Few Random Impressions of Thailand

Over the last two years I keep transiting Thailand without spending much time there, except the first time. This time I intended to stay a month but they changed the duration of visa on arrival from 30 days to 15 days and I quickly arranged my way to Taiwan. So before I leave I thought it’d be good to share some impressions.

Bangkok has these very nice, very green and free bicycles you can ride around the touristic area.
Although you have to show them your id when taking one, knowing that you can even
get a pilot certificate on the next street, they also take a photo of you, just in case.

Thailand is one of the most touristic countries perhaps in the whole world and it is one of the easiest to find your way around in. The internet is full of material on Thailand and whatever I may write here has the possibility of having been already written down somewhere else. Since I don’t want to pass by without blogging anything about it and not repeat anything else, I’ll just write down a few random things that caught my attention about Thailand, and most will still be repetitions :)

Colorful Ayutthaya tuktuks. Busses and taxis are also extremely colorful here.

Thailand is the only country in South East Asia that has never been colonized. It has been a neighbor to other colonized countries all around but it always kept the kingdom strong. The current king, King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who is eighty something, is the world’s longest reigning monarch alive, with 61 years on duty. But Thailand is not a monarchy, it’s a parliamentary democracy. Well, on the other hand Thailand has the greatest number of military coups in this side of the world. In other countries around, like Myanmar or Cambodia, when army takes power they seem to hold on to it. Whereas in Thailand army takes power, makes elections in a couple of years, the same guys they made the coup against gets elected, they kick them down and make another coup, sometimes silent. But whatever happens, Thai people really trust the king and almost worship him. Little shrines devoted to his highness can be found all around the country and being disrespectful to him is a big crime. (As a side note, I have first time experienced in Thailand such a strong single superhero, revered almost as God almighty, just like the worshipping of Kemal Atatürk in Turkey. But this time he’s alive.) Unfortunately King Bhumibol is very old and sick and there are no good heirs to the throne, with the son being a corrupt womanizer of a socialite and the daughter, although very charitable and much loved by the people, being single with no children (plus Thailand never had a queen without a king before).

One of the millions of shrines in honor of King Bhumibol.

What happens when you cover all your temples in pure gold?
Your neighbor gets jealous. And in this case, the Burmese invaded the capital Ayutthaya
and to take the gold –by melting it- burnt down all the temples and palaces.

The king’s color is yellow but every year people choose a new color for the shirts they wear with the royal seal. When I arrived everybody wore yellow because the king was 60 years on the throne and he was born on Tuesday, the yellow day. This year they all wear pink, which creates a very soft feeling when you look at a crowded market place where many Thai people proudly carry the royal seal on their pink shirts.

King Naalesuan was sent to exile when the Burmese invaded Siam. He became a hero
with his later victories and his fondness of cock fighting is remembered by
all the big and small rooster statues in shrines and monuments in his honor.

The current political situation in Thailand is very strange. Couple of years ago the army took power against Thaksin Shinawat, the Thai Berlusconi, who was charged by corruption. Apparently people were not that happy with him and his privatization and selling government companies and other property to his family. After less then 2 years they held an election and although he himself was in exile (in fear of being jailed in Thailand) his supporters won the elections. He briefly visited Thailand but was forced back to exile when the court cases started to show results against him. Then the opposition started to make mass demonstrations and asked his party to give up. They had a few incidents when demonstrators on both sides clashed and killed each other on the streets of Bangkok but recently they’ve been first occupying the party headquarters, when some people threw hand grenades on them and then they went on to occupy the two main airports of Bangkok just before Christmas time. Reports said 300.000 tourists were stranded for almost a week when thousands of supporters of Peaople’s Alliance for Democracy took over the airport by literally chasing away the few hundred airport security and policemen there. And in the end they got what they wanted. The irony is that People’s Alliance for Democracy didn’t accept the results of a democratic election and pushed army to force a man in uniform to be the prime minister once again. After all it is just a light scale social class war between these urban middle class and the rural population who still support the old prime minister. The unfortunate result of this is the crippling of tourism industry which is one of Thailand’s main sources of income.

The giant swing of Bangkok. Who else would have thought about holding competitions of high swinging
to the point that it becomes fatally dangerous? I tell you, it's no coincidence they love Red Bull.

Thai people are also different than other SE Asians, they are in a way more fiery. SE Asians in general are very kind and gentle people and in most cases this applies to Thai people also. They have these big smiles and they know how to make fun of life. But within the region they are the more aggressive and violent ones perhaps. As far as I know, Thailand is the only country in the region which has a living fighting sport tradition, muay Thai, or Thai boxing. They consume unbelievable amounts of really strong red bull and other stimulants all day long. In fact red bull started in Thailand where the local versions have too much caffeine and taurine to be legally exported.

Picking drinkers from the street on the new year day in Bangkok's Khaosan Road.
It is very strong and you can be 12 and still have it!

Most Thais are Buddhist (some Muslims and Chinese also) and in traditional families men still spend a couple of years time as a monk in a monastery (somehow like the military service back in the west but not compulsory of course). This is a tradition of the whole Indochina region and even the king does his duty as a monk, and for some years every morning takes his bowl and goes begging. On the other hand, also like other societies in the region, there is belief in spirits, supernatural powers and honoring of the ancestors (sometimes wrongly mentioned as ‘ancestor worship’). They make these tiny houses in front of their houses where they keep little statues of their ancestors and honor them with offerings of rice, fruits and Fanta every morning. Many Thai people are crazy for amulets. You can find amulet markets by the sidewalk where vendors sell little clay figures of monks in meditation, or sometimes Buddha. The clay from each amulet supposedly comes from a sacred location and they are sometimes produced in monasteries. After you put the jewelers magnifying glass in your eye and check out all the tiny detail of workmanship and you decide to buy one amulet, you find a suitable house for it, which is a little transparent plastic ad silver pendant that you can hang on your neck with a heavy chain. And some people carry really big ones.

