I always get a certain frisson (I have no idea what it means?) when I search for something and can't find it on facebook. Here for the world... "Hobbitual Expansion" as a term that refers to a director blowing so much air into a plot, novel, or story, that it expands beyond its capacity to hold meaning..
Saturday, December 28, 2013
Friday, December 06, 2013
I crap ornaments and piss tinsel
Oh yeah... Xmas is coming to the land of tomorrow, and with December reached I simply can't be cranky about how many lights are up, and how ubiquitous the xmas songs are...
I believe, tomorrow night, I will go out and take pictures of the neonstrous awesomeness of this city as Santa Day gets closer.^^
I believe, tomorrow night, I will go out and take pictures of the neonstrous awesomeness of this city as Santa Day gets closer.^^
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
I have a pain in my Sydney...
Monday July 29th,
from KL to Melbourne Int. (Some evil portents are seen!)
Tuesday July 30 Travel to Geelong
In the morning it was back to the airport to catch a bus to something like a City Center and then a train to Geelong.
Wednesday July 31 – to Sydney
On Tuesday we woke early (like 3:30 AM) and got a ride to the airport from a particularly garrulous lorry-driver who really, REALLY liked sports. The transport company insisted on picking us up at 4:00 for a 6:10 flight. When we got there we were the only non-employees in the airport, and the flight had already been delayed. So.. a lot of waiting.
Thursday Aug 1
We managed to get up before 11 – I’m not sure what kind of laziness assails us on vacation, but it is a profound one. We hung out for a while then headed out.
Saturday Aug 3
We grabbed a ferry to the Circular Quay and headed to the Museum of Sydney. This was kind of cool, with a history of the city, some decent stuff on the Aboriginal experience (a phrase that pretty much means “Aboriginal genocide”), and an exhaustive exploration of the development of the Sydney Opera House.
You ask how far the farthest star is
To go by bus or to go by car?
Is the way too far? you couldn't say
You won't get there anyway
He says it takes a private plane
Tuesday was a travel day.. just off to the airport by
shuttle-car and a nearly 8 hour flight to Melbourne, where we were waiting to
travel to Sydney, because a professor at Dongguk was supposed to be in Sydney.
We had jiggered our schedule so that even though we landed in Melbourne we
would immediately go to Sydney. That professor then bailed on Australia,
leaving us with slightly odd travel plans.
In Melbourne, because we arrived at 11:30 pm, we’d taken a
hotel that was close to the airport.
At the airport, my bank card was declined by the ATM. I was a bit
concerned, because sometimes Korean bank/credit cards don’t travel as well as
they should. When I asked a man at an exchange kiosk, however, he laughed and
said, “Oh, don’t worry, it’s just that VISA isn’t working on our machines.”
So, like, half the credit cards in the world, and the only
ones I have? Yep!
Then I went to the bathroom and saw what I took to be a poor marketing approach:
Then I went to the bathroom and saw what I took to be a poor marketing approach:
Er... really? "Minimum Size?" |
We got to the hotel just as the restaurant closed,
discovered no mini-bar, water, or food of any kind, and headed down to the
reception to discuss options. I said I wanted to exchange some money and find a
store, and the nice woman there said there was a 7-11 about 15 minutes down the
road.
We walked down there, Yvonne gibbering all the way about how
dark it was, and when we finally found it, to my dismay they did not sell beer
(this was my first introduction to the BS, “London circa 1970” alcohol rules in
Australia). Fortunately, however,
my VISA card did work here, so we had some scratch.
A quick walk back and we micro-waved the entirely artificial
potato and mash concoction that Yvonne had purchased, and while she took a
shower I tried the Internet.
Which, was pay by the minute, and also had to be set up by
the women at the desk, and since they were already asleep (probably had a
champagne room set up for personal use after work!) it couldn’t be done.
Still, there was one epic feature to the Internet plan that
made me think that the Australian Internet Scheme was not a plan so cunning that
it would make a weasel stand up and salute (oh, c’mon, if you don’t recognize
that reference… uh.. likely you have a life?).
You could buy 15 minutes for $2AUD or and hour for $10AUD. I
was tired, out of sorts, and sober, but even I could do the math on that one. I
wanted to march down to the front-desk, plop down my ten and when they started
to ring it up, say… oh…. Wait.. and pull out the $2 coin and say.. nah.. 15
minutes… And then do that until the first hour was over.
Alas, my plan for a ridiculous and petty revenge could not
be put into effect as the staff were in the Champagne Room.
I went to sleep hissing, and planning to take revenge on Australia as a whole.
I went to sleep hissing, and planning to take revenge on Australia as a whole.
Tuesday July 30 Travel to Geelong
In the morning it was back to the airport to catch a bus to something like a City Center and then a train to Geelong.
This took longer than expected.
Then, there was one of those moments that makes no sense
to me. Yvonne and I got our train tickets, and they were for the un-reserved
first two cars of the train. We sat opposite each other in a four-seat cluster
of two facing benches. The train continued to fill up, and never quite did,
with a sprinkling of seats throughout the car.
Just as the train was about to pull out of the station, our train car titled downwards behind me, and a fellow who might have been Mr. Creosote, lumbered in.
Now, it’s a reasonable assumption that as jelly-filled fat
fuck (a phrase for which I will always be grateful to my Brother-in-Law for
bringing to my attention^^) myself, I might at any time be the chubbiest fellow in any particular
overseas train car, and it’s possible that this was the case here.
Which is why it is bizarre, completely beyond bizarre
actually, that Rotundo The Wonder Beast immediately slumped down beside me.
By which I actually mean, half on me.
The dude had enough spare ham on his thigh to feed an entire
Saudi Arabian (non-Muslim, I guess) village. And that massive ham was now spread across the lower half of my body.
I looked across the aisle to Yvonne who was trying, about
50% successfully, to stifle an enormous grin.
My guess is that Elephant Man chose the seat he did because it was
closest to the entrance, and trust me that’s a lesson learned.
