The 5000 Project

For the first time during this journey, I wasn’t hot. Da lat is a city in the highlands 400kms north of ho chi minh. The cool air comes with a cost though, there are heaps of Asian tourists so everything is a little expensive. after walking around for a while, I found a dorm for $5 a night. There aren’t many western tourists and if they do arrive they pay for their own room, this gave me a unique opportunity to hang out with local visitors who choose the cheap dorm because they can’t afford anything better. All three guests in the dorm were motorbike taxi drivers for tourists known as ‘easy riders’ they do long distance journeys but charge $20/day when they get customers, these kind of drivers are all over the city.

They invited me to have dinner with them, so we all headed out to a local restaurant which puts out a gas stove in the middle of the table and when the initial soup is served on top, it is upto us to cook the noodles along with the vast mound of vegetables and herbs. Although their English was a bit poor, we managed to understand each other after a few half shots of vodka when someone calls ‘yo’. They had a good month with their collective income, so it was a night of celebration. What seems to happen is that during the bad months, they survive solely off money that they borrow from friends who are doing quite well, and during this good month the debt is paid. Spreading the wealth in an unofficial socialist way. I found a similar thing in Cambodia, a street full of tuktuks would all be working together, the guy who knows English the best would be the manager, not actually a driver.

After lots of drunken talk about girls, sex and female body parts – I managed to change topic and fetched some interesting info on how free tourists are, yet the locals are quite constricted.

One of the guys mentioned that if he rides with a westerner on the back, the cops never touch him. He could speed right past them. If he’s riding on his own or with a local, he gets speeding fines for no reason, one time he was going 40km/h and given a 1000000 dong ($50) on the spot fine, a huge amount for a lowly income.

Da lat is a beautiful area with really nasty cheesy tourist foundations. I paid $12 to see a whole day of them. One attraction is a nice scenic view on a hill, they have ticket booths to gain entrance and the summit has cheap kiddy rides and untrustworthy carnies, destroying the nature view. This park is known as ‘the valley of love’ it has love themed cartoon statues scattered throughout.

Each waterfall in the surrounding area also has an entrance fee, one even had a rollercoaster to provide transport, incase the 10min walk down is too far.

One great thing about da lat is the huuggge market, awesome food. Traditional pho noodle soup stands were everywhere, all different styles. There’s also bakery stalls which also serve hot flavoured soy milk to go with the pastries, I chose a muffin thing with custard in the middle. One benefit from French occupation.

For lunch one day I bought a huge ripe avocado, 2 baguettes and a small jar of salt with pepper and citric acid. Bloody awesome lunch and so very cheap, probably lacking in nutrients though.

After a few days I came to the conclusion that I have got the most out of this town, I booked a bus ticket to nha trang.

Also like to note, I am not going to see another waterfall, I’m totally waterfalled out. A bit islanded out too. Bring on north asia and Europe.

Some of you may be wondering why I am in Vietnam already. Well, I visited siem reap (Angkor wats) during my last trip and covered a bit about the ancient history in that blog – also there was no other place to visit to the east without requiring an English speaking local or couchhost to help me out.

Ho Chi minh is a really nice city – there are many parks and the streets are clean, best part is that the locals enjoy the privileges of the city which was a welcome sight after Cambodia. Each night I would head to the beer hoi stall, a small street pub that only sells homebrew beer on tap for 25c per middy, and talk all night with locals and backpackers as equals. They would cram everyone into a tiny area and you’re forced to sit with strangers while the ridiculously cheap fresh tap beer flows endlessly, every 10min a local would shout YO (cheers) with a raised glass and the clash of glasses with spilling beer within the entire pub would invigorate the crowd; everyone has to take a swig – else risk being disrespectful to local culture. It was a very jovial atmosphere.

having an excellent time with a local and a canadian, over beer and candied duck intestine

Ho Chi minh city unfortunately shares a similar depressing recent past with Cambodia; the well known Vietnam war. I visited a very interesting war museum which portrays the other side of the story different to what I have been brought up to understand. The ground floor displayed photos and newspaper articles displaying protests from many countries around the world, against the American offensive in Vietnam. They even included the American people’s protest and although the museum definitely had a bias, it was never against American individuals, only the leaders. For a Communist country that likes to end protests quickly, to me it seemed to be promoting the evident effectiveness of going to the streets with free speech.

