I've just picked up a prepaid mobile SIM for use while I'm here in KL. The rates are amazing - it's a RM0.45 (0.15AUD) per minute flat rate on the basic plan, which I managed to pick up a bit cheaply since I'm working at one of the telcos here.
The SIM is prepaid with RM25 worth of calls for only RM10, which is pretty good as well. But, best of all, it means I don't have to rely fully on email, nor do I have to wait until I get back to the hotel to make or receive any calls.
Selamat datang from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia!
The flight over was relatively uneventful. I heartily flying any airline which offers individual screens and movie selections - it makes a seven hour flight pass reasonably quickly. I thought my luck was in when I was offered an emergency aisle seat. For someone tall like me, the extra legroom is invaluable. Imagine my disappointment when I found that my seat had the bulkhead right in front of it, my extra legroom non-existant and in fact less than it would have been had I had a normal seat. I had certainly snatched defeat from the jaws of victory!
There was a massive line at immigration for those without a Malaysian passport, and it's probably the only time in my life I'll ever wish for one!
I caught the express train in from the airport to KL Central - and after seeing the traffic jams banked up at the toll gates was glad I did! - and after that a minivan to the hotel where I'm staying, close to the Petronas Towers (aka KLCC). At this stage, it was 11pm at night, or 2am AEST time, and I only wanted two things - a hot shower and a cold beer from the minibar. The shower was no problem, but the fridge was empty, much to my dismay. Note to self - stock up on duty free alcohol next time, just in case.
Last night I had dinner at an open-air food court restaurant next to the hotel, called Lotus. They seem to be a chain, but in Malaysian-style, there's a bunch of little stalls selling satays, nasi goreng and mee goreng.
Despite the BBC forecast of thunderstorms for the next week, there's only been one so far, accompanied by booming thunder rolling around the hills, lightning and a sheet of rain that was visibly approaching. The days, on the other hand, have been dry, but humid. The humidity is not too bad, without being uncomfortable.
Anyway, that's enough for now. I'm still waking up at around 5am, due to the time difference, and starting to nod off around 10pm. Hopefully that'll wear off soon!
Have to leave for the airport in two hours, and haven't finished packing. Fire off this last post, then I'm off. Will pick up this thread on the other end of the 9 hour flight. Direct between Sydney and KL, so at least there's no annoying stopover in Singapore lah.
Weather-wise, it's looking like thunderstorms, heat, and high humidity for the next week or so. South-east Asia's rainy season. Gotta love it.
Had a great time Friday night and yesterday at work's Christmas party, but no time to write about it. Will have to write on the plane.
This evening, we've had to evict from the premises three different Christmas beetles (or it could be the same persistent one!): one from the kitchen, one from the loungeroom and one from the bathroom. Not sure if this constitutes a plague or not.
Not sure just what it is about our place that is attracting them, either.
But, since these little fellas are starting to appear, that can only mean the emergence of the summer bugs. Such as the terrifying orb spider. Urgh.
Have to leave for the airport in two hours, and haven't finished packing. Fire off this last post, then I'm off. Will pick up this thread on the other end of the 9 hour flight. Direct between Sydney and KL, so at least there's no annoying stopover in Singapore lah.
Weather-wise, it's looking like thunderstorms, heat, and high humidity for the next week or so. South-east Asia's rainy season. Gotta love it.
Had a great time Friday night and yesterday at work's Christmas party, but no time to write about it. Will have to write on the plane.
It's all confirmed. I'm flying out on Sunday afternoon, and will get in to KLIA about 9pm - Kuala Lumpur is now 3 hours behind Sydney time. From memory, the airport is a fair hike out of the city, about 40-50km, so it might be quite late by the time I clear customs and get to the hotel.
Speaking of the hotel, the client is organising that, since they can get a better deal, and will likely know the closest places to work. I asked for a serviced apartment - the extra room is much better for a stay of a few weeks than is available in a hotel, and I can fool myself into thinking that I will cook regularly. Knowing that the food is so delicious and cheap, I doubt I'll be getting the pots and pans out very often...
Anyway, if I get in early enough, I'll have a look around, try and acclimatise a little. That'll help the jet lag a little, and be a nice way to stretch my legs after having been stuck inside a metal tube 10,000 feet in the air for the previous 8 hours.
Just got back from the dentist in Chatswood. Thanks to being diligent about brushing, there's no cavities, but I did get a bit of a telling off about not flossing. And all that coffee probably doesn't help, either. That's a habit I really should think about breaking one of these days...
Ah, I knew it. There's a button on the actual TV itself, not on the remote, which had set the TV to a different setting. Fixed!
Kathleen's reponse: It's fixed! Thank you! I love you. Even more than the TV.
I'm set to go to Malaysia for six weeks over December and January for work! Obviously, that period of time includes Christmas and New Year, but I'll be back for that - there are some things which are sacrosanct, like being at home with the wife for our first married Christmas!