His Expansiveness also talked continuously on his cellphone (example
witticism - “that dude is a douchebag!”) and had managed to lose his ticket in the 30 meters
from the station to the train. I presume he lost the ticket into some fold of his own flesh, from which he would later pick it, rancid and moldy, and then surreptitiously eat it. Or, since the dude was big enough to have gravity along the lines of a Black Hole, the poor flighty ticket had been sucked into his gravitational field, and instantly destroyed.
That was all good, because it gave him an excuse to get up,
pat himself in a process that disconnected his shirt from its tuck-in and
revealed his underwear, and then WWF fashion, drop 300 pounds of right leg onto
me again.
Geelong was nice enough. Pretty in that clapboard (that
might not be the word I’m looking for…. Gingerbread? Artificial?) way that much
of Australia is, and we wandered about it, mainly trying to adapt to Australian
accents.
We quickly hit the three bookstores on the map and then,
while I shopped for drugs and alcohol, Yvonne went back to the best one.
Then, rain threatening, we headed back to the hotel.
As we had to wake early, rocket-scientist, international
planner, and my wife, Yvonne? She
came up with a plan… We would go to bed at 9 and this would give us a restful
6.5 hours of sleep.
Which never works with me. If I go to sleep that early I always wake up in the middle of the night and can’t go back to sleep.
Which never works with me. If I go to sleep that early I always wake up in the middle of the night and can’t go back to sleep.
Combine that with the “night before Xmas” feeling of being
about to go to a new place and I slept about 15 minutes
all that night.
Wednesday July 31 – to Sydney
Sittin' in the mornin' sun
I'll be sittin' when the evenin' come
Watching the ships roll in
And then I watch 'em roll away again, yeah
On Tuesday we woke early (like 3:30 AM) and got a ride to the airport from a particularly garrulous lorry-driver who really, REALLY liked sports. The transport company insisted on picking us up at 4:00 for a 6:10 flight. When we got there we were the only non-employees in the airport, and the flight had already been delayed. So.. a lot of waiting.
Then a quick flight (slowed slightly by a delay through
which we circled over Canberra, so now I’m going to claim I’ve ‘visited’ the
place) to Sydney and an equally quick ride (The multipass deal in Sydney is
just brilliant) on the public transport to Double Bay, at which we arrived
about 5 hours before our scheduled check-in with our airbnb host. So, we hung
around on the beach, dodged some rain, and eventually settled in at a coffee
shop for a slow cup of coffee. At the coffee shop I was introduced to an evil
truth about Sydney – it is VERY wireless unfriendly. I could see the router of
the coffee shop, but when Yvonne went to ask for a password, the man mumbled
something from between his beak of a nose and landslide of a chin (a very
Australian look) about “downloads” and claimed there was no Internet
available. Oh well. Many places don’t have wireless at all,
and those that do are tightly locked down and you stand a reasonable chance of
being denied access if you have the temerity to ask. Nonetheless, it was
remarkable to see that someone, some dastardly bastard, had created a network
with the exact same name as the coffee shop! Will the temerity of these internet imposters never cease?
Then it was back to the beach to watch the ferries to roll in and out.
Then it was back to the beach to watch the ferries to roll in and out.
After stalling til about noon, Yvonne was getting
super-antsy, so we picked up the keys (among three other sets under the gnomes
in front of the building!) and dropped off our luggage, quickly went shopping
for some food, and then headed downtown to check out a bookstore.
This short trip revealed to me that Sydney is a REALLY
beautiful town, and I can only blame my mother for not having taken me there as
a youth, so I would have known.
Lots of brick buildings and intricate ironworks, in some
ways it reminds me of New Orleans, and every so often a lovely park, or a
stunning view of the harbor. We
ended up in Hyde Park, watching old men (including a really irascible and mouthy
old asian dude) playing chess on one of those on-ground, laid-out chessboards.
After a bus trip back, we finally met our host, and whiled
away the evening over a bottle of red wine and a series of his amusingly
escalating (in proportion to wine consumed) jibes at Australians and their
culture.
At just about midnight, exhausted from lack of sleep, we
turned in.
Thursday Aug 1
It’s just another story of love that’s turned into a tragedy
What am I supposed to do, you want a toast from the man who’s lost
The man who was double-crossed?
From cover to cover?
Baby, you and me were just book lovers.
As always, the first full day is bookstores. We spent
considerable time on busses and found about three of them, all pretty cool. On
the way back, and partly because I needed to find a bathroom (really,
bookstores WITHOUT bathrooms? Sydney, what are you thinking?) we headed into
Sydney University and found a young lad playing simultaneous chess with about
10 challengers.
They Seem to Like their Chess, some, in Sydney |
I headed off to find the bathroom, slowly listening to
Yvonne’s voice dissapear into the background, muttering things to onlookers
like “That’s a Yahtzee! That’s gotta be a Yahtzee” and “well, he certainly
trumped the wicket on that play. Fair dinkum down the old dijideroo on that
one, I do say!”
I fear her efforts to fit in did not work out.
Then, off to two more bookstores and the shocking
realization that Sydney is not a first-world city – it does not have nearly
comprehensive nor in any way speedy, Internet. It’s an AOL world here, and it’s
one of the things I really disliked about an otherwise beautiful city.
Then it was out to the Circular Quay for a trip to Double
Bay. Returning home our landlord(?) warned us that he would be in late the
following evening, as his company was having a 휘식 (work
drink-along) to reward salesmen for good performance. The original bar tab was set at $400 comprehensively, but as
a performance bonus some good salesmen (electricity contracts) would get an
extra $40 bar tab each.
Our host warned us not to expect him in early.
Our host warned us not to expect him in early.
Friday Aug 2
There was no one all around
There was no one there but me
I was staring out a window
I was standing by the sea
The waves kept on repeating
Each one crashing to the shore
And my footprints nowhere leading
As they disappeared once more
We managed to get up before 11 – I’m not sure what kind of laziness assails us on vacation, but it is a profound one. We hung out for a while then headed out.
There was one more bookstore to hit, and it was about three
blocks from Bondi Beach, which is also the start of a brief (3 KM) beach walk,
so we grabbed a bus there. After a water and coffee (I’m sure it’s obvious
which of us had which), we went to the bookstore and then down to the beach.
