XC 1X2

 An early wake up for a long travel move. Five hours of bussing to KL, too much time to kill, then a ten hour flight to Sydney. The first thing I discovered is that I’ve lost my eye mask. I picked up a nice one back in Chicago from Target. Big, adjustable, and more generous padding than a Victoria’s Secret push up. I’ll miss it. The ride goes easy enough and I even have an empty seat next to me for much of it. I took the liberty of making a stop at a convenience store last night for snacks and my sambal egg onigiri breakfast is filling a hole. Back in KL I dumped my bag at luggage storage and went off to get a roll of film developed. This lab is incredible. For four bucks they’ll process, scan, and email me the results and get it all done in under two hours. A gift after the lab in Delhi which still hasn’t gotten back to me after over a week and charging me double. To kill the development time I grab a bowl of noodles and another teh tarik. I didn’t sleep much last night and every ...

 One thing I may never understand about this country is the napkins. Sit down for a meal and more likely than not, you won’t find any napkins on the table. If you ask, you’ll be handed a box of tissues to clean your hands with. They don’t absorb much of anything and they’re far too fragile to scrub oils out of your mitts. Today will be relaxing. Lots of doing nothing, reading, and drinking tea. Theres a night market but until then I’m just flipping pages, daydreaming, and preparing for tomorrow’s travel day. Right now it’s about four thirty and the most eventful thing I’ve done is laundry. It isn’t even strictly needed but it will be cheaper here than in Australia and it’ll save me a load out there. Laundromat, apartments, farm As luck would have it, the afternoon rain started right when my dry cycle finished. This meant I got to enjoy the exercise of riding as much like a Grab driver as possible. The local delivery guys don wait for nobody and in the rain with clean laundry and no...

 The backpackers here say the thing to do is hiking. I set off for a trailhead and some breakfast. Malaysia has a fun nonalcoholic drink culture unlike any other place I’ve seen. Just about every place you go has a page or two of drink options listed. Granted, some of these are redundant such as listing coffee and coffee with sugar as two separate drinks. Still, the list is long. Motorcycling on the left is turning out to be easier than I thought. Figuring the instinct to ride American started out tough and got easy. With a motorcycle specifically, I found myself second guessing my lane position a lot. Lots of little motos on the wrong side here. Just enough to make you doubt yourself. I got to the trailhead and checked online after to see what I was in for. Three hours of crawling up a mountain though the jungle. Hmmmm, that’s not what I want right now. I guess it was my mistake to take a trail recommendation from a German backpacker. They’re notorious for calling a few dozen kilo...

 When the British set up this resort town they brought their tea habits with them. There are two old plantations they started still operating today. Some of the original Nissin Huts brought up are still around, keeping the production dry. Since I’d be motorcycling some ways, I figured I’d start my day with a cuppa cawfee. There’s a local specialty, white coffee. It’s a light roasted bean served like a cappuccino with lots of milk and sugar. Now I’m buzzing and so is the bike. We’re at altitude but blissfully this machine is well maintained and happy to hit the road. It’s a 30 minute zip from my hotel to the plantation and the views are fantastic. Thick jungle, huge trees, serene farms. The humidity makes the surrounding area quite lush and helpfully, takes the wrinkles out of my shirt.  Can you tell I’m caffinated? The plantation is huge and has a comparatively small visitor’s area. A cafe that serves their own, a shop, a factory tour, and a short hike with a view. I start wit...

 KL is an expensive city, I think part of that is psychological. How am I supposed to take the currency seriously when it’s called Ringgit? That’ll be 100 Ringgit sir. Sure, that doesn’t spoil so bad. How much could a Ringgit hurt? This place is like Vegas, designed to pull as much money from the visitor’s wallet as possible. I’m also getting tired of the “I am the main character” photo culture. I’ve seen people stand in the street, block sidewalks, and almost get their kid run over in a quest for a perfect shot. They’re always surprised when four cylinders of reality come roaring for their abdomens. Idiots. Get the fuck out of the right of way if you want something for your socials. I have about an hour and forty-five minutes to kill between checking out of my hotel and my bus departure for Cameron Highlands. Since I’m in KL and hungry, grabbing a bagel on the way to the bus terminal should take all of that time. Predictably, after breakfast I get to the bus terminal five minutes ...

