~such a long, long time to be gone and a short time to be there~

Our system for measuring time has always seemed so petty and trivial to me. We measure our lives by the revolutions our planet makes around its orbital star! How could that tell us anything about ourselves? Anything about anything for that matter. At the micro level its even more ridiculous. Some magical, perfectly arbitrary distance between two spikes in a gear that an overly meticulous Swiss nutjob locked away in his basement decided one day - "though shall be called one second!" 3540 more of those and "though shall be called one minute!" etc.

Well, about 7.8 million of those little 'tics' have tocked off my life since the last time I was in the Taipei airport. But like I said, that's a perfectly silly way to think about it.

It was one meditation retreat ago, 50+ facebook friends ago, dozens of sunsets ago, three or four dreary sunrises ago, maybe a hundred beers ago, 18 blog posts ago, nearly 2000 pictures a ago, hundreds of motorbike kilometers ago, thousands of bus or plane kilometers ago, 23 dives ago, probably millions of grains of rice ago (none better than the laos sticky rice, of course), hundreds of kilos of delicious food ago, half a dozen boat rides ago, a dozen germans ago, 6 swiss ago, 15 french ago, americans, aussies, israelis, russians, indians and brits ago. It was jews ago and muslims ago, over 40 hindu/buddhist temples ago, two new wars ago, maybe two or three desperate bouts of loneliness ago, thousands of shared laughs ago. It was over a hundred monkeys ago in three different species ago, not to mention three different primates ago. What was I like four or five pop songs that I actually enjoyed ago? Seven countries ago, 18 passport stamps ago, a dozen revelations ago, maybe 25 completed poems and many more scraps of poems ago, ($3-5000 dollars ago :-/ I didn't bother tallying), a clear, well-defined purpose ago... and a complete Leo ago.

                        

(Or at least facial hair ago)   

God I learned a lot! More than I could ever hope. The most important thing I learned was how perfectly little I know about any damn thing at all. Also, I learned how to be a better human. Show me one college course syllabus whose "after this course you will know" section lists "how to be a better human". I learned to stop rushing through life. I learned to meditate every day. I learned how to dive SWEET JESUS! I learned how privileged, how oh so privileged I am. And everyone around me. Everyone I know who nags incessantly about this flu season or that break up, about this teacher that grades unfairly or that stressful work week. It's all nonsense. Ridiculous consumptive bouts of self-absorption. Selfish denial of anything that really matters in this world. I'll gripe that I have to pay an extra 150 cause I missed a flight but I'll make it up a thousand times over in my life and, hell, I'm on a friggen FLIGHT! The little Filipino girls that stop me on the street and beg for my water bottle so that they can turn in for pennies that their parents will either spend or bread or cigarettes (I'll never know) have no chance short of prostitution of ever being on a flight... I learned that I love my family oh so so much and I have so much to be grateful for in my cozy bourgeois lifestyle. I learned that I'm not going to change anyone's mind that's made up so I might as well focus on building mine up.

With this blog post, I'll complete my first experiment with travel blogging. I'm happy with the way it turned out. I hope to get the opportunity to improve my skills in the future. Thanks for tagging along and I hope I could make at least one person realize how awesome traveling is!

~it's all over now, baby blue~

Well, I told the cabbie to step on it so that I catch my flight in 2 hours. Destination: Taipei, Taiwan. I'll have a few hours to burn there before China Airlines takes me back to the free world! Jeanette left before I awoke this morning and I spent the day making it out to a crappy little shantytown market for some last minute souveniers. (Traffic's not looking very promising right now).

So Manila, what can I tell the masses about you? I'm an anti city person to start with but if I were to plan five nights in any city, Manila wouldn't be very high on my list. Everyone told me you were an underwhelming empty place full of poverty.

I guess I verified that. But we shucked the ugly shell from the 'Pearl of the Pacific' (Manila's former glamorous nickname) and found her precious underbelly.  Jeanette and I enjoyed delicious cuisine, a glimpseback West, good people, and as with any place, a flavour of its own.