As a California guy I’m pretty proud of our beaches, but
Australian beaches crush US beaches into the sand (pretty appropriate, I
think).
We sat on the beach for an hour or two and then headed out on the coastal walk there. It is very short, just over three kilometers, but manages to include three beaches, two of which have “seafront” swimming pools, both of which were being pummelled by the surf.
We sat on the beach for an hour or two and then headed out on the coastal walk there. It is very short, just over three kilometers, but manages to include three beaches, two of which have “seafront” swimming pools, both of which were being pummelled by the surf.
At the second one Yvonne (pace Jennifer!) made the mistake
of turning her back to the sea, and while I was filming excellent shots of the
waves pounding the beach?
Yvonne was busy getting drenched:
Yvonne was busy getting drenched:
After getting drenched, while taking this picture of me -
she decided to get filthy, and so she stepped into a mud-pit that grabbed her left leg just about to the knee. So then it was off to the beach, where she removed her sock and shoe, rolled up her pants, and tried to clean the sock and shoe. Which wouldn’t work, because she stood facing the sea bending over to dunk her dirty clothes, but as soon as a wave came in, she quickly ran away from it. After this happened a few times I became cross, and when the next wave came I pushed her into the sea.
she decided to get filthy, and so she stepped into a mud-pit that grabbed her left leg just about to the knee. So then it was off to the beach, where she removed her sock and shoe, rolled up her pants, and tried to clean the sock and shoe. Which wouldn’t work, because she stood facing the sea bending over to dunk her dirty clothes, but as soon as a wave came in, she quickly ran away from it. After this happened a few times I became cross, and when the next wave came I pushed her into the sea.
Awesome!
Everything clean.
A buss ride brought us to Harbour, where we walked around
amongst other tourists, by the Maritime Museum, a boat show, and several other
things that didn’t interest me in the least, and then we finally found the
ferry stop. So we took the ferry to Circular, then another to Double Bay. This
was the only time we actually crossed under the bridge (and by the alarmingly lunatic
gate to Luna park) on our way past the Opera House, and it was grand.
We went home, certain that we would go to sleep and hear our
host crash in, knocking various things to the ground as he entered.
Instead the innkeeper came in at about 10:45, retreated to his room where he apparently undressed to
his shorts and t-shirt and then opened the door and asked how he looked.
I said, "ok," and ran for the safety of our bedroom.
I said, "ok," and ran for the safety of our bedroom.
About 5 minutes later, as we lay in bed, we heard him rush
to the bathroom and be briefly but noisily sick.
We laughed in a sympathetic way (well, maybe not Yvonne?)
and went to bed our badselves…
Saturday Aug 3
Hey Mr. Bartender, won’t you give some wine?
I gotta get outta town meet my lady on time.
Put 5 gallons in my petrol tank
You know we just about made it but my breath sure stank.
The Internet in the pad is broken, which has required me to
entertain myself in unusual ways. So it is that at 7:30 in the evening I am
sitting on the back lawn of the lodging, with the sea, less than twenty metres
away, pounding at the sand in its ongoing battle to reduce it. Every now and then
a ferry boat comes in, or a a pleasure boat docks for the evening. But,
primarily, it is me and the sound of tide thumping against the land.
Oh, well, that and a couple of beers and the noble sounds of
Mott the Hoople thrashing from the iPhone (all you youngsters should look that
stuff up).
Today, we awoke reasonably early and attendant to the fact
that our host was likely living in world of regret, we trod lightly and exited
early. We made some breakfast, packed some lunch, and headed to the ferry to
catch a boat to Circular Quay.
Then we spent about 4 hours walking from hither to thither, and yon
beyond. This included the Sydney Opera House, which is as cool as pictures
suggest.
Next death march was through the adjacent Botanical Gardens (with a stop at the Governor’s House), which were absolutely brilliant. While I continue to have some kind of reaction to the looks of the Australian people, the city of Sydney is nothing other than drop-dead gorgeous. Next it was out to MacQuarrie’s Bench - or some equally unbelievable name which describes a brilliant folly of empire – a governor wasting money on a road and a bench carved into rock on the beach. And why? So his wife could go out there conveniently and have a place to sit.
Next death march was through the adjacent Botanical Gardens (with a stop at the Governor’s House), which were absolutely brilliant. While I continue to have some kind of reaction to the looks of the Australian people, the city of Sydney is nothing other than drop-dead gorgeous. Next it was out to MacQuarrie’s Bench - or some equally unbelievable name which describes a brilliant folly of empire – a governor wasting money on a road and a bench carved into rock on the beach. And why? So his wife could go out there conveniently and have a place to sit.
Empires are AWESOME!
And as I type those words it all makes sense – he wanted the
ball-and-chain out of the house and had the particular means to accomplish it,
even if it meant wasting municipal funds. The guy built a road and stone chair
with British Imperail money, just to get his wife out of the damned house.
Now THAT allows a British fellow a means by which to
maintain his stiff upper lip!
Then a walk back to the NSW Art Museum which is free and
pretty vast. The museum has its share of modern ‘art’ nonsense. I don’t think I
will ever be impressed by a ‘painting’ that is 9 square meters of a single
color on rough canvas, even if the notes are relentlessly inventive in
imploring us to see its “roughness, varied strokes, and alterations in depth.” Honestly, that sounds like the
description of a gay porno, and ever since the Internet has become ubiquitous,
I won’t pay for that, either.
Tuckered, we headed back to Hyde Park and watched a bit more chess on the “walk-on” chess board. On the way there a friendly guy in a park saw me looking for my map and asked where we were going. He agreed with our assessment that it was on the other side of the church we were looking at, but added that if we walked to the stairs of the nearby carpark we could go to its lowest level and take an automated walkway to Hyde Park. He was correct, it was excellent, and the moron that I am, I filmed most of it.
