Why not Malaysia?

The Philippines allows Americans to stay for 21 days without a visa which meant that I needed to leave by Nov. 9 or pay a big fee. I was meeting the group in China on Nov. 14. I had a few choices- I could go to China early and spend a few more days in Shanghai or I could go somewhere else entirely. With low cost carriers like Cebu Pacific, going from one country to another in SE Asia is pretty cheap and after looking into it I found that heading to someplace like Singapore for a few days wouldn't cost too much more than flying direct to China. But where to go?

When you are traveling, especially when staying in hostels, you meet all sorts of people and in this day and age with facebook and email it is easy to exchange info. It is not uncommon to spend a few days with someone and then leave them with that general invitation, "if you ever make it to Timbuktu (or where ever) on your travels, let me know and we can meet up!" I've given a lot of those invitations myself- "when you come to Denver look me up!". In a discussion with my mom about where to go she reminded me about the girls that we met in the hostel inNorway. One girl was from China and we missed each other when I was in Beijing because of the national holiday. The other girl is from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I sent her an email and she would be in KL at that time. With no better reason to go anywhere else, I booked a ticket to Malaysia. Why not?

KL is an interesting city. The skyline is dominated by huge skyscrapers mostly built in the past 10 years. But when you get closer to the ground, you find an interesting mix of cultures, with China town full of persuasive street vendors and family temples to head-covered Muslims and modern domed mosques to barefoot Hindu temples filled with flowers.

After a day in KL with Sum, I headed to the old capital Malacca. Here I stayed in a hostel and almost immediately after I arrived I was offered a bike ride around town. This was by far my most successful bike outing yet, mostly because I had a good bike and someone to teach me how to use it correctly. I have been thinking more and more about my options for when I get home and I think that biking is a better and better option. I really don't want to buy a car and I know that I will not have the money to do so for a while anyway. Anyway, I spent the day exploring Malacca and shopping. The next day I headed back to KL and straight to the airport for my flight back to China.

The hostel life

About half of my travel so far on this trip has been in "hostels". Hostels are loosely defined as private businesses that cater to budget travellers, youth and students for accommodation. The general picture that comes to my mind is a building with several large dorm rooms and some sort of shared kitchen, but I have found that hostels can vary widely. I have stayed in just about every type of hostel- from small, converted apartments with just a few rooms to large corporate affairs with a front desk and swimming pools (seriously, at a hostel in Florence!). My favorite places were probably somewhere in the middle- homey, but big enough that you don't feel like you are stepping on people and with enough people to have a wide variety, but not so many people that you can't seem to meet anyone.

I've met some really interesting people in hostels- from the guy writing his novel in Bulgaria to the many gap year Aussies and a few slightly odd ducks. Occasionally I've run into people again randomly, like the guy we met in Bosnia and then was in my hostel again in Kiev and the Norwegian guys from the hostel in Plovdiv who I played cards with halfway through Romania.

I was worried that I would be lonely or shy or bored travelling alone, and sometime I was. I've decided that I still do prefer to travel with someone (at least someone cool!) to travelling alone, but I have also found that I CAN travel solo. I have met a lot of people that are doing long trips, that make my round the world look like a mini break. I don't know if I could do it-after just a month on my own I was feeling ready for a break. We will have to wait and see how I feel in the middle of the longer (three month) trip later in the year.

Anyway, I have found he hostel life to be fascinating and I'm glad to have stayed in some really interesting places- and a few uncomfortable ones.

Tips for hostel travel- ear plugs and sleeping mask are a must when staying in dorm rooms (sometimes it seems like there is a snoring contest going on), talk to people- if you want to be alone you are staying in the wrong place, keep your belongings neat- the best way to lose something is have your stuff spread all over a dorm room, don't be afraid to cook in the kitchen but ask before you take any food that's no yours!

Happy travelling!

Sent from my iPod

Back in Bulgaria

After my short trip back to Albania, I returned to Bulgaria. Last year when I went to Istanbul and Romania, I went straight across Bulgaria three times and only stopped for a few minutes in the Sofia bus station, so I don't think you could say that I had "been to" Bulgaria. I had honestly heard mixed things about the country, but after my few days with the PCVs for the fourth, I knew I wanted to spend some good time there. When I arrived in Sofia, I got on the first possible train to Plovdiv, a sweet town in the central part of the country. Plovdiv has it all for an Eastern European city: Roman ruins, old mosques and churches, ottoman buildings, a pedestrian shopping district with street musicians filling the air with ambient music. Plovdiv was my first real stop without Alexi and I stayed in a hostel on my own for the first time. I will probably write a whole post later on hostels and "hostel culture," but for the moment I'll just say that traveling alone a different experience from traveling with someone or a group. I had to readjust to being by myself a lot and I had to start being brave and talking to strangers. I went to dinner with three British girls and wandered around the city by myself. When I am alone, I am less motivated to go to museums or things like that and more inclined just to wander the streets or sit and people watch.

After Plovdiv, I took the train to the Black Sea coast city of Burgas. I decided last minute to head to Burgas and I sent out a few last minute requests to PCVs that I had found online. I got a last minute response from Tyler, an RPCV living with his HCN (Host Country National) wife. It is not uncommon to find PCVs in relationships with and eventually married to HCNs. Tyler and his wife Stella were great. Even though it rained, preventing me from going to the beach (again!) we had a great time. They were super helpful with getting me a train ticket to my next stop, made me dinner and took me to watch a world cup match at a local bar. The day that I left, the sun finally came out and Tyler and I went for a walk on the beach.

My last stop in Bulgaria was the town of Veliko Turnivo. This town may be one of my favorite stops in the whole trip. First, I stayed in a great hostel. It was the perfect size- big enough to have a lot of people, but small enough to feel homey. Second, I met some really great people- particularly three girls (two Aussies and a Kiwi). And third, we went on the most random, fantastic tour.
When I arrived at the hostel I met Andy, another Kiwi who had come on vacation to Bulgaria a few summers ago and had been coming back ever since to work in the hostel in the high season. His job required him to be on call at night and take tourists out on tours to interesting places in the surrounding areas during the day. In return he got room and board for the summer. The tour was very unique. About an hours drive away from town is an abandoned Communist monument nicknamed "the UFO" called Buzludzha. This meeting hall/monument was built high on a hill in the early 80s. After the fall of communism in Bulgaria, it fell into disrepair and now is closed up and falling apart. The building is just a drab concrete circle from the outside, with a flying saucer like shape (hence the nickname). But inside, the meeting hall is filled with magnificent mosaics in the communist realism style, glorifying the worker and the communist party leadership. You can tell that when this building was built, it was fantastic. As it is now, it is a bit surreal. The surreal aspects were increased by the cloudy, foggy, creepy weather (which turned into a downpour) and the herd of wild horses hanging out outside the building. The crumbling roof didn't do much to keep out the rain and after a little while inside we were all soaked and freezing. As the rain let up, we walked outside into the dreamlike fog and the horses galloping by. On the front of the building someone had written in large red letters "FORGET YOUR PAST" in between the poems extolling the virtues of work and nationalism. Many Bulgarians of the right age (late 20s) will tell you that they remember going to this site when they were school children, but many others now don't even know that it exists and now only foreign tourists with a desire for something unusual come to visit. For many people in this part of the world, remembering the past is still very painful and I guess I don't blame them for trying to forget. The only problem with that is that when you truly forget your past, you are only doomed to repeat it.