesson learned: I repeat - eat everything.

Trekking in the Highlands

I arrived in the Cameron Highlands after what felt like an incredibly long time in Kuala Lumpur (3 days, can you tell I'm not a fan of the city?) and I was instantly in love with the Tanah Rata and the highlands. I knew nothing about the place but when I got off the bus I was fell in love with the greenery and nature around me, the cool, sometimes cold, fresh air and the fact that it was so much smaller and laid back than KL. I checked into the CH Travelers Inn which ended up being great for meeting fellow backpackers and finding people to go trekking with and while talking with them and exchanging the usual backpacker sentences - "Where are you from? How long have you been traveling for? Where have you been? Where are you going to next?" I responded by saying I had been traveling for 3 months and I was instantly floored. My second day in Manila I'd spoken with a girl traveling for 3 months and I could barely imagine getting to that point since I'd become so accustomed to the whirlwind 12-17 day trips which were the only type of trips I could go on until now. In Manila I joked that I'd blink and suddenly it would be 3 months. It happened.

My first day there I met six girls all traveling solo, all german (they're taking over the Cameron Highlands),  and the next morning we decided to hike Path 1. Around the area there is about fourteen different treks you can do and we went with the one that was supposed to be the most difficult but had the promise of a delicious tea plantation at the end of it. We left the hostel clad in multicoloured cheap plastic rain ponchos, hit the main road and then hitched our way to the start of the path past the town of Brinchang. It was too hard as a group of seven so we split and four of us ended up in a car with the wonderful Jan, an absolute sweetheart who I was also able to practice a bit of Malay with. Halfway there, we saw the other group of girls walking so we asked Jan to stop and pick them up too, good thing so many people in the area drive pickup trucks. The walk up was steep and grueling and after weeks of lounging on a beach and barely even walking around I was loving any amount of physical exercise. It helped that we were surrounded with stunning views of the tea fields all around us. We made it to the top of Gunung Brinchang and sadly the stunning views did not follow since at 2000m the view we had looked like a blank sheet of paper. While the skies in KL are white due to smog or burning fires from Indonesia, the Cameron Highlands is often blanketed with thick sheets of mist so it's common to see nothing at the peak. We entered the mossy forest in hopes of finding the giant rafflesia flower but when the patch became so muddy that we were almost knee deep and the people coming from the opposite direction looked like mud monsters, the 5 girls turned back leaving Isabella and I to venture further on our own. We never did find the flower, apparently it is in bloom for an extremely short amount of time, but we did emerge from the Mossy Forest also looking like mud monsters and realizing that out of the sweaty dirty backpacker group we were now the worst.

We walked down to the Sungai Palas Tea Plantation to try the boh tea, however the poor tea was completely outshone by the scones and even more so by the cakes. We finished our cakes and sat talking for a while as we were all eyeing up the abandoned table next to us that still had a nearly full piece of cake, and to make it worse, it was the banana carrot cake which was the best of the seven we tried. Finally one of the girls grabs the cake and we end up helping her finish it....which started a bad trend as 2 other neglected cakes made their way to our table. I'd gone from staying in a hotel in the heart of a metropolitan city to hitchhiking, being covered head to toe in mud, and eating abandoned cake. I freaking loved it.