Tuckered, we headed back to Hyde Park and watched a bit more chess on the “walk-on” chess board. On the way there a friendly guy in a park saw me looking for my map and asked where we were going. He agreed with our assessment that it was on the other side of the church we were looking at, but added that if we walked to the stairs of the nearby carpark we could go to its lowest level and take an automated walkway to Hyde Park. He was correct, it was excellent, and the moron that I am, I filmed most of it.
Then it was back to Double Bay, a short trip to the store,
one pint at the pub, and a return to home to eat some pizza and be very quiet
as our landlord (judging by what was in the sink) had risen only to make some
pasta, and was back asleep in his room.
Then, out to this backyard. A bit brisk, but in clear
Australian air, and drop-dead scenic.
And, beer.
And Mott the Hoople.
Sunday August 4th
I come from London town
I'm just an ordinary guy
Fridays I go painting in the Louvre
I'm bound to be proposing on a Saturday night
There he goes again
I'll be lazing on a Sunday lazing on a Sunday
Lazing on a Sunday afternoon
A cup of coffee and a quick bite at a local café – not the
one that denied us internet access on our first day, but one that, true to
Sydney’s lame form, simply did not have internet access at all.
Then, Yvonne style, it was off to look for even more bookstores
and we kind of lucked out.
The Ampersand café lied to me that it shut its internet down
on weekends, but I tried the password and it worked. Duplicitous Aussie
weasels! At the same time, the attached bookstore was awesome - several floors with overstuffed
chairs and couches to sit on, food could be served in the bookstore, and a wide
range of books though, predictably for this trip, nothing that served me.
Across the street and down was the BerkouW bookstore, which was also pretty
cool, and we wasted a few more minutes there, before walking downtown to the
Australian Naitonal Museum, which had some cool things in it, the coolest of
which were unrelated to the main goals of the museum. The first was a wildlife
photography contest winners exhibition. There were many pictures of cute, cute
animals, several instances of nature red in tooth and claw, and every one with
some little bromide about the responsibility mankind has to nature. I was so
overwhelmed by this message, that when we finally did leave the museum I went
up to the first obese pigeon I could find and tried to punt the bugger into
next week. The other exhibit
was a Charles Addams exhibit. I’m guessing this means he was born in Australia,
but couldn’t be bothered to look beyond the cartoons themselves, some of which
were as funny as I remembered, and the remainder had to do with the Adams
Family, which I suspect was his largest paycheck.
When we returned home our publican had returned to the land
of the living and we had an excellent conversation while he was cooking his
curry (for the second night straight we were on take-and-bake pizza as we had
brought two home the previous night, suspecting our landlord would be in no
condition to cook, not that he would still be locked in his bedroom).
Monday August 5th
We grabbed a ferry to the Circular Quay and headed to the Museum of Sydney. This was kind of cool, with a history of the city, some decent stuff on the Aboriginal experience (a phrase that pretty much means “Aboriginal genocide”), and an exhaustive exploration of the development of the Sydney Opera House.
Then a short walk to the Sydney Barracks, which we toured
the outside of before Yvonne decided to go inside. At $10 it didn’t really
interest me as much as a glass of wine at the adjoining café, so Yvonne went in
and I sat down for a glass of wine. Which, I was quickly informed I couldn’t
have unless I ordered something to eat (Did I mention that, for a nation of laddish
drunks, Australia has some very bizarre licensing codes?). I had coffee
instead. Then, as the sun dropped behind the buildings of Sydney, I waited in
the courtyard for Yvonne. Because I was not inside the museum, Yvonne found it
very interesting and consequently refused to leave. I sat in the sandy, now
dark, courtyard contemplating the rise and fall of empires, the inexorable
passage of glaciers, and the eventual heat-death of the universe.
Here is where All Time Ends... |
Inside, Yvonne minutely examined various scraps of cloth,
and shards of broken pottery indistinguishable from the contents of the rubbish
bin behind our rental.
Galaxies exploded into life, then imploded and disappeared. Life forms evolved, took their days in the sun then faded into oblivion.
Galaxies exploded into life, then imploded and disappeared. Life forms evolved, took their days in the sun then faded into oblivion.
Some time later, Yvonne emerged from the barracks.
Then, because Yvonne wanted to see more of the bay, it was
off to the Circular Quay to catch the big ferry to Manly. Manly is one of those
pre-fab surfer towns (some old and cool architecture notwithstanding) which
attempts to hover precariously between tattooed cool and naked merchandising,
with the latter having the upper hand. The beaches were vastly inferior to those
of Bondi, Coogee, etc, as they weren’t very dramatic. The main entertainments
of the town came from the fact that everything was the “Manly this” and “Manly
that” which sometimes made for amusing place names, such as the “Manly
Olympian” and “Manly public Toilets.”
This is a joke I’m sure the residents of Manly found amusing for the
first 13 minutes of their "Manly" (LOL! It NEVER gets old!) lives, and then found tedious beyond
belief.
Yvonne insisted on staying until darkness fell, and when we
got on the back of the ferry, which unaccountably turned out to be the front of
the ferry (it doesn’t turn around.. apparently having five gears in reverse as
well as forward). Consequently we were whipped by the frigid gales which blew
over the harbor, or at least until we were nearly crushed by the horde of
alarmed photographers who had rushed to the ‘front’ of the ferry, only to
discover that it was now the back of the thing.
That realisation occasioned a mad rush to where we sat at
the end (front? Back?) of the front/back of the ferry, and I was quite
surprised we didn’t have a Marx Brothers moment where the entire ship listed
towards the bow, prior to all of us being dumped into the water and drowning.
As we approached the middle of the harbour, the photographers began snapping
away in earnest, nearly a third of them with their flash-units fully engaged,
despite the fact that the nearest object they could be photographing, unless it
was my charming and photogenic bald spot, was 500 meters away.
Once home, I defrosted in a bath of beer, applied
internally, and we went to sleep relatively early for the trip to Alice Springs.
POSTSCRIPT...
POSTSCRIPT...
We have plenty of extra photos of all this. But most of you refuse to come over to our house.
We'll have the slide-projector cued up, just in case.
But we're prepared to never have to use it.
We'll have the slide-projector cued up, just in case.
But we're prepared to never have to use it.