A shrine for dead ancestors shared by a living neighbor on the basement.

Thailand used to be called Siam but changed their name because Siamese is just the main ethnicity here, whereas Thai means free, thus Thailand ‘Freeland’. I really appreciate this kind of name changes. Burma changed into Myanmar with the same reason as there are other ethnicities than the Burmese in Myanmar. I wish the same will be possible for Turkey and other countries where racial identities try to dominate a whole country.

Monasteries are home to many dogs, to the point that there are more dogs than monks like this one.
And the first time I was seriously bitten by a dog was when I was in a monastery in South Thailand,
sitting and meditating under a tree early in the morning. Bad karma dog!

Being a foreigner in Thailand makes you a ‘farang’ and you are recognized as a money source in most places. It is so strong that it feels like in return of most Thais seeing all foreigners as tourists, most foreigners treat the country as an oversized hotel. Although this makes the country very convenient to travel in, I cannot say it is a good feeling not to be seen as a real person.

__________________________________

I rushed this one to post it just before I leave for Taiwan.
I hope to write more about Thailand when I’m back here in March.

Ms.Loh’s Guesthouse, my home away from home

Teluk Bahang bay and village. Ms.Loh’s is in the green behind the big school buildings.

Ms.Loh’s place is not for everyone but for the last couple of years it became my base in Southeast Asia. When I first arrived in Malaysia with Ayşegül, we learned that we had to wait for two months for her passport extension and started looking for a home. It was clear from the beginning that, one, we couldn’t spend so much time in a guesthouse room, and two, we couldn’t stay in a big town like Georgetown no matter how much we may like it for a short time. So we ended up looking for a house for rent on the far side of Penang Island, in a fisherman village named Teluk Bahang. And we were fortunate enough to have read the few lines on a friend’s guidebook, saying that in Teluk Bahang, there is this place with such an endearing garden that some people end up staying a long long time. It turned out to be true.

Our street with Ms. Loh’s place on the right.

The bungalow building in the garden.

The garden is on one of the backstreets of Teluk Bahang, away from the packed fisherman village, surrounded by a durian plantation. Because of these giant trees (it takes a big tree to carry such big fruits) there are no neighbors around. And in this garden, on one side of the road are some 4 buildings spread out among all kinds of fruit and flower trees, coconuts, durian, starfruit, rambutan, mango, hibiscus and others. All buildings are made of wood and even from a short distance they are lost among the vegetation. The main house is just a ground floor one with a long veranda in the front. It has 10 rooms for guests, one main room which also houses the protector deity of the house and a big kitchen. Then there is a side bungalow with 3 rooms, and two separate buildings which have some rooms on the upper floor while one of them has a nice big shaded area looking the garden under it. The place is big and there is much open space.

The protector of the house

Home Day (winter solstice) morning Ms.Loh appeared early in the morning to
light up this huge incense and give lots of pink offerings to the protector of the house.

As soon as I saw the kitchen I knew I’d choose to stay there and I’d love it. The kitchen has a great diversity of equipment that concentrated there over many years. Some bowls and utensils almost look antique but it also has two working refrigerators and a working stove which makes all the difference. Anyone who has lived in a community knows how important the kitchen is for the social interaction there. And it’s the same here. You meet everyone around the kitchen. And the tap water is drinkable, what a great rare luxury. And you can do your yoga or whatever practice in the shade, or play your guitar on one of the garden swings all around the place (Ms.Loh loves garden swifts so we have many).

Enjoying one of the many swings.

Ms.Loh is a Chinese lady in her 70’s. She’s been running this guesthouse for over 35 years. To have space and freedom for the guests she has moved from inside the village into this garden 25 years ago. At that time there were many travelers on this side of the world. Those were the good days of 20th century, before islamophobia stopped travelers from visiting so-called Muslim countries (as if countries have religions). So the tourism development stopped and small places shut down. But Ms.Loh survived thanks to all the people who saw this place as their home and kept coming. The place has this potential to make one dream of old time travelers places because it’s one of the few remaining relics of that age. You can actually find travel guides and magazines from 70s and 80s and it’s not hard to loose time.

The front veranda where most of life takes place.

Apart from the trees and flowers, the garden is a home to a lot of animals. First, we have the dogs, the numbers of which is usually between 5 and 10 but can get over that if two bitches give birth at the same time. Then we have the rats and mice, which are the nighttime visitors. They seem to enjoy having big football games up on the roof every night but luckily not for a very long time. The first month here it was one of my favorite evening pastimes to sit and watch them carefully but with short rapid moves approach the dogs’ food bowls, grab a chunk of leftover rice and make their run behind a rock or up a tree. They are responsible for the cleanup. Then we have some lizards, the millions of geckos which make these birdlike sounds and eat mosquitoes (which is why we like them I think) and the occasional monitor lizard. Monitors are huge lizards. First time I saw one I was really scared because I thought it was a crocodile. The big ones you can see around here are perhaps 1,5 – 2 meters but they can get bigger than that. Raja, one of Ms.Loh’s handymen, tries to convince us that it’s the monitors that take the puppies when they get lost and not the Muslims (Muslims here don’t like dogs and sometimes kill them). There is a family of these monitors living under the bridge just on the border of the garden but they are very shy and they’re also very scared of the dogs. Raja also says they caught some really big snakes in the garden just on the other side of the road but I only met one green tree snake in the bathroom once (which turned out to be a quite poisonous one). Philip swears he saw a black cobra in the toilet once. Macaque monkeys make their ways all the way from the nearby national park to the durian orchard on the other side of the road but luckily they don’t cross the road and enter our territory. Then there are birds. Mynas are also big fans of dog food and they also come to clean the dinner table. Then there are small colorful flowerpeckers which hover in the air and suck nectar from flowers with their long curved beaks. A little after noontime comes the golden orioles and sometimes you can see a fish eagle nesting on one of the highest trees. Wire-tailed drongos make their number 8 dances almost look like they want to catch that black butterfly following their tails. And there are butterflies, many big colorful butterflies.