 Now that it’s Monday, I’m doing another side quest. Since I’m in a place where it’ll be cheaper to handle than it would be in the US, I’m off to see if I can get my camera repaired. There’s a promising spot that seems to specialize in film cameras not far outside of the city center. Predictably, it’s in a shopping mall. New country new address format, I’m wandering around this place for what feels like an eternity trying to figure out where I’m supposed to be. Eventually I find it. The head honcho is out to lunch. Fine by me, I’m hungry too and the man still working has a good lunch recommendation.  The new kills the old Vegetarian Chinese food. What a change of pace from standard Malay fare. The meat here has been delicious but I’m happy to skip it for a bit. One of the staffers is intrigued to see someone so pale so far away from the main tourist zone and sits down with me. We talk about our travels. He’s a hairdresser by trade and spent years wandering the earth cutting ha...

 Clean sheets, sleeping in, silence on the 33rd floor. Fast internet, a shower that heats up faster than I can get in. These are a few of my favorite things. It’s not lunch and I’m not hungry so I figured I should start my day by pulling cash. 500 ringgit oughta do it. The machine spits a pile of 20s into my hand. I’m so tired of these countries not owning their inflation. At least the Uzbeks have useful currency. I bought a soda on my way out of the 7/11 with the cash machine. I left the half ringgit piece outside on a trash can. I’m just not interested. Everything is a mall I abandoned the Joseph Conrad novel I bought for being written in an insufferable style so I was due for a book adventure. I walked from my hotel to a nearby mall to see what I folks find. Everything is a mall here. Between the humidity and the wealth, the entirety of KLCC has been pushed indoors where the air is cool and dry. I can’t blame the locals for that. I haven’t felt humidity like this for some time, ...

 Delhi was not going to let me go without one final cab story.  The auto wallas and uber drivers here have been… unconventional but experienced. There is a method to the madness. I was woken up before my alarm by a call from the front desk, letting me know that my airport transfer had arrived… more than an hour early. My tour company likes to partner with charity organizations whenever they can. Tourism can be bad for a country, using it for good is a lovely way to counter the evils of inviting a bunch of goras over to crowd your historic sites. Without going into details, the cab company that was contracted to handle the ride is well intentioned but uses drivers who are not typically doing professional work in India. The hour and a half early wake up call was my first clue. When we went to load the car, the trunk wasn’t big enough for my bag and so it went in the front seat. We were on our way and after the driver stopped to ask for directions out of the neighborhood, we were...

 Not a super early morning today but I don’t get to sleep in either. I have a few errands to run around the city and to turn the work into play, I’ve arranged a motorcycle rental for myself. Royal Enfields are iconic out here and the little thumpers are a common sight in the roads here in Delhi. The tour van driver knows a guy and conveniently, he’s located near a metro stop. Easy peasy. Getting around in India is complicated, operating a vehicle doubly so. Now that I’m comfortable with walking and it seems like motorcycling here is a kind of an extension of those behaviors, I figured I was ready to take a crack at it. It’s raining today. I hate rain. Ehhh whatever, it’s not coming down too hard. All part of the experience and besides, I’ve got a rain coat. I make my way to the rental location and the man comes out to take my info and arrange payment. 1500 rupees for the day plus a 5000 rupee deposit. As luck would have it, I’ve only got about 200 in my wallet. Off for an ATM. On t...