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Malaysia Ends, MalAustralia Ensues
Day 7 26th - Into the Jungle / Day 8 Saturday July 27th / Day 9 Sunday July 28th?
On our last day we had a choice between Penang Hill and the National Forest at the end of the island. We opted for the latter, which required hopping a bus and riding out past Batu Ferringetti (however it's spelled), and near the end there was some confusion (I had some trouble with the guy's accent) about where to get off, which the bus driver finally ended by telling us we were"at the end of the world." This we understood, and decamped. Outside the park there was a line of touts, each trying to sell a boat service to somewhere, and we decided to arrange it so that we could "trek" first, and then get picked up by a boat to return.
The "trek" actually turned out to be such a thing.. a walk through some densely overgrown jungle, scrambling up muddy bits, down roped bits, and across tangles of roots. The most exciting thing we saw as a gigantic, as in four-foot long, lizard, which I took an absolutely impenetrable picture of.
After a bit more slogging we got to the beach. There was a little inlet we had to cross which turned out to be much deeper than it looked. It was a good thing I had shifted my iPhone to my backpack or it would have been drowned. The beach was named "Monkey Beach" and true to its name had a monkey, just the one, who was dispiritedly tearing old potato-chip bags apart and licking at the salt within.
Then there was the beach.
It was clearly off-season, so there was nothing to do but suck down a coke, watch the waves crash, and stare longingly at each boat that came ashore, hoping it was finally ours.
Finally, ours did come, and we were away across the water, which was nice and refreshing? Here is Yvonne enjoying the moment (Note the noble mien!).
\
Then, after a slogging and sweaty walk towards the tourist area of town, we stopped for a bite and were "befriended" by two cats who wanted our food. One of them was quite amusing - it would swat with its claws if you were brave enough to try and touch it, but oh could it meow piteously if it thought you had food.
NEXT MORNING
The next morning, we got up and got ready to catch the bus to the airport, but Yvonne made a command decision, so instead we got the hotel service, which left us at the airport about three hours early.
and there we waited. Generally speaking, a boring day.
IN TOWN
The next day is no less boring, as I stayed in the hotel room working on blog posts and Yvonne meandered into town, this time managing to avoid gambling houses or friends in Itaewon (you?d have to be a mad reader of this irregular blog to understand those references, but so what? Reading is fundamental)
The big move is tomorrow!
I'm tryinna keep a date
with my little girl that was back in the states
I?m standing in the jungle
I?m afraid of it all?
On our last day we had a choice between Penang Hill and the National Forest at the end of the island. We opted for the latter, which required hopping a bus and riding out past Batu Ferringetti (however it's spelled), and near the end there was some confusion (I had some trouble with the guy's accent) about where to get off, which the bus driver finally ended by telling us we were"at the end of the world." This we understood, and decamped. Outside the park there was a line of touts, each trying to sell a boat service to somewhere, and we decided to arrange it so that we could "trek" first, and then get picked up by a boat to return.
The "trek" actually turned out to be such a thing.. a walk through some densely overgrown jungle, scrambling up muddy bits, down roped bits, and across tangles of roots. The most exciting thing we saw as a gigantic, as in four-foot long, lizard, which I took an absolutely impenetrable picture of.
It's in there, and it's TERRIFYING! |
After a bit more slogging we got to the beach. There was a little inlet we had to cross which turned out to be much deeper than it looked. It was a good thing I had shifted my iPhone to my backpack or it would have been drowned. The beach was named "Monkey Beach" and true to its name had a monkey, just the one, who was dispiritedly tearing old potato-chip bags apart and licking at the salt within.
Then there was the beach.
It was clearly off-season, so there was nothing to do but suck down a coke, watch the waves crash, and stare longingly at each boat that came ashore, hoping it was finally ours.
Finally, ours did come, and we were away across the water, which was nice and refreshing? Here is Yvonne enjoying the moment (Note the noble mien!).
\
Then, after a slogging and sweaty walk towards the tourist area of town, we stopped for a bite and were "befriended" by two cats who wanted our food. One of them was quite amusing - it would swat with its claws if you were brave enough to try and touch it, but oh could it meow piteously if it thought you had food.
NEXT MORNING
The next morning, we got up and got ready to catch the bus to the airport, but Yvonne made a command decision, so instead we got the hotel service, which left us at the airport about three hours early.
and there we waited. Generally speaking, a boring day.
IN TOWN
The next day is no less boring, as I stayed in the hotel room working on blog posts and Yvonne meandered into town, this time managing to avoid gambling houses or friends in Itaewon (you?d have to be a mad reader of this irregular blog to understand those references, but so what? Reading is fundamental)
The big move is tomorrow!
Wednesday, August 07, 2013
Malaysia Day Six.... the long walk to nowhere
Day six and seven were just different versions of wandering about. On day six we tried to catch the last of the spots that Google has listed for used bookstores, which required us to travel back down towards the Clan Jettys and just come across what we come across. That included a couple of inscrutable temples, which are shown just below.
The "bookstores" on the other hand, were all actually book publishers picked up by Google's lazy search algorithm.
Incense |
No incense |
Yvonne, as always missing no opportunity to piss of the locals, made sport of several representations of grand men.
Of course we ended up back to the Red Garden Food Paradise and I made the mistake I make in every country (and will make again in Melbourne) of trying to eat Korean food overseas. With the exception of a few places in California, this never ends well, and this time was not different as the kimbap arrived limp, covered in a thick layer of grease that is clear even in my non-photograpic quality photograph, and full of chewy tastelessness. Yvonne had one piece, sneered, and returned to contemplating the various duck dishes offered at the place.
Tomorrow would mark our last full day in Penang, and we felt a bit like the jungle
At least, my stomach did, after that kimbap.
Malaysia: Day Five
Day Five Wednesday 24 -
Was supposed to be a trek up Penang Hill, but we decided to
head to the beach. The beaches here are not as cool as those in Langkawi, which
is not that far away by ferry, as we seem to have discovered by all the offers
in shop windows to purchase tickets to Langkawi. We caught the 101 bus in
Georgetown, which took about 45 minutes to get us to Batu Ferringhi. We got
there at noon and pretty much everything was buttoned up. The beach is narrow
and the tide was almost all the way up it, so the only way to use it was to
stay at one of the few open shops which faced the beach. We went back to the
main street and had a rice lunch, stopped at a store for drinks, and then
headed back onto the beach.
