Penang - Land of my Dreams
OK, maybe not my normal dreams, but definitely my food dreams! Anyplace that combines Malay, Chinese and Indian foods so effectively with a heavy emphasis on spices is my kinda place! Last night I wandered through a hawker stall (best invention ever!) and enjoyed some delicous Laksa Ayam and PohPia (fresh spring rolls) along with Lychee drink! YUM!!!
Today was also fun, because I decided to skip all the temples and blah blah, instead choosing to go on a tour of an organic tropical fruit farm and a spice garden. The spice garden was a bit of a bust (except the random wild monkeys that I saw), but the fruit farm ROCKED! The guys were so excited about talking about fruit, and they loved to dish on the goings on in Penang. I took way too many pictures, and sadly probably won't remember the names of all the fruits, but in all it was a great day. Then I came back, schlepped around Georgetown in the sweaty heat, the came back to my hotel for the free cocktails provided by the club lounge (thanks expedia.com for hooking me up with a club floor room! Yehaw!). So I'm enjoying some Australian wine now (note: wine in China basically sucks. Stick to beer, although the beer there also sucks. How psyched was I to have a cold Crown Lager in Hong Kong?!) In 45 minutes I will head out to another Hawker stall for some more delicious eats!
So to answer the question thats in all of your heads, YES, the real Penang is every bit as good as the restaurant! Yes, its everything I expected. Yes, I want to buy a house here and become part of the scenery. Also I'm loving the Malaysian folks that I meet here. Surprisingly my tourguides all complain about their Arab tourists, who apparently are very rude. I guess that Arabs are literally not allowed to visit Thailand after some sort of hooker murder incident (!?) and they flock to Malaysia for tropical fun. I saw my first woman in full body and head covering, although I don't believe she was an arab as her companion looked distinctively indian/pakistani. Islam is fun!
Actually, I'm not kidding, I am more intrigued by islam after visiting XinJiang and now Malaysia. One of these days I will do my big middle east tour, but later for that....
CHINESE GIRLFRIEND SEARCH
I have decided that it would make a lot of sense for me to have a Chinese girlfriend, preferably from Northern China. Why? Because I need to practice my mandarin and I don't think I want to spend my class credits at UofC on Chinese class, which will only lead to stress and frustration.
Why Nothern China?
A) Because Shanghai women are reported to beat their husbands/boyfriends
B) Hong Kong women don't speak Mandarin, and are also reported to beat their husbands/boyfriends, and
C) Taiwan girls don't like me (not sure why, but might have something to do with my Japanese surname)
So if you have any leads, definitely hook me up. And I'm not talking Chinese American, I'm talking PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA, so keep your eyes open!
OTHER NEWS:
1) The rest of my trip is basically planned at this point:
Tomorrow/Thurs - Singapore
Friday - London
Sat - Sat - Turkey with Quyen and Ish
Week after - Eastern European excursion
June 10 - Spain
June 17th - Bill's wedding in NYC
Then I'm just going to schlump around NYC and maybe Washington DC for a week or so, followed by fun in Seattle with Elaine and maybe even Rocio is she's around?? Then I'm back in CA for July 1 but hopefully I can swing by Vegas to celebrate the birthday with Queen B (Bea), which promises to be crazy.
August - Inca Trail with business classmates. This could be insane or it could be really cool. Either way, I already paid and hopefully don't have to buy anything!
Other updates:
1) If I get into China stuff I will get all choked up and nobody wants that
2) I have too much crap in my suitcase and need to figure out some way to lighten it up
3) Through some miraculous act of God, I didn't gain any weight while in China. I think it has something to do with fat weighing less than muscle, so my deterioration in muscle mass was just perfectly offset by incremental fat gains. This trip to Malaysia isn't doig much to help me out though!
Keep your eyes open for new fresh pictures of my last days in Beijing as well as fun with fruits and spices here in Malaysia. Wish me luck in Singapore...la!
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