The history exhibit may not be what you will read in the Wikipedia article for the war although it was a very interesting sight. The war started with the French returning to Vietnam purely to reclaim their lost control over Indochina. After many French were captured in an ambush, they decided to do what they do best, they retreated and surrendered the land back to the Vietnamese people. This is about the time when the US arrived to help the French, but unlike the French they didn’t leave, they had their own reason to stick around, paranoia of communism. This, according to the museum’s portrayal of history, was the only reason the invasion occurred towards Vietnam as a whole.

a US tank with a vietnam banner in the background, war museum

With my limited and possibly inaccurate western history knowledge (typing local blog post, can’t check Wikipedia), I was under the assumption that before the US arrived there was a struggle with the south to fight back Communist aggressors in the north. According to current day Vietnam, this is not the case.

To quote some guy: history is made by the people who write the history books.

There was definitely a north vs south, but I think the lines were blurred towards the end. I found it interesting that the elaborate maze of Vietcong tunnels are just a few kms from ho Chi minh, a notion that the Vietcong were everywhere.

The tunnels had large top-side entrances so that the Americans can try to go through them, but then the tunnels gradually get narrow which causes the US (and Aussies) to get stuck in a very unfortunate location. The tunnels and nasty looking traps were a huge way of trying to even the balance vs the mass weaponry of the US army… and their puppets (as is written in the museum).

In ho chi minh I stayed in a new dorm hostel managed by a couple of Brits, I was their first guest. They actually had the same idea that I formed during the last trip, introduce dorm accommodation to south east Asia, there is never an ultra cheap alternative to a ‘1 bed room with fan’ when traveling alone in these parts – I should have jumped to this idea years ago, hmm maybe I could be the competition once I finish this project. As long as I don’t present my ideas to the public, I should be fine :|

some locals enjoying noodles and beer on a clean street full of nice trees, city centre

After seeing the sights, unfortunately not getting a response from couch requests, I headed north to the city of da lat; in the cool highlands, a refreshing change of temperature.

The weather was good but the sense of westerner guilt in a deprived country did not fade.

I was confirmed by a couchhost although upon arrival in the city I had no message providing address, the profile mentioned that he runs an indi cinema, confirmation email mentioned that he is generally there from 5pm each day. So I checked the website and found the address of the ‘movie house’ and decided to attempt a long walk there.

During the walk I noticed that certain areas were purely for  foreigners, all the shops were new and flash, everything was highly expensive, the only locals within the walls were the employees of the foreign invested businesses – the majority of the locals were outside in their tuktuks and motorbikes waiting to provide transport for the foreigners.

After an interesting walk I arrived at the movie house and met with my host. That night we went to a foreigner pub, containing mainly NGO employees and a few Expats, for the weekly ‘nerd night’ which consisted of anyone presenting a slideshow on a projector and having a talk about anything, their passion, a project they’re working on, or it could just be about themselves. It reminded me of TED talks in perth but a lot more frequent and with people from all areas of the world – really interesting stuff.

I ate dinner right in the middle of a large busy market

What made the night even more interesting was the controversial chat I had with my host after a few drinks. Disclaimer: what follows may only apply to certain scenarios, I don’t have a long list of references to prove complete truth. Purely speculation from what others have told me. Which I guess is exactly what a blog is.

