I'm alive!

That's about all the time I have for now. Things have been wild but good. At airport, boarding now, gonna run...much more soon i hope.......

-erik

Long Pasia

I'm in a remote village at the end of a 4 hr 4WD dirt road. And there is (one, very slow) internet connection here! I'm not sure if i'm excited or mortified. (No pictures for now because of internet speed...) Anyway, very nice and very simple here. Almost all the 400 residents are farmers or hunters. I am certainly the only "white guy" here, although they are setting up a homestay program (that's what i'm doing) so they get approx 100-200 visitors a year.
The local people here are formerly head-hunters but are now Christians. (Boy though missionaries got arround). When I told my guide I was American, he got very excited about Billy Grahm. The drive here on the rough road in the pouring rain, with lighting and thumber with Christian rock music blaring is certainly an experience to remember.

Today I'm touring the village and resting. I met the "chief" this morning. The food is a little strange of course (I had deer soup, tapioca leafs and rice last night...) but so far so good. Add my host family is very nice, with the wife, Magdelana, speaking some English. Tomorrow I go off with one guide and one porter (not the beer type...) for 3 days/2 nights of jungle treking. I think i am suppose to sleep in a hammock or something. I think we are bring some food, but I think we are also planning to eat what we find/kill in the jungle. Will be interesting.

Anyway, just a brief hello. Don't want to monopolize the whole towns internet anymore. Should resurface again a few days.

-erik

I'm back!

Back from 5 days of diving in the Sipidan! The sharks didn't kill me but the 10 hour overnight bus ride last night almost did. The diving was great, enough to make me stay for an extra day (despite the very primitive accommodation's). I ended up doing 14 dives overall there! Saw sharks, turtles, barracuda, sea snakes, morey eels, cuddlefish, and a billion other things. It really was an amazing place. I think I need to stop diving forever now because I'm pretty sure everything else will be a let down.

Today is a recovery day: from the diving and from the bus ride. I'm actually staying in the Hyatt in Kota Kinabula today - the most expensive place I've stayed so far by a factor of 2. I'm splurging partly because I've been sharing a room with a mouse that has no private bathroom at a "resort" that has no hot water and only a few hours of electricity a day... And partly because I couldn't find anything else. Anyway, its very nice! Tomorrow I head back out to the sticks: a small village in the middle of nowhere for a 4-5 day homestay. I expect some pretty basic accommodation's again. But that's OK, it is part of getting away.

I actually really liked the place I stayed in the Sipidan. It wasn't actually on Sipidan; you can't stay there anymore ever since terrorist/pirates from the Philippines abducted a group of tourists from there and held them hostage for over a month. The terrorist were from a group called the Muntando Islamic Liberation Front, or MILF. Look it up. On second thought, you might not want to google that...My "resort" was on Mabul Island, which had a sizable local population. Actually it just seemed to have a sizable child population. I think the number of humans on the island under 10 was probably 3-4 times more than those over 10. I really don't think I'm exaggerating. I think that it wasn't because there were locals were especially, uh, frisky, but because many of these adults work in other areas and leave the kids with relatives. Or, seemingly, alone. There were roaming bands of kids everywhere all the time. Luckily the kids were ridiculously cute and friendly. And all the stereotypes about poor kids being happy to play with what little they have certainly applied. I saw so many little made-up games with sticks and plastic bottles and rocks. Anyway, I took a billion pictures of the kids and put it on my picasa site:
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/erki666/SoliDudeBorneo

OK, now here are a few random notes:

• Malaysians think that we eat hot dogs and beans for breakfast. When you order and "American Breakfast" that is the only difference from the standard egg breakfast. Strange.
• Aside from the Liberian flag (which is a blatant rip off...) show me a flag that is more like the stars and stripes than the Malaysian flag. You can't.
• Almost ever local will ask me if I'm traveling alone, and when I say that I am, there always respond, "What? No friends?" I now respond, "No, I don't have any friends. No body likes me." Starting to hurt my self esteem a little.
• Locals also tell me that Americans do not travel here much. Except for a travel spike that happened a few years back after Survivor: Borneo. Perfect.
• I learned to count to 10 in Thai on my last day in Thailand.
  
• I've become a "one language translator" on several occasions. Trying to help Europeans with poor English understand Malays with poor English.
  
• The Olympic coverage here is super if you are a fan of badmitten or ping pong. I can not believe that I actually am starting to know who's who in the world of badmitten...

OK, I need to go eat. I'm totally going to eat something without rice, chicken or fish. It will be wonderful...

-erik

Happy Anniversary Katie!

Today/Yesterday was Katie and my 11 year anniversary! Happy Anniversary Katie!! (All those of you who think I’m a lame husband for only wishing my wife a happy anniversary on my blog, you should know that I actually called too. I even called twice: once on August 16th in Borneo and once on August 16th in California. So there…) (But, yes, I am a lame husband for leaving my wife for 3 months) (She is coming here to celebrate our anniversary though…so that’s something, right?)

Anyway, here in Borneo grows the Rufflesia, the largest flower in the world. There is one in full bloom here were I’m staying and is all roped off from the public to protect it. I was able to convince the gardener to let me into the “forbidden area” to get a picture with the flower for Katie. So here you go Katie: here is the biggest flower in the world for you. Happy Anniversary! Can’t wait to see you! Hurry up because this flower probably isn’t gonna look so good in a couple weeks though…

Kinabula

Well, I’m alive, but only just. The climb up Kinabula was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. And I never want to do anything that hard again. It was actually going pretty well up until the last 2K. I didn’t get altitude sickness or anything, but the thin air above 12,000 feet made ever step a struggle. But I made it. I have a certificate that sez so. Pay no mind to the fact that I don’t have any pictures at the summit (it was cloudy, raining…) or that my GPS mysteriously stopped working (too close to satellite?). Any suggestions that I paid the guide 100 ringgit to give me the certificate are slanderous!

Now I’m (appropriately…) at a hot springs resort near the base of the mountain. It is a little busy here during the day (the tour buses roll in early, out late…) but peaceful in the evening. And the tubs are just what I needed. I almost slept in it last night. Still can barely walk though.

Europeans are screwing everything up...

I'm currently a little pissed off at Europeans. It's more about quantity that quality; all the Europeans I've met have actually been quite nice, it's just that there are waaaaay to many of them here (what, do they all get the month of August off or something? Oh....) and it is impossible to do anything here without booking 2 weeks out. Literally. I almost booked a flight this morning for Sumatra, but I assume they will be there too. Jeez. This has had several significant impacts for me:

1. Climbing Mt Kinabula: I want to do the 7200 foot climb to the top of Mt Kinabula. (formerly the highest peak in SE Asia, but I guess new satellite mapping decided something else is higher). This is a 2 day trip with a stop at a rest house 1/2 way up. Well, guess what? Guest house booked. So tomorrow, I'm getting picked up at 5AM to go and try to bag Kinabula in one day. I am excited that I'm getting a chance to do it, (er, rather try to do it) but I'm a little freaked out that I might actually die.
2. Diving at Sipadan: I mentioned that I was going to try to go to this best-place-in-the-world dive stop before. Guess what? Booked. I've now shuffled things around, will go later and now stay in a hostel instead of a resort (probably anyway as I'm burning the cash quicker than I'd hoped. Would people be cool with me selling add space on the blog?). The long and short of it here is I have to do some significant backtracking now and will spend about an extra 16 hours on buses (including an overnighter) to get to Sipadan. But at least I'm going.
3. Hiking at Mulu National Park: Super-awesome Park: Booked. I did manage to get 3 nights there in 2 weeks from now (I wanted to go tomorrow and stay for 1 week...). But at least I'm going...

What does this mean to you? Well every European I talked to was salivating about the dollar/euro exchange rate and almost all are planning on coming to the States next summer. So if you what to go to San Francisco or Yosemite or Yellowstone or anywhere next summer, book now...they might even just buy your depreciated-value house, kick you out and just stay there. I don't trust those guys anymore...

Anyway, I might die on Kinabula tomorrow and/or be out of internet land for a few days. If I make it out alive, I expect to have some pretty nice pictures. Can't wait til September when I should start getting rid of the Euro's as well as those annoying college summer-breaker's.

Stay tuned...

-erik

Katie's Cookbook!

Forgive the non-travel entry, but here's some breaking news: Katie's Cookbook is finally done and published! You can buy one right now! You can check it out at :

http://www.lulu.com/content/1183494

Good job Katie!!! A multi-year labor of love, and it really did come out great!

The Jungle Report

Just back from 3d/2n in the jungle. I think I probably could go the rest of my life without seeing another monkey and I would still have had my fill. But I'm sure I will see many more on the trip, and that's OK too. In the jungle I saw the following: proboscis monkeys (only found in Borneo), orangutans, macaque monkeys, silver lipped moneys, a crocodile, a pit viper, the biggest butterfly i've ever seen and a zillion bazaar looking birds. No elephant or python sightings, though they were suppose to be around. It was pretty awesome and definitely wild. But I was certainly back on the tourist track. There were more people than monkeys and many sites (and there were alot of monkeys!) so that was a little lame. Where aren't their tourists? Winters, I guess...I did make some friends and nearly got adopted by a very nice Dutch family (wife, husband, 14-yr old son). There headed to Sipidan today for diving and I almost went straight there with them, but some (boring-to-you, important-to-me) logistics got in the way. Might still get there and meet up with them.

