Hello,
Since I spoke to you last, few things have changed. I have a little bit of a tan on my neck, arms and face. Nothing else, as I like to be a little bit covered and I don't like wearing shorts, apart from during sport!! Anyway, on to what I've been up to.
Day 37 - Still in Kuala Lumpur
The first thing I did was go to the post office to send off some postcards (addresses please if you want one!!) to some friends. I then had a little wander around the Chinatown area, which was like most other chinatown's I've been to. Off to the park area I went, as this had most of the interesting things to do in the city. I went to the Muslim museum which had some excellent displays of ancient Muslim art. Also, while walking to the museum, I saw some little monkeys being fed by a guy on a scooter. Took some pics of those little rascals. My personal highlight of the park was the bird park. This is where I've finally got some quite stunning photographs. I saw flamingo's, hornbills, peacocks, parrots, Emu's, eagles and many more; most of whom were free to roam due to this park being undercover from a huge net. I spend my last little bit of money to enter the park, and after a few hours of walking around, I was dehydrating and made my way back in to town to find an ATM and get a cold drink. On my way in to town, this man started speaking to me. Asking me where I was from, how long had I stayed, how long was I on "vacation" for etc.. He then asked me to have a sit down and he started talking to me about his daughter going over to England to become a nurse. I was very pleasant, he then started saying that his wife had been taken sick, due to the worry for his daughter. He said he wanted me to speak to his daughter on the phone, I obliged using his mobile. But she couldn't really understand a word I was saying, and I asked her where she was going and I don't think she knew. I started thinking that I may be being scammed straight away as this man started speaking to me, but now he was asking me to go to his house to speak to his daughter. He said that he would drive me there and back, I declined nicely. I thought this could be a number of things, he's a pimp trying to get someone for one of his girls, he could try and kidnap me, mug me or even murder me (I've been reading my serial killer book, you see). I left him after making my excuses. Still dehydrating, I finally managed to find an ATM and went to a 7-11 for a cold Ribena, lolly and a bottle of water. I then proceeded to walk back to the hotel. Now today, the temperature reached a highpoint, 41 degrees. That's how I burnt, I put factor 38 on and it didn't give me the immense protection that was needed. Anyway, after walking 3 hours to get back to the hotel, I passed an Indian not far from the hotel. I decided that I would dine there tonight. I got back to the hotel and slumped on to my bed, shattered, burnt and feet aching. At around 8pm I ventured out for my meal, and very nice it was to.
Day 38
I stayed up late to watch the football (kick off was 3:30 am here), and it was good to see Arsenal lose. I got up then around lunch time and went for a swim in the hotel's swimming pool for a couple of hours, just keeping cool. Reading in the newspapers about the large scale worries of Dengu fever and bird flu is a little bit of a concern. But, they have this sort of thing every year, and forest fires as well. So what's the problem. Today I saw my first droplets of rain in over a month. A boiling hot, tropical rainstorm. I stayed up tonight to watch Man Utd. Fell asleep during the match but woke up seconds before Crespo scored his goal, bollocks.
Day 39
I spent most of today making the decision, using research, about what was the best way to get to my chosen destination. That destination being and Island off the east coast of Thailand called Ko Samui. To go by Air, train or some other way. The factors being involved were cost, but mainly time. I decided to go by a combination of Train and boat. After sorting this out, it was time to do my last bit of tourism in Kuala Lumpur, go up the KL Tower to get a panoramic view of the city. Once that was over and done with, I went to a "healthy eating" restaurant and had chicken and chips. This gave me a bad stomach.
Day 40
Had a bit of a rest during the day and eventually went shopping to see if I could find a new pair of sunglasses. I couldn't. My god, some of the stuff here was cheap. A pair of Diesel jeans were 12 quid, I would have bought 3 or 4 pairs if I had the room in my bag. Anyway, after eventually finding my way out of this huge mall (took about 4 hours to walk around it), I made my way back to the hotel. The evening was going to include some drinking in the sports bar, where they had a buy one get one free promotion. Classic. So, I went down, spent 4 and a half hours partaking in this brilliant offer before I asked the barmaid if there were any good nightclubs near. She gave me a slip of paper, which after I finished off my final beer, I handed to a kindly taxi driver. I can't remember the name of the place, but no the way there, my taxi driver was offering me girls from all over Indochina. I said no, saying that my girlfriend would kill me. Anyway, I went round a few bars, the place was bouncing, in time I was steaming. I got in a taxi, with no money on me, and went back to the hotel. When we arrived at the hotel, I told the taxi driver that I needed to go to the ATM. I didn't, I just told the night porter that the taxi driver was trying to do me over for money. The night porter then told the driver to get lost, and I didn't have to pay for the taxi. Sweet.
Day 41
Hangover, went to the train station and got my ticket to Hat Yai (the bottom train station in Thailand) for a 2nd class sleeping birth. I had 7 or 8 hours to waste before the train departs. Had some lunch, bought a phone card. Phoned some of my friends up as this phone card seemed to have loads of time on it for some reason. Eventually after walking around the station for hours, looking in every shop, eating chicken in a Kenny Rogers outlet, my train arrived. There were lots of other backpackers in the carriage. I was on the top bunk, which was a nightmare to get up and down. There didn't seem to be anywhere to put our backpacks though. So we all had to sleep with them. Despite being a clean and tidy train, at one point we had to stop for quite a while due to the electricity going out. Some of the track must be in one hell of a state because of the bumpy ride, my head literally hit the partition while I was sleeping.
