a couple days in KL and back to KK

back in KL, didn't do much. Did some laundry went to the movies $3 to Bedtime Stories, a waste of $3 if you ask me. Ate some weird foods on the street. I seem to alway pick the weirdest looking dishes and most of the time they are not very tasty, so i end up getting something else. One of these times i am going to find something that is out of sight good, just not yet. The food here is set up like all pot luck style. You get a plate with rice.I always ask for less rice and the end up giving more rice. Then like a cafeteria line you go along and pick out what you want. Lately i have been sticking with some sort of friend chicken in some sort of saucey soup. The spicey honey red sauce has been a favorite. Sometimes i get a piece of fried fish, that tends to taste like it was cooked a week ago. They do not have much of a selection of vegies, usually saucey onions or way salty collard greens. I go for the greens and a pineapple shake for my vegi intake.
Josh wanted to go to the gym in the Petronas twin towers one day so i walked around town and found the central market. All over town there are guys with carts selling cut up fresh fruit for $0.40 a bag, so i eat a lot of pineapple, mango and papyas. At the Central market i found a funny little spa treatment. There is a big pool with seats around the pool, you take off your shoes and hang your naked feet in the pool. The kicker is the pool is filled with little fish that nibble on your feet. 5ringet, which is a couple of bucks. the guy selling tickets said that they are fish doctors to heal all your aliments? I thought i would go back and grab Josh and we would give it a try. When we came back we both decided that since we had both recently cut big chunks from the bottoms of our feet while in Koh Lipe, that we should probably keep them clean and away from any fish spit. There were two Britts with their feet submerged and they said it tickled so much that they could hardly stand it.
We went to the airport in KL to meet Josh's friend Lori. It started to rain and by the time we got to the airport it was dumping. At one point while waiting in the lobby, a big flash of lightning went of and then a huge thunder clap. So loud that it set of thirty or forty car alarms, the whole parking lot was beeping and honking. We met Lori and then all three of us flew back to Kota Kinbalu. We are now waiting for my friend Ann to fly in tonight, but i think her flights were delayed to where she may have missed a conection, so it may be a couple nights here in K.K. Soon we will be flying to the east side of Borneo, the town of Semporna to go and dive Sipadan and Mabul islands

copy and paste this into the browser to see some photos
http://picasaweb.google.com/farleysmail/OnKohLipe?feat=directlink

Done with Koh Lipe

We are back in KL, Lipe was great. On the dock in Langkawi while we waited on our speed boat to get its gas tank replaced we started talking to a couple of Swedish Girls. I wont give their names since we just referred to them as 'The Swedish Bikini Team'. Neither of them had the last name of Lundman, nor did they know anyone by that name. We ended up hanging out with them the whole time in Lipe. The ride over was scary. The driver was probably high on gas fumes, and because of this he never trimmed the motors or boat so we rode the hour pouncing through waves with a mean port list. Once there we booked our bungalow at the first one we found. It is way cheaper than the states, but Thailand costs more than Malaysia and more than what we were used to. For two nights Josh and i each paid $10 for our hut. After the second day we moved locations. We took the Bikini Team with us and we all moved into a group of huts that also happened to be next to the generators that power the entire island, this was bad because of the continuous noise, but good because we had 24hr power and fan. Here we paid $5 each a night. The other downside to this place was we think that nearby there had to be a big black pit that was full of the entire islands sewage, because when the wind would blow our way the smell was atrocious, but then on the good side, our huts were also the Tsunami Shelter point, so we had that feeling of safety. While in our new digs, we met our neighbor and new friend Raquel from Espania (that is Spain for those of you who do not know) The five of us became buddies. We would go together to breakfast and then either walk two minutes to Hot Beach, where most of the people hung out, there was no breeze and the sun seemed to be just a few feet away, or we could walk two minutes in the other direction to Windy Beach. This had bigger waves and you would have to struggle to get your towel to lay flat on the sand. We spent equal time at both. One day we walked North, or at least what felt like north to 'Porn' beach. There is a porn resort on porn beach. Porn, we all decided means something different in Thai than it does everywhere else. This beach was mostly older couples with kids, who were all clothed. Though we did see a few disgusting speedo wearers AKA banana hammocks.Yuck!!
One day we booked a snorkel trip, this was fun. We took a longtail boat out to a couple different coral reefs and tooled around, We all got way too much sun, but had fun. A longtail boat is what the locals use, it is an all wood, thin shaped boat with a huge car engine on the back with a propeller that extends out the back some ten or so feet. The are surprisingly maneuverable and can go in very shallow water. After our day of sun and snorkeling we decided to eat some of those lovely fish that we saw. For dinner i had an assortment of shells, a squid, and a small grouper. I was tempted to eat a trigger fish, these guys are very colorful and known to bite through your wetsuit when you come too close to their lairs. I didn't want to mess with my fish karma since i would be diving among them very soon. Dinner was good.
Koh Lipe was a good time and we are thankful for meeting up with the Swedish Bikini team and Raquel, cause it made it way more fun then if it had just been Josh and i. We are now back in KL until we meet Josh's friend Lori on the 28th. We will then fly back to Borneo and wait for my friend Ann to come in, then finally we will be on our way to Sipadan for some long awaited diving. The main reason i came on this trip.
I had a list of notes from my stay on Koh Lipe, but i left them back in the room. If they still seem interesting i may do a second recap on our time in Koh Lipe

