It's Still 32°C Here. Is Vancouver 2°C?

Day 90 - Oh, damn. Looks like is it going to be 32C (89F) again! That's not much of a surprise, actually. No matter how much I cheerlead for perpetual change, having a constant temperature suitable for daily swimming is really very nice. Even with a pool just a 29-storey trip down the elevator, I didn't use it. Our apartment in Relau had four split-A/Cs which we didn't use either.

Maybe I get my love of heat through some Finnish ancestry. Finland might be a cold place, but those people have been working to perfect hot saunas for about two millennia. Oh that, and generally drinking too much.

Today, we are just hanging around until we leave for the airport at 9:00 PM. It already feels a little weird saying bye-bye to Penang. We get to spend the night in KLIA2, our second time flying through Kuala Lumpur this month. We have to go south quite a bit before heading north some more. Someone should be waiting to cart us to the Nine Incense Sticks Guesthouse after our 7:50 AM arrival in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

All the Pics from this Winter so far ...

Day 89 - You might want a direct look at some of the pictures I've blogged since leaving Vancouver at the end of November. Of course, I took a whole lot more photos than have been used in my eJournal and images. In fact, presently there are 1265 images in this single Flickr album.

Click the following 'screen capture' or sample image to load the album.



I'll continue uploading photos into this collection until we return to Vancouver in mid-April. We head to Cambodia on a night flight tomorrow. That means all our Siem Reap photos will also be in the Winter 2017/18 album.

Starting the Packing Process

Day 88 - The process of packing is both physical and mental. I started both today. We don't have a whole lot with us for the winter. Each of us has just one bag and a backpack.

On the whole, after almost three months in Malaysia, we have about the same amount as when we came. A few items have been replaced, as in clothing and soap supplies. So, during the physical part of the packing, all the crap should fit into the same bags.

We have a lot of extra space in this apartment and this is probably the first time we've used the littlest bedroom of the three. It seems nobody took us up on the offer of a free place to stay, yet. We've only two more nights, so they'd better hurry!


I've also started to mentally pack. This is a different sort of winter as we continue onward to a new destination for our remaining seven weeks. I have started to consider Malaysia as a completed experience and am thinking about our upcoming time in Siem Reap now.

Facebook, You and I Had a Great Run!

Day 87 - I once worked with a colleague who never had much nice to say. You know the type, he could and did find fault with just about everything. One strength of this guy was his aptitude in picking up new languages. He once said he worked hard at becoming proficient in a particular one. He studied and learned the difficult idioms and everyday slang. After he'd attained a fairly good proficiency, he came to a realization. He said he discovered the people who speak it didn't have anything important or interesting to say.

At a risk of being like that fellow who went sour before his 'best-before' date, I have decided to spend a whole lot less time on Facebook. First, I was wasting more mental energy deleting ads and turning off annoying feeds than I was enjoying my sessions. Also, I started finding myself little interested in reading the links my friends posted. As a rule of thumb, the only time one should post a news link is if one's in it! More importantly, I have a whole lot of FB friends whose lives really don't matter to me at all. Yet, some of the friends with whom I would enjoy bountiful communication via the platform don't use it at all.

It is well past time for a change of behavior. So yesterday, I vowed I shall continue to check in, but will certainly spend just a fraction of the time I'd been wasting. This is coming from the guy who joined Facebook when a college or university affiliation was necessary to sign up. I joined in July of 2006. I regularly get reminders of what I said nine or ten years ago. I was passionate about trying to get others to sign up back in 2010.

It has been a very useful run. It is just there are more useful ways to use my hours, even though early retirement has provided me with a surplus. I've turned my attention to Twitter again where I can select the type of information I get to consume.

Relau: The Neighbourhood

Day 86 - We don't need to buy much now. We'll be packing this weekend and leaving Penang on Monday night. Trips to a supermarket are no longer necessary. Actually, there's a shop right next door that could have fulfilled the majority of our needs during the last three months. However, we have enjoyed getting out to the big hypermarkets quite often.

Today, the only thing on the grocery list was bananas. It's not possible to buy too far ahead in weather such as this. Sometimes green ones seem to ripen on the way home from the market. We went down to the closest vendor and restaurant area. It's about a 750-meter walk from the house.

I took my camera along just to snap pictures of everyday things. When we leave Malaysia, these things will no longer be 'every day' to us.

To and From the North of the Island by Bus

Day 85 - After not using our weekly bus pass at all yesterday, we hopped on our local bus this morning. First, we transferred to a #401E at the Compleks Bukit Jambul. It really is worth catching as it gets downtown at least 20 minutes faster than other routes. We went downtown primarily to catch the #101 right from the Jetty. That is the 'tourist' bus that runs past the Batu Ferringhi beach, resorts, and condos for foreigners. It's usually a very busy route. The road twists and turns along the edge of the coast after it leaves George Town.