Pol Pot’s Khmer rogue reign of slaughter resulted in 3.6 million educated people killed or  missing. Their culture was destroyed. As such, a lot of the locals don’t know how to read their own language; they also have no concept of what a movie is, with a beginning middle and end. My host used to provide a day for free screenings for locals, his cinema is the only one showing actual movies in phnom penh that isn’t just slapstick cambodian comedy or chinese Charlie Chapman. While the locals watched the western movies they would get bored and leave, even though some of them understood the language it was a matter of not understanding the concept of a movie story.

The country is so poor, yet there are so many NGO funded English schools to help the children. What this seems to do however is inject money into the growing occupation of foreigners and foreign investment, NGO management drive expensive cars and spread the wealth to the feel-good backpacker employees when, sure enough the kids learn a bit of English, however there is no handover for the next teacher to replace the last one after a few months – so they start from the beginning again. The end result: tuktuk drivers who sound like they know fluent English, until you attempt conversation.

The government is not helping the people at all, instead they build more on the foreigner-occupied areas, such as, what will be the second highest building in the world on an artificial island, for the financially bullshit of the world to visit. Meanwhile 90% of the Cambodian people live on the rice fields in the country areas, in poverty, just as the Khmer rouge envisioned. 50% of the population is under 21, the new  young generation is not getting a new age upbringing.

The tuktuk drivers provide for their families in the country, while in the city they actually sleep in their tuktuks as accommodation. This was a frequent observation.

To continue the negative vibe, lets get on with what I did in this city. Well, I went to the genocide museum where people were tortured to death and the killing fields were hundreds were killed and buried.

I could go into detail but its far too sad and this post is getting too long already. All i’ll say is that after the genocide; we, as citizens from UN countries, appointed pol pot the Cambodia seat at the UN and for some reason there has been little media attention on this era of real terror since. From my experiences many people in the world aren’t aware of how nasty the Khmer rouge was, when he was just a step below Hitler.

Skulls on display at the Killing Fields, one of many mass grave sites all through cambodia

Now for some positivity.

The house where I was staying is a 3 story building with a rooftop shower. A shower completely in the open, but high enough for a little bit of privacy, was quite different.

the rooftop shower :D

After a few days of walking all over the city and seeing the sights, I applied for a Vietnam visa (cost $45, can’t get it at the border) which took a couple of days. On my final night I joined a pub quiz at a foreigner bar, my host was the quizmaster, then headed to Vietnam on a bus the next morning. No real adventures to be had.

I Just updated the expenses page, its a button at the top. Ill get it properly uptodate soon but it would seem I slacked off a bit with my accounting log in my notepad after taman nagara – ill try and remember ;)

This should give you all some idea of how cheap south east Asia is if you spend some time to look for the cheap spots.

I know the journey tracker is very outdated, I can’t update the maps on my phone, ill sort it when I find a cheap netcafe. Same goes for uploading photos.

Heading to Vietnam in a couple of days, ill post phnom pehn then.

That is all. As you were.

It rained for 3 days.

I stayed in, yet again, the cheapest place I could find – $4/night with onsuite and satellite TV – everything in the room was broken though, except for the TV, which is handy because on the second day the rain was so heavy that I just bunkered in for most of it.

On the third day the rain was light enough to go for a decent walk. Sihanoukville has a beach with bars lining the whole bay, considering the quite evident low season, the hawkers were relentless. It was quite sad to see the vast poverty between flash new buildings, that with the rain, I felt a little depressed and began smoking gudang gurams again after noticing them being sold in shops.

I decided to walk about 4ks to a marker on Google maps, titled: “new bus station”. Determined to not be ripped off by third parties, I headed to what I hoped would be a walkable central bus terminal. Just 30min into the walk and I was already outside the tourist area and onto local village suburbia. Just one street off the main road where a large western nightclub has been built; there was a large suburb of wooden houses on stilts with bundles of firewood collected to the side, ox and geese roaming the roads and swamp fishermen showing off their bucket filled with snails which they have harvested to eat. There were a group of middle aged ladies playing cards and gambling their money, they invited me to play with them but the game was a bit tricky to understand – and they will most likely win all my money. One thing that cheered me up were the smiles in the village, compared to the hawkers, bar staff and beggars on the beach – however it’s the relentless workers that are providing money for their village families, for survival. Cambodia is one of the most poorest counties in south east Asia with a terrible past and a current highly corrupt government, which I will go into more detail with the next post.

gambling ladies with a lot of character. I was not willing to take the risk of playing.

