All smiles over subpar Margaritas. Bangkok.

Ariel at Utopia, an unbelievable bar.  Luang Prabang, Laos.

Ariel on our hotel balcony. Vientiane, Laos.

Map consultation. Luang Prabang, Laos.

Crumbling French colonial. Vientiane, Laos.

Drinks at Tiger Hut. Ko Chang, Thailand.

Public bus. Bangkok. (Courtesy of Chao)

Laotian hotpot/grill. Vang Vieng, Laos.

Chao at Buddha park. Outside Vientiane, Laos.

Finished papaya salad. Ko Chang, Thailand.

Hammock outside of our hut. Vang Vieng, Laos.

A slightly sturdier hut with drying clothes. Ko Chang, Thailand.

Marketplace in Luang Prabang.  (Chad, you'd love this.)

View of northern Laos from the bus. (Courtesy of Chao.)

Street food, Bangkok.  (Squid tom yum and crab cake with fried basil. YUM!)

Ariel and I looking tanned.  Bangkok.

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And so...

Beijing is bone-chillingly cold and it snowed recently, ending over 100 days with no precipitation.  (True desert!)  This is markedly different with every single destination in Southeast Asia, which is where Beijingers with know-how, creativity and cash flock during Spring Festival rather than taking filthy trains to grey cities.

Our particular dash from winter was far more relaxed and vacation-y than the last trip to Malaysia and Indonesia, which had some hair raising moments.  This is probably because Thailand and Laos are positively loaded with tourism and can feel very "Australian Spring Break."

THAILAND is not exactly how I remembered it; last time I was there Bangkok was full of passionate protesters.  It's still a love-hate place; messy, absolutely trashy tourists, culturally obtuse and congested beyond belief, but so dedicated to spectacular street food that it's all forgivable.  Thailand is good with chill-on-the-beach tourism and offers the best values in Asia.  People are accessible and friendly.  We went to Ko Chang, an island half a day away from the capital with laughably beautiful beaches and palm thatched huts by the side of the ocean.  Fried fish and beer.  Absolutely perfect.

LAOS was new to everyone, and was not quite what I expected.  It felt more like an Asia escape rather than what it actually is, which is one of the continent's poorest and most corrupt countries. (And Communist to boot.)  Since the tourist scene is so clearly defined, you feel quite separate from the locals.  Foreigners fall in love with the country, and the bars and restaurants of the nicest areas are staffed by European owners serving clever cocktails and Laotian inspired dishes for very low prices.  Culturally, it's like a Thai village, with some strong similarities in language and food.  Laotians are far more conservative and quiet than Thai, and tend to ignore rather than pester.

Also, check out Ariel on Facebook for better photos!

Hello all, quick hello from Vientiane, the capital of Laos!  The city is a lot more developed than I expected, although mostly within tourist spots.  The seperation between locals & foreigners feels very Colonial, quite unlike Thailand.  The capital is full of charming, dilapidated French colonial buildings and Communist style monuments, also dilapidated.  Locals seem surprisingly unSoutheast Asian in that they are meek and seem nervous around white foreigners, who are numerous in the city centre.  This city has the strongest & most authentic cafe culture I've seen in Asia.

SO, we're back in Kuala Lumpur after a harrowing bus ride to Solo and some ridiculous nonsense we had to deal with at the airport.  I'm going to wait before writing more about my month in Indonesia, but suffice to say I'm happy to have an air-conditioned, reasonable, hassle-free, artificial break in Malaysia before heading back to Beijing.

<3

Traveling by bus, especially in Sumatra, you're bound to see signs which are actually in Indonesian languages, but act like English homophones.  It makes things even stranger that Bahasa Indonesia has no concrete spelling, so the same word can be spelled many ways, or there can be regional, dialect variations.  This also means that any recognizable English loan words (like "business") could easily be spelled two or three different ways.  I'm sure this is also true with the hundreds of languages in Indonesia, most of which use Westernized script.

English homophones I've seen on signs in Sumatra:

Cat oven (I believe this means "kiln")

Door smeer (This means a car/motorcycle polish)

Air (This means water or any liquid)

Semen (This means "cement")

Tie rod (Can't figure this one out!)

Bali, in various pictures

-~`*`~- 

ARIEL enjoys our lush garden in Kuta beach.

ROSS sunburn-edly waits for warung food.

CHAO dramatically overlooks the Wild Buffalo temple, in a borrowed sarong.