Plan A was to spend no time here and all our time nature trekking/caving/scoping out the biggest rice terraces in the world up North in Sagada. But, alas, Typhoon Henry had his own version of what we were going to do. We decided not to risk being drenched for all the outdoor activities and just stick around Manila. We accidentally stumbled across a hostel we read about en route to the one we were actually looking for. Though the first night we were a bit put off by certain ominous sounds coming from our roommates' beds we stuck around and luckily the problem went away. The bathrooms were immaculate and it was a much appreciated surprise to find clean hot showers instead of mildewed faucets above our heads - or worse: poop bucket showers! (don't ask). The atmosphere was jovial and we made friends with our Filipino, British, Bangladeshi, Korean, Chinese, and even South African flatmates.

The first full day, Jeanette and I snooped around the only real museum here for a glimpse at impressive gold and chinese ceramic collections,

a weird modern art collection, a beautiful modern art collection,

and most importantly an illustrative exposition of Filipino history: from the 10,000 person islamic settlement Magellan found, to the papal controlled Spanish colony, to the Americanized 'Pearl of the Pacific' in its glory days (US bought Phillipines from Spain along with Cuba, Puerto Rico and a few other Spanish colonies for $20mm in 1898) complete with SEA's first movie theatres, opera houses,  other luxuries, to its solemn Japanese occupation days during WWII victimized by one of McArthur's worst tactical mistakes, to military dictatorshop, and finally to democracy established in the 80s. Afterwards we stumbled upon a nice little Singaporian Tea room with which we fell in love and revisited twice more.

That night we went out with some hostel mates to catch a groovin' raggae band & dj. It was clear that we would make the most of 5 nights stuck in Manila!

The next few days we went on a comical and illustrative Manila history walking tour,

visited a entirely worthless (albeit the world's first) chinatown, walked through oneof the city's many proper metal and wood scrap walled slum,

ate like kings and queens, and most importanly unwound from our long and exhausting travels. Philippines, SEA's most westernized country because of the American occupation in the early 20th century, is a nice transition to life back home and has some of the elegant niceties of American life.

We're now circling around this huge airport trying to get me to the right terminal so I gotta run! One more post coming.

EDIT: made it in time, dodged the airport security guards elaborate ploy to syphon bribes outof me, and have completed leg one of three in my 40 something hour journey trip back to reality.

~in the shadow of the moon, terrapin station~

Nothing more annoying than a sleepless overnight flight. The grogginess wears off soon enough but the frustration lingers. Cebu Pacific shlept a tired and pissed off Leo (accompanied by a peacefully asleep Jeanette) to Cebu City, Philippines arriving at the ripe time of 4AM. Afraid that the incoming typhoon would put a damper on our stay, we immediatedly hustled to the port where we caught a 6AM ferry to Bohol. The weather in Bohol was supposed to be better than Cebu, and indeed, the weatherman wasn't mistaken. Gorgeous sunny skies awaited!

Our itinerary was loose but Aditi mentioned a nice guesthouse, Nuts Huts, inland on the island right off the Loboc River. While it was a ways out from the main littler-island-off-the-little-island center, Panglao, it was a pleasant little jungle lodgey type feel complete with an herbal sauna and firefly cruises down the river (neither of which we found time for).

We rented a motorbike and cruised to a Tarzier sanctuary. Tarziers, for those unfamiliear, are adoooooorable little primates about the size of your foot with big bulgy eyes. Apparently, they're the only primates that hunt. Their diet consists mostly of insects. The funny/not-so-funny thing about them is that they're notoriously moody. To a fault. They commonly commit suicide under physical or emotional stress. They do so either by refusing to breathe or by smashing their head against heavy things. Because of their emo tendancies, owning these little critters became illegal three years ago. Regardless, the locals capture and stash these poor beasts away in cages to keep as roadside attractions for the flocks of tourists who don't know or don't care about Tarzier wellbeing. When they killed themselves, the locals would just go out and get new ones. And now, these cute little guys are endangered.
 

                               

Afterwards, we rode down to Panglao to snoop around for tomorrows activities and seek accomodation that would be closer to the port from which we'd be departing the day after. As a bonus, we enjoyed a delicious chilli crab and salmon steak dinner, our table on the beach, watching the sun set into the pacific ocean.