For some insane reason all the people in Cameron Highlands stay for 1-2 nights, however I liked the place making me the anomaly who stayed for 5 nights. After that first day there, the rest of the days passed in roughly the same manner. Say goodbye to friends who were leaving, meet new friends (likely German girls) the night before or the morning of, go trekking with the new friends, eat lunch and dinner at the two insanely cheap indian restaurants Sri Brinchang or Kumars that are next to each other, drink beer at the bonfire around the Jungle Bar. Repeat. I'd change things up a bit by doing a different path each day and by switching up my hostel halfway through because I found out Kangs Travelers Inn was only 12 ringit a night ($4CAD, half price of CH Travellers) and it was attached to the Jungle Bar. On my last day there I decided to skip trekking and take a rest, something that lasted until around noon when some new girls arrived and after talking with them for 5 minutes we were on our way to tackle the hardest paths that would lead us to Brinchang where we would hopefully make it there for the weekend night market. I'd like to say I was talked into it but I was the one already bored with doing nothing and itching to hike more who suggested it. The path was fun but the night market was easily the highlight. I made sure to eat as much as humanly possible and for the fifth time in the last 4 days I had people comment that they enjoyed watching me enjoy eating. I'm not sure how to take that but the other two girls were helping me drink the leftover chocolate from the chocolate covered strawberries so they're in no place to judge me. One last night at the Jungle Bar and the next morning I would make my way to Penang to begin volunteering at a hostel.

The Trails I Did

Path 1 - Took ages and was crazy steep but beautiful views and cake

Path 4 - Super easy, only 30 minutes in one direction, you get to see the pretty Tappia Waterfalls and the not so pretty polluted river

Path 9, 7, 8 - This took us 3 hours though we were told it would take 5.5-6 hours and met some people who gave up part way in. It was a fun trek and while it was super steep it was not Very Difficult as described by the official tours

Path 5, part of 3, 2 - Path 5 was an easy 1 hour trek, we stayed on path 3 for a half hour, and then path 2 was the shortest bit but possibly the toughest of the trails we did and took 45 minutes. The end of this route led to night markets.

Lesson Learned: Look up! When you're walking down a difficult path you spend so much time watching your feet and where you step that you might miss the amazing scenery and things going on around you.

This is what 12 ringit a night looks like

The lovely Dutch girls who hiked trail 7, 8, 9 with me

Tappia Falls - Trail 4

Failing at being a Backpacker

Melaka

After leaving Aseania resort I met up with a South African friend I'd met earlier at Aseania and together we headed for Melaka. Unlike myself who is so cheap I'll put up with any sketchy hostel, my friend insisted on getting a proper hotel room so next thing I know we're checking into the Rucksack Caratel which is a month old place that was beautiful, great location and pretty quirky (i.e. the 'please clean my room' signs said 'help! Our room has been taken over by leprechauns! please chase then away')

In Melaka it is a pretty and laid back town with a river running through the historical center and the Dutch buildings are painted red and the streets are filled with stores selling scary durian concoctions and baba nyonya reataurants which are based off the cultural mash-up of the Chinese men (or sometimes Dutch or Portuguese) marrying Malay women. The baba nyonya food was good, the durian concoctions I found a loophole around. I'd promised a friend I'd try durian ice cream so at an ice cream parlour I had a sample of it than then tried to drown out the taste with a scoop of non poisonous ice cream - mmm white chocolate macadamia.

In Melaka there was a lot of walking around the rivers, and visiting Fritz, the Dutch guy from Aseania who took us to this little hole in the wall Indian place with excellent tandoori. We  were supposed to leave Friday but after hearing about the weekend night market we extended our stay and that Friday I gorged on food. Coconut shakes, fried veggie cakes, dumplings, satay, ice cream in a freshly made fish shaped cone, you name it and after the night market we ended up at Eleven drinking beer and tequila and sharing a few glasses of single malt with the owner of the bar and his brother who blew our minds with excellent magic tricks. 

These freaky neon bikes were everywhere

Kuala Lumpur

We eventually left Melaka and headed North to Kuala Lumpur which was almost like a shock to my system being in such a big noisy, dirty, busy city after 2 months on a quiet island. Even Melaka was like an adjustment period but it still was pretty small in comparison. In KL we stayed near the Bukit Bintang station right in the heart of downtown facing the Kuala Lumpur Pavilion. The city was busy,  full of shopping (which I don't care about), western chain restaurants (don't care about), and overpriced attractions (especially dont care about). In the 3 days we stayed there we saw the Petronas Twin Towers, the KL Tower, Chinatown area and a bunch of westernized restaurants (my friend wasn't a big fan of Malay food). After 3 nights in the big city both of us were itching to leave so he headed to Langkawi and I was hopping on a bus to the Cameron Highlands and it was only as the bus was pulling away that I realized I had no clue what to expect at the Cameron Highlands or whether the name was an actual town or just a region but after KL I was up for any change.

