island style

so we're back in Kota Bharu (you may remember it from such films as "Five Countries and Four Months Ago," "After the Jungle Train," and "Super Huge Mega Market") after 2 days and 3 nights spent on the lovely Perhentian Kecil, the smaller of a pair of islands just off the coast here. It's Malaysia, by the way, for those of you having trouble keeping track. We flew from Bangkok into Penang, stayed the night there, where we stayed last time, then took a bus in the A.M. across the peninsula to here. we strolled about for here a couple of days, enjoying reflecting on how much and how little we and it (respectively) have/has changed in the past four months, and digging in at the night market. the day before we left for the islands, we met a newbie traveller, Rob, from Connecticut, who was headed out that way too. He'd spent the last 2 years living in Australia studying for his Master's degree in sustainable architecture.

anyway, we all joined forces and headed off into the teal blue seas the next morning. the next three days were full of sand and sea and swimming and reading and relaxing. really a nice break from seeing and absorbing and being alert and all that. so now we're back and off to KL to meet our next servas host (australian barry). we'll meet some peeps there before bus-ing south back to our other malaysian favorite: Melaka. There we eat roti canai and chill with the history before making our way even further south, to the tip of the peninsula: good ol' singapore. i pick up a replacement for the credit card i left in an ATM in bangkok, we do a couple of errands, and at 2am on the night of the 10th (technically the 11th), away we go.

excitement is in the air.


email me