Koh Lipe

Well there is Internet on Koh Lipe, but no ATM, which is a shame, cause neither Josh nor i took out enough money to stay the amount of time we would like to. We are both very happy with our decision to come to this island. It was a bit of a sketchy ride over here. We took a speed boat with three engines. We were meant to leave at nine in the morning, but the boats fuel tank was leaking gas so they had to first swap it out. We took off an hour later with the fresh smell of petrol in the air. I think the boat driver was a bit high, because he never trimmed the boat, so the whole 45 minute ride we were listing hard to the port. At first it was fun as we flew into the waves, fun until the time when we all thought we were going to flip. We went from laughing and smiling to straight faced and ready to be there. Once on the island we got our passports stamped and we checked into the nearest bungalow and off to the beach we went. While waiting for the boat to be repaired in Langkawi we started chatting up a couple of nice Swedish Gals. Teres and Ida have now become our Koh Lipe travel companions. They are both very nice and it is way more fun to sit on the beach with two pretty girls than just Josh and i.
Koh Lipe is a very laid back island, there are a lot of tourists but they all seem to be here for the same reason, to sun themselves and to get their relax on. I didn't meet any Americans in Malaysia, i know of at least four couples here. One place was showing a bit of the Inauguration, and all of us Americans were watching. Finally!!! get that guy out of here and let the Obamanation begin. I don't have much to write about what we have been doing, a lot of sitting in the sand and swimming in the ocean. The water here is crystal blue with nice corals right out from the beach. I have been using my mask and snorkel a lot, thanks Mom and Enza. We have booked a snorkel trip for tomorrow. I here the diving is good around here, but i would rather stay a few more days then go on a dive, and we can't afford to do both. We had planned to Island hop our way up to Phuket and then fly back to KL on the 28th, but i think we will instead stay here till the 27 and boat back to Langkawi and fly back to KL for $30 instead. Plans change so who knows.

Langkawi

we arrived Langkawi in the morning and got suckered right away at paying too much for a room. I guess i can't complain too bad about paying $10, but we could have done it for $6, but then you are not on a tropical S.E. Asian holiday if you are not pooping water and getting ripped off at least a couple of times. Tonight will be our third night here. We walked the beach front strip the first day and then watched the sunset on the sand at a bar near our hotel. The next morning I walked around alone, as Josh had too many rum and coconuts and maybe one too many beers. He got up around noon and we decided to walk down to where we found out was a much cooler beach scene and cheaper rooms. I had a beer, and Josh had water at a cool little bar, then we sat on the beach. I have not been managing my tanning sessions well, I burnt myself the first day and now i am just a big blotchy red, white and tan peely mess. Today we rented a car for $14 a drove around the island. We stopped and took a ride in some gondolas way way up to the top of the island, it was a great view and we felt very satisfied after paying $6. for the ride. During our Island circumnavigating we stopped at a few other happening touristy spots, but they all cost $$ so we skipped them all, except a crappy little waterfall that would have been spectacular had there been water falling. We stopped at the ferry terminal and bough a ticket for a jet boat that will take us across the border tomorrow morning to the Thai island of Koh Lipe. We have decided that we are going to island hop our way up to Phuket and then fly back to Kula Lumpor the end of the month to be on our way back over to Borneo to finish up the trip.
They say Koh Lipe has no ATM's, and island without ATM's is probably an island without internet, so this may be it for a few days