I took of my shoes, immediately stubbed my toe, and headed
into the water which was awesomely warm. I was considering making fun of Yvonne
for staying all dressed and shoed up, but for some reason didn’t. Which was
good, because when I got out of the water the sunlight revealed I had torn the
tip of my big-toe-skin off. LOL… hadn’t noticed the bleeding til I was back out
of the water.
And my walking for the day was over.
I thought!
As it turned out, Yvonne had bought tickets to Gurney Plaza,
because she knew there were some bookstores there. So, then, with bloody toe
tightly encased in a bandaid, sock and shoe, I had to follow Yvonne from pillar to post as we
looked for bookstores. First stop MPH, which was just a boring regular old
bookstore in an upscale mall.
The next stop was more fun, as I figured out from the Google
map that the bookstore must have been in one of the old fashioned, many-storied
interior malls across the street from the Penang Adventist Hospital. We rolled
up the stairs and around each floor, but no bookstore. I spotted a little
corridor rolling off to the back, which led us to another little internal mall,
and lo and behold, the bookstore was there on the 4th floor. If I
hadn’t been dizzy from blood-loss, I would have celebrated. It’s an interesting
place, with a group of older men playing some kind of dominoes/card game next
to me, and two kids playing some kind of card game. Lots of fantasy type
posters, books, and games. Get your nerd fix here!
Then, a stagger back to the food court and the hotel.
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Malaysia or Korea as tourist destination?
LOL.. why Malaysia is a better tourist destination than Korea?
1) Not one Malaysian has asked me about Malaysian disputes with Indonesia
2) Not one Malaysian has asked me if I "know" any indigenous food
3) When I order something spicy they give it to me without asking "If I can eat spicy food?"
4) They don't care where I come from, if I'm married, or if my wife is Malaysian>
5) AWESOME beaches.?
1) Not one Malaysian has asked me about Malaysian disputes with Indonesia
2) Not one Malaysian has asked me if I "know" any indigenous food
3) When I order something spicy they give it to me without asking "If I can eat spicy food?"
4) They don't care where I come from, if I'm married, or if my wife is Malaysian>
5) AWESOME beaches.?
Malaysia Day Four
On the Pier |
In the Family Quay |
House on the Quay |
Toilet for Tourists |
Tuesday morning was for exploring.. which for Yvonne, means finding bookstores. The internet connection continued to be chancy, but we finally got a good Google map of where the bookstores were. By luck, our hotel was less than five minutes walk away from a cluster of bookstores, and we checked out about four of them.
Seoul taxi drivers are well known for their devil-may-care attitude about things that include speed limits, lane markings, zebra-crossings, and the law of physics that demands that two objects cannot simultaneously inhabit the same space. In Penang, however, Seoul taxi drivers would seem like little old ladies – tremulous, careful, and ridiculously conservative. Scooters, cars and buses ricochet around the city, and walking the streets becomes something like living inside of a pinball machine, and you’re the money ball.
In Little India I had some kind of delicious street-food – a kind of potato and corn tart with a lot of some kind of red spice. This would later come back to haunt me.
In Little India I had some kind of delicious street-food – a kind of potato and corn tart with a lot of some kind of red spice. This would later come back to haunt me.
Then it was a walk down to the quays, which were quaint and antiquated, not too mention thoroughly commercialized. My favorite thing, I think, was the “bathroom” for tourists.. a rectangular hole in a slab of concrete, a hole that opened directly to the bay below, and beneath which swam hordes of little fishies, all looking to get “lucky” when someone had to use the bathroom. I think that tells you all you need to know about how horrible it is to be a fish, and if I ever am to be reincarnated on the wheel of life, I know have a pretty good idea of where I’ll end up.^^
Then, as we walked to Fort Cornwall, we noticed the “hop and
stop” free bus for tourists and with that devil-may-care attitude that makes us
popular among test pilots, extreme adventurers, bareback gays, and heterosexual
priests, we hopped onboard. The
bus runs from the ferry to the tallest building in Georgetown, in a tight loop
that is occasionally the same roads, and the bus, mercifully, is
air-conditioned.
We ran the loop until it passed Fort Cornwall again, where
we decamped. The fort wasn’t all that, but at 2 Ringgit it didn’t have to be,
and it did allow me to take this picture of Yvonne, nobly defending the Empire
against the wogs what begins at Calais.
Defender of Empire |
And, then imprisoned for her imperial excesses:
Jailhouse Rock |
Somewhere along the sweaty way Yvonne left her sweater (Yes
Virginia, 32 degrees and Yvonne wore a sweater) behind, and I gallantly stayed
put under the shade of some trees while she had to go back and retrieve it.
Then a walk to the hotel, where we luxuriated in the Air-con
for a bit, before heading out for a late afternoon bit of Indian food. Yvonne
headed off to do some shopping at the bookstores, while I headed back to the
hotel to face Buttocalypse from my morning’s food. The less said, the better.^^
When Yvonne returned we headed back to the Red Food Court,
had some light snacks, and chilled.
Back to the hotel, watched some ridiculous TV (ridiculous,
but after three years of not having a TV I find most anything on it intriguing)
and another night of air-conditioned slumber.
“It’s just the same thing, the same way, every day:
Stupefaction!”
Malaysia Day Three
Day Three was supposed to only be a transit day, but it turned into a little more than that.
Our plan didn’t leave KL until 8, so we had a lot of waste-time to fill up.
At checkout at noon we left our bags at the front of the hotel and went across the freeway to “KLIA Airport Town,” Which was three dusty rows of businesses backed by housing. It was primarily restaurants, a couple of stores, and the odd automobile related business. It took us about 15 minutes to canvas the whole thing, and we were back to the Hotel, and off to KLIA. We stayed at KLIA for an hour or two, had lunch, and I struggled with the internet connectivity, which was incredibly crappy.