There is an endless cosmic dance in the garden.

The flowerpecker having his breakfast.

Then there are the inhabitants of Ms.Loh’s place. Since this is not the kind of place that pops up as a guesthouse in the minds of people who carry guidebooks, the fast travelers usually leave a bit disappointed. Most places these days offer rooms with attached toilets or even air conditioners, and of course, newer beds. But some see the garden, get hooked up on cooking and end up staying longer than they intended. The main crew of the place however are people who make it their base when they travel and mostly for many many years. There are people who keep coming back here for tens of years and of course they are old. Because of this mostly it is a good place to hear some old travelers’ tales and get some good advice. But of course some old people complain a lot and are not flexible anymore, and some people cannot handle old travelers. So there is this social dance that takes place in this garden and without taking parts or feeling included in any group, I like doing this dance. I like communities anyway. Some would say this is not a community because we pay for things, have our rooms and things and we don’t have any prior agreement with each other. But I like to see it as a small experimental society. A unique one.

V for Verygraceful

I love Penang

Penang is an island just a little off the Western coast of North Malaysia. It was virtually uninhabited until the British East India Company thought it could make a good port to compete with the Dutch port of Melaka (today also in Malaysia) during late 18th century. They needed to clear the jungle and create a town and to do it fast, the story goes, they loaded the cannons with silver coins and shot towards the jungle. The workers now had a good incentive to cut all the vegetation to get the silver and create land for development.

Koh Kongsi, an early Chinese trade union. Until early 20th century, Penang was under
unofficial control of this sort of Chinese trade unions and secret societies (mafia).

Muslim village in Batu Ferringhi, as oppose to the Chinese and Indian villages just next to it,
this one, like other Muslim villages, doesn’t have any dogs because they are considered non-halal.

Very fortunately they didn’t cut it all but created more land by filling the sea. And soon Penang became a bustling port full of merchants from everywhere but mainly Chinese. As far as I know, today Penang is still the only majority Chinese state in Malaysian Union. The other founding state which was also majority Chinese was Singapore and was forced to leave not wanting to give away the economic power of its Chinese population only two years later. Today Penang still has all sorts of people but none seem to be majority and there seems to be a general feeling of “sharing” this land.

Georgetown as seen from the terrace of Kek Lok Si Temple.

Main pagoda of Kek Lok Si Temple

Georgetown, the capital, has the old and the new city right next to each other. It has great colonial architecture and an alive little India, while next to them is one of Asia’s longest towers, Komtar, and once longest bridge on earth, the 13.5 km long Penang bridge connects the island to the mainland. There are great many temples for all religions, Chinese and Indian temples, mosques, many churches, Thai and Burmese Buddhist temples, and others. The Thai temple has a huge reclining Buddha which used to be the biggest in Southeast Asia. Today Penang is known as Malaysia’s Silicon Valley and the microchips for my next passport are being made here. But a traveler never notices this.

Penang Bridge, which connects Penang with the mainland.

Gurney Drive, where the old city turns into the Cyber City Penang.

When you leave town along the coast first you see big posh shopping malls and tall condos with swimming pools. Later on you come to a long beach called Batu Ferringhi, the Foreigners’ Rock. I don’t know where the rock was and where all the nudists who discovered this beach have gone but today this most promoted touristic beach of the island is full of resort hotels and Saudi tourists. Unfortunately, especially for those who decide to spend their holidays here after seeing the brochures of the place, the seas around Penang are not good for swimming. Because of the Melacca Straits, which runs between Mainland Malaysia and Sumatra, and is one of the busiest sea highways thanks to all the Chinese exports, the sea here is usually murky and quite full of jellyfish.

Local people of Penang having a sunset dip on
Teluk Bahang beach, with their clothes on as usual.

Air Hitam dam lake

But the center of the island still has some amazingly old (like millions of years) untouched jungle and in or around this jungle it’s possible to take a dip in a waterfall or a pond on a river. Many people who stay here enjoy the long treks to these hills or the peninsula at the Northwestern corner which is the Penang National Park. This park is home to the cheekiest little macaque monkeys I’ve ever seen anywhere. They treat your belongings like theirs, completely ignore you and even fight with you to take them. This applies especially to plastic bags and drinks. I’ve got lots of food stolen by monkeys in India but I had never in the past experienced a monkey coming to claim the drink in my hand and even playing tug-o-war with me for it.

Cheeky monkeys of Penang National Park.

One of the roads on the edge between a fast developing city and an ancient jungle.

Before I arrived here I didn’t know what a “food enthusiast” meant and now I think I turned into one in Penang. The ethnic mixture in Penang gives one great many choices of food and especially the street food is very special. There are so many books on hawker food of Penang, one can help acknowledge that the foods from these kitchens on wheel are sometimes better than the food from well established restaurants. If you were obsessed with food in the past and came over it after much effort, don’t come to Penang. It’s to a food lover, what Jamaica is to a pothead.

Evening food court on Gurney Drive where you get the best variety of food.

The main temple of Penang is Goddess of Mercy Temple
which is recognizable by the smoke rising from it.
Although it has big fans to clear the air inside, still the walls have all turned
black and in front you can always see these 2 meter incense burning.