We stayed on all the way to Teluk Bahang. The bus actually turns around near the entrance to the Penang National Park area.





We didn't do any hiking today, not even to famous Monkey Beach. The board showed the trail was closed but Jay later researched on the Internet and found out that is just a ruse to get people to use the private boats that will take tourists along the coastline of the park.





When returning home, we happened to find ourselves downtown again. We always manage to make that happen. We hadn't tried the Restoran Kapitan for a while and enjoyed the view from the second-floor balcony area.

We spent about four hours aboard buses today. I guess we got the one day value of $US 1.09 from the Rapid Penang passes.

Our February Thaw

Day 84 - My weather app just advised me that Vancouver, BC is going have below-freezing temperatures tonight. We have now spent nearly three lovely months in Penang. So, I cannot really relate.



Then again, I am pretty sure I don't really want to relate to a concept like that.

(I always use centigrade for weather temperatures. There are a few old folks left who might prefer the old scale though. Oh, and there are a few entire countries who can't quite keep up with world standards. Two of them are Myanmar and Liberia. I forget the other. Anyway, big numbers look more impressive, and we do like being 'all about the drama' around here.)

Selfies

Day 83 - Jay wanted to mail a few letters with pictures to his sisters today. We went over to the Queensbay Mall for the Malaysian Postal Outlet on the first floor. The mall's Chinese New Year decorations continue to be up in the central hub. I thought this young family taking their own selfie was cute.


Of the 100 or so Flickr pictures of Jay and me taken over the last 33 years, only a couple of the most recent were taken as selfies.

I sort of miss that people no longer ask strangers to take their pictures. It made for a type of people-to-people connection that seems missing in the world today. I suppose, with some cell phones at $1000 a pop, no one wants to risk a stranger bolting from the scene.

Have No Regrets

Day 81 - Most people of the world do the same things over and over every day and then they die. Once in a while, these folks have a few days or weeks of something unique or inspiring. However, they quickly crawl back into predictable, little ruts where they eventually stop existing.

Today I felt great gravity in this realization. I try to console myself, thinking that words such as typical or routine exist for all these humans. I am sure most of them are satisfied and that their lives have merit. However, at the promise of proving I am elitist, I feel sad for most people, very sad.

I cannot imagine having 'day after day' of the same. I praise my parents and every step of my educational experience for providing me with the belief that I can do anything. I am fortunate I have never felt myself without choices. Furthermore, I am blessed with a partner who loves exploration and we have saved enough money to be able to do so. I live very far away from a life of convention or routine.

What has prompted this onslaught of contemplation? Well, we will be closing a small chapter of our lives soon. On the 26th of the month, Penang Dennis will disappear to be replaced with Siem-Reap Dennis.

Upon leaving, we will have only lived on Penang Island, Malaysia for three months. Yet, this has certainly been long enough to develop an affinity for the place and experienced its life. More often than not, I have felt welcomed and at ease. I want to suck in as much as possible and remember what it is like on this particular piece of ground.



Due to Jay's heart surgery last year, we did not leave BC for the winter. Now, though, we're back on track living our 10-Year Plan.

As we walked in the neighbhourhood to buy local bananas from a street vendor, I looked around and hoped I'd always remember this.

狗年大吉

Day 80 - At around 7:00 PM, we ordered an Uber car for the short trip over the mountain to the Kek Lok Si Temple. A couple of weeks ago, we visited the largest Buddhist temple in Malaysia during the day and saw how the impressive site was being decorated for the Chinese New Year.



As I mentioned during the recent Hindu festival, Malaysia is very multicultural. Nearly 40% of Penang's population have Chinese heritage, so the New Year celebrations are a big deal.







Our ride hit a huge traffic jam as we arrived in Air Itam. We suggested the driver let us out a bit from the destination as it'd be easier for him to let us walk the final kilometer or so. It gets dark at around 7:45 PM but there very little annual change. Being so close to the equator ensures around twelve hours of daylight between the hours of seven and seven.







We hiked up the traditional path to the temple, although most of the traffic was attempting to park up at the top of the hill. We made it much more quickly, I'm sure. There were loads of people, both locals and tourists. It was packed although that it hard to see in the photos. Watching everyone was part of the fun of visiting. The air was warm and pleasant without the heat of the sun.



After about an hour and a half we boarded a regular bus to George Town. We had chicken and nan at our favourite restaurant in Little India. Then we rode back to the apartment on the #301. We got home about 11:30.