Lesson learned: It was nice spending a few nights in hotels (and swiping all the free toiletries!) but I am still at that stage in my life and travels where I need to be staying in questionable hostels, and weird accomodations full of equally dirty backpackers because the thought of sketchy hostels, dirt cheap street food-that may make me sick, travelling in cheap but uncomfortable transportation and meeting ridiculous penny pinching backpackers like me still excites me. Again, I may be a masochist.

Leaving the Islands

After nearly two months bumming around on the beach at Aseania Resort it finally hit that I had one month left on my Malaysian visa and I'd only seen 3 islands that were all located near the Singaporean border and the rest of the country had barely been explored. Once this realization hit I gave myself one last week there and told Jasbeer. During that last week Jasbeer was gone till the weekend and the resort was somehow nearly empty so it wasn't a super busy week. I did however have many great conversations over cold tigers with Fritz,  the Dutch expat friend of the boss who  was staying there for weeks fixing up his sailboat. We even made plans for a sailing trip before he returned to Melaka but the last day there was not even the faintest breeze. Oh well, c'est la vie! At least working the beach bar was easier now that the terrible 200 songs John and I now knew by heart were deleted and replaced with 2000+ actual good songs by this South African guy George, thus saving our sanity or what remained of it after hearing the gangster boogie song a zillion times.

During my last week I got to hang out with the staff a fair amount too, which meant many talks with Halim and the restaurant boys and talking and joking around with John at the beach bar. Eewyn and I would hang out at the jetty and one very slow evening the indian boys were playing cricket on a small field and I was dragged on the field to join them.  Sadly I don't think I have a career in the world of cricket. After playing cricket everyone leapt into the sea and for once I held back because it was the one time I was not wearing a bathing suit (stupid me) then I realized I could just swim Malay girl style - fully clothed. We played catch in the water and two of the guys made us race afterwards, of course I lost miserably but that evening was pretty great.

Four days before I'd be leaving a new volunteer Amber from California arrived. Terrible timing because she was a really cool person and super easy to get along with. We bonded over drinks and just how cheap we were, so with any luck we may get to travel together again in the future since it seems we have similar travel styles. On my very last night the resort was pretty much dead so they decided to have a big staff dinner where everyone from volunteer to restaurant to housekeeping staff gathered. The boys drank beer and Amber and I assembled sangrias and it was a perfect last night hanging out with everyone. Plus once the music broke out all the indian boys were suddenly tearing it up on the dance floor...and I was somehow dragged out too! The next day was almost surreal leaving since I'd been there for so long but I was bound for Melaka and still needed to see the rest of Malaysia.

My Friends on Pulao Besar

Me and Jessica, the baby bird we rescued 

The spa girls and I

The beach bar team - me, Amber and John

The Aseania volunteers

My wonderful boss Jasbeer

Visiting Sibu Island

Aseania Resort is one of the resorts owned by the larger group Sari Pacifica which has several resorts sprinkled over the Malaysian Islands and the nearest one is on Sibu Island which you could almost see from the beaches of Besar Island. Unlike Aseania which has seen almost no turnover in manager or staff in 7 years there has been more turnover on Sari Pacifica Sibu over the year's so occasionally Jasbeer will be called to Sibu to help out so when he made his most recent 2 day trip there I was lucky enough to go along and continue my island hopping. We took a boat directly there that was nearly an hour ride on water so choppy that the waves splashing up were sometimes as high as the roof of the boat. So of course I was loving it and standing in the back at the open air part enjoying the waves and not caring that I was becoming covered with seawater. The only tricky thing was trying to drink my can of tiger without adding beer spills to the seawater stains now covering me.