There are also other things about Penang which you’ll have to discover yourself. These were just a few things why I love this place and see it as my base. Ah, and there is Ms. Loh’s place…

Smiling for peace, Golden Smiling Buddha in Kek Lok Si Temple

Nonsense Visas for Nonsense Borders

Sometimes I can’t believe I’m still living in this age where there are borders, visas, governments, armies, police and all that goes with this mass illusion we wrongly call civilization. I have been feeling we’ll be done with these quite soon and I still believe that. But it seems it’s not time just yet.

Last year I went to China. It was really smooth. I went to the embassy in Bangkok, filled in a form, paid some money and returned 4 days later to receive my passport back with a sticker inside. No questions asked. It was funny to go by boat from Thailand to China on the Mae Kong river, which is the border between Myanmar and Laos. It’s like walking on the thin line people draw on the map and say “this is one country and this is another” as if when you are on that line you could tell one side from the other.

Then this year in April, just the day I was going to buy tickets for Macau on the way to China, there was the main news that China changed the visa regulations because of the Olympics. I had thought Olympics would make it even easier for foreigners to go to China but it was just the opposite. They asked to see hotel reservations and return tickets, neither of which any serious traveler in such a vast country has. It meant that for the Olympics they only wanted tourists and not travelers. But more than that, they had some other new rules such as “passport holders of Asian countries can take China visas in their home country only”. And this didn’t apply to Malaysia which I saw as my current home unless I had a working visa there. I had to go back to Turkey in order to go from Malaysia to China! After the Olympics, I heard, they changed the visa laws back to the traveler-friendly earlier one and everybody took a deep breath. It was almost unseen in this region and perhaps just an arrangement for only once.

Lately I’ve been planning to go to Taiwan. As soon as I arrived in Malaysia I started to call the consulate but first the numbers were wrong and then I could only talk to robotic ladies which would connect me to non-answering departments. I sent an e-mail which also received no answers. Finally I went to the office for China Airlines and got a more private number of the consulate. I rang and managed to actually talk to a real living being. She asked me my nationality, made me wait a few minutes, asked if I’m working here, made me wait a few more minutes and in the end returned and said, “we can give you a visa only if you have a working visa in Malaysia, otherwise you have to get it from Turkey.” If I had a working visa here, I’d be working and wouldn’t be going to Taiwan for a month, would I? It’s kind of similar to that you have to prove you don’t need money in order to get credit from the bank. It is nonsense.


And I sit and think. Taiwan’s official name is Republic of China, as oppose to People’s Republic of China where visa is an easier story, and I had of course imagined it to be a more free country than China but it turne out to be a Beurocrat’s Republic of China. And in the end it’s supposed to be the same country anyway. All these Malay people who inhabit Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines and other countries in the region have their root sin Taiwan. But Taiwan still has some openness to learn from these countries.

Malaysia gives 3 months permit at the border to any foreigners for free. Indonesia charges some and gives a visa on entry for one month or in the embassy for two months. Philippines gives three weeks free at the border which can be extended up to two years without leaving the country. Do these countries feel more secure that they can invite people like that? Do Taiwan have more terror than them so it has to keep things in control? Does it make sense?

Perhaps I should look into my passport, the only one I can get because I was born within certain borders. It’s the passport of Turkey, a medium sized country in the Middle East. Aha, Middle East. Perhaps that’s why. Everybody knows about muslims terrorists and although they didn’t strike Taiwan yet, who knows they can sometime soon. Does it make sense at all?

So I changed my plans and decided to go to Thailand, which gives one month free visa at the border, and see some friends and do ameditation retreat toclear this energy. And I think “Thailand must be pretty deserted now because of this airport occupation of the most anti-democratic democracy movement. They’ll be happy to see another foreigner and I’ll be happy to see less.” But then, in the evening I learned that they changed the visa policy! Now they give only 15 days on the land borders. If you fly in you get 30 days but if you come overland it is only 15 days or you have to get a visa in the embassy. This is so absurd. Why now of all times when the country is suffering an unseen 50% tourist loss? It doesn’t make any sense.

So I decided not to stay so long in Thailand, let them loose me, and go to Myanmar for a month for which I need to get another visa. I heard a friend was refused a visa there last month and he assumes it is because his passport was from USA and USA supports the opposition in Myanmar. I wonder if they know about muslims. I hope they don’t.Muslims don’t care about human rights anyway so I guess they’d be getting along pretty well.

Long time I have stopped considering traveling in Europe because the treatment they give in the consulates in Turkey is simply inhuman. I refuse to be treated like that. So I’ve been happy in Asia where the countries are not saturated with illegal immigrants from Turkey or scared of muslims. But this last visa troubles I had with two Chinas is making me consider eliminating Chinas from my map also. They’ll be loosing, not me :)

__________________________________

Revision, December 29, 2008, Bangkok

Just to prove the absurdity of all theses "absolute" laws and regulations, today I received my 60 days visa for Taiwan. As soon as I arrived in Bangkok I called the consulate, got to a real person pretty fast, and the nice lady replied me with the words "you just come here, fill in the form, pay the fee and pick it up later." But, but, the embassy in KL even sent me an official enough e-mail containing a long list of requirements such as invitation, reservation, return plane ticket, proof of funds and the worst of all resident visa in Malaysia. I asked to the lady on the phone and she giggled "no, no, you don't need to buy your ticket or anything, we only need your bank statement."

So I went there the next day, had a brief and nice interview, mostly about the reasons behind my continuous traveling and the lack of Turkish visitors in Taiwan. Then today I received it. I'm really happy about it.

