Articles in Snapshots
Pulau Langawi
We had originally planned to cross to Thailand right after Georgetown, but we decided to linger a bit longer in Malaysia. Still looking for the perfect picturesque island, we settled on Pulau Langawi, which was said to have Malaysian’s best beach.
Georgetown
The empty streets were bustling with activity at night: we were right in Little India and we could almost taste the smell of incense, burning in front of most shops. We were also close to a Mosque, and the first night, we suddenly woke up to the sound of the prayer call in the wee hours of the morning—it was pretty surreal.
Kuala Lumpur
Crossing the street is best done with both eyes closed and a prayer book in hand, as you try to dodge trucks, cars, irate taxi drivers and motorbikes. The pedestrian green light, a flashing animated little stick figure that runs, sums it all up: run like hell.
A Foodie's Day in S'pore
I’m lucky to have a strong stomach and a taste for street food. I’m not a huge fan of “weird” meat (i.e. intestines and the like) but I can eat pretty much anything else. You can’t really apply Western health standards to Asian street food but I’m perfectly fine with that. Who wants to live in a tasteless sanitized world, anyway?
A Secret Affair
At 11 p.m., we suddenly realized we’d better print the Kuala Lumpur hotel booking confirmation we had just made online. Obviously, we don’t carry a printer with us (although I sometimes wish we did) so we had to find an Internet café.
Singapore's Chinatown
And this is where my perception of Singapore suddenly changed. Just a couple of blocks from all the main Western financial institutions, we stepped into another world.
Canberra
Australians are quick to dismiss their capital and I don’t think I have ever heard anybody bragging about being from Canberra. Indeed, the state of ATC (Australia Capital Territory) is tiny and Canberra is usually not on the backpacker trail—we didn’t go last time we were in Oz in 2003.
But this week, we had a car and time in our hands, so we took the mountain road to the capital to see what it looked like.
The Grand Pacific Drive (III)
We finally found a little paradise, 500 kilometers from Sydney and 700 kilometers from Melbourne: the little town of Narooma, on the Eurobodalla Coast. Conveniently located far enough from the two big cities, Narooma manages to retain some of its local charm and it’s not too swamped by Australian holidaymakers.