I cant imagine many tourists would ever see the real sihanoukville, the beach attracts mainly party going travellers as most beach side bars serve happy shakes (magic mushroom) and happy pizza (marijuana) on request, it reminded me of Vang vieng in Laos. They will all be oblivious to the mass poverty just a few km away.

few lads showing off their snails and a couple of small crabs

I digress, so, back to the walk. I arrive at what should have been a bus terminal, it ended up being a huge local market with all kinds of interesting stuff. On the way back to the beach, I spotted a private bus terminal, as it turns out there is no local bus just a few private companies. I bought a ticket to phnom pehn for $5.

The rest of the day, night and following morning was once again invaded by heavy rain. I watched the Dockers get slaughtered by Melbourne to wrap up this rather miserable and unexpected stay and hopped on the good old bus back to phnom pehn. This time, however, I managed to get a couchhost to accept my request.

The border crossing was quite dodgy, first off, there are guys standing just outside the immigration booth who take your passport then fill in the visa application for you, then demand cash in order to get your passport back. Thankfully I was warned of this by the Expats in trat and was quite happy to fill in the paperwork myself, they asked for my passport but I declined. Another dodgy thing is that most border crossings for Cambodia cost $20 for the visa, the visa itself has $20 printed on it, this crossing only allows payment in baht, 1000 baht, which is around $30.

The third dodgy was a big one. There were a bunch of foreigners with a ticket already booked for sihanoukville, their lift to the bus station had arrived, I asked if I too can get a ticket. It would cost 650b ($20). I was reluctant at first as I knew the distance to the southern beach is short, the American tourists convinced me that transport in Cambodia is expensive, and I felt a little isolated on the border – so I paid it out.

Considering I didn’t book, I was thrown on a different bus to the others as their bus was full. The ticket guy pointed out the bus and I hopped on, the name of the destination on the bus was in Cambodian, I trusted it was heading in the right direction.

4hrs later, after seeing large markets and thick population for a beach town, the bus stops. Time to get off. I was a little puzzled, it surely didn’t look like a coastal town. I inquired as to where I was – the reply was quite a shock.

“Phnom penh”

I asked again incase I didn’t pick up the accent

“Phnom penh”

A view from the bus, sure doesnt look like a coastal town...

I spoke with the closest bus agency employee that I could find and raised my ticket that clearly showed Koh Kong to sihanoukville. After a bit of quiet spoken diplomatic ranting I convinced the guy to give me a free ticket to sihanoukville, the next available was the next morning at 7:30. What grinded my gears a little more was the fact that the bus tickets normally cost $8 – same price for both destinations. The locals had a good chuckle when I told them how much I paid. I put on a smile to stay diplomatic.

They offered me a tuktuk ride to the hostel suburb for $2, which was apparently very far from here. They offered a ride for the morning too, and mentioned that it would be difficult to direct a normal tuktuk driver as the bus station was privately owned and they had many in the city with the same name. I asked for the name of the street so that i can use it as an identifier; and the direction in which to walk to the hostel suburb, once pointed I walked with fair haste as it was fairly late in the day.