So what was wrong in Malaysia? Perhaps they had the Muslim Alarm on, or only business travelers fly from Malaysia to Taiwan, as oppose to genuine tourists who fly from Thailand. In any case this goes to prove one thing: even when the officer behind the desk is telling you it is just the law and there is nothing he can do about it, he may be wrong or just trying to avoid you. Laws are not absolute; they bend. And as conscious people we'll help them bend wherever they can.

What’s so special about Malaysia?

Malaysia is in South East Asia. It’s population is a mixture of Muslim Malays, Canton and Hokkien Chinese and Tamil Indians, plus the almost extinct Orang Asli, the original people or aborigines. It’s nature is similar to the countries around but not that special and badly damaged. It has some nice coral islands along the East coast but on the West coast the sea is not clean due to all the pollution in the Malacca Straits. It has some of the few remaining “oldest” jungles on earth which survived many ice ages. Its history perhaps is a little more special due to its geographic importance during the days of spice trade. Although the first colonies were Portuguese and Dutch, it entered the last century under British rule and is still a part of the British Common Wealth. There are some nice historical sites to be seen in Malaka and Penang. It’s also a fairly developed country. Its petrol and palm oil production has created much wealth in the past decades (and destroyed most of its forests), which is distributed better than in other countries of the region. Malaysia has the world’s highest twin towers, one of world’s longest bridges, most successful budget airlines and even a space program. It is a so-called democracy with very little freedom of speech and a less than democratic election law. It has the world’s only rotational kingdom system, which permits the kings of 13 states be the king of the whole country for 5 years each but their responsibilities are symbolic… But for me, none of these are what makes Malaysia special.

Kuala Lumpur landscape with Menara KL and Petronas tower on the back.

Petronas are the world’s tallest twin towers.

Having different cultures living together creates the richest aspect of Malaysia. In many places there is no apparent majority of the population. Each society has its organizations, schools, press and even special laws. For example there are things Muslims cannot do, such as play lottery or join a meditation retreat. The Chinese own most of the big business and have their own schools in Mandarin, while the Indians represent the lower part of the economic scale and lately have been expressing a rare discontent because of this. Apart from these it is not uncommon to see Christian churches, Tibetan Buddhist temples and others.

Traditional Chinese tea in China Town, Kuala Lumpur

Perhaps it’s this cultural mix that makes a foreigner feel at home. A westerner who’s visiting Malaysia is many times treated the same way as a Malaysian person as long as s/he doesn’t act like a tourist and not in a touristic area. If you have traveled in Asia you can understand how precious this can be. In Thailand, which is the most popular tourist destination in the region, wherever you go, however you behave, even whichever language you speak, Thai people will see you as a “tourist”. In return, most westerners see Thailand as an oversized hotel (though it’s not easy to say which comes first). But here in Malaysia you are almost a local after a couple of months but as soon as you arrive you’re already a person, not a tourist. This changes the feeling you have just walking around or talking to people. It is very pleasant.

Tea plantations of Cameron Hills.

And you thought all that tea came from Darjeeling?

It’s not that Malaysian people just mind their business and leave you alone. If you need help or just want to chat, you can just go and start it and most people would love to talk to you. Malays like it if you can speak a few words of Bahasa Malaysia, the Chinese or the Indian don’t mind but pretty much everyone speaks English. So if you are a social person you easily make friends here and they will be friends.

Attempting to make friends with the kids of the tea plantations

One contributing factor to the pleasant feeling one has visiting this country is that Malaysia is relatively more prosperous than its neighbors. It’s not that Malaysia has more resources than the rest (like Brunei Darussalam) or historically more privileged (like Indonesia). I think most of it comes from being smart in managing what they have and also the lack of corruption. I believe as long as there are politicians there is corruption but around this side of the world there are guys such as Soeharto of Indonesia and Marcos of the Philippines who stole the wealth of millions of their citizens and even after decades their countries are still trying to take the money they stole back (in fact, there is still a continuing court case against the Marcos family to get the billions of dollars of the country back). As oppose to these pro-American dictators, Malaysia had Dr. Mahatir Mohammed which was like an Asian version of Hugo Chavez at his time. He didn’t take orders from USA or the World Bank, created one of the biggest growth rates in the area and successfully carried Malaysia to safely across the big Asian financial crisis which collapsed the economies of all countries North and South (which also slowed down Malaysia). Today the country neither has Mahatir nor a closed economy and is tensely waiting for the tsunami of the global economic meltdown. But although there is possibly corruption, it is not big or widespread enough to keep the country poor. And the distribution of wealth is pretty well.

Giant poster of the Malaysian space program

So this creates the scene of lots of cars and motorbikes and just a very few people dumpster diving. In Malaysia you don’t find the insisting souvenir sellers in Thailand who are desperate to sell you that one dollar thing so they can profit one cents. Neither do you find as many beggars or inhuman living conditions as in most other places around. Things are a bit more expensive than other countries around with the exception of food. Ah, food…

Adam and Eve Beach in Pulau Perhentian Kecil,
where I swam with many little friendly sharks

I’ve seen the ancient jungle in Taman Negara, dived around a couple of coral islands, seen the tea plantations and some historical places in Malaysia but in my eyes, none of these makes Malaysia as special and worthy of a visit than its food. First of all there is the Malay food, which is mainly lots of spicy curries (not nearly as spicy as in India), fish soup, fries, and some light sweets. Then there is the Chinese food which is like… well, Chinese food. It can be anything and all different ways of cooking them. Then there is the Indian food which brings the roti chanai (like bread and curry), tandoori, tosai, chai and some more spicy curries (still not nearly as spicy as in India). And there are mixtures of these like the Nyonya kitchen which is Malay-Chinese mixture. Western food is also pretty common but you’d be missing a lot if you stick to your old food habits.

Lok Lok stall in the night market. You pick an assortment of
things on sticks, boil them there and eat with yummy sauces.