we will have fun, and we will be safe

KL day #2

two days in a row with no rain, i love this town. We hit up the Petronas Twin Towers yesterday. They only allow so many people up onto the sky bridge, which is kind of nice. You get ten minutes, but there are only about ten of you, so enough time to get a great view and some nice photos. There is a five story mall on the first five floors so we walked around there and even went and saw a movie. Four Christmas' for $2 US. It was arctic cold, happily i had my sweatshirt along with me. We laughed outloud.
Today we took a stroll through China town, had some food, your choices are pretty much Indian or Chinese, i think we had closer to Indian food. We then walked around and found a Botanical Gardens and a, bird sanctuary that we did not want to pay to get into and an Islamic Arts Museum. We paid to get into this for two reasons, one was to get out of the heat and the other was, we have no idea what Islamic art is. Geometry, beautiful designs where you at them and think, 'How in the hell can they do this' then it shows you some complicated geometric formula and wah-lah mathematics the root of everything.
We are staying in a dorm with room at a Hostel in the India part of town, this is why all the food we find tends to be Indian. We are paying $4.20 for a bed. The first night the guy above me talks in his sleep and yells out in French. I did not mind too much since i have always kind of liked the French accent. Now i have a German kid above me and he also talks in his sleep, like full on conversations with himself. The two accents i never cared much for are Israel and German, so his coughing and yelling does not really lullaby me back to sleep.
We leave for Langkawi in the morning, we are talking about maybe staying there five or so days then flying East to the Perenthians? these are islands on the Upper East Coast of Malaysia.
here is a link to some photos so far. There are some shots from New Years Eve and a Wedding i went to before flying over here.
http://picasaweb.google.com/farleysmail/Borneo?feat=directlink

No more rain = no more Borneo

Our last night in KK it dumped rain, so much rain that the streets flooded and it looked as though water would soon flow in under the doors of our Hostle. Within 20 minutes after the rains slowed the the streets were completely drained of water. They are used to it here and must have good drainage, though i am sure it goes unfiltered right into the sea.
Then next morning we took an 80 person speed boat ferry to the island of Lambuan. The ride in the rain and waves took about three hours, it would have been nice to see a little more than fogged up windows, but we sat about two feet away from a tv screen playing a really bad karate movie, so at least we were entertained. We decided to stay a night in Labuan instead of catching the next ferry to Brunie. It rained all day. Josh caught up on his internetting and i walked through the rain to the cities museum and learned all there was to know about Labuam from the dawn of time (cavemen) till now, a duty free port where people load up on booze and cigarettes on their way to Alcohol free Brunie. We found a realy dumpy place to stay for 20RM or $6. This place was like Bangkok dirty, but it was the cheapest place we could find. It was discovered in the morning that Josh was missing $50 in $1 bills, obviously taken while our bags were in the non too secure room and we were away. He confronted the door man and then the owner. We went through a long drawn out ordeal that included a trip to the police station to fill out a report, obviously Josh is still out $50 plus the 2RM he had to pay for the report. While still being stuck in raining Labuan we walked into a travel agent and since air travel is so cheap here we booked two tickets to Kula Lumpur. $50, we just wanted to go any where that it wasn't raining. The cheap flight was the late flight so we left our bags at the travel agent, bought two shitty little paper thin umbrellas and laughed at how wet we got from the sideways rain as we walked to the Aquarium. After looking at the few fish on display we called a cab, picked up our bags and went off to the airport 5 hours before our flight. We hung out at the airport playing chess and cribbage. We got to KL and into our Hostel at 2am. We are out on the town now, it is not raining, it is way less balmy, maybe in the high 80's. Josh is booking us a $30 ticket to the Island of Langkawil, which is in Upper East Malaysia.