I can't wait - I had a great time in Jakarta in 2002 when I worked there for three months, and when Kathleen and I went to Singapore and Malaysia for holidays, we spent less than a week in Kuala Lumpur. That week was pretty action-packed, but not altogether to Kathleen's tastes. It's definitely not a spotless Asian city, like Singapore, HK or Tokyo, but I found it fascinating. She did enjoy Penang a lot more though!
And mum, don't worry, I've even read up on the travel warnings - nothing to worry about!
The project itself will be fairly straight-forward, but with any luck, I should have plenty of time after work and on the weekends for exploring.
Our TV has gone into this ultra-bizzaro mode where every single external input bar the aerial appears as black and white. Video, DVD, digital camera - none of them display any colour through the TV. I've tried different cables, chaining them through each other, but with no joy. I'm flummoxed.
Stock-standard TV works fine, though. I suspect we've set some hidden setting, but without the manual, it's difficult to say. I need to fix it up before I head off next week. The thought of Kathleen suffering through six weeks of black-and-white TV is just too terrible to comprehend.
I'm taking a well-deserved week off next week, after six of the most frustrating months I've had in the workforce. Changes to plans, deadlines, delays... a project that just seemed to drag on and on with no discernable finish.
I'm at the point where I really needed a week off, to recharge the batteries. I'm looking forward to days where the most strenuous thing I do is get out of bed. Kathleen's on notice that what she sees me wearing when she leaves the house is what I'll be in when she returns, but she wasn't impressed. I suspect she'll have a few chores for me to do.
Australia 1 - Uruguay 1 (4-2 on penalties)
"Are you watching the soccer tonight?" I asked one of my coworkers on Wednesday.
"...What else is on?" he replied.
That should give you some sort of indication as to how high (or not) the esteem in which the Australian soccer team is held in this country, after numerous failures at qualifying. It doesn't help that the Oceania conference is the only one in which the winner doesn't get automatic qualification into the World Cup. For the 2002 World Cup, Uruguay broke our hearts with their home ground advantage, and in 1998, Iran somehow managed to score against us here in Australia.
But you never want to not be watching when history is being made, and so I found myself sitting through 120 of the most tense moments I've ever spent in front of the TV. Even as we were 1-nil up (and what a lucky goal that was!), knowing that just one second of poor concentration could mark another four years of disappointment and recrimination, there was never a feeling that we had won.
And then, in the penalties, for Mark Schwarzer to stop two Uruguayan shots, and for John Aloisi to put the match-winner in the back of the net was an unforgettable moment.
A pretty busy weekend.
On Saturday, we went shopping to try and find a present for Masumi, a girl I taught English to when we were in Japan. She got married on Saturday! We bought her a picture of the city from the Rocks Market, and the sepia tone as well as the light really gives the photo a Japanese feel. We then bought her and her husband a little Christmas cake from David Jones, which will hopefully give them a bit of an authentic Christmas.
Then on Saturday night, we went round to Eva and Steph's for dinner, but mostly for Kathleen to play Eva's new karaoke game - which had a whole bunch of 80s songs. Funny how those games are always more fun after a few drinks...
We wandered up to the Pacific Highway on Sunday to have a look at a few dining room tables - Kathleen seeing our crappy second-hand trestle table, which we bought for $50, on sale for $25 recently was the last straw - and managed to find a nice one with a fairly dark stain that we actually managed to agree on. We'll order it next weekend hopefully in time for Christmas.
And finally, our next door neighbours Ian and Renee came over for dinner on Sunday night.
To celebrate Movember, I'm going to grow a Merv Hughes moustache. Maybe not to that sort of scale, but anything is possible. Seems such a shame to waste a good three day growth by shaving it off for work on Monday morning, so the excuse of raising awareness for male health seems like a worthy one.
Nobody has asked me about my so far admittedly quiet effort, which sort of defeats the purpose of raising awareness. I'm sure things will pick up towards the end of November, though.
As you can imagine, I wasn't looking forward to a roast dinner at Dickson and Lucy's, especially since their place has the awful tendency to become a sauna in summer. But what a relief when we arrived to see the air-conditioner tradesmen on their way out, and a brand new box on the way spewing out blessedly cool air!
Instead of sweating in our seats working our way through dinner, we were able to relax in the gentle climate, enjoying fine wine, fine food and fine company.
All those angry thoughts I had about the inability of my fellow man to take the summer heat without resorting to environment-destroying, energy-guzzling air con have now been taken back!
It was our last chance to see them before they headed off on their long-overdue honeymoon to Africa and Asia. Lucky souls will be away, relaxing, while we're busting a gut at work! Grrr!
Last night, I had the misfortune to be standing in the sweltering heat on a train platform at North Sydney, along with a whole bunch of other unfortunate commuters.
With the next train not for another 8 minutes, the platform was already quite packed, and by the time the train eventually turned up, was an unpleasant crush.
And, of course, the train was only 6 cars long.
It was already packed.
Worst of all, it wasn't air-conditioned.