It would take a long blog entry to explain the food of Malaysia. As far as I know, it’s the only country for which the Lonely Planet guide has planned “Food lovers’ country tours” in its local guidebook, which are tours you can make around the country in search of different tastes. As a person who spent most of his life hating to eat and seeing the whole thing as a chore, I had a second awakening about food here. First time I went to India I discovered the art of cooking. Now in Malaysia each time I go to an evening food court I feel like I’m in an amusement park. Food courts are like big parks where many people put up small food stalls at night and there are tables in the middle and sometimes there is even entertainment on stage. You can find stalls where you fill your ingredients into a bowl and ask them to make them into a soup or you can get things on a little stick (almost anything edible from tofu to crabs to quail eggs) and boil them yourself (lok-lok on photo). And as soon as you take a seat, someone comes to ask you what you drink, which can be a variety of fresh fruit juices to teas and coffees to healthy barley water or sometimes shakes. But when there is no food court, like here in Teluk Bahang, I go to the lady on the corner who cooks at home and sells them on a table every evening. I get rice and self serve myself a choice from her almost 20 yummy dishes. And it’s cheap.

Another pleasant thing about Malaysia is its peacefulness. First of all the country has no serious army or military confrontations. It doesn’t have any terror or people who are seeking independence for Malaysia. And in a smaller scale, you don’t come across people fighting or even quarreling. I’ve spent many months here and haven’t seen a single loud quarrel in public space. They don’t even raise their voice and they don’t drive as aggressively as people do in other Asian countries (although, of course, you cannot compare it with European driving). There is some crime, especially kidnapping of little girls (I think it has to do with the conservative Muslim society) or bombing of ATM machines to rob them. But there is not the prevalent feeling that there can be a criminal next to you who can steal your bag or any dark street can be dangerous. You get these feelings rightfully in neighboring countries but not so much here. Malaysia also doesn’t have any natural disasters, no volcanoes, typhoons or earthquakes (it was hit only lightly by the famous tsunami although it’s very near to where it originated). And best of all, Malaysia is the only country I know which gives 3-months free visa at the border to citizens of almost all nations (it doesn’t recognize Israel). There is even a “Malaysia My Second Home” program, which permits foreign pensioners to deposit some money in a Malaysian bank and stay as long as they wish (or live). And there are many foreigners living, working, studying here but you don’t see the expats of the type that is so common in countries such as Thailand, Cambodia or Philippines, because there is no sex tourism here.

Tree top canopy walk in the
ancient jungles of Taman Negara

Friends ask me why I spend so much time here in Malaysia, why I chose it as my base? I love the people, I love the food, I love the feeling, I love the peace, it is right in the middle of the region and conveniently has the cheapest airlines and other connections to everywhere, and I’ve found here a little place with a garden which I like to see as my home for the moment but that is a subject for another post…

A warning sign in Lake Garden’s Park, Kuala Lumpur

______________________________________________________________


*I feel I may write more later but meanwhile if you have any questions, any points about Malaysia or the region that you’d like to be clarified about, please leave a comment and I’d be more than happy to reply each of them.

*Most of my time in Malaysia I didn’t have a camera, so the photos here may not be a good selection to represent the country.

Traveling in the Philippines

Philippines is not a very well traveled country but is well worth it. It has anything from coral islands to mountain jungles. There are many endemic animal species and different indigenous cultures. It’s also generally a safe and healthy place to travel. The only thing that keeps it out of travelers’ maps is its remoteness.


Logistically, Philippines is not a very easy place to travel. First, it is not near anywhere; it just sits by itself near the edge of the vast expanse of Pacific Ocean. It’s not on the way between any two locations unless you’re going from Australia to China. Then, it consists of 7.107 islands, spread out from north to south. There is a big national highway that runs all across but the roads are not always in good condition and neither are the busses. Trains are virtually nonexistent. To travel between distant islands one has two choices, the ferry and the airplane. Like Indonesia, Philippines also has many local airlines with cheap prices and some with old propeller planes. Ferries take more time and depending on the boat and the class you choose it can be either very comfortable or not comfortable at all. I took Superferry once for 13 hours on “tourist” class (second cheapest of the four classes) and it was a big AC hall with about a hundred double deck beds and was very comfortable. You can even travel very cheap by cargo boats if you have the time and the guts.

The good thing about traveling in the Philippines is that you can speak English to anyone and they will understand you. This makes traveling more hassle-free and also sometimes leads to forgetting that it’s still Asia where the bus arriving “just now” may in fact come an hour later.

The prices for transportation are similar to other SE Asian countries (such as a 6 hr bus ride for about $10) but the visa is the most expensive I’ve seen. You get a 3 weeks free on entry which is extendible up to two years without leaving the country. But each 2 months extension costs about $70-80 (different charges apply each time), which makes it around $250 for 6 months which is simply unheard of. On the other hand, Philippines being the only country in SE Asia which doesn’t have any land borders, it may be seen as a blessing that they extend it here, rather than forcing you to fly somewhere after two months, like they do in Indonesia. That would surely be less nice and more expensive. This also explains why and how there are more expats here then there.

Since it’s way out of the way to anywhere, there are not many foreign travelers in the Philippines. The foreigners are either expats who are settled here, students (mostly Korean) or missionaries. So in touristic places the accommodation and services are adjusted for Filipino tourists. And they travel in groups, sometimes big groups. So what you find are rooms good for 6 or good for 10 or 15. Sometimes it is hard to find a double room and single rooms are nonexistent although sometimes there are dormitories. So when it comes to renting a room it makes it so much cheaper to share it with a group, and more expensive if you’re just a couple. I have stayed in a room good for 8 just by myself but the owner was kind enough to let me pay for one. And it is close to impossible to guess from the name what kind of accommodation is waiting for you. A resort can be a hostel, an inn can be a guesthouse and cottages can be a hotel. Transient usually is a place for groups which also has kitchen, cable TV and other furnishing. Homestay or pension is usually the cheapest but has less privacy. And prices for a similar room in different places can change dramatically with no objective reason.