Over the last few weeks I've been spoiled at Aseania so I couldn't help but make comparisons (i.e. the staff at Sibu are nice but can't match the incredible warmth of the always smiling staff at Aseania, or how the rooms are nice beautiful rooms but I prefer the wooden charm of the ones on Pulao Besar). Comparisons aside Sari Pacifica Sibu is a huge resort on a beautiful island that has a giant pool, great beaches and on a clear day you have a stunning view of the nearby Tinggi Island, now if only the didn't illuminate the many fountains with garish multicoloured almost Christmas-ey lights at night then the view would be even better! It was weird being there as a guest meaning I didn't have any hours at the snorkel rental shack or have anything to do but relax. How many luxury resorts can I stay at before I lose my budget backpacker status? Hopefully the fact I'm averaging $5/day in Malaysia lets me keep that status!

On our first day Jasbeer decided to take a boat around the island to visit a friend of his who runs a nearby resort and of course I was more than ready to see more of the island. We took the boat from the jetty on the other side of the island this time where I got to see the terrible government planning in action. The government built this giant jetty that cost millions of dollars on a part of the island where about 20 locals live (who never use the jetty) however there are no connecting paths from the jetty to the three Sibu resorts so each had to build their own jetty as the million dollar one goes to waste. We reached Rimba Resort that was fairly close and it was such a different environment from Sari Pacifica. It was much smaller with charming wooden huts crowding around the beach and the vibe was much more island resort than luxury resort - plus they seemed to have tons of expat volunteer/staff there. It was hard not to fall in love with the place and even harder harder to not love after 4 gin and tonics with Jasbeer and his friend while watching the sunset. The rest of the stay was much less eventful, I'd relax and read or swim while the boss did work things and in the evening we drank scotch so old it would be legally old enough to drink itself if it were back in Canada.

After the short stay we took a boat to some small jetty place south of Mersing with nothing there except a giant KFC and then at Mersing we parted ways as I returned to Aseania with a bag full of Chinese dumplings from Jasbeers favourite Chinese dumpling place. That night instead of going to the restaurant for dinner I pigged out on them instead - big mistake,the next day EVERY staff member kept asking why I missed dinner and if I was okay and why I wasn't at dinner. As every staff here is Muslim I don't think they would have appreciated me eating my very not halal pork dumplings around them.

Things I've done: been mistaken as an owner about a dozen times, mistaken as a travel writer twice and as an Australian five times (that part I really don't understand).

Lesson learned: Try and learn what someone does for a living within seconds of meeting them. By doing this you will avoid talking with a guest about how useless and biased guidebooks have become, then a week later opening an ebook guidebook for the first time and seeing that the author has the same name, nationality, and appearance as that one person. 90% sure it was the author. OOPS!

Selfies on Pulau Besar

I feel I've settled in well here at Aseania and I find myself having grown comfortable here and wanting to stay a full month or more. There are some slow days and then other days where it feels like I'm constantly doing stuff. John, the main guy who handles the snorkel shack/beach bar has been great to hang out with and on his day off he asked me if I wanted to go jungle trekking, a question met immediately with a hell yes. There's a path that goes through the jungle from the resort side of the island to the deserted side. The trek was pretty fun and since I'm becoming gym deprived I was thrilled with the 80 degree angles of the path and we were rewarded with a remote, somewhat rocky, beach. Because I'm apparently a sadist my favourite part was that the mosquitos swarmed poor John and left me alone. After days and days of sitting at the snorkel shack with the sandflies swarming me and ignoring him, it felt like it was finally his turn. It was also a good experience because since then I've been able to give a bunch of guests information. On jungle trekking and I'll usually look then up and down and if they're fit I'll say it's about 30-35 min, if they are older or less fit I now say an hour.