Along the way I constantly declined tuktuk and motorbike drivers, there was one tuktuk driver who knew a bit of english; when he asked if I wanted to stay in a hotel, I asked him if I could stay at his place in a semijoking way. We both had a chuckle when he declined and I assumed that would be that, unfortunately he followed me for the next two hours. He even sat with me while i was eating some noodles at a street kitchen – this would have been an awesome experience dining with a local, if he said anything other than:

“hotel?”
“girls?”
*quietly* “… want some weed? Its ok to do in cambodia”

He repeated these words frequently,  this is when I noticed his English wasn’t as good as I previously assumed. I politely declined and tried to let him know that he has picked the wrong foreigner and that he would make much more money if he wasn’t where I was at all times. Unfortunately he didn’t understand, and there were no other foreigners to lure him away.

I asked locals where a netcafe is so that I can try a last minute couchsurf, one guy was about to point me in the right direction before he had a chat with my tuktuk buddy in Cambodian. Feeling a little annoyed I kept heading in the same direction as was pointed out initially and eventually found a hostel… for $14/night… it was starting to get dark, the tuktuk guy was still following me I asked him to go home and have dinner… he told me that he has no money for dinner. I felt sad but wasn’t sure if he was telling the truth, if he can waste fuel following me around on a tuktuk for 2hrs, he should have enough for food… or perhaps this is his last desperate attempt.

I decided to take a few different turns in busy streets to lose the guy, my mind was conflicted but I know that I didn’t trust him after my day of being conned I wasn’t in a trusting mood. I eventually came across the hostel suburb and after asking around and bartering for the cheapest room, I got one for $5.

I lay down on the bed and closed my eyes for a second. I immediately opened them when I realised that I had completely forgotten the name of the street that the bus terminal is on, also I had no idea how to walk back. I logged into the hostel wifi and Google mapsed the shit out of it. There was only a main office address listed for the bus company, I was sure that wasn’t the location, I tried to trace my path back on the map and was 50% sure I knew how to get back.

I had an early night and woke up early. My memory served me well, I found the way back very early, bought a baguette for breakfast and waited for the bus. The bus, thankfully, took me to the sunny beaches of sihanoukville… only without the sun. It was raining heavily… and it didn’t seem to stop. I guess its the wrong season for this part of the world.

I took a minivan to the harbour and caught the last ferry, at 7:30, to Koh Chang island. I followed the directions and met with the Russian couchhost.

He runs a Russian tour agency on the island, the office is located out the front of a cheap collection of bungalow style huts, he lives in a dodgiest one out the back, with an outside kitchen pantry comprising of a bench for his cutlery and essential non-perishable/difficult for animals to get to, food, like oats and tea. That night we cooked sausages (Frankfurts) on his coal campfire just outside the hut, he does this often to save on money. It’s currently the off-season, business has been slow due to the lack of Russian tourists. After two years of running the place the russian has adapted to a very simple way of life.

snaggas and toast with the russian

In the same neighborhood there are hugely expensive resorts which seem so surreal after spending a night sharing a dodgy old bed (in a heterosexual, definitely using my sleeping bag, way) in a tiny hut that only has water for the shower, sometimes.

After going for a few walks, I decided that this place is not for me, there were no real backpackers, the locals were eager to take my money, the wealthy travelers just stuck to their resorts and the weather was bad at the time; resulting in very murkey beach water. The next morning I woke up early, noticed that the water wasnt working in the hut, so I found the most expensive resort with the most impressive pool and had a nice long swim before hopping on the ferry back to the mainland and a songthaew (modified ute for personnel transportation) to trat.

Trat is a nice old town with really awesome markets. I observed  some strange sea creatures at the fishmonger that look a bit like a crayfish and a lot like a cockroach. For dinner I had a generous serving of a mix of fried potato with mussels for ~60c. For desert I consumed the best deep fried icecream I have ever tasted for ~40c. Trat is a great place for food.

I think someone should comment on this post letting us all know wtf these things are

I stayed in a cheap Guesthouse that seemed to be host to a whole bunch of old Expats, over a few beers I heard some incredible stories which will no doubt be shared again, but not here.

There was a huge storm that night, I was very hesitant to leave for Cambodia the next morning – although I was fairly certain it was more the hangover than the weather. I tied my jacket over my bag to protect it from the rain and hopped on the back of a motorbike for the bus station, enroute to the border.

