Crossing the Equator to Indonesia!

Our plan of taking a short ferry from Malaysia to nearby Sumatra, Indonesia was foiled for many reasons. It is actually the first time since I left to travel 2 years ago that I have had to change my plans due to safety reasons. We wanted to go to the north of the island of Sumatra called Aceh to go to the famous turtle reserve and the best surfing beach in the world, among other things. But, as it turns out, the region of Aceh is under martial law! A place with martial law and mostly Muslims just didn’t seem like the ideal holiday spot, so we skipped it.

Indonesia also changed their visa policy 3 months ago. It used to be that they were quite liberal; you could arrive for 3 months at a time and enter and enter by land, sea or air at any one of their borders. The new rule (in addition to levying a fee) is that you can stay only for one month and you "probably" have to enter and exit from the same place. I say probably because virtually NO RULES have been issued by the government, so rulings have been arbitrary and based on the mood of the border guards. We have had to follow the updates from other travelers on an internet message board. Some people have been turned down when trying to leave the country - border patrol saying that they have to go back where the came from. Others have said that they weren’t allowed into the country unless they had $2,000 in cash or traveler’s checks. Others have been denied entry if they didn’t have an onward flight.

All this considered, we decided to buy a return ticket to Jakarta, the country’s capital. Fortunately for us, a new low cost airline just started! In case you are interested, it’s called AirAsia and it’s kind of like Southwest Airlines in the US, but more like Ryan Air in Europe. It was actually cheaper to fly than take the ferry!

Between the new visa rules, the bombings in Bali last year and general unrest in certain regions, tourism here is at an all time low. Yesterday we went to Indonesia’s number one tourist destination, called the Borodur Temple. It’s ancient Buddhist temple; something like a mini Angkor Wat. We were two of 10 foreigners that visited the temple while we were there. Even the souvenir vendors have packed up and left the site! There must be hundreds and hundreds of empty stalls. The hotel we are staying in was listed as the number one recommended place in the city, and for the first night we were the only people staying. Since then, one other girl has checked in. The price we paid for the room is 25% of what is listed in the brochure. It appears to be the same all over Java, at least it was the same at Pangadaran, the now deserted beach resort in the south of the island. You can have it all to yourself if you go now!

We arrived to this Muslim country on the Prophet Mohammed’s birthday. I think he’s the one that created the religion of Islam. I don’t know much about this religion, but have learned a little. Did you know that they pray five times a day and the first time is at dawn? Most mornings that’s how we wake up here in Indonesia.

Since we arrived we have been on the island of Java - home for half of Indonesia’s 230 million people. Java is half the size of the United Kingdom and has twice the number of people. It’s packed! And, as we discovered on our first day of bus travel, not a highway in sight. Nearby large cities seem to have a few miles of toll highways, but nothing to get you from city to city. In the past week we have spent 25 hours on local buses navigating the two lane roads from Jakarta to Yogyakarta!

It’s unfortunate for the locals that the place is so deserted, but we are certainly appreciating the lower prices and always available best hotel rooms! The people have mostly been really friendly and we are really looking forward to Bali and the Komodo dragons! This afternoon we are taking a bus to a large crater that contains three volcanoes. The installment will hopefully be from the white sandy beaches of Bali!

Greetings from Malaysia & Singapore!

We planned the end of our stay in Burma to coincide with the arrival of Rob’s friend, Nick in Bangkok. We weren’t really sure if he was coming or not since he doesn’t have email and we don’t have a phone, but we knew if he was coming, April 5th was the day. As it turns out, his plane was taxi-ing down the runway immediately after ours. We could see his plane before we even got out of our plane! Then we bumped into Nick at customs. It was a real surprise for him – he had no idea we were coming since we only booked our flight the night before. The next coincidence was that their friends (who got married only the day before) were going to be honeymooning in Thailand, first stop Bangkok! So, even though Rob missed their wedding – we joined them on their honeymoon for 2 days.