On planning a trip to the Philippines, one must be careful with the seasons. With around 30 typhoons hitting the country every year, typhoon season, June to November can sometimes be unpleasant. Roads can be closed due to flooding or landslides and the mountains can be too cold and wet. Ferries and planes also may become unreliable. But of course this is also the discount season while Christmas and Easter times are the high seasons when it may even be hard to find bus tickets or rooms.

But apart from all these practical aspects, Philippines is a very pleasant place to travel. People are just great, they are kind and when you are in need they will sort you out. If you ever get the chance, don’t say no to going there. You can hardly regret it.

Some more impressions on the Philippines

The Philippines is a unique country on the eastern edge of South East Asia. First of all it has that “the” in its name as if there are other Philippines. Before I came around here, I thought it was somewhere in Latin America, thanks to all the Spanish names. It was the only big Spanish colony in Asia as well as the first colony there. This also caused Philippines to be the only majority Christian country in Asia. Famous “explorer” Magellan was the one who “discovered” Philippines and in fact, contrary to what’s generally told about him, he couldn’t go on with his famous tour around the world because he was killed here (his fleet completed the tour without him).

In other countries of Asia there are usually different cultural influences on the culture because people from different cultures live together or close to each other. Especially the Chinese communities which you can find all over SE Asia is a good example to that. But in the Philippines even the Chinese change their names and “mix in”. The society in general looks more homogenous then other places. There are Catholics and some Muslims. But when it comes to cultural influence there are all sorts of influences. First the Spanish, than the Japanese and the American, all of which colonized the country for some time, plus Chinese. As I wrote on the other post on names, these influences are very clear in names. But also food, games, daily things are all a mix.

Market in Manila

Popular sports in one country is a good sign of where the cultural influences come from. In the Philippines the most popular sport seems to be basketball. There are basketball fields everywhere and it’s always on TV. Soccer is almost nonexistent and it was pretty much a disappointment for me to realize that even the Euro Football championship was not in any news or papers (when Turkey was once again miraculously making it all the way to the semi-finals). Occasionally I see kids in school yards playing baseball or throwing this strange shaped American football to each other. But perhaps next to basketball the most national ‘sport’ is cock-fighting. This is a very South East Asian sport. Although in most countries today it’s deemed violent, thus banned, or only allowed on temple grounds as a part of religious ceremonies like in Indonesia (as if there is no gambling), here it is very public and includes lots of gambling. Although I haven’t seen live games, I always see it on TV and all around there are these posters advertising a breed of fight cocks or vitamins and feed for them (like the one in the photo). And it is a very violent ‘sport’. It’s not like they let two cocks fight like they’d do if they let them in a pen by themselves; they attach a 8 to 10 cm blade to one of their legs so when they attempt to grab the opponent they actually stab or cut them. The games usually last less then a minute and ends with one competent dead or fatally injured. I feel the justification behind this cruel treatment goes something like “we do cut and eat these chickens anyway, we’re even doing them a favor by offering them an honorable death through fighting which is their nature anyway.” So it’s not only the cat and dog owners who associate human feelings with animals!

Fighting cock advertisement, includes a complete list of
achievements and a brand vitamin for best strength (click).

When you ask someone they say they are all Christians giving you the impression of a strong unity but the fact is a bit different. Before the Spanish arrived people of the islands carried beliefs mainly of animism and shamanism with a strong Muslim tradition in the south as well as some Hinduism and Vajrayana Buddhism. When the Spanish came they quickly started to convert people to Catholicism but they were not that successful in remote places, such as the Mountain Region where the people were finally converted about a 100 years ago. Catholics also made the laws of the country some of which remain today. For example there is no official divorce in the Philippines and the age of sexual consent is only 12 (which leads to child prostitution but there are people who are trying to bring it up to 16). But Catholics also welcomed the integration of local beliefs (perhaps it was how they could succeed in the first place). I saw a half-documentary film which showed shamans performing a ritual for good rice harvest while villagers join singing Christian hymns. But with the Americans arrives the fundamentalists. These are the backwards protestant churches which are mostly very inflexible in their beliefs. They supposedly only follow the Bible. If it was true than there’d be a single Bible-only church but the fact is that all towns are littered with small ‘fundy’ churches and there are all these American missionaries everywhere. They also approach me sometimes, and I don’t mind pushing their buttons. The sad thing about their existence is that, according to what I’ve heard, in places they get established they try to eliminate all the traditional elements, saying it’s all superstitious and non-Christian. There are all the apocalyptic churches from Mormons to Scientologists and their existence is as irritating as any other religious fundamentalists. The good thing about missionaries is that they do some social work, such as free medical care and education. On the other hand there are not many expressions of religion in public places and occasions. There is no special costume or a way of salutation. It’s comforting that religion is less of an item for showing off here than in some other places around. And I like to see the little stone cave-like places that people create in the nature as houses for Mary and also the Baby Jesus, which is so clearly one and the same as baby Krishna, Gopal.