Spend my days "working" here

Some days here feel pretty slow and then other days might feel pretty jam packed and the jungle trekking day was one of them. In the afternoon  I was at the beach bar that was deserted and Eewyn shows up out of nowhere hurriedly telling me to close the place 'now NOW! ' and to meet her at the jetty asap. Since there was almost no guests that day a group of the staff and myself went out on the boat for an impromptu sunset island hopping tour. We stopped at a few places and Eewyn and Ieka would take selfies (and even tried giving me a selfie lesson), the guys would fish, and John and I would go snorkeling. On the way back I saw my first Malaysian sunset. Every day so far the horizon had a line of clouds blocking the sunset but that day out on the water we had an incredible sunset with the sun having turned into this giant pink ball of fire. As we neared Pulau Besar the driver of the boat decided to have some fun since there were no tourists on board and ended up doing circles so fast the boat was tilting sideways and us on board were shrieking with laughter while holding on as tight as possible . That jam packed day ended up with Eewyn, Ieka, Ucciel, and Farhan fishing out in the jetty, hanging out, and some ukulele music made an appearance. Thankfully the few times they had me throw a line out I caught nothing. The squid were probably scared away by the sound of the girls screaming - never seen such severe reactions to a cat brushing up against them.

Island hopping with the crew

Since I arrived here I've seen some pretty cool things, the night on the jetty we saw a giant turtle nearly 2m long and John had also told me that large dugongs lived in the area. He tried to draw me a picture but I still had no clue what it was. Then a few days later I was hanging out with some guests on the beach bar when someone shouted "dugong!" And sure enough there was a giant manatee about 2 feet away from the shoreline. Another fascinating thing has been watching the delivery of diesel. While fuel deliveries might not sound too exciting it's pretty fascinating here. The barrels are too heavy to carry off the boat and up the stairs so the boat pulls up, pitches a couples dozen barrels in the sea, then a bunch of staff plunge into the water and swim up to the barrels and push then to shore and roll then up the beach. It's quite the operation and it's hilarious seeing one guy jokingly belly flop onto a barrel and the two guys near him deciding to pile on top of him.

It seems a large number of our current guests are Chinese and I've come to the conclusion that I'd like to be a middle aged Chinese man.  While the younger Chinese crowds spend endless hours taking selfies,the middle aged Chinese men are having fun tossing back beers and glass after glass of whiskey and in the case of the recent guests who were friends of Jasbeers they might be found drinking and sharing their whiskey with Canadian volunteers. I'd take that lifestyle over selfies any day. I've had to restrain myself from having selfie interventions with some guests, the worst case hands down was the newlywed couple dressed up in full wedding attire with TWO professional photographers and even with 2 professionals at their beck and call, out comes the selfie stick. I might have tried to intervene at that point had I not been on the floor hiding behind the counter laughing my ass off. By the end of this trip I will know all about Asian selfie habits.

Beautiful chalets at Aseania (yes I'm staying in one!)

What I've learned: I've learned I will never have a career as a server. I finally figured out the reason I can't carry trays to save my life is that I have a bizarrely bouncy walk.

Things I've done: jungle trekking to the other side of the Island, island hopping, snorkeling, learned how to make Kopi tarik, fell in love with the drink milo (though I still can't figure out what it is...), seen giant sea turtles and manatees, finally starting mixing drinks behind the bar too.

Paradise aka Aseania Resort

For the umpteenth time since I arrived here I have thought is this really my life? Imagine a beautiful tropical island with a perfect beach resort and a really cool boss. That is my life for the next few days/weeks. Aseania is the  beautiful pristine island retreat that I arrived at after Tioman Islands to do my next HelpX thing.

My first night I tried to help out and even awkwardly carried my first tray of fancy drinks. As I reached for the tray I had a sudden flashback to the only time I'd ever done serving for a catering company in Ottawa. When clearing the tables at the end the person who was paired with me piled tons of wine glasses on the tray and said "go". I made it to the kitchen  before having the giant tray topple over. Needless to say I was not called for a second shift. This is what was running through my mind as I started to do a simple task that servers could do with their eyes shut. Luckily no beers, margaritas or tequila sunrises were harmed that night. At least not at my hands.