On the Spur of the Moment

Day 79 - I wanted to go to downtown George Town to check out a phone dealer. I have been trying to decide whether to buy a new phone here or wait until we get back to Canada in April. There's one dealer in the Prangin Mall which sells the OnePlus brand. We took the bus downtown, and indeed he had a 5T on offer. The price was about $CA 60 cheaper than waiting for Canada, mostly due to lower taxes. However, the only colour available in Malaysia is black. I'm sick of black and if I wait till we return home, the OnePlus 6 might be out. I didn't buy one today.

As we walked out, we saw a RapidPenang #10 bus. They are as rare as hen's teeth, I'm led to believe. This route ends at the Penang Botanical Gardens. We knew the general area from our trip to a Hindu Temple at Thaipussam at the end of last month. However, we took a shuttle bus to that.

We ran to catch the bus as it entered the Kotmar station and were at the main parking lot of the gardens within a half hour. We walked. We walked all the way up to the waterfall area which is closed to the public as it is a water supply resource. There are hiking trails which go to Penang Hill but we weren't that adventurous.

















Most British colonies from the Victorian era in the tropics have Botanical Gardens. This was a very pleasant place although we were out in the midday sun. There were lots of shaded places on pathways through the free park. It appeared well maintained. Not many folks were there, but I imagine it gets more people in the evening time. Other than us, we only saw a few tourists.

We had to wait only about 10 minutes for the return bus. Other than one Chinese lady heading to a local temple, we were its only passengers going back to Little India. We, of course, had lunch as it was 2:30 by then.

We ARE the Brands We Consume

Day 78 - We didn't have valid RapidPenang bus passes, so we went to the closest place which sells weekly ones. The Bukit Jambul hub also has our closest large supermarket. It was impossible not to pop in for a few things.

We needed less as we are starting to slowly wind up our time in Penang. I did pick up a few bang-around-the-house t-shirts. One reads: "Me? Weird? Always." The other says, "Money Talks." My other find was the metal can of 'Snake Brand' powder because nothing makes one think of smooth skin more than a slithering snake (with an arrow through its head!) I love shopping in foreign markets.

I think spring is hitting Penang as the days seem warmer and the January evening thunderstorms have abated. We will be heading to Cambodia for about seven weeks just when it starts to really heat up there. Daily temps in Siem Reap should hit around 34 or 35C during the daytime hours. You'll not hear the tiniest peep of a complaint from me!

We Interrupt This Blog for a Commercial Announcement

Day 77 - I hadn't thought about visiting 'KIA Malaysia' to learn about the Niro PHEV here. For all I know, they might be more forthcoming than 'KIA Canada' has been.

I've been trying for a few weeks to get some info from the headquarters in the Great White North. My local BC dealership hasn't been able to provide me with any information yet. The car, in question, has been selling in the US from the beginning 2018, but it has nary a mention on www.kia.ca. No teasers. Nothing. It's as if it doesn't exist.

Today, I may have figured out why. It seems the 'Canadian International Auto Show' in Toronto is coming up. This Friday, it opens and the new PHEV version of the Niro will be announced there. This must be why they have been so tight-lipped.

In today's world of the Internet, such promotional stunts seem increasingly counterproductive. I've been scouring the Internet for the last two months and watching first-hand accounts by a particular Danish owner since last year! It's not easy listening to the guy, but I'm a real trooper. He has many more 'views' than the KIA corporation does on this vehicle. A company should make learning about its products as easy as possible.

An auto show is hardly a necessary premier event in today's global car market, even less so in a country with a geography such as Canada's. It is plain silly to withhold information from potential customers who are unable to make it to an event in Ontario. Dumb, eh?

Now Everyone Can Fly

Day 76 - We spent a lot of today in the second airport terminal in Kuala Lumpur, probably more than was truly necessary. When booking tickets to and from Brunei, Jay was more cautious than necessary. He made the connecting flight back to Penang a few hours later; as he says, "Just in case." Though, I have learned from 33 years of experience that he is always right, even today.

It was a pleasant enough way to spend the afternoon. This airport appends each announcement with, "Thank you, and have a happy journey." So, you can surmise that flying is less of a hassle than in many other places in the world. The KIA2 was built on the other side of the runways in Kuala Lumpur. The main airport is spectacular. The second is designated as the Low-Cost Carrier hub. Primarily, that means it was built for Air Asia and I'm in awe of its amazing growth.

Back 'home' for a few more weeks. Then onward to Siem Reap for the remainder of the winter ...

Posted by Dennis Sylvester Hurd on Sunday, February 11, 2018

Our flights were easy. Passengers know the routine, are polite, and can help empty and fill an A320 in just a few minutes. I promised myself that I was going to take a whole lot of photos in the terminal as that was our major experience today. I didn't though. Here are a few: