The rest o' my journeys

I'm cold. I know that in Minnesota right now it's about sixty degrees or so (F) warmer than Minnesota and there isn't any snow to be found, but I've still got the goosebumps. One reason is because of the humidity; all the time it feels like right after it rains on a cold day. Another reason is probably because I just got back from the perma-summer that is Singapore.

Here's what happened since I last updated.

The "grab a quick dinner and go to the bus" became "grab dinner, walk around for a while, see some of the Christmas lights, struggle to find a taxi, rush back on the subway, quickly grab all our stuff and run to the bus station to get to our bus on time". Customs between Singapore and Malaysia was a little rough, just because we had no clue what was going on (it didn't help that we didn't speak any of the languages the bus driver did), but we got through them fine. Despite the windy roads I fell asleep on the bus.

When I woke up the first thing I noticed was that it was chilly out. The Cameron Highlands are about a mile above sea level, so that combined with the proximity to the equator makes the area a consistent 70-80 degrees during the day and 50-60 degrees at night year round. Some of the people with me thought it was rather unpleasant during the night, but it didn't bother me much at all. The hostel we stayed at, Father's Guest House, was great, not just because the rooms were inexpensive and comfortable but also because the employees there (especially the owner Gerard) were extremely helpful with all the questions we had.

Our visit to the Cameron Highlands was filled with lots of hiking. There are plenty of trails around Cameron Highlands with varying difficulty, and we went on some of the easier and some of the harder ones. All in all our group probably tackled 20 km in trails or so (I sat one of the two hikes on the first day due to general tiredness and blisters on my feet).

Probably the most fun part was getting up for the sunrise on the second day we were there. After seeing the sky explode in colors (there will be pictures soon!) and hearing the forest wake up, we went on a hike through the mossy forest, named as such since the age of the forest (230 million years) gives it a lot of different vegetation. At some places the compost on the ground is a few meters thick and jumping on it gives a little bounce, like a mini-trampoline. After the mossy forest we went to the BOH tea plantation where our guide told us about how tea is made. We later got to sample some tea at the BOH teahouse.

The afternoon that day was also packed with adventure. After looking at a few nearby strawberry farms, we headed down to Brinchang, one of the three cities of Cameron Highlands. We had a quick lunch there then trekked off on a hike back to Tanah Rata, the city we were staying in. This was probably our most fun hike of the trip because the weather was pleasant and the trail had a lot of hills, streams, and things to see. Unfortunately, two people on our group went quite a bit ahead of us and turned a different way at a fork in the path. We all made it back to Tanah Rata safely, but we arrived quite a bit after the other two and they were quite worried about us.

After the Cameron Highlands we were off to Taman Negara, which literally means "National Park" in Malay. The name isn't very descriptive, but it's a 3000 acre rainforest preserve. When we went there we thought we'd be roughing it from what we've heard from other people (no hot water, leeches everywhere...sounds like a fun time). However, there was a reasonably priced hotel we stayed in that had hot water, a free laundry service, air conditioning (the rainforest is quite a bit warmer than the mountains), and nice soft beds. We were sure roughing it.

It's pretty unlikely to see much wildlife near where we were staying (since they're scared away by people), but we were lucky enough to see a few deer, a boar, and a striped civet (a big rainforest raccoon). The most fun part was probably going rapid shooting (taking a motorboat through some rapids) and stopping by a clean stream to go swimming and use special rocks to paint our faces.

After two nights of "roughing it" we took a boat out of Taman Negara (on which we saw a few water buffalo) to Jerantaut where we caught another bus to Kuala Lumpur. KL is much like Taipei in that it's a modernized Asian capital and it has some tall buildings (the Petronas Towers are the 3rd and 4th tallest buildings in the world), but the similarities mostly end there. There is a strong Muslim presence in Malaysia which can be seen by what people on the street are wearing and heard when the call to prayer happens five times a day. There is also a bit more diversity: While ethnic Malay are the majority, there are also a sizable amount of Chinese and Indian, which adds color to the culture.

The hostel we stayed at was a newer one called the Hostel Cosmopolitan (I think it should be nicknamed the Cos Hos). It was inexpensive, clean, and we met some cool people there, but on the downside it was rather tough to find and there was no drinking allowed (since the owner is Muslim). The first night we did some exploring around our hostel and bought a few things (I got some killer fake Armani shades and other people got some cheap clothes) and went to the Reggae Bar, which had relatively inexpensive drinks (considering a normal beer at 7/11 cost US$2.25 at the cheapest) and we had fun until about 3:30.

We were initially planning on getting up early to go and try getting tickets for the Petronas Towers (they only give out so many a day, but they're free), but that didn't happen. Instead we took the subway to try to see some mosques and find a gourmet food festival which was supposed to be going on that weekend. We found mosques but we couldn't go inside (prayer time) and we found a market but it wasn't a gourmet food festival. We ate lunch, and since the heat and humidity has a draining effect, we went to a park to relax for a bit. After short naps we saw some other nearby parks (one had monkeys!) and decided to head to the Petronas towers for some pictures.

The Petronas towers did not look too far away. However, after a little more than an hour of walking we finally got there. I saw the path we took on a map afterwards and it was basically a diagonal across the city. I was a little tired after the walk, but the rest of my group wanted to go see things. We eventually settled on a compromise: we both go to Petaling Street (in Chinatown) where they can shop and I can sit down and drink a beer at a food market.

That was the last night of our trip. Our trip back had a red-eye flight to Manila followed by a long layover, then to Taipei. Both our flights were delayed, so we got to wait quite a bit. When we stopped in Manila we had a chance to take an airport shuttle that passed by some nearby shops, and Manila looks pretty interesting. It has a very Spanish feel to it, which can be seen in their music, their culture, and their Christianity. It may make a nice future destination on a trip.

Anyways, that's my trip in a nutshell. I should be getting pictures on Friday or sometime after Friday (I'm not quite sure yet). I just started a new semester at school, so I should be getting to bed so I'm not a zombie for class tomorrow. Later folks!