I have been to Bangkok twice before both times I stayed in khao San rd, being the cheapest accommodation for backpackers in the city, it also hosts a lot of bars with western food and little culture (great place to purchase a cheap fitted suit, though)

This time around I ensured that I had Couchsurfer hosts so that I can get a more accurate opinion of what Bangkok is. My first host was an Aussie guy who lives in a nice apartment complex close to were the president lives, he mentioned that due to the political situation, he’s going to be quite worried and cautious within the next month. Election time is coming soon, there are about 20 candidates, but according to the yellow shirts, it doesn’t matter who you vote for; they are promoting a ‘dont vote’ campaign.

To try and understand the political situation, we have to look back at the troubles from last election; a man of great wealth was elected possibly by the people, the yellow shirts didn’t like this, there were a whole bunch of violent riots and the president elect was sent to exile. 4yrs later noone is sure what will happen, noone knows for sure if the elections are rigged or if the red or yellow shirts will return if its a decision they don’t like. The main advice I was given is to never talk about politics in public, there is a good chance it will offend someone in a big way. If you are offended while reading this, please direct your anger into a comment and bare in mind I have probably only heard one side of the story.

We went out on the town that night, there were two Portuguese couchsurfers also being hosted by the Aussie who joined us, as well as a local Thai girl and her French friend. We had a few beers out the back of a mobile bar, which is a customized combivan; known as a combibar. There were a group of prostitutes on that street, incredible bodies – I was told by my host that every single one of them is male, the news came as a shock, especially considering I was just groped by one on the way to the toilet.

I had a good conversation with the local Thai girl in our group, she has been highly frustrated with the current social situation in Thailand, according to her 80% of males are gay, she has a few female friends who are prostitutes and there is an approaching trend of lesbianism due to sexual frustration.

I began to wonder who started this, was it the farangs (foreigners) who stole all the ladies to cause the men to turn gay. This can’t be as there is a prostitution culture even in the remote villages (I blogged about this during my last trip). Or perhaps there’s just something in the food?

After the interesting night and drinking till 5am and then swimming in the host’s pool before passing out, I endured my hangover and took a skytrain to my next couchhost, a local girl who doesn’t normally let guys stay at her apartment but she read my blog and figured I wasn’t some dodgy farang.

We went out for dinner, awesome street restaurant that serves north eastern Thai food, very similar to the Laos omelet I had when I was in Laos last. It involved grabbing some sticky rice and dipping it in this awesome sauce, with a bit of beef, quite a lot hot. She too agreed that 80% of guys are gay, she provided a bit of info on the political situation – however her English was a little poor so the conversations were difficult.

After a decent night’s sleep, I hiked to the bus eastern bus terminal. I mentioned to the host that I might be staying another night if I couldn’t get a ticket to trat in time; I bought the ticket at the bus terminal at 12:20, the bus was leaving at 12:30… perfect timing.

During the bus tip, there was a guy who walked up the isle asking if anyone is going to Koh Chang, I said I was only going to trat. Moments later I checked couchsurfing (3g on the Thai sim) to find that there were no hosts available for trat, but there was one for Koh Chang. I changed my mind and hopped off at the interchange to Koh Chang island instead of trat, the couchhost confirmed and gave instructions. Little did I know that the island is very touristy and well known by wealthy scandanavians, thankfully I had a free place to stay and cheap local food to eat, surrounded by fancy resorts. This is turning out to be a rather  unexpected journey.

We took the last leg of the jungle train to a train station a few clicks off kota baru, the last town on the border of Malaysia. At first we were told we could walk to kota, 15min in we were told that we should have taken motorbike taxis from the train station, we decided to hitchhike the rest of the way… shortly after we hopped in a car, we saw the city. It looked massive. No way could we possibly walk to a backpackers from where we were, the driver dropped us off right in the centre of the hostel area.