Then it was a bus to LCCT where I huddled in the Starbucks (again, crappy internet) while Yvonne shopped for an hour in the bookstore. Then it was off to the McDonalds, where we could sit outside with just a bag of fries, and wait. Finally, into the waiting room, where the LCCT internet was crappy UNTIL I tried to hook the iPhone up to it and then use the iPhone as an anchor. The minute I did this, however, it knocked some kind of sense into the wireless router, and the laptop worked. Twice the laptop went offline and couldn’t re-connect, but the minute I fired up the iPhone, the same miracle occurred.
I have no idea why.
The trip to Penang was about 40 minutes and we were picked up from the airport. Because it was still before 10:00, we decided to go out and check out the neighborhood. Turns out, we’re in party central. We walked past one place that was.. well.. the loudest in the world, but I can’t get the sound clip to work.^^
I tried to get killed at an intersection when I looked at the street light and it was counting down from 30 seconds. I interpreted this to mean that I had 30 seconds to cross the street, and started across, only to have a small car whiz by right in front of me. Self-righteously I flipped the car off, only to hear Yvonne yell, “Charlie, what are you doing?” I said I was crossing the street and Yvonne then told me that wasn’t a good thing to do when the cross traffic had a green light. Ooops… the red (Yeah.. RED!) numbers were counting down UNTIL the light turned green and I was an idiot.
I survived, however, and we continued to walk around and look for a place to have a quick seat/bite. Finally, we settled on the Red Garden, which is hard to explain, so here is a movie of it in which you can see what it contains..
And here is what is sounds like in full fury And when it is fully rocking
I had beer, Yvonne had a Pepsi, and we split a few pieces of salmon sushi. Just before midnight, we headed across the street to the motel, and passed out in untidy heaps.
Our plan didn’t leave KL until 8, so we had a lot of waste-time to fill up.
At checkout at noon we left our bags at the front of the hotel and went across the freeway to “KLIA Airport Town,” Which was three dusty rows of businesses backed by housing. It was primarily restaurants, a couple of stores, and the odd automobile related business. It took us about 15 minutes to canvas the whole thing, and we were back to the Hotel, and off to KLIA. We stayed at KLIA for an hour or two, had lunch, and I struggled with the internet connectivity, which was incredibly crappy.
Then it was a bus to LCCT where I huddled in the Starbucks (again, crappy internet) while Yvonne shopped for an hour in the bookstore. Then it was off to the McDonalds, where we could sit outside with just a bag of fries, and wait. Finally, into the waiting room, where the LCCT internet was crappy UNTIL I tried to hook the iPhone up to it and then use the iPhone as an anchor. The minute I did this, however, it knocked some kind of sense into the wireless router, and the laptop worked. Twice the laptop went offline and couldn’t re-connect, but the minute I fired up the iPhone, the same miracle occurred.
I have no idea why.
The trip to Penang was about 40 minutes and we were picked up from the airport. Because it was still before 10:00, we decided to go out and check out the neighborhood. Turns out, we’re in party central. We walked past one place that was.. well.. the loudest in the world, but I can’t get the sound clip to work.^^
I tried to get killed at an intersection when I looked at the street light and it was counting down from 30 seconds. I interpreted this to mean that I had 30 seconds to cross the street, and started across, only to have a small car whiz by right in front of me. Self-righteously I flipped the car off, only to hear Yvonne yell, “Charlie, what are you doing?” I said I was crossing the street and Yvonne then told me that wasn’t a good thing to do when the cross traffic had a green light. Ooops… the red (Yeah.. RED!) numbers were counting down UNTIL the light turned green and I was an idiot.
I survived, however, and we continued to walk around and look for a place to have a quick seat/bite. Finally, we settled on the Red Garden, which is hard to explain, so here is a movie of it in which you can see what it contains..
And here is what is sounds like in full fury And when it is fully rocking
I had beer, Yvonne had a Pepsi, and we split a few pieces of salmon sushi. Just before midnight, we headed across the street to the motel, and passed out in untidy heaps.
Monday, July 22, 2013
Malaysian Art and Birds....
First order of business… On day two we saw this street-sign:
Day two was spent lolling in the hotel room for a bit… we
had noodles and super-strong black coffee from the in-room coffee-maker and headed off to downtown. A bit
pricey at 70 Ringgit each way for the two of us, but the fastest way to get
into town. We landed at KL Sentral and one short hop on the Komuter Expres and we were
at Kuala Lumpur Station, which has a really cool decayed Victorian vibe. I
guess it used to be the main train station, but it has been surpassed by KL Sentral
and KL City Center.
We walked over to the National Mosque, taking a bizarre route through a rundown car park with no cars in it and a tired-looking man slumped in chair watching for the onslaught of cars that was obviously never to come. We took this route as Yvonne completely refused to believe the signs that directed us to go to the front door of the Mosque. Instead, we approached to the side and Yvonne noticed that you had to take your shoes off well before you entered. For some reason this gave Y the heebie-jeebies and she started keening (Hi Katie!) in that high-pitched voice she has when she gets nervous about how we "shouldn’t go near the place." As she continued keening, butterflies dropped, stunned from the air, tropical plants wilted, and paint began flaking from the minarets. Fortunately, a security guard waved us towards the front, which was where tourists enter.
We walked over to the National Mosque, taking a bizarre route through a rundown car park with no cars in it and a tired-looking man slumped in chair watching for the onslaught of cars that was obviously never to come. We took this route as Yvonne completely refused to believe the signs that directed us to go to the front door of the Mosque. Instead, we approached to the side and Yvonne noticed that you had to take your shoes off well before you entered. For some reason this gave Y the heebie-jeebies and she started keening (Hi Katie!) in that high-pitched voice she has when she gets nervous about how we "shouldn’t go near the place." As she continued keening, butterflies dropped, stunned from the air, tropical plants wilted, and paint began flaking from the minarets. Fortunately, a security guard waved us towards the front, which was where tourists enter.
