The heat and humidity here is amazing! And unlike Singapore where I was freezing cold from the cranked up AC more than I was warm from the outside temp, here they believe in keeping the AC more reasonable. That part is actually nice---I'm sitting here in my hotel room quite comfortable in a tank top despite the fact that I have the AC turn up to high. In Singapore, I turned my AC down as low as possible and still had to wrap myself up in the duvet while I was working on my computer.
It is hot outside, though. Whoa.
Yesterday, we went to the Batu Caves in between visits and climbed the ~280+ steps to the see the Hindu temple. It was actually quite interesting and my favorite part was that there were tons of macak monkeys just hanging around.
It probably wasn't the best activity to do between meetings since one tends to perspire a bit when climbing ~280+ stairs in 95 degrees and 95% humidity. Oh well, I get off the bus when I'm told and do what I'm told. When we got back down we had a nice refreshing coconut...although to be honest, I didn't find it that refreshing. Rajesh, my classmate was kind enough to let me try some of his, and while the liquid was OK, the pulp was just slimey.
Later in the afternoon we went to the Royal Selangar factory where they make really lovely pewter items. It was a slightly different visit from our others but it was really interesting to learn about how the market has changed, how they market their products, and how they recently developed a new metal.
Tomorrow, I am participating in the trip to Malacca and then to Kuala Selangar. Malacca was once the hub of the spice trade and I am really looking forward to seeing it. Kuala Selangar has more monkeys and swarms of fireflies and should be interesting as well.
I am so looking forward to going home! Everyone is counting down the days now, and none more than me since I have been gone a week longer. The only thing that makes me sad is that Mr. Barker won't be home when I return! Sure, it will be nice to be back in the fuzzy, loving arms of Schnuffy, but what's the fun in being home if Ian isn't there?
4 comments:
I suppose if you're hot and thirsty enough, even a slimy coconut is refreshing. I think it also depends on your expectations and whether you can disassociate your experience of processed coconut products from the raw version at the source.
I know I'd have to think of a raw coconut as something unrelated to a variety of coconut products I might buy in the grocery store.
We are the good of coming home - even if Mr. Barker is not there! And Kiwi is there too... Come on?!
It's weird, but the towers in the first picture appear as though they were digitally inserted into the photo. It just doesn't seem real. Is that sense unique to the photo, or do the towers have an "unreal" quality when seen on the scene?
Margaret, yes it is true that it will be good to come home to you and Kiwi (and Schnuffy)...but it doesn't change the fact that 5 weeks with only 40 hours of seeing Mr. Barker is too long to be apart!
Greg, the towers are pretty amazing and very unusual. What isn't glass is stainless steel and so it is dazzling in the sunshine--it does have a rather other-worldly quality.
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