The next day we woke up early and headed for the bus station, to Thailand!

The Malaysian side of the border was very flash and professional, the Thai side was a very busy and chaotic small hut on the side of the road – no police to be seen. We could have easily walked past, performed some crimes, then just stroll back the same way. Not that I recommend any of you people do this.

We walked to the train station, it was more heavily guarded than the border, army soldiers roamed the complex armed with M14 assault rifles, one guy had a large fully automatic. Feeling a Tad nervous, we purchased our tickets for hat yai and hopped on the train. The area to the north east of this border is renowned for Muslim extremist activity and apparently sometimes they target the trains.

We arrived in the safety of hat yai unharmed, this large city had markets on most of the central streets, fresh fruit and deep fried pasteries was my food of choice at the time (having a bit of a weak stomach from either the durian I ate days earlier, or some bad noodles). Feeling a lot better after 2 days rest, we took a local minivan to trang, enroute to ko muk, a semi-untouched (but a lot touched) island.

After extensive searching, accommodation seemed quite expensive, even though its the off season, there were only flash resorts to choose from – I really wanted to stay with some locals in their wooden shacks :(

Eventually, after walking a third of the island, a resort gave us a good deal ~$12 for a bungalow with a double bed, fan, fridge, TV, onsuite. Nothing that we needed but a lot more than we were used to. Being the only one with a sleeping bag, I was happy to volunteer to sleep on the floor, last thing I wanted to do was remember how nice it is to sleep on a really comfortable bed; conditioning is a bitch.

That night all the restaurants were closed, locals kept pointing is in the same direction, to the school where there seemed to be some kind of festival – it was to introduce 25 exchange students from Malaysia – there was much food, singing and dancing. We felt it rude to eat the food, thankfully we bumped into the owner of the hilltop cafe, she took us up to her shop on a motorbike with a side cart, over some really bad roads.

The next day we decided to hike through the island to a secluded beach on the other side, although some parts were thick, nothing compared to taman nagara – we were there before we knew it. Unfortunately the beach was full of rubbish, the weather started to get rough and we headed back quickly.

We took a ferry back to trang the next morning, having felt that there was nothing left to see on ko muk, only one nice beach and a whole bunch of resorts, the locals were great but none of them seemed to host simple accommodation.

I took a sleeper train to Bangkok while the other guys took my advice and headed for tonsai, on the coast near krabi (I was there last trip, great cheap Backpacker place, awesome for rockclimbing, good beaches).

I was on my own again, I felt the comforting breeze of independent travel. I sent out some couch requests for Bangkok.

The last night in taman nagara was something to note. At 2am a blade on the ceiling fan became loose, which caused the fan to come off balance and make a thunderous racket. I woke up and starred at the guy in the other bunk, who was starring at me – eyes fixed in terror, we were both certain that we were in an earthquake – this is when the heavy plastic fan covering fell from the ceiling, shaterring in many pieces.
** Note: could have added this bit to the end of last post but forgot at the time

Soo in the morning, it was me and the lads from Singapore, hoppin’ on the local bus for jerantut, the town with the train.

Unfortunately for us, school holidays had started, the jungle train was fully booked – up until a town called kuala lipus, a few stops in. We walked back to the bus station to get ourselves out of town.

Lipus is a vibrant hub of local trade, although the trade was limited in selection but abundant in numbers. Every second shop was a chemist/Chinese herbalist/fruit store and every other shop sold shoes and bike parts. The buildings were unchanged since colonial days, the signs were dusty with old fashion font, a bit like an old western.

Old building in kuala lipus

After a meal and supplies, we hopped on the jungle train towards gua musang. Gua’s main landmark is a giant limestone hill with a verticle cliff-face, right at the location of the train stop (the image when Googling is what lured me to this small town).

The limestone hill in Gua Musang

We found accommodation at a hostel owner’s house and prepared for the steep hike up the hill the next day.