El Nido St.Fancis Church

There are very many Filipino people; with around 90 millions it is the 12th most populated country in the world. It is very sad to see so many “kid factories” in suburbs of big cities while the country is having difficulty feeding itself. There is close to no birth control, thanks to the Catholic religion. Abortion is illegal and there is a lack of sexual education. There is this very touching statistic which compares Philippines with Thailand “In 1975 both countries had similar population sizes of 41 to 42 million. Then Bangkok launched a major family planning effort. Now Thailand has a population of around 64 million and is the world's top exporter of rice. Meanwhile, the Philippines with a population of 90 million is the world's top importer of the grain.” This also owes to the ‘democracy’ of Philippines being far more corrupt than the ‘kingdom’ of Thailand. In any case, Philippines is a crowded country with swollen cities and an uncontrolled birth rate.

Baguio City with its cathedral on the hill, as seen from the SM Mall

Because it consists of thousands of islands (7.107), people speak many different languages and literally come from different tribes. The idea of one nation is still in the creation and even for the communists here nationalism is not a bad thing. It makes it clearer to see that nationalism has its place in the making of a country and only after sometime it becomes an obstacle to development. Here most people speak more than one language. They speak their very local language, and then the language of the region they are from, in addition to the almost national languages of Tagalog and English. This is very good in the sense that a person learning to think in a different language is a different, a more sophisticated person. But it has its downside that some people are not that good in their mother languages, which leaves them with a secondary language to express everything, which will perhaps never be as good as a mother language. As a foreigner here, it is a great boon to be able to talk to anyone in English though.

Igorot boys playing the gongs and dancing

Filipina girls posing with guard soldiers

Filipino people love to sing and dance. And they are surprisingly good at it. But apparently, the traditional music and dances are rather simple, similar to other SE Asian traditions. For example, in the area where I spent most of my time here, mountains of Luzon, the traditional music is performed with gongs and bamboo percussions with the occasional addition of the mouth harp. The shamanic and animist roots they have are still there. Today the most common social music is the music in karaoke bars. For those of you who don’t know the word, karaoke (“empty box”) is a Japanese invention where people sing to the background music of famous songs with the help of the lyrics on the screen. There are few different types of karaoke places, the ones where you can rent a private room with your friends or those which offer a karaoke automat in the middle of a bar. The song lists usually consist of popular American oldies and Filipino songs but there are the occasional Nirvana or Christmas carols for a change. People are so practiced with these things that most people sound well when they sing and sometimes it is hard to tell if the music is coming from a nearby karaoke or is the original version (but of course there are also those which just shouldn’t sing to a microphone). And people also seem to watch MTV and learn how to dance well. There are many dance bars in most places and different types of them. One type of bar which is on the decline is the American country music bars. For me it was a very interesting experience to see Filipino people dressed like cowboys, playing really good cowboy music and dancing the cowboy dances. But these are mostly for the old generation who knew when the Canos (Americanos) were still here. New generation prefer really loud music. As a related note, I have to add that Filipino people, especially women, pose very well. As soon as they see a camera they put on this pose one can see in a fashion magazine or TV. Perhaps they are the most photogenic people. They just seem to practice a lot.

A Filipina girl, Maya, testing her singing in karaoke.

Local pork sausages longanisa is a mix of
fat, sugar, nerves, cartilage and also some meat.

After seeing all the talent in music and dance, one wishes they also cooked well but unfortunately they don’t. Philippines is for me the worst place for food in SE Asia. There is neither the variety nor the sensitivity put on food in other places. They eat a lot of meat and only a little vegetables. Being a tropic country it’s a shame that they don’t even have good fresh fruit juice (in fact, I even see pineapple juice imported from Turkey). Of course there are occasional delicacies but that’s a rarity rather than the general rule. Fast food is very big. There are all sorts of fast food outlets everywhere and the most common street foods are hot dogs and hamburgers accompanied with barbecued meat on a little stick. The interesting foods I’ve found were a bit too strange. Balut, which is supposedly an energy food, is a fertilized chicken egg on its day 12 to 18, with a semi-grown up chick inside. It is strange to gulp a whole embryo like that but it is tasty and full of protein. They also have the one day old chick barbecue or deep fry but you can find that in other countries of SE Asia too.

Balut, a fertilized and semi developed chicken egg,
well cooked and yummy.

Gloria cares. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is the second woman president of the Philippines. Everywhere you see posters saying “Gloria cares” under her cute motherly face. Many believe that she’s also corrupt “but who isn’t”. Just like Corazon “Cory” Aquino, who came with the People’s Power revolution against the dictator Marcos and was the wife of an assassinated popular politician, Gloria is the daughter of a former president. It’s not easy to find woman politicians who are not related to a more successful man anyway. Her photo of surfing has the same feeling of Bill Clinton playing the sax. But after all she’s a politician, she represents a government, etc. all of which we’ll have to dispose of soon.

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo surfing

In the Philippines everybody seems to want to go abroad. It already has the biggest diaspora in the world, with over 10 million Filipinos living abroad. On one side all the money these people send to their families back home contributes greatly to the economy (family ties are very important here). On the other hand, there is an immense brain drain. For example, Philippines is the biggest exporter of nurses. So much that you see nursing schools everywhere. But I heard that it’s such a popular way to make an escape from this country that even doctors take nursing training and go abroad, leaving the country’s hospitals lacking in personnel.

And because I’m being and I’ll be asked, I have to add, yes, Filipina girls are beautiful. Just like the rest of Southeast Asia, people here are rather small, tanned, mostly with slightly ‘Chinese’ eyes and are gentle in spirit. As is the case everywhere, people of the mountains are chubbier then the lowlanders. The most significant difference in physical appearance of Filipinos to the rest of Southeast Asians is that there are more plump and fat people then in other places, possibly due to the consumption of so much meat and cooking everything in lard.

After all, Philippines is a country worth visiting. People are truly kind and helpful but they don’t overdo it. The nature is pretty diverse and has many surprises. And the culture is quite unique. You wouldn’t regret being there.

[For information on how to do it, read the next post titled Traveling in the Philippines.]