I decided to wait for the next one, which apparently was 6 minutes away.
As many people as humanly possible decided they couldn't wait and so decided to jam on.
The train slowly moved off, and the platform started to fill up again, not helped by the fact that a lot of people had been unable to get on.
The next train, too, was only 6 cars long. Again, it wasn't air-conditioned.
In fact, it's only saving grace was that it wasn't (yet!) full. But it crawled slowly across the Bridge, since the train in front had quite obviously been delayed by the crush of people no doubt waiting at Wynyard and Town Hall, all trying to get on and off trains that are not built for the pathetic excuse that Sydney calls a train system.
And it's not good enough. It's 2005, and still we have trains on the tracks that are old, decrepit and slow. How are people expected to make the switch from comfortable, air-conditioned cars, when they see that the alternative is a cramped, hot, uncomfortable trip?
By the time I got to Central, only 4 stops away, I was hot, sweaty, and angry. From now on, I am going to complain, loudly, until the government gets the hint and starts investing in quality public transport. Cheap bastards.
Sculptures By The Sea is back on again. Steph and Eva, Kathleen and I went on Sunday afternoon, which just happened to be the first nice day all week!
This year, my favourite was the amazing crested wave made out of construction piping. It's 20 foot high and totally dominates the top of the south Bondi headland. It was such an incredible piece, not only because of it's imposing nature, but also due to it's simplicity. A wave is so in keeping with the theme of sculptures by the sea, that it was difficult to believe no one has attempted something similar in the past.
Not surprisingly, it won the Director's Prize this year.
Kathleen preferred the sleeping head made of marble, which was certainly eye-catching.
By the time we reached Tamarama Beach, the heat had really started to take its toll. We weren't so much interested in the artworks as we were of getting out of the sun! If you were an artist, you'd hate to have a location at the end of the walk, especially if people aren't giving your work the attention it deserves!
On Saturday, we were all set to head off to the movies for the first time in ages. We even combined it with dinner in Artarmon, at our new favourite Japanese restaurant. Since we bought this money pit (otherwise known as an apartment), we seem to have been spending a lot of time at home, not spending much money and just trying to knock the mortgage down a bit.
It wasn't until we were at dinner that we realised that the free movie tickets (exchanged for credit card points) we were going to use weren't valid on a Saturday night.
Huh.
Now, the movie we were thinking about seeing wasn't the sort that we absolutely had to see on the big screen; in fact, we were a bit ambivalent about it, and only really were going because it was 'free'.
We suddenly realised two things:
Actually, that's not really true. We ended up going to Blockbuster, renting a DVD, and buying a six-pack from the nearest bottle shop, and the total cost wasn't that far off two adult tickets to the movies anyway. But there's not that many movies that are worth $30 to watch, compared to waiting a few months for it to come out on DVD.
I guess really that we've become a little more discerning about what we spend money on. When we were living in Melbourne a few years ago, we'd actually go to the movies almost every other weekend. Mind you, back then there just seemed to be more movies that we wanted to see.
I think what it comes down to is that this is the first time in my life where I've actually had to prioritise what I wanted to buy, where I don't have enough money to buy all the things I want to buy. We have the money for stuff we need, which is different from what I want. I've got things I'll be saving until next Christmas for!
And so stuff that a year or two ago I would have spent money on without much thought have now become big things that require a bit of thought and prioritisation.
That's the first sign of growing up.
MARGE: Hmm... Homer, I'm very uncomfortable about having a gang of crows in our bedroom.
HOMER: It's a murder, honey. A group of crows is called a murder.
MARGE: I'm sleeping on the couch.
We were woken up this morning at about 4am by a murder of crows going absolutely berzerk outside. Sometimes proximity to nature is not all it's cracked up to be...
Just got back from H&R Block, where I got both my and Kathleen's taxes done for the last year. What a shock. Far from getting our money back from the government, instead, they've got their greedy little mitts right back in our pocket. B*st*rds!
Looks like we're going to have to get a little more aggressive, a little more creative, with our tax so we don't have this experience next year. Tax time is for refunds, after all.
So, I'm looking into a few ostrich farms. I hear they're all the rage at the moment. And of course, I could always invest in a true-blue, loss-making Aussie feature film. Excellent!
Kathleen came home from work with a CD. On it was the entire output of her work's IT department - a movie sequence of timelapse photos taken from a 16th floor office tower over Circular Quay out to Sydney Harbour.
What an amazing movie it is, too. Watching the activity on the water over the course of the day makes you realise just how much happens. Boats that seem to glide lazily into the wharf aren't quite so laid-back at 5x! Now I want to set a camera up on the balcony to see what happens when we're at work!
andrewandkathleen was meant to be a place to chuck our photos and diaries of our time in Japan. Since then it's transformed into a way of letting our friends and family know what we've been up to!
We've been together since high school, married since 2005. We've travelled and lived in different cities and different countries and are now trying to work out whether we're settling down or having a rest!