It took us half the day to find the entrance to the hill path (through semi-slums and villages, dodging goats and angry geese). After 15min of climbing, we came to an apparent dead end, until my singaporean buddy noticed a gap between the rocks, just large enough to fit through, for him; just large enough to fit through if I breath out, for my bulky European body.

Within the gap was an epic large cave, we could see faint light coming from the other side, so we carefully trekked through aided by the torch on my phone.

Now would be a bad time for a land shift

After climbing through to the other side of the cave, the rest of the hike was reasonably easy. The top had a decent view, although trees clouded what would have been the most scenic spans.

All the meals in the town were Chinese, infact most of the people were Chinese-Malay, with my friends being Chinese-singapore it was a good opportunity to try some unique Chinese food and practice/learn some more mandarin.

The next day we hopped back on the trusty jungle train towards  dabong, a town that is host to what it boasts as the largest waterfall in south east Asia, about 15km from the stop.

Before heading to the fall, I went to the only ATM in the town to extract some well needed currency.  I inserted the card, the on-screen display mentioned that the card was being verified, a consistant beeping sound came from the machine, then it sucked my card in and printed large text on the screen ‘System malfunction – Card withheld’. From walking to the ATM until the current stage of the ATM user input, I had pressed nothing at all other than put my card in the slot (It wasn’t a scanner, I checked the slot beforehand).

I called the bank number. Thankfully they had English service reps. I Thanked too soon.

‘No I will not call my bank, your ATM has my card’

‘No I will not put my card on hold with my bank, it is nice and secure; within your heavily fortified ATM safe with alarm’.

After mentioning the ATM location three times and passing the phone to a Malay guy, who also mentioned it three times; it was evident that either the ATM wasn’t listed with the bank, or the customer service guy isnt brightest guy in the office. He told me he has put through an escalation and that I will be contacted in three days, hopefully, when the card is out of the machine.

Generally I look for the cirrus sticker before I try to use ATMs, I was annoyed with myself that I didn’t, more annoyed that it ate the card instead of just politely letting me know it wont work. The bank that owns this ATM is “The Bank of Islam” – I wondered if all their ATMs swollow cards from other banks as a purist religious statement, I quickly abandoned this theory as fundamentalists are generally against corporate influence.

The rest of the day I tried to enjoy the waterfall, but my mind was on the thought that without money, life can get a little tricky.

largest waterfall in south east asia, apparently

I got back to the base of the waterfall before the others, to collect my thoughts. I was shortly approached by a local holding a phone.
“ATM – you talk”
I was a little stunned, I slowly took the phone to my ear.
“Hello ATM man coming”
It was the local guy near the ATM who helped me communicate with the dimwitted bank guy
“Hello, ATM maintenance man coming, 5pm”

I was still a little stunned how he knew this information, also stunned how all the locals know each other, least surprising was everyone knowing I’m the ghost white foreigner of the ATM. If the bank called, they would have called my phone. I was cautious with this news as the guy near the ATM wanted us to stay at his Guesthouse earlier, weird thoughts of a possible elaborate con sent warnings. A good distriction was hitchhiking back to town on the back of a Ute as it poured down with rain.

We got back to the ATM at 4:30 – noone was around. 10min later an unmarked white dirty old sedan drove up to the ATM, a guy in a clean white shirt stepped out. He had a lanyard around his neck with a security card attached, he immediately approached me and asked me to photocopy my main passport page while he fetches the card from the machine. I found a print shop and did as he asked. I signed a page in his documents and he gave me my card back.

I know that most of this text is just for getting a card from an ATM, but for me it was a pretty eventful day.

In the end the local guy who was near the ATM never returned, perhaps he is somewhere else in the world, in another time maybe – helping other travelers with their resource trade units withheld within evil devices. He could be out in the vast cosmos right now, perhaps one day you too will meet the man near the ATM.

A terrifying reenactment