Ok, here is the picture of the pit viper:

My favorite part about seeing the viper was not getting bitten by it. The boat driver navigated the boat so that the snake was directly over my head, with the snake about 3-4 feet away. And while I will say that no one probably deserves to be bitten by a pit viper, this French lady in front of me got pretty darn close (to deserving to be bitten and to getting bitten...). The snake is in that attack position in the picture because she stood up when the guide told her to sit down, grabbed a branch about 1 foot from the snake that was blocking her view, then stuck her camera literally less than a foot from it. Holy Maird! Any, if that would have made the snake fall and bite me, it sounds like I would have up to 2 hours to kill her before dying myself.

There were also many many bugs in the jungle, as you might expect. And they also bite me quite often, as you might expect. There are almost always bugs crawling on you and there is always sweat dripping on you, so it is hard to tell when to slap about in a panic. So I just bitten. Its OK, I'm taking malaria pills.

So, the proboscis monkey was really the star of the show. We saw them everywhere. You'd seen pictures of them before I'm sure. They are the one with the really big noses. No? Ok, here are some pictures I took of them:

The are actually quick large. The largest, or one of the largest monkeys on the planet. And they jump around (tree-to-tree) alot. Which is pretty neat.

OK, that's all for now. Need to rest and try to figure out had to get to wherever it is I'm trying to go now.

Oh, BTW, today is my 1 month SoliDuding anniversary. So far, so good. Definitely looking forward to Katie's visit though. Getting adopted into a Dutch family would have been nice, but there is no substitute for real family...

Talk at you all soon...

-erik

North Borneo: Not Boring

Well, it seems like I’ve finally fallen off the tourist trail. I’m in Sandakan in northern Borneo now and things have certainly gotten more “foreign.” But mainly in a good way. Very few tourists here. Much less English spoken. But finally have the feeling that I am exploring now instead of having pre-digested adventures spoon fed to me. I’m sure I will accidental find my way back on the tourist track sooner than I want. It seems to be pretty well beaten. Now the random notes:

• Today was a “business day.” I changed hotels (more on that later), did laundry, booked a 3 day/2 night trek (with option for extra days), tried (and failed) to get my cell phone working, got a hair cut, made some travel plans for Katie’s visit, and ate a lot. And now updated my blog!


• Paying $2 for a haircut from a guy that doesn't speak English is a little scary. I look a little geeky, but not too much more than normal. (Someone once told me that all guys look like nerds for 3 days after a haircut, so should be OK)


• The people in Sabah (north Borneo province) are pretty "cool." A little depressing, though not all that surprising, that even kids in Borneo are more hip than I am. They are all spiky-haired, tight-jeaned, cigarette-smoking, shiny-belt-wearing, grungy-T-shirt-sporting cool (see photo above). And I'm wearing zip-away pant/shorts. Looooser.


• Even though its a billion degrees here, I'm wearing pants because everyone (except the few uncouth tourist around) else is. You wouldn't understand; its a Muslim thing...


• And these cool Sabahniese (?) are also pretty tough looking despite that fact that I don't think I've seen one yet that is bigger than me. I would not want to meet any of them in a dark alley. Which is unfortunate as there are many many dark alleys here.


• Last nights hotel: Was OK for $20 (i know i was going to stop doing that, sorry...) but was on a super noisy street. I had to sleep with ear plugs in and take one of the sleeping pills that I had brought over for overnight plane/bus trips. Wow those pills are nice. What a sleep. Almost seems worth getting addicted.


• Plans: so the next 3-4 days, I'm on a river boat going up the biggest river in Borneo. Spend the night in 2 different juggle lodges. Maybe stay an extra night in one of them. Lots of mini-treks, boat safari's etc. Then when I come back, I'm gonna head to Sipadan, which is suppose to be one of the best dive spots in the world. Me and my 6 dive-history will have to see about that. Then I'm not sure. Probably head to central Borneo and/or go to hike some really big mountain they have here. And I might go and try to "do Bali" before Katie comes on Sept 5.

Well that's it for now. Unless one of the juggle lodges has satellite Internet, I'm probably AWOL for a few days. I hope you all can survive it.

Stay leech free and don't let the bed bugs bite...

-erik

Kuala Lumpor: Kinda Lame

Greetings from Kuala Lumpor. Arrived here as scheduled yesterday evening and leave for Borneo tomorrow(unless I change my mind at the airport, which I'm actually 25% considering...) KL is OK, but not blowing me away. Kinda seems like a SE Asian version of Minneapolis. Lots of friendly people, but surprisingly little to do or see for a city this size (1.5 million). I'm sure there is a super-cool underbelly that I haven't found, but it seems to be hiding pretty well. Very different from Bangkok which has a billion sites and an energy that just oozes out in all directions (for better or for worse.) Aside from some small pockets (like Chinatown, where my hotel is...) it seems like all there are here are Bank headquarter buildings. Though it does have the Petronas Towers which I went and which are awesome. I thought they'd be cool, but they were cooler than I imagined. I actually went twice: once in the morning to get my "first-come, first served" ticket for going up to the skybridge, and once again at 6pm to actually go up to the skybridge (which was also even cooler that I thought it would be...). Aside for that, hoo-hum.