Over the next while my main task appeared to be manning the beach bar/snorkel rental hut from 12-2 and 4-7 and if we were fully booked then I'd help out at clearing dinner plates and helping Halim out at the bar. Not a bad gig and on slow days  at the beach bar I would get an exceptional amount of reading done. I got to also speak with John a bit, the Indonesian  guy who ran the beach bar during the day. His english wasn't to great but my bahasa malay and Indonesia is nonexistent so no judgement here. We'd talk a bit in broken English and would occasionally refer to his malay-english dictionary whenever one of us would say something that elicited a blank stare. After a week I had a new job added to my tasks. If the beach bar wasn't busy I'd close up early and go for long sunset walks on the beach with Strix, a good looking boy. Only downside was that boy was a dog but who am I to be picky?

I definitely can't go on without mentioning the staff here - the staff and Bosd Jasbeer are amazing. Jasbeer took over about 7 years ago, personally hired all his staff and takes care of them and stands by them and is very proud of his workers; something I definitely believe because there is no turnover, many have been there 7 years. When a communication error leads to a staff making a mistake or bringing something to the wrong table he laughs it off with the guest and makes it seem like he intentionally sent it to them. With the exception of the Malaysian kitchen staff the rest of the staff are from India, Indonesia and Bangladesh and every single one of then are amazing and really nice, somewhat shy, guys. The only female staff here are Watiih and Eewen.  Watiih I have not spoken with much but Eewen is a firecracker who has even invited me to hang with her after work before. She may describe everyone as 'her best friend' but I still am happy to have made the cut even if it's not too exclusive.

Jasbeer has been a fantastic boss and I've thoroughly enjoyed all the late night talks (over beer, wine, mojitos, or whiskey) and I've been lucky enough to have him share his love of food with me in the form of chicken pies and some great Chinese food. The Chinese food was during a Mersing field trip where we went to this Chinese place that's been open for 25 years or so and unlike the "Chinese food" you get in North America this stuff was legit. It's now looking like I'll be staying here for the next month, and if my first week has been any indication  of how things are here it's going to be a great month.

Things I've done: taken drink orders and carried 7 drinks on one tray (I list this as something I've accomplished since I was sure I'd drop it), started to seem like I know a bit around here, drank plenty of brandy with some of the Chinese guests who invited me to join them one evening, bartended (only easy stuff so far), snorkeled a ton on Besar island, and ate way too much food....every single day.

What I've learned: The staff here are troopers. Every time I see their cell phone background and ask who that cute kid is 100% of the time it's theirs. They work here all year long any only see their kids at monsoon  season.  I'm almost afraid to ask one of the guys "who's that kid?" because he looks like a kid himself.

Lonely in Paradise?

Written July 18th (bad wifi)
I have come to the conclusion that everyone on the island belongs to one of two clubs: The couples and The divers. You of course can be a member of both but a member of neither and you begin to feel like somewhat of a pariah. You also get sick of the following two questions which are "wait, so you're here alone?" and/or "so what are you doing on this Island if you're not diving". As a serial monogamist I've been in a relationship since I was 15 so having lost my membership to The Couples is even more difficult to handle here. I mentioned this to my sister and she reminded me of Eat Pray Love, a bizarre coincidence since I went to the book exchange the other day and the only english book was the sequel.

I think the loneliness of travel didn't hit my first few weeks because I was constantly doing stuff or surrounded by people interested in hanging out,regardless of diver or couple status so I've spent the last few days trying to organize my next voluntheer spot and finally a breakthrough. I have a tentative start date! In contrast to the oh so lonely day the next day started with meeting the 2 french girls in the chalet across from me and having free food. It was the second day of the post Ramadan celebration and all the places had opened up their homes and we're encouraging everyone who walked by to come up and have free food. It was like bar hopping but food style. Damn good food too. Together with a few others we spent the day swimming, hammock lounging, and eating far too much, especially at our chalets the South Pacific Chalets where the wonderful owner Tony would convince us to have another round of food each time we passed. I briefly considered asking if whoever cooked the curry was single.