I took a ferry over to the island across the way for some snorkeling, sun and fun. I went with a Canadian in my hostel and another Canadian gal we met at the hot-springs. The island was the same island where i got my dive certificate two years before. I think i was so excited to use my new Mask-Snorkel set up that i put sunscreen on my arms and had the Canadian gal goop up my back, then i dove. The snorkeling wasn't all that great. The water was kind of cloudy, but still saw some cool stuff. Back on the beach i layed on my back and fell asleep. Into the water, onto the beach, in and out a few times. When the boat came to get us around 3pm i felt a little burning sensation around my legs and stomach area. Back on the mainland i bought some aloe, but not nearly enough. I awoke many times in the middle of the night in total pain, headache and diarea included. The next morning i limped myself to the nearby marked in search of some real Aloe leaves. The Chinese had no idea what i was asking for when i would say 'Aloe' i walked around for too long and then gave up. On the way back to the Hostel, one of the gals who works there ran into me and she said she would find me some, she did and i covered myself in it and took a nap, she was a life saver. I am still red, but it does not hurt too bad and hopefully it will fade to brown, or even back to white would make me happy.
Josh and i are taking a ferry to Paulu Lompabom (sp) in the morning on our way to Miri.

jungling

bought a day trip up into the jungle and at the same talked to the kid selling us the trip about hiring him to drive us around the island. He said that he could not talk about it in the office but he would meet us after work. We met up and then walked to the Filipino market for some food. They have fresh fish bbqed up and you walk by and pick out what you want. I got some sort of snapper a tiger prawn and half a stingray. You then sit on these little plastic chairs at a long table. Our new friend Lee walked us through the steps, you fill a bowl with water and then your drinking glass. The bowl of water is for dipping your fingers in since you eat with your hands. Pull off some fish, smash it up into a ball along with rice and shove it in your mouth. It was all quite good. When you are finished you squish little limes into the water, swish your grubby fingers around and now your hands no longer smell like fish. We ended up not hiring hime to drive us around the island, but dinner was good.
Yesterday morning we got picked up in front of our hostle at around 8am and drove an hour or so, we were getting a tour along the way, but i was only picking up on half the stuff our guide was saying. The story of Mount Kinabalu, the tallest peak in all of S.E. Asia. Something about a dragon and a pearl, a prince who dies and a sad princes, who turns into a rock. We were headed to the base of the Mountain, where the is a botanical garden and hot springs. We stopped a couple of times on the way for some photo ops. Had lunch. It was Josh and i, a Malay couple, a young gal from Canada, and an older women from the UK. From the looks of the places we stopped, you could tell that had it been peak travel season, the places would have been packed. The place we stopped for lunch had some 30 tables inside and only two were filled. One by our group and another by a Japanese group.
We got to the garden, which was very cool It had a nice set up, well kept path. The park was not very big but in the acre or so we walked through there were some 400 species of orchids and another few hundred other plants and flowers, there were marked with red meaning they are only found at the base of the mountain, blue meaning they had medical uses and green meaning they were native to all over Borneo. We were showed the smalled Orchid, which was the maybe the size of the tip of a bic pen, heck i would have walked right past it. We were also showed, but not allowed to touch some super rare orchid that used to be sold for $700 to the USA, this is what our guide told us, or at least that is what it sounded like he was saying. We learned a few things, like if we get lost in the jungle there were some plants and berries we could eat and some that would give us stomach problem or maybe die?
The next stop was some cheesy souvenir market, where every stall sold the same thing. This set up is different from Thailand and everywhere else in S.E. Asia. the sellers just sit there fanning themselves or texting on their phones until you touch something, then they jump up to attention tell you the asking price and then tell you they will give you 'special discount' and if you start to walk away they just sit back down, no pressure to buy. Maybe it is just too hot to wheel and deal.
The next stop was the hot springs, some scalding water bubbling up from a rock pool mixing with some water flowing down the mountain. The pools were man made. there was the cool pool and then and area with Japanese style soaking tubs, that you would fill with a spout. Scalding hot on one side and cool on the other. Before we got in the tubs we did a hike up the mountain and across the cable bridges through the canopy. Anyone with any fear of hieghts i do not recommend this, cause we were way up there. Now we are back down, hot and sweaty and jump into the cool pool then make our way over to the tubs. I found an empty tub and turned on the faucet and could tell that it would take at least two hours to fill, so we wondered around and found one that was a little fuller. We ended up sitting, Josh, Me, the Canadian and the Londener in a tub that should probably fit two. You need friends for water displacement in order to sit in a full tub. At this time it also started pouring down rain, so there was no need to dry off or change back into our dry clothes.
Josh is on his way up to the tip of the mountain and i am meeting up with the Canadian gal, and another Canadian from my hostel to take a boat over to the island across the way for some sunning, snorkeling and relaxing. It seems to be clear skies and sunny, then it pours down rain between 4-6 then clears back up in time for dinner.