Day 42
Woke up several times throughout the night due to the bumpy nature of the ride. Got up properly at 10 o'clock. We still hadn't arrived at the border yet, as it turned out, the train was quite a long time behind schedule. About 3 to 4 hours I think. Eventually we got to the border. We were ordered off the train to go to immigration. We all left our backpacks and stuff on the train while we went in to get all the passport business sorted. We were not allowed back on to the train for some reason, so I started speaking to the other backpackers from the carriage. There were a bunch of lads from Liverpool and two girls from Finland. The girls from Finland, were actually going to the same destination as myself, so I tagged along with them. At one point at the border station, the train left the platform, with all our stuff still on it, and we didn't get told what was going on. After about 3/4 of an hour it returned after getting rid of a few carriages. Phew. Back on we went and on to Hat Yai. When we arrived in Hat Yai, we were set upon by many touts. Not taking notice of any of them, myself and the 2 girls from Finland (actually sisters, even though they didn't look alike at all) went straight to the information booth and got a timetable for trains going to Surat Thani, which is the port town where we'll get a boat over to Samui. We sorted out our train tickets (2nd class, air conditioned), and had a couple of hours to kill, so we went all went for some food and a drink. We went to a cafe for some proper Thai food, I had Thai Red curry and they both had Thai Green curry accompanied by some Thai beer. Excellent, and all came to about a fiver for all of us together. Time to go to the train station, the train was due to leave at 2:35, eventually it departed at 3:25. Oh my god, I wish we hadn't gone for the Air conditioning, it was bloody breezing. It was so cold, some officials came around giving us blankets. I can only assume that there was a problem with the Air con. Anyway, we got to Surat Thani at 9pm. We were met by a lot of touts yet again, but we were planning on getting the night boat. We were asked what we were up to by a local man, who turned out to be a hotel owner, and he said he'd give us a room and bus+boat for the following day. Myself and the girls went with it, and he gave us a car ride to his hotel, quite some distance away. The Banton Inn is where he took us to, it was clean and basic. We dropped our bags in, paid the man, then thought about what to do for the rest of the evening. I took us to an all you can eat BBQ place that cost about a quid for the all you can eat. You went up and picked your meat, veg etc, and cooked it yourself. We had a couple of drinks then walked back to the hotel. Once back in the hotel, I find that I've left my plug adaptor in the last hotel. Gutted as now I can't recharge my iPod, which really needs it.
Day 43
Wake up call at 7am, shower, pack everything up, bus was arriving at 7:30. Bus was late, it went around picking others up, and eventually got to the boat place at 8am. Got our tickets, and went on to the boat. We had to sit on deck as there was no more room to sit. It was nice though, we were on the side that wasn't in direct sunlight, so I didn't need lotion and there was a nice breeze. It was strange setting off though, a bit like a Vietnam war film, with the scenery and all. While on the boat we saw some flying fish and other marine life jumping about in the water. It was stunning. After a 3 hour boat ride, we eventually arrived at Ko Samui. We organised a bloke to take the girls to their place and me on to anywhere that wasn't full. I saw them off, wished them all the best. I must admit, it was getting a bit of a nightmare, trying to get somewhere here. It is especially popular with tourists, old and young. I must admit, I would rather the old (probably German) people cover up a bit more. An old man in short shorts, old lady's in skimpy bikini's isn't a nice sight for anyone. Anyway, I eventually got my place. It is a lovely bungalow, with Fan, air con, hot water, fridge and TV. I have a little walk around the local area and stop for some food. There is quite a lot to do on the Island, so I plan on what I'm going to do. I think I saw some advertisement for a shooting range or something, I'll have to do that. Elephant trekking: yes; kyaking: yes.
Day 44
What lovely weather. The only problem with this place is that it's extremely touristy. Loads of ex-pat pubs, it reminded me a little of those Spanish resort areas. Anyway, today I checked my e-mail (took me like 2 hours), then had a spot of lunch. After lunch, it was time to actually do something, so I had a walk around the area to see what's what. I booked my flight to Bangkok for Sunday in a tourist information office and proceeded to walk on for a few hours. In the blistering heat, I was suffering and I got a taxi to what I wanted to do first, the shooting range. This was sweet, but quite expensive. I first tried a magnum, as the instructor said it was good for first timers. I did pretty well with that at a distance of 10 meter's. The bullet holes it put through my target sheet were quite alarmingly large. Anyway, next up was a rifle, shooting a target at 25 meters. The dude told me that the sight and barrel weren't correctly lined up, so for me to aim to the top left. Ok, I tried. But I don't think I'll be becoming a sniper or assassin any time soon. I think I would have been better with a pistol from the distance. What a noise these bastards make as well, it was awesome. The lady cashier took some pictures of me with the rifle which was quite cool. A little disturbing however, because, you never know where these pictured may end up. Anyway, time to get some food and drink for the evening, and relax in my cabin. My word, they had a tesco. Class, I got some French bread, meat etc., and set of back to my room and promptly collapsed on to my bed. Tomorrow I shall be booking my kyaking and going down the beach to do some sunbathing (or should that be burning) and reading.
Bye now!!
