Malaysia

Back in Malaysia after almost 6 years.

After leaving Bali, we flew to Singapore and were met at the airport by Raja, a friend of mine from work. He gave us the abbreviated local tour as we were in Singapore for exactly 24 hrs. The next day, he graciously drove us into Malaysia (Johor Bharu) where we caught a flight to the North East corner of Malaysia. To travel this distance overland, it would have taken us two days. However, we found an incredible deal on a low cost airline, Air Asia, and we took the hour long flight for the amazing sum of $12 CAD per person. Once we landed, we driven to another coastal town where we caught a boat to the Perhentian Islands where we spent 5 days sitting on the beach and relaxing. It is a beautiful, idyllic island with nothing to do but enjoy the beach and scuba dive. After a little bit of apprehension (I haven't dived 6 years...since the last time I was here), Melissa and I did a quick refresher and went diving. One was enough for her, but I did 4 dives. Nice diving and very cheap. *Random Thought- Everything I write about seems to get related back to price or value...typical accountant.* The highlights were my first wreck dive, swimming in a school of 3 ft barracudas and seeing a stingray. For anyone who has never been scuba diving, please try it if you get the chance. It is an amazing sensation. However, the underwater pressure, was as deep as 23 metres, caused my left ear to become plugged. Kind of annoying, but it will have to wait until I get back to camp to get cleaned out.

After finishing off our beach tans, we headed back to the mainland and on to Kuala Lumpur. Upon arriving at the impressive airport (nicest airport I've been to), I ticked off an obscure goal from my list of life goals. I had been in this airport in 2000 and traveled from Canada going westward. This time, I arrived from the east. Therefore, I have now officially traveled around the planet. Kind of stupid, but I'm kind of proud of it.

KL has got to be my favourite city on the planet. A vibrant city with an amazing skyline covering up grotty little neighbourhoods. After being to Singapore, I can see that this skyline is in direct competition with Singapore's. It's kind of like the pissing matches between the billionaire sheikhs in the middle east. However, KL will never be able to match Singapore in terms of efficiency and cleanliness. It is this haphazardness that I rather enjoy. The people are great (not pushy like the other asian countries I've been to).

As our schedule has it, we only have 2 full days before heading back to Singapore. I wish we had more time, but we are looking forward to exploring Singapore, having already spent significant time in KL back in 2000. We only have two real goals while here. One was to go to the Petronas Towers, the tallest twin towers in the works (88 floors) and the other is to go back to Chinatown to explore. Yesterday, we did the first. We even went up to the skybridge (the walkway linking the two buildings on the 41st floor). Today, we are heading to Chinatown and tomorrow we are off to Singapore via a 7 hr train ride.

Bali Two

*Random thought - On my overnight flight from Dubai to Singapore, I had a window seat as we flew through a lightning storm somewhere over India. What an amazing/terrifying sight.*

Ubud has been great. A laid-back mountain town with lots to do and see. After the first two nights at a so-so hotel, we found a great place situated in between two rice paddy fields. Check out Tegal Sari. We haven't done a whole lot other than relax and soak in the peaceful surroundings. When I was researching Bali prior to arriving, I remember reading a quote about the landscape. It said that there are not enough words to describe all of the different shades of green in Bali. It sounded silly, but it is starting to make sense.

One of the things Bali is renown for is its massage and spa centres. A few nights ago, Melissa and I decided to see how the other half live and got the princess treatment at one of these places. I got a wonderfully relaxing Balinese massage followed by a facial treatment. Sounds a bit fruity, but the facial did wonders for my desert dried face. Melissa got some sort of body wrap using coffee. To finish off the princess for a day treatment, we spent another 1/2 hour soaking in a flower petal bath. Weird experience, but very relaxing. I think I am going to have to go hunting Komodo Dragons to get a bit of my masculinity back. See Pertenin Spa.

While in Ubud, we also went on a countryside bike tour and took an Indonesian Cooking class. Both were good. The bike tour got us out to the beautiful rural countryside and villages and was a good source of info regarding the Balinese people, customs and lifestyle. The cooking class was very interesting. It showed us how some of the amazing dishes we've been eating are made.

We are now on Kuta Beach and staying at the Mercure. It is a 4 star resort right on the beach. Way out of our league, but just another indication of the devastated economy resulting from the bombings in October. The hotel is very nice with an amazing pool. All for $45 USD a night. Two more days and we are off to Singapore and then into Malaysia.

Bali One

After a quick trip through Dubai, I headed to Singapore on an overnight flight. Thankfully, Melissa was waiting for me at my arrivals gate. She had been on a monster flight from Calgary-Vancouver-Seoul-Singapore and arrived about 7 hours prior to me. We then boarded our short 2 her flight to Bali.

Our first three nights were spent in the Sri Phala Resort located in Sanur Beach. Normally, this would be way out of our league, but the tourist economy in Bali is very poor now after the bombings here in October, 2005. The room we got usually goes for $125 USD a night, but we got it for $50. Beautiful place, but not in a great location. It poured (real rain...not that pissy rain we get in Canada) for three days. This was great as we were both looking for some real down-time after getting there. Just today, we left Sanur beach and headed to Ubud, a town in central Bali which is considered the arts and culture center of the island. Didn't do much today other than check out the town and enjoy some of the beautiful scenery (endless rice paddies with a volcano on the horizon). We're not sure what the next few days will bring (maybe a bike tour, cooking class, a good book), but we are having a good time in this very different place.

Today, I went Skiing

I finished up my mammoth 6 weeker on Wednesday after a productive day with my rotational partner, Frank, who came in a day early. It was early to bed and early to rise (3:30am) to begin the long trek out of Yemen. Got to Dubai yesterday afternoon and headed to the mall for my routine butter chicken and a Starbucks Frappucino. Ah...civilization. As my flight doesn't leave until Friday night, I spent Friday at the brand new Mall of the Emirates, supposedly the largest mall outside North America. The reason that I went to this mall is that it has the world's largest indoor ski hill attached to it. I slapped down my dirhams and was handed ski pants, a jacket, socks and a pretty decent set of equipment. Funny enough, they can't give you mitts or a toque for sanitary reasons. Must be just a small coincidence that you can buy them in the gift shop. Anyways, the hill is 400m long, has decent snow and was fun for about 45 minutes. Rocky Mountain skiing it sure ain't, but it was a bit of fun and a chance for me to get in some skiing this winter. Just another experience added to my list of weird/ wacky/ wonderful things that I've had the good fortune of doing. Unfortunately, I did not have a camera. Please check out more about the "Ski Resort" by clicking here. I am now in the Dubai airport awaiting my flight to Singapore in about an hour and a half.