Another early morning as we met our bike renter man at 5AM. Outside Nuts Huts, we raced against the sunrise as Jeanette's dolphin watching trip departed at 6. After some quick but safeish motorbiking, I managed to get us there by 6:10 and all was good. The boat hadn't left yet. And while Jeanette boarded, I went on the rocks to meditate and happed to stumble accross some tiny crabs.
                                         
The best breakfast of my backpacking career, mango pancakes, honeyglazed ham, and rosemary eggs with a fresh fruit shake, escorted me into the final dives of my trip (22 & 23)

This time, the main attraction would be turtles

(of which we saw plenty) but also trumpet fish,

a beautiful gnarly frogfish,

 
and his giant ugly counterpart,

a cleaner fish that I scared off the shell of a turtle and somehow managed to entice onto my skin (doubtless, a compliment to my hygene),

brilliant nudibranches,

venomous lionfish, 

and the usual assortment of spectacular underwater wonders.

Although the camera crapped out after one dive making me miss the beautiful yellow pipefish, jackfish, puffers and porcupinefish, I was able to only pay for half of it so it was okay.

Jeanette and I rendezvoused for a yummy lunch before riding 2 hours to the middle of Bohol to see the chocolate hills. These are a gorgeous expanse of rolling green mounds formed by underwater limestone and seashell deposits being elevated out of the ocean. They call them the chocolate hills because people say they resemble hershey kisses... I'm not sure about that but they were pretty.

A very complicated and stressful journey (last public bus out of Loboc was late, no jeepneys ((cool looking local transport here)) headed toward Panglao, Jeanette+Leo+Jeanette's backpack+Leo's backpack+driver crammed on a motorbike with my 14 kilo backpack trying to pull me off for half an hour) brought us safely to our guesthouse. Upon disembarking, Jeanette asked "Leo, where's your yellow bag?" With my charger, hoodie, glasses, other goodies. Turns out I left it on the bus... classic Leo. Luckily, a kid who worked at the hostel drove me back to the bus station. Originally he said all I'd have to pay him was for gas but he wouldn't even let me pay for it. He was so nice! After getting my bag back (whew) we dropped dropped off the bike at the hostel and I went to get Jeanette to join us for a few beers. She was fast asleep :-/ so it was just me and my hospitable Filipino pal, Marc. We had a blast and he told me about growing up in the Philippines and the struggles he has to deal with and the country's corrupt history and poverty. One of the many many reminders of how privileged we are to live in a wealthy nation and speak the universal language. It seems every day, I'm more and more grateful every day to my grandpa for taking us over. Anyway, Marc and I made friends with a bartender and the next bar and got some free tequila shots, played bar games and had an amazing night.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that Marc bought me a Balut. If I would have known what it was before eating it, I wouldn't have... balut... oy...

Of course we massively overslept our ride to the ferry the next morning but managed to make it on to the ferry with a minute to spare. Some much needed luck that seems to followme around wherever I go. With some more luck, I'll get back the raincoat I lost last night! Only a couple more posts left...

~farewell to you old southern sky, I'm on my way~

Sitting here in my familiar Singapore airport (complete with two free movie theatres, a swimming pool, game room, massage chairs, and 6 stories of food) I've reluctantly parted with the Southern Hemisphere. The haunting feeling churning my guts reminds me that seven Filipino sunsets separate the wild, blissful freedom of these past three months and the meticulous, rigorous challenges of the next sixty. But in the words of the great philosopher, Yeveniy Elperin, "I'll burn that bridge when I get there"...

So this past week was remarkable! At Jogjakarta (the most important of four cities in the Special District of Yogyakarta which is the last remaining Sultinate in Indonesia), the wonderful Jeanette Ling arranged for a couchsurfing host for us. For those unfamiliar with couchsurfing, it is a social network for travelers by which members offer complete strangers spare rooms/beds/couches in their homes for free! Sure it sounds dangerous, but of the dozens of travelers I've spoken to who've tried it, no one has anyhing but great experiences to share! Our host, Ananda, was THE MAN! Not only did he graciously put us up in his restaurant, Kono Resto, but he drove us around the city, showed us local cuisine, waited in the car while we did the touristy things, and hung out with us. Of course we chipped in for gas and bought him a few meals but we got much more than what we paid for. This was the sort of kindness from a total stranger that can restore your faith in humanity.