-<>-

So, I'm in The Aquarius Hotel on Kuta beach drinking insipid tea and rather delicious oatmeal waiting for the two others to wake up.  We're all quite happy with this place; very resorty, but the most beautiful beach I've ever seen with frothy, crystal clear water and powdery sand.  It's a much welcome fun and dumb and relaxing atmosphere, and is reminiscent of Florida beach towns.  Now that I've seen the two tourist meccas on the island, I can make some general observations: 

** Even though Ubud is the "cultural capital," you can eat actual Indonesian food at warung in Kuta.  Unless you want overpriced nasi goreng or hideous things like "Balinese tapas," you have to actually leave Ubud to eat. 

** Balinese dance and gamlean are so beautiful, especially when seen in Ubud palace.  The beaches are all Tom Petty covers delivered with thick accents.

** Relationships between Balinese and foreigners seem to be more meaningful, deep and friendlier in Kuta as compared to Ubud. This may be due to the economic discrepancy between the two kinds of tourists that frequent these areas.  Certainly, the locals in the tourist sector are more friendly here and give the impression that it's not only about milking you for cash.
 

** Ubud is a thousand times more beautiful as a city than the poorly planned, overdeveloped Kuta.  Even north towards fancier digs, Ubud has a more rewarding and "Balinese" landscape.
 

** North of Kuta in Seminyak or Legian, you notice that the expatrate community living in and around the area seems larger than Ubud.
 

** Ubud: hippie, new-agers taking crystal infused spiritual classes, eating overpriced cranberry muffins, being nervous and pretending not to be in Bali.  South Bali: Surfer type, beautiful people who miss Australia while eating overpriced brick oven pizza and pretending not to be in Bali.

The honest truth is that I do not ultimately enjoy touristy places.  Less simulated reality is healthy, even if it isn't pretty.

Tomorrow we leave to Candikunning and the lakes and hill towns of north Bali for a few days.  Also, a botanical garden and volcanic sand beach!  Hopefully it won't be overrun.

We've been in Bali for about five days now and have been mostly in the so called cultural center of Ubud and one night in some horrific beach town in the south filled with middle aged Australians dancing frenetically to Bob Marley covers delivered in slurred English. There is a lot to say about Bali, not all good, but I think Ariel puts it best in his email to family back in Miami:

"Hey guys, 

Bali is great but too damn expensive and touristy.  There's a lot of things that I hate about it, but it's so damn pretty at times that you really want to stay for years.  On the other hand, the locals are cash fiends and most people want nothing from you except for money, and that obviously leaves a bad taste in your mouth.  Bali is best if you're an indulgent, naive person willing to spend at least a hundred dollars US a day.  Backpackers it seems, deserted this bitch a long time ago and won't be coming back anytime soon.  

Out of all the places we've been to in Southeast Asia, Bali is the least friendly to it's tourists, (especially those who aren't desperately and stupidly throwing away money) and that's not a great feeling when you're on vacation and genuinely interested in the culture you've come to explore.  Bali is best it seems, for rich old ladies who think "Eat Pray Love" is the greatest story ever told, or people who've never been to asia before and never want to come back after.  Sometimes it feels about as hokey and removed from any reality as the World Showcase in Epcot center.  At present, I sit somewhere between moderately happy and terribly underwhelmed.  And nearly broke."

I'd also like to add: where is this money going?  Every single tourist facility in Bali overcharges (and occasionally just cheats tourists) dramatically, but the basic infrastructure here is below that of anywhere in Java, more comparable to Sumatra.  My father told me that the Balinese say that beggars on the island are from Java, but that is total nonsense.  Outside of tourist zones, the Balinese use poor roads, throw trash literally everywhere, have sidewalks with gaping holes and have large amounts of dogs with mange and disease wandering around.  Besides hostility, what lasting effects has tourism actually brought?

More on this later, as I formulate a more fair assessment of the place.  On a positive note, the temples, culture, babi guleng (roast pork) and especially music are magnificent.

Indonesia food is delicious.

1 - Ayam goreng (Indonesian style fried chicken with mint basil, spicy bean paste and rice)

2 - Gudeng telur (Rich, stewed jackfruit with a hard boiled Chinese style tea egg, with fried buffalo skin and tofu sambal)

3 - A rojak vendor's display (sliced fruit salad with a tangy, salty, spicy dressing)

Not pictured, but much beloved: tempe sambal, (fried, fermented bean curd slices coated in a chili sauce)  roti bakar, (pan fried bread with a variety of different fillings, including chocolate sprinkles, peanuts, cheese or jam) bakso, (meatball soup with bits of fried tofu, glass noodles and fried shallots) es campur, (refreshing shaved ice with fruits, syrup, preserved tangerine, croutons, young coconut, etc.) ikan goreng, (fried fish, usually with sambal and lime) and nasi goreng (fried rice! Cheap and everywhere).