 Today started quite well. I got to sleep in as late as I could manage and I figured out how to use the shower here. Rest assured that it’s more complicated than it could be. We pack up the van and head off to Delhi. On the way I’ve booked some treats for myself when I get there. Shave, tea, other stuff to be disclosed at a later posting. Just nice things. Before hitting the road we popped into a monkey tamale nestled into a canyon. Monkey man asks me if I want a picture with the monkeys. Assures me he can grantee my safety. Promises me he is friends with all the monkeys. That’s not impressive, all my friends are monkeys. Sorry monkey man. This place is, luckily, filthy enough to prepare me mentally for a return to the capitol. Monkey… Man On the long ride to Delhi I’m thinking a lot about the tour itself. Of all the countries I’ve been, this is the one where I’ve interacted with the least number of strangers. When I did talk to locals, it was arranged and safe. Having someone else...

 5 AM alarm. Why did I agree to this? I suppose if I’ve happily stayed up late to ride bikes after sunset, waking up before sunrise for a group ride is probably a good change of pace. Our guide has arranged a cycle tour of Delhi for us. He’s described it as a “cultural experience.” Undersell of the year. We arrived at the start point and I was pleasantly surprised to see a row of bikes in good shape, maintained and adjusted properly, with clean uncrashed helmets. That’s a good start, most bike rental places won’t even get you that. We started before the sun rose and after a brief cow feeding session, grabbed a chai. Apparently this guy is Modi’s favorite chai walla in Jaipur. Chaipur? I’ll see myself out. Morning cup We saw a few sites in the quiet of the morning and got to have them all to ourselves. Once the sun came up, they got us to a market and supplied us with marigold wreaths. Leaving the market we went to a park and did yoga with a few other tour groups as well as a handfu...

Our alarm clock for today is the work bus. At about seven he sounds his musical horn repeatedly to wake the villager’s day laborers and carry them into Jaipur. Another cuppa chai and we settle our bills with the house. Generous tipping feels like a good idea. The folks working here are rural enough that they don’t speak English and hardly get farther out than the nearest city. Honor has been kind enough to spot me a roll of black and white. We’ll see what the camera decides it’s willing to do. Our first stop of the day was Anoothi, a nonprofit focused on teaching women in tough situations salable skills. The tour company works with charities like these to get them more attention and always needed dollars. This center specializes in block printing. We start with a demo, an older master printer shows us how to properly make a print. We are all then given hankies and instructed to make our own. There are a number of hand cut wooden blocks and our group gets very creative with the inking a...

Last night there was an engagement party at the hotel. Best wishes to the happy couple to be. Since they were bumping tunes (and moving furniture) late into the night, I dipped into my supply of earplugs for the sake of my sanity. I woke up a few minutes before I had to be at the van, having slept through my alarm. Luckily for me, I have more than a little experience with packing my bag and it all came together quite quickly. By some miracle I wasn’t the last one downstairs. Skipping the hotel’s breakfast wasn’t a big deal either, their chai tastes like water. Yogi, the driver, took us to another Mughal palace. Here I was able to secure a small satchel of “India’s Masala Spice” Lays. You can get them in the US if you know where to look but they’re fresher here. I think I’m getting “elaborately carved red stone fatigue.” There’s nothing I can say about this place that would be new. There’s got to be something about the stone that keeps these carvings in such good shape. An Italian struc...

 Okay so I woke up a bit more hungover than I’d anticipated. I’m back in the part of the world where you have to ask for water when drinking, there’s an adjustment period. Still, I make it to the hotel’s restaurant in time to wolf down some potatoes and chai. We pile into the van and set off for Agra fort. In a moment where the thread of history has been uncut through my travels, we arrive to this Mughal fort. The Mughals are the descendants of the Timurids who came from Persia and ruled Uzbekistan for many years. Many architectural motifs are common to both areas, the family resemblance is quite clear. Fort Calling it a fort is really underselling it. This place was a place and a capital for one of the richest empires of all time. A moat of alligators and another of lions. A massive throne carved from one lump of onyx. Thousands of square footage dedicated just to housing the harem. A hot tub sized pool for rose water. A vineyard with soil brought in from friendlier climates. Foun...