After spending time in Burma, it was great to take advantage of modern Thailand. We did some shopping, some sightseeing… but mainly we ate. We ate a lot! Nick’s girlfriend, Anne, is Thai and knows lots of great places to eat – and what and how to order them too. We also went to the Floating Market and a Thai Boxing Match. When we were filled to the brim with Thai food, we took an overnight train heading down to Malaysia with Nick and Anne.

Last time I was in Malaysia it was rainy season. Note to self: don’t go to Malaysia in the rainy season. I heeded my own advice and this visit was a thousand times better! First we visited some gorgeous islands called the Perhentians, complete with a coral reef outside our bungalow, falling coconuts, and nightly fish barbeques.

Despite the fact that most of Malaysia is covered in palm oil plantations (their biggest export), they created a national park called Taman Negara to preserve some of the oldest rainforest in the world. Apparently the Malaysian Peninsula was never hit by the Ice Age and all other earthly rainforests were, so it wins the “oldest” title. While we were there, we got to walk the length of longest tree canopy walkway in the world! It’s a bunch of rope with planks strung through them and you walk from treetop to treetop. Carla – it was nothing at all like the one sturdy metal canopy we went on in Tasmania! Taman Negara is also where we spent my 30th birthday! Fun fact: 3 birthdays have past since I got laid off from my job.

In Kuala Lumpur, we tried going to the Petronas Tower three times, but all three times the tickets were sold out! Also, I bumped into a friend of mine that I met last year while in India! His name is Natesh and he lives in Bombay. It turns out he was in Kuala Lumpur on business. He had some time between meetings and was taking a bus somewhere when he spotted Rob and me walking back from the Petronas Towers (again). He couldn’t find me when he got off the bus, so he went to an online café and emailed me right away. I happened to check my email about an hour later, so I called him and we met for dinner! Amazing! It’s not the first time we’ve had such coincidences in the past few months – and hopefully it’s not the last!

Now here we are in Singapore, the fine city! Okay, I know it’s the same joke as last time I wrote a newsletter from Singapore, but I still think it’s funny. I learned a few more things about how “fine” it is: apparently some years ago they did not allow men to have long hair and if you arrived at the airport with long hair they would not let you through customs if you didn’t immediately let them chop it all off. They no longer have this rule, but you still aren’t allowed to chew gum. We were also noticing today that no one has any pets… maybe it’s a law around here or maybe a preference. I plan to look into it. It also turns out that they only open the palace to visitors on selected national holidays. One of which is Labor Day... which is today! So we got to check the place out. It's smack in the middle of the city, very modern, and they turned most of the grounds into a golf course!

Love, Alison

Mingalaba from Myanmar!

To go or not to go to Burma was the question - their government is a militant regime and some people say that visiting the country is supporting the government. Others feel you are only deserting the people of the country by further isolating them. We read up the subject, weighed the pros and cons and decided that we should go. If you are conscious about the way you spend your money, most will go to the people, not the government. Before I came to Burma I didn't really know a lot about it, and so maybe neither do some of you. You might find a little background information interesting so you know how the country arrived at it's present state...

For over 100 years, Burma was a colony of Britain. Then, World War II broke out. After the war was over, Bogyoke Aung San, a Burmese military leader, went to London to request freedom for his country. The Queen granted his request and he is now considered the father of Burma’s independence movement. Unfortunately, one month later, he was assassinated in a military coup. This military regime has been in power ever since.

The government controls all newspapers, radio and TV. Email and internet is forbidden as well as any foreign news. There are virtually no hospitals for any civilians, only for the military. School is not free so most can not afford to go, plus there are no jobs for them when they finish anyway. Passports are not issued and people can not leave the country. There is no recognized legal system; the government just does whatever they want and slave labor is one of the more pleasant ways they treat their people. In 1988 the people got sick and tired of the regime – the students staged a peaceful protest outside the university calling for democracy. Within six weeks over 3,000 men, women and children were killed. They even shot the nurses who trying to care for the wounded. The university was shut down.