I thought I would feel my most dirty backpacker moments in metropolitan Singapore but instead it was on Tioman Island surrounded by all the Muslim peple dressed in beautiful colourful fabrics with every girl looking like princesses as we sat in jean shorts that were still wet from our bathing suits - Usually the same suit that had been worn days before too. Another bizarre thing we noticed was every child that arrived at a new location would be given 1 ringit. Why did I spend all those years settling for candy on Halloween when kids over here are getting money? The evening I went to the newly opened jetty bar and we listened to live music over tiger beer. Amazing how no matter what country I'm in the live music is always north American songs I recognize and can sing along with.


Things I've done: island hopping in Malaysia, celebrated hari raya(end of ramadan) with lots  of free food, saw dragons as big as crocodiles, saw giant bats as big as cats, snorkeling in Tioman Islands,

Things I've learned: Muslim formal wear is absolutely gorgeous. Even more so when you look at your dirty backpacker self in comparison

Singapore to Malaysia

For the umpteenth time I have confirmed I am a travel masochist. I was walking along the sidewalk the other day and the ground below me gave out. The stones below me actually crumbled leaving me falling about a metre deep, having to climb out with my pack on, the edges of the sidewalk taking some Canadian chunks of flesh as souvenirs. I began thinking 'holy crap Malaysian sidewalks aren't the safest' which quickly morphed into 'holy crap I'm in Malaysia?' 

My last day in Singapore had been a long but good day with the blisters to prove it. From 9am to 10pm I was wandering around the city visiting the sights starting with the expansive Botanical Gardens. JP had mentioned that 40% of Singapore was forests, a fact which is hard to believe considering how small and densely populated it is, but after spending hours through the giant and beautiful Botanical gardens and seeing it wasn't even one of the biggest parks I'll definitely trust him on that statistic. My sightseeing also included visiting the Jurong Bird Park. I'm not normally a bird person but it was pretty cool to see all the different birds there. That said, my time spent as Bismallah Biryani was ten times more enjoyable. JP and his friend Varun recommended it as the best biryani in Singapore, located in Little India and while it was the only one I tried there, I'll agree. The mutton biryani was so delicious that you didn't even notice that the surroundings were not the usual immaculate Singaporean surroundings.

Back at the giant Marina Bay Sands I decided to take a friends advice and I went to the bar Ce La Vie to have the most expensive drink of my life. The view however was fantastic and the drink was delicious, plus it'd feel wrong leaving the country without having a singapore sling. The $29 I spent on one drink may seem ridiculous (and it is) the more ridiculous thing was the people paying $25 to enter the observation deck next to the bar and that does NOT include a drink. After the drink I returned to gardens by the bay and saw the light show put on in the super tree Grove.

After Singapore I entered Malaysia arriving in Mersing and taking the ferry to the Tioman Islands. For 25 rm a night ($8) I found myself at SPBC in an empty dorm room in a bungalow along the beach. I spent hours walking around still mildly in shock that I was in a tropical paradise in a remote Malaysian Island. I'm also in shock at how many people are studying these big books. Clearly proof that everyone on the island (except frugal me) is here for diving or lessons.


Things I've done: most expensive drink ever, walked endless hours in singapore, had Indian food in little India (at a place highly recommended by two Indian friends), sipped a Singapore sling at the top of the Marine Bay Sands hotel, fell though a sidewalk, had te tarik , entered a country through a border crossing (U.S. doesn't count)

Lesson learned: If you are travelling to a Muslim country know when Ramadan is and if you are there when it happens carry a lot of snacks or you may find yourself stranded food less until restaurants open at 7pm.