words, words, words

Haven’t surfed for two days. Felt sick yesterday, and then today had a botched attempt at a drive in the mountains. Wound up getting half-conned by some Balinese road bandits. They worked as a team, a pair stopping the moto to say that it was over-heating, while the other turned on the choke. Then a good samaratin appeared to help replace the part (the starter for some reason), and he could do it for … “How much money do you have?” It all sounded a bit dubious, so I called the place I rented the bike from and they drove all the way out to where I was to tell me to turn off the choke. Which could have been done over the phone. A bit fruitless.

Waves

Finally got some surfing in, and on a good new board, as well.. Yesterday, I went to Nusa Dua, which is a world class right, but was a bit windy and choppy. And having to paddle around the DRY coral reef at low tide was a bit intimidating.

Today, I woke up and surfed Ulu Watu, which was very good, but small and crowded. Here are pictures of Ulu Watu, and another .

I can’t wait for a big swell to arrive. But I am still having a lot of fun.

The people here are a bit desperate for money and everyone is working an angle. Which can be a bit annoying, but saying “No” seems to do the trick.

Hopeully, I will find a way to connect the laptop and be able to upload some photos soon.

The house I rented is a bit far away from the internet places in Kuta so updates may be sporadic at best.

New Board

I bought a new board today, so hopefully, I will finally start to surf some of the classic waves here.

Also, found an apartment for a song. It is in between a lot of the major surf breaks and far enough away from the tourist pit of Kuta.

Bali .. Finally.

So far, the surf has been good, but I have broken one board already which I bought that was a piece of crap. I got about 2/3 of my money back since it was my second wave I had taken. And it wound up in two halves. Someone had basically painted a broken board back together. (Luke just reminded me that I’ve broken 3 boards this year so far. Doh!)

It is a bit frustrating not having a board here yet. But I am working on it, thanks, in no small part to the help of Nick, a really nice guy from England, is one of the founders of BootsNAll, the company that published my El Salvador story. He is working on a site about Bali.

The people are very nice, the food is good. There are not as many tourists as normal and it is good to finally be here.

I just have to sort out the surfboard thing.

Kuala Lumpur (Still)

Caught the first waves of the trip, thus far.

In a swimming pool. Really. There is a waterpark here and they have surfboards for rent. About 4 foot waves, but 1 wave sets and 10 people in the water on each wave. A total circus.

Bali in 2 days and counting.

Kuala Lumpur

After arriving in Singapore, the cost of living looked like it might be too much for me. So I left and went to Malaysia.

I like it here so far, after arriving yesterday afternoon.

There is a sense of possibility in the air. Something like Las Vegas, where there are a lot of broken dreams, but there are a lot people with very (unrealistically) high hopes.

The people are more of a mix than anywhere I have ever seen. Arabs, Indians and Chinese rub elbows on buses and nobody notices. There is no friction.

It is a petri dish for what a cultural mix should be like.

Today, went and climbed a waterfall, in flip flops, with only one fall and that one into a pool. But it was good to feel a surge of adrenaline again.

Counting down the days to Bali and trying to have as much fun in K.L. (as the locals call Kuala Lumpur) as possible.

The languages are similar which will help, too.

After the Holiday in Camboida … Bangkok, Thailand.

After a couple of bus journey’s, totaling a whopping 12 hours, I have arrived back in Bangkok in time to do some boring day to day crap, like file an extension on my taxes, pick up my laptop that I left here with a friend, etc…The border between Thailand and Cambodia is officially closed to the Thais and Cambodians but apparently tourists can still get through.

Cambodia has been my favorite SE Asian country so far. The people are so nice and they seem more honest and less capitalistic than the Vietnamese. Plus, every single person you see shouts “hello!” to you.

After Angkor Wat, I spent the last week on the beach in Sihanoukville, Cambodia.

The beaches are beautiful. Every morning girls selling fruit would parade up the beach selling you the freshest fruit salad in the wold for a dollar. They would cut it right in front of you. The snorkeling was ok, but it was nice to just be in one place for a while and swim in the South China Sea, instead of sweating in temples (though I’m not complaining about that either, the temperature didn’t take away from the beauty.) I also went to a few small side trips to fishing villages and national parks, which were fantastic.

I did finally learn to ride a trail bike, a 250 cc, donor-cycle, which, although I never mentioned it, has been one of the things on my “list of stuff I want to do in my lifetime” list that I wanted to check off.

While I was having all this fun, however, unbeknownst to me, SIhanoukville, is the one of the pedophile capitals of the world.

I am going to write an article about it, hopefully that I can get be published,. The Cambodian Government, the UN and the respective country of each individual offender will all be prosecuting the crimes now. They are all taking it very seriously and I would like to do what I can to protect the children that I befriended on the beach. The problem is that there are orphaned children that sleep on the beach and survive on the handouts of the foreigners. I was only too eager to help and bought them food, whenever they seemed to want it, but I don’t feel like I’ve done enough. I would like to do more. While I was in Sihanoukville, an Englishman was arrested and charged for having a boy in his room, and then nobody really knows what happened to him, as there were many rumors (Rumors and travel have always seemed to go hand-in-hand, but it seems the British embassy is now involved.). However, after touring the S21 prison in Phnom Penh, I can certainly assume that the Cambodian jail situation is extremely uncomfortable at best. I am not being a megalomaniac in thinking I can solve the problem, but maybe a small article talking about the very very serious consequences of pedophilia in Cambodia might do a little bit to help.

On a lighter note:

I got to shake the hand of the one of the Cambodia’s leading singers, whose name I have no idea, but she was filming a video on the beach. I will never wash that hand again.

Flying to Singapore on the 11th, and then a week there and Malaysia, and then off to Bali, for some much needed surfing.

I might be coming back to Cambodia for the July elections, hopefully, if I can find a correspondent job, writing for someone, anyone, who would pay me. I think the shit is going to hit the fan here and I would like to cover it. The ruling party is not going to give up power easily and the story needs to be told.