A few misc observations:

• Guess what the language is here: English! Who knew? I didn't. (BTW, why the hell doesn't the Lonely Planet guide discuss how easy/hard it will be to get by in various countries speaking English? Kinda useful to know...) Ok, so the "first" language is Malay, but pretty much everyone speaks English, both because it was an English colony for some time and because it is a pretty international place and English is the common tongue. I was talking to a local (in English!) and he said that people who move to KL will live here for years without learning any Malay because it is so easy to get by with just English. Nice for me...
• Apparently it is not a social taboo to pick ones nose in public in Malaysia. This trend seems to hold true for restaurant workers too, which is more than a little bit troubling.
  
• Apparently it is also not a social taboo to look at porn in an internet cafe. The user at computer #1 appears to have several dozen explicit webcams open, while the user at #3 prefers a site called "gayromeo.com." (for the record, i am not on computer #1 or #3...)
• Horrible generalization: Thai people (men, women, and ladyboys) seem to be overall much more attractive that Malaysians for whatever reason. The people here really do seem nice though. They do seem more serious though. I have gotten very use to constant joking/kidding that is a standard Thai conversational tool. Doesn't seem to a factor here.
• Speaking of Thai conversations: my English has seemed to morphed in to version of English that Thai people speak. For example if someone asks, "What did you do today?" instead of saying "I hiked to a waterfall, but got caught in a rainstorm and got a billion leeches on my feet" I now say, "I hike to waterfall. Much rain. Many many leeches. Not good." This has happened slowly and unintentionally. I've noticed that it has carried into my conversations with Katie ("I go to Borneo soon. Maybe no have internet. I call soon as I can.") and even the voice in my head ("Very tired, but must get up for free breakfast buffet now. No need pay for breakfast. Can sleep later, OK?"). So you can probably blame at least some of my typos on that.
  

OK, speaking of sleep, it is 12:45AM, so I better quit. Oh that reminds me one more thing though: My current hotel room has no windows at all. At first that seems like a bad thing. But its actually pretty awesome. The darkest sleeping room I've ever had. I was like sleeping in a sensory deprivation chamber. I might have actually slept for 32 hours last night, I don't know. Might get to the airport tomorrow and find out I missed my flight by a day. I need to leave for the airport at around noon tomorrow and I'm probably gonna set my alarm for 11am just to be sure. And its super quite too. If I ever build a custom home, I'm totally gonna add a windowless "sleeping chamber" off the "bedroom." Why don't people do that? Can I patent that?? OK, clearly someone needs some sleep.

Thanks for reading...

-erik

Slideshow Update

Here comes another update, but I think I will use more visual aides this time. I'm back in Phuket (just back today) and catching a flight to Malaysia in 2 days. I just spent 3 mostly good days in Khao Sok national park. Here are some of the things that I experienced there...

I did a 2 day, 1 night "trek" with these people...

The overnight, we stayed in this place...

(brief aside: this place had no bathroom (barely had a roof) so I wasn't able to collect more info on the Thai ADA for bathroom door height, but a 2nd place now has had a 5'9" bathroom. I think that might be the national standard.) It was a wonderful "raft house" in an extremely isolated spot. Gorgeous. We trekked to a cave...

we trekked into a cave... we trekked to a mountain view spot...

on the way, I swung on a vine because that's what you do in the juggle...

Speaking of trekking, I am not totally sure why they call it trekking instead of hiking here, but I believe that the presence of leeches might have something to do we it. If you are out on a hike, and you get a leech, then you are now on a trek. That is now my definition anyway. With that I can tell you that yesterday, I went on a major trek. I literally pulled about 50 leeches off of feet during the 15 miles trek....

I also pull more than a dozen off this random dog that decided to do the whole trek with me. Off his paws, nose, lips, gums...

I also nearly stepped on this poisonous snake in Khao Sok that was on the stairs to my room. The guide at the guesthouse didn't know the English word, but the Thai word for the snake translates to "Arrow of God." That doesn't sound good...

One other interesting thing. I didn't get a picture, but there are some jungle insects (might even have been cacattas?) that made this incredibly loud and constant noise. The closest thing I can think of to describe it is the sound that BART makes between the 12th St and West Oakland stations. Also sounds alot like wet mt. bike disc brakes. Was pretty cool actually.

Ok, I think I might pause it there for now. Maybe more later before I head to Malaysia. I did just post alot of new pictures here if you want to see more:

http://picasaweb.google.co.th/erki666

Ok, see you later.....

-erik