So we started off eating breakfast at a hole in the wall local joint that BLEW our minds (or more appropriately, our tongues). We proceeded to the largest Buddhist temple in the world, Borobudur,

until Ananda drove us to a museum which explained Yogyakarta's royal family. Afterwards, we met up with his cousins who happened to be visiting for Ramadan and took a Jeep up a volcano which erupts every four years. It's due for 2014 but luckily, we missed it.

Later all 9 of us went to an ALL MUSHROOM restaurant for dinner where we stuffed ourselves with assorted truffes for two bucks!

Before the night was over, we stopped by a local park where uni students hang out (Jogja is a giant college town). We sat around the park while buskers approached to seranate us with western and Indonesian favorites for a quarter. Kids cruise by in these neon rental beatles blasting top 40.

People drink delicious, mostly nonalcoholic beverages to the wee hours of the morning. There are even a couple of trees 10 meters away from each other that are said to be protected by spirits. The goal is to blindfold yourself and try to walk straight through them from 50 meters away. Jeanette and I failed :-(. All in all, it was a charming little nighttime town hangout that America needs much more of.

Back at the Kono Resto, the coowner, Desi, had some wild French and Indonesian purse designer friends over for drinks so we shared laughs with them. A drunk kid stumbled by, insisting that I was god because of my beard. I played along but Desi was disgusted at his inebriation. Because of a certain religious extremist and mafia presence in the city, many restaurants choose not to serve hard alcohol. The result: less drunk idiots bumbling about. Not a bad call.

The next day found us at Jogja's second famous ruined temple, Pramanan. Local archaeologists struggle to restore and rebuild this UNESCO world heritage site after frequent earthquakes endemic to the volcanic island of Java. Yet they persevere and their efforts shine.

Next Ananda drove us to a snakeskin fruit plantation that his friend owns. What is snakeskin fruit you ask? It is part white juicy lychee-like sweetness and part GOD. Delicious! The owner led us around a river past a couple small waterfalls before the rain started hammering down. We drove to shelter to enjoy a snack of snakeskin, fresh made tempe, and rich, ripe coconut juice!

Upon returning to Kono, Desi had prepard an all-you-can-eat feast that pumped at least 10 lbs of food into my gut. We ended the night at the market for souvenier hunting.

At 6 AM, Ananda picked us up, stopped to grab a few delicious Jogja pastries, and shipped us off to the airport. Off to Sumatra! We didn't have much time to explore the world's sixth largest island so we leapt straight into the jungle for some treking. But not before the World Cup final! We woke up at 2AM to catch the exciting and captivating match from our little jungle restaurant/hotel surrounded by dozens of europeans and villagers.

On the trek, our party consisted of four Dutch, two Swiss-Germans, a Russian, and us. It was a merry cast led by a jungle village pothead trickster guide, Ardo. Ardo, self-proclaimed king of the jungle, found us over a half dozen Orangutans,

 

a pack of black gibbons

and a few other beasts.

The real treats were the Orangutans! There are only two places on earth where you can see these majestic apes, Sumatra and Borneo. The Sumatran Orangutans are smaller an their Borneon counterparts, browner and more tree dwelling. After a rigorous day of trekking, we set up camp in the lush green forest overlooking a stream

and Ardo entertained us with card tricks, matchstick puzzles, and riddles. Great conversations ensued (Oleg talked about how positive life in Russia is and how very little it resembles the ignorant American propaganda), great laughs, and, of course, more great meals! 

 A sketchy river rafting session (one tube popped, a girl and a guide fell off into the rapids) brought us back to the little village, Bukit Lewang from where we caught a van back to the main ciy Medan (according to the Dutchman's well travelled brother, the filthiest city in world). This is a run down massive traffic jam of a town where car horns replace bird song and smoke fills the skies. A $12 flight the next day (+$20 mysterious airport tax) and we're back in the airport to which none other compares, Changi, SIN. 9 more hours and Philippines await!