Even though this all happened, the regime was blind to the fact that they were hated by the people, so they held an election in 1990 expecting to be re-elected. But they weren’t. Bogyoke’s daughter, Aung San Suu Kyi, ran for president of the democratic party and won by a landslide. The military regime threw Suu Kyi and forty members of her party in jail. Some of the prisoners were killed, others tortured. Some still remain in jail, some are “missing”. Suu Kyi was eventually released from jail, only to be placed under house arrest.

Not much has changed in Burma since the military regime took over; the government just sucks the country dry of it’s resources and keeps it’s people down. Burma is the 5th poorest country in the world despite it’s plethora of oil, precious stones and other natural resources. Many of the students fled to the jungles and borders of Burma and are fighting the regime from there. This (and a thriving opium and narcotics trade) is the reason why as a tourist you must only visit “approved” places in the country. Almost all borders are off limits to foreigners. Day trips are allowed at two places along the Thai border but to visit Burma for longer than an afternoon you must fly into Yangon, the capital, or take the occasional flight to Mandalay, a northern city.

The military regime has done a good job of hiding the reality of their country from foreigners. The unsuspecting visitor may not even notice that anything is amiss, especially if they fly from place to place. We spent almost 3 weeks taking buses around the country and if you look you can not miss the open quarries where women and children are turning boulders into rubble so that roads can be built. Then, on the roads, you see children not even 10 years old placing these small stones a handful at a time onto the road to make repairs or widen the lane. Everything involved in making a road is done in the most manual way possible; and all under the scorching sun. Food and accommodation for the workers all takes place under tarps on the side of the road. They eat, sleep and breathe the dust of that road. Evidence of this work could be seen on every inch of every road we drove on.

Even in a society such as the one I have described, there are many who have managed to defy the regime either through friends in the right places or through people supporting them from around the world – or maybe both! We were lucky enough to meet just a few. We met a very outspoken man who boldly described his reality and the reality of his country to us. He talked to us about how aggressive the regime is and how it has affected him and his family. Not all of them are still alive.

We met another interesting troupe of people called the Moustache Brothers. They are a trio of comics famous among the Burmese. They incorporate satire (political and otherwise) and dance into their act. They had been famous for years and years traveling the country and entertaining the Burmese people. For some reason, their political satire was tolerated by the regime for all this time. Then, they decided to stage a very public performance in front of the house where Suu Kyi was under lock and key. For this act they were given 7 years in prison (mostly hard labor). They also achieved notoriety around the world. Major newspapers on every continent ran articles about the brothers. Some have even interviewed them since their sudden release from prison in 1991. Most of the edgy stuff from their routine has been removed, but they welcome foreigners into their home every evening to meet them and stay for some comedy and dance. The Brothers claim that the media has saved their lives. The worldwide media attention given to them has protected them from the regime. If anything were to now happen to them, the world would know about it the next day. They were pretty funny too!

Despite their government, we had a fantastic visit to Burma… you don’t meet the government (fortunately!) you meet the people and the Burmese are among the most friendly and welcoming people in the world. They are actually excited to see you and everyone says hello. Little kids are wide eyed when they look at you and they always smile. Maybe foreigners give them a little hope and insight about the outside world they are isolated from, or maybe they are just laughing at the way we dress. Some just want to sell you bananas or postcards.

After the serious tone of this newsletter, here’s some FUN facts about Burma:

1. Almost all men and women wear a longyi (pronounced lawn-gee). A longyi is kind of like a skirt except there are no curves in it for your hips! It's very wide at both the top and bottom and is always floor length. One size fits all! They have a certain way of folding and tucking the extra material at the waist. If you are royalty, you fold and tuck your longyi differently.
2. In Burma, handmade cigars are called cheroots. I don’t know much about cigars, but a retired New Zealander we traveled with for a little while claims they are fantastic and he smoked them non-stop. Dad – you can expect a few in the next package!
3. The betel nut is probably the worst thing about the Burmese – I think they learned it from the Indians. The betel nut is this brown nut that they chew up until it is full of saliva and then they spit it into a leaf and wrap it up. It is then shoved back into their mouths. They suck it like a piece of hard candy all day long, occasionally replacing it with another. The thing is, it’s NOT like hard candy. It turns your spit brown and you constantly need to spit. And they do. Everywhere. Even the women. You can tell who chews and who doesn’t because your teeth turn almost entirely brown from this lovely habit.
4. Many Burmese women, and some men, wear a pale yellow paste on their face called Thanaka (pronounced tin-akha). They wear it to keep their faces out of the sun. It's a kind of sunscreen and skin whitener all in one. Basically though, it looks like war paint! Most women wear it brushed on both cheeks - not like blush though, it goes straight across the cheek. Others just smear it all over (including ears sometimes!) and it looks like they never washed off the soap from their shower.
5. Burma has most of the world’s teak trees. Teak is the world’s hardest wood and is very desirable. The regime is trying their hardest to cut down every teak tree in sight and is selling them to the Chinese. They seem to be doing a pretty good job too, because often enough we would see giant piles of “inventory” stacked up on the side of the road awaiting shipment. We saw thousands and thousands of trees in these stockpiles.
6. There used to be so many rubies in the rivers that it appeared that the rivers were running red! The area where those rivers “flowed red” is called Mogok. Foreigners are only allowed to visit here by permit only. A permit basically means that for a mere few hundred dollars a day you get a government escort, car and driver to accompany you on a pre-planned government-approved itinerary. The escort takes notes about your every move.
7. The most religious site in Burma is called the Shwedigon Pagoda. It’s a gigantic temple covered in 60 tons of gold leaf. Even if you are not a Buddhist (um, like me) it’s still an amazing place to visit. How often can you watch an orange sun set on 60 tons of gold leaf??
8. A stupa is a Buddhist religious monument that is kind of cone shaped and pointy at the top. Usually they are covered in gold or whitewashed. In Burma, there are millions of stupas everywhere you look. I’m not exaggerating when I say millions either. Anytime you look out into the countryside, the whole landscape is dotted with them.
9. In 1989, the country officially changed the English name of it’s country from Burma to Myanmar – which is what they call their country in their own language. Coincidentally, their language is called Myanmar as well. If you were a Burmese person, you are now a Myanmar person. It doesn’t appear though that this change has caught on in most of the world – just today, a mere 15 years after the name change, I read an article in Thailand’s largest paper about the country. There was no mention of Myanmar… only Burma!
10. Monks are everywhere. In Burma they all dress in red robes and they seem to be more traditional than other South East Asian countries. The women wear light pink robes with some brown. Most monks and nuns carry umbrellas – the sun would burn their always shaved heads if they didn’t. You actually see both the monks and the nuns walking in groups from house to house chanting. They are not supposed to have any money, so the people feed them. They get a little spoonful from each house they visit.
11. Like other countries around here, most of their vehicles come from Japan. Except in Burma, there are no junkyards. It seems that cars and buses never come off the road. Despite the fact that there are a reasonably small number of cars for 54 million people, the pollution plumes out of the exhaust pipes at an alarming rate. The stuff that comes out of the back of buses and cars is thick and black. One hour of walking around a city and your skin is coated.
12. In a country of 54 million people, there are only 700 foreigners living there - and even they have a hash, which we went to. We met 40 of the 700 foreigners in one afternoon!

As for tourism, we got to see quite a bit in 3 weeks. At Inle Lake we got to see the famous leg rowers and the floating tomato gardens. In Bagan we took a horse and cart around the 3000 temples built there. We only went inside about 15 of them though! In Mandalay we hiked barefoot up to the top of the hill and peered into the former palace. Also, we were two of 16 foreigners to visit the Golden Rock Pagoda on the day we hauled ourselves up that mini mountain. Down south we went to see the world’s biggest reclining Buddha. It’s been a work in progress for over 10 years and they are nowhere near completion! We also went to the beach on the Andaman Sea and at an ancient capital city we walked across the longest teak bridge in the world.

Now we are back in the “civilization” of Bangkok where we met up with Rob’s friends Nick and Anne. We will be traveling to Malaysia with them in a few days!

Hope all is well! Regards, Alison