Day two in KK, Borneo

while at the internet place yesterday we heard what sounded like a major car accident, and withing minutes the sky opened up and dumped waterfall onto the streets. I have not seen rain like that since, i don't know when. We were very unprepared so we decided to take a cab that i had spotted just around the corner. I do not mind a little rain, but we had Josh's big backpack since we had not checked into a new room yet. As we left the internet place on the street in front of me a motorbike came to a sliding halt and ended up underneath the car in front of him. Being a veteran of that sort of thing i ran through the rain to see that he was ok. I pulled his bike out and stood it up, He just looked at me with a "what are you doing" sort of look as he crawled out from under the back of the car. I asked if he was OK and he looked down at his bloody leg looked at me then hopped on his bike and sped off. "Just walk it off" i yelled.
We found the cab and all the cab drivers huddled under a very small overhang, we hung out under there with them and worked out a price to the new motel. We made it and checked into to our new spot. $6 a night for a dorm with AC. We walked around and found a couple new malls and bought some essentials, My head has been totally clogged with cold like symptons since i have been here, went to the pharmacy and using my pro charades skills i told the gal what was wrong and she gave me some pills, i took one and felt clear and much better this morning.
Today we have booked a one day trip to the nearby national park and hot springs. I also talked to the young kid who booked our day tirp about hiring him to drive us around the tip of Borneo over to Sandakan, that is where he is from, I thought this would be a cool way to see Borneo, with a local guide who also speaks English. He said we could not talk about it in the office, but he will call and meet us for a drink tonight to hash out the details. We will see if the price is not too high?
It is hot and humid here and i can see big bubbly clouds off in the distance, It seems to dump rain in the evening heavyly but not for too long. I think we might look for a beach or something for today.

I'm in Borneo

I was tired of being cold in America so i decided to go down to Borneo for a few weeks. I flew out of SF a couple of days ago and i new as i was handing my bag to the lady at the United counter that my bag would not arive with me in Borneo and i was right. They were really friendly at the airport here and actually came up to me to say that my bag was missing. I will head back to the airport tonight to retrieve it. I am traveling with a co-worker of mine named Josh. Josh and i got in at midnight and shared a cab with a dude from NY who works at the UN. He picked up the bill too. The hotel was way out of town and conected to what is known as the first and largest super mall in east malaysia. maybe it was not called super mall, but it was something like that? We got settled in around midnight and then walked around the mall even though everything was closed. We did find a happening little night spot with a live band, two Filipino gals singing american pop songs while some old dude played the keyboard. We were two of maybe six people in the bar. We paid almost $5 a peice for two small beers. We we soon joined by a very drunk Malay who bought us a round of Guiness' I saw the bill and he paid about $5 for four beers. We talked a little but his drunken English was not very good. The two singers finished up and and came over and talked with us. It was then our turn to buy a round. It took a while to interprit that i would pay for the beers but i wanted our drunk friend to order them so that we could get local price. The guy kept telling us he was from Brunie, which would be like saying 'I am rich and important' then the singers would giggle and lean in and tell us he is only saying he is from Brunie? We cut out of the joint about the time the drunk guy was way drunk and seemed to be hinting that maybe he should stay in our room since his not so drunk friends had already left him. He did not stay with us.
This morning we walked around the super mall, i bought some sunglasses and josh bought a phone, call any time as it cost us to recieve incoming calls. 011-60145-602735 It seems like a lot of numbers but i am pretty sure that it is right?
We are off to find a new place to live