Regional variation means you'll try many different versions as you travel.  (Guess which one of the above was influenced by the Dutch!)

Flower tiles and a preparing gamelan orchestra

Chao in our 60s bungalow-type homestay lobby

Prambanan's Shiva temple

Public artness

Endless transportation

Gamelan on display

A certain photographer at Prambanan

The Sultan's daughters

Restored pleasure palace of the 18th century Sultan

Deco train station

---

YOGJAKARTA

This is the culture center of Java, and it's fairly obvious.  Marred a bit by unchecked, rip off tourism, it's still a lovely, small city arranged around the kraton, or Sultan's palace, who still officially runs the show.  Lots of old converted Dutch buildings intermingled with intricate Javanese wooden porches, endless crappy batik sellers with that ubiquitous call of "hello mister!"  A lot less heavy traffic, with becak bicycle rickshaws and horse drawn carriages for tourists.

Today we leave for Borobudur, which is possibly the largest Buddhist temple in the world, built over a thousand years ago.

 VISIT LAKE TOBA

Consider this for your next vacation and you won't regret it.  Breathtaking views, resort style Batak houses for surprisingly cheap, the kindest people ever and a totally unique culture, all on a tiny island floating in the center of a tremendous volcanic lake in Sumatra. They need and want your business. Come.

Oh, and be sure to try pepes ikan (steamed fish with coriander, lemongrass, candlenut, coconut, green chili, etc. wrapped in banana leaves) at Juwita's Cafe.  Possibly the best food on earth made by the loveliest woman ever.

Greetings from the island of Sumatra.  We've been having issues with several details including domestic flights, ferry failures and Chao's card getting hopelessly trapped in an HSBC machine because of a (frequent) power outage. 

This country is markedly different from Malaysia considering the similarities in Malay-Indo culture/language/food.  Everything is much, much more third world and overwhelming, more Cambodia than China.  We're adjusting.

Recent travel: We just left two blissful days in Bukit Lawang village, where we trekked in the rainforest, saw a mother and baby orangutan in the wild (!) and climbed on all fours into a bat filled cave.  That, and stayed in a gorgeous traditional house with a view of the jungle and rushing river.  Breathtaking and humid.

We're currently in the north Sumatran city of Medan, famous for rat filled sewers and the smell of burning trash.  (Also a couple of old mosques, I've heard.)  However, owing to Indonesia's jaw dropping economic disparity, the city center is blanketed with air conditioned malls, which we are naturally enjoying.  We're having more issues with Air Asia, but after some kind of resolution we are quickly heading to Lake Toba, where we will swim in a volcanic lake and see Batak houses.

More to come!

-- In Malaysia, no shoes inside most buildings or temples. --

UPDATES: We had a small change of plans since we went yesterday to buy our ferry ticket to Indonesia and found out that the ferry to Sumatra from Penang Island has been canceled permanently.  So what this means is that we must fly, an unnecessary expense and a delay.  The cheapest flight we could find leaves on the 13th, giving us a little less time in Sumatra.  However, we could do worse with our surroundings; tropical weather, crumbling Deco architecture, garish Chinese temples, endless lounging, mountain view beaches and iced drinks in lazy warung shopfronts.  This island has a great feel, a little like a larger Hoi An in Vietnam.  Why, then, am I anxious to leave?

A slower pace is clearly healthier.

<3- One of Ariel's three daily lunches. -<3

Penang Island, Malaysia

About a thirty minute bus ride outside of Kuala Lumpur lies the Batu Caves, a Hindu temple complex inside a huge cave with a great number of stairs and a huge statue of a deity out front.  The complex is most important during the Thaipusam festival, when devotees celebrate the son of Shiva by piercing all sorts of things through their bodies and faces.  Outside of festival time, it seems to fall to disrepair with rather unimpressive religious tableau and more construction material and bags of cement than Hindu objects.

There were a lot of tourists when we arrived, mostly Chinese from various countries and Australians.  As you walk up the steps to the mouth of the cave, you're more or less greeted by about twenty monkeys that eye you suspiciously.  The cave interior itself is massive, dark, blanketed in sleeping bats and impressive.