Unfortunately, we arrived at a time that the mosque was
closed to tourists, so we wandered about the outside, snapped photos, and
sweated like crazy.
Mosque Exterior (All we really got to see^^) |
A few questions revealed that the National Islamic Art
Museum was right around the corner.. so we headed off there and it was rather
awesome. For about 20 Ringgit for
the two of us, it was one of the best deals we’ve had in Malaysia. The Museum has three floors and it collects
Islamic art from all over the world. This was super cool, because you got a
chance to see how different countries had internalized Islam and turned it into
art. Persia (we think?) had all
kinds of cool calligraphy, including some calligraphy written into leaves.
Calleafgraphy |
Also cool, but not pictured, what China did, which was to
used it’s traditional brush-calligraphy and draw what, from far away, looks
like traditional Chinese art, but upon closer inspection is made up of
calligraphed passages from the Quran and Islamic scholars. Looked totally cool.
And two random snaps I took from behind protective glass:
A Pistol Grip, Actually |
Jug |
Afterwards, we headed to the Butterfly Museum, but missed it
totally, and ended up super-sweaty
in front of the Bird Museum, the so-called “largest free-flight aviary” in the
world. From the outside you couldn’t see any birds, and when we got to the
front we saw the most dispirited looking topiary in, perhaps, the history of
topiary.
That's Supposed to be a Bird! |
Confidence not much built, we sat down for a bottle of
water, and Yvonne wanted to go in so badly that she offered to pay (butterflies
flew again, tropical plant sprang back to full height, and flaked paint
returned to minarets!). So, since
she wanted in so badly, I got a couple of tickets, and in we went.
At first it was motley profusion of peacocks, doves,
pheasants, storks, and a few other birds.
Section 1 was pretty much just that, wherever you walked, though they
were remarkably unafraid of humans, so you could walk directly up to them.
Of course there was the splendor of the ostrich who posed:
Looks Edible! |
Around section 2 things began to perk up, and as we walked
through we saw a cool variety of birds in a cool variety of settings, including
some in cages. By the end of our
walk, I was pretty sure it had been worth it, and if we had my godson and
god-daughter with us, it would have been completely awesome.
There's Always One Idiot Trying to Break Back IN! |
Final thrill, and a great example of vendors adapting to the
modern world, for 10 Ringgit you could get two birds perched on you, and then a
friend could take a picture of your bird covered self with your own camera. They were rolling people in every 45 seconds or so, which would mean a rather nice hourly wage.^^
Yvonne, Uncertain or Happy? |
Then it was back towards downtown, where we took a very
short break for a drink behind the Petronas Towers, an awesome plaza with
dancing fountains and a variety of cafes facing out to it.
Finally, dinner with Chocoballnoona and her best friend. As
it is Ramadan, we set this up for 7pm, and waited a bit for it to be “safe” to
eat. I passed along some books I had brought, and they were saints and paid for
dinner. Yvonne and the two women chuckled regularly at jokes I didn’t get^^ and
a great time was had by all.
Then, back about an hour to the hotel, and sweet, sweet bed.
Today, we are in transit to Penang.
Oh, yeah, this is what the sign meant:
Shelter From the Storm |
Sunday, July 21, 2013
To Malaysia!
The first step of our plan for world domination is
successful. We have reached Malaysia.
The trip was relatively uneventful,
if you are me. If you are Yvonne it was the most dangerous ride at the carnie
on bad acid. When we hit turbulence that wouldn’t even rock the gin in my gin
and tonic, she drew her coat up over her lip because she was, “trying not to
scream.” I’ve seen tougher 2 year
olds.
The night before, of course, she played her traditional game
when we have to take a plane-trip – the let us not sleep or prepare game, for
it is always better to wake up exhausted, with things left to do (or undone, to
be fair), and haul ass to the airport.
Yvonne Hides in Jackets |
Selfie and Yvonne hides in Jacket |
Which was remarkably crowded. We spent about 40 minutes in
line at Asia Air and then longer than usual through security and customs. But
we got there about 20 minutes before boarding, which is good enough, and we
were in a row of three seats with one seat empty, which is always good. Air Asia has attempted to monetize
pretty much everything imaginable and I was amused to see, later as I thumbed
through their “air catalog” that if there are two empty seats next to you, for
only 20 Ringgit (a local currency based on mussel-shells, and the overseas
funds that Malaysians accrue by selling their less attractive children into slavery), on
is allowed to ‘buy’ those seats. LOL… I wonder how they enforce that one.
I slept on and off for the first three hours of the flight
as I was tir… did I mention that at some point in the night I woke up and
Yvonne was applying hot compresses to me? Because in summer in Korea that’s
what a fellow needs? I thought it might have been a fever dream, yet there, in
the morning, was a large yellow bowl full of water and a compress. It would
take three psychiatrists, a forensic scientist and three sticks of dynamite to
figure out what switch flips in Yvonne’s brain on the night before we travel,
but that switch, it is a dire one.
I got through Korean customs without getting my
all-important “blank” passport page stamped. It turns out that if we are to go
to Jakarta I have to have one blank page in my passport (and it can’t, for some
obscure reason, be any of the last four pages in the passport). As it happens,
my career as a world famous expert on Korean literature, in concert with my
unspoken job of international playboy, means that I only do have that one page.
So at each stop here I will have to stop the nice person at the immigration
desk and ask them to NOT stamp page 24 of my passport.
One down, two to go.
One down, two to go.
Except of course we got to Kuala Lumpur and discovered we had misplaced a decimal when converting IDR to dollars, so won't be going to Jakarta at all. Instead, we are booked for Penang, which looks old school and lovely, and is MUCH cheaper.
Tomorrow we meet an old friend in Kuala Lumpur.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Homoerotic, or just plain weird
Really, Korea?
At first I had the semi-reassuring thought that it was, at least, each person's finger.
TEXT:
Men's Formal Wear/Casual
Price destruction hot deal
Friday to Thursday
Event Park
At first I had the semi-reassuring thought that it was, at least, each person's finger.
TEXT:
Men's Formal Wear/Casual
Price destruction hot deal
Friday to Thursday
Event Park
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