KOrea - Hanging in the south with little Kim's big brother South East Asia, Nepal, Korea

so we have been stumbling around in the 1pm heat going from place to place trying to find an internet cafe that isnt closed. and this one has air con and warcraft 3 for some reason that i cant really fathom. we are in a place called taman negara in the oldest rainforest in the world. its 130 million years old, and hasnt been affected by any(?) ice ages owing to its location close to the middle of the world. i like how punctuation can change the meaning of a sentence. i have 8 weeks off drinking! can become i have 8 weeks off. drinking! think i prefer the latter. so we made a highspeed dash down from krabi in thailand to melaka in the south of malaysia in 2 days or some rubbish, stopping only so the drive could buy some nuts, and to cross the thai malay border. i ate some highly suspect chicken on a stick, but it was the last foreseeable time that i would be able to do so as we were leaving thailand behind for a difficult to think properly about right now period of time, and i didnt get the sick. think i have massive immunity now due to a lack or aircon and drinking the tap water. maybe i just have liver flukes. but they probably have alcohol poisoning, so it all kinda works out. well its good that i didnt get the sick, due to the aforementioned lack of toilet stops, and the van having no suspension. it would have been a miserable 8 hours. anyway we met sam coop and kylie in melaka and missioned around with them for a while, got some bikes and an irish dude and cruised the city for a few hours, travelled prolly 4 km (SHITTTTTTTTTY bikes) and sweated about a gallon. which is 3 gallons less than sam sweated. but we did see some badly evolved fish lizard frog things wallowing around in the muds of a river, and the by now obligatory monitor lizard. and we saw some dutch gravestones from the 16th century with a skull qand crossbones carved into them. cool.

we cruised to mersing by the worst means of transport known to uncivilised people, and had some lasagne at a french run cafe. it was awesome. then got on a fast ferry type thing out to the island pulau tioman (east coast this time) where we cooper led the charge to the bar on the beach that had a 10 ringitt for 3 beers happy hour. and sam got sick. think it was the burger that none of us can properly remember at a restaurant further up the beach where we scared off everyone that was sitting less than 4 tables away. after recovering and having another burger for breakfast we went checking out the wildlife. there is a water monitor lizard that mok reckoned is as round as him and half a meter longer that swam around for a while, plenty more that are not quite as prehistoric, a handful of monkeys (not sure if thats the right name for a group of monkeys) some big spiders, 4 pythons that took over the beach from the cobras a few months back, and the usual butterflies and whatnot. but we spent most time watching the lizards swimming around and basking on their rocks. fuckin impressive. also we went snorkeling just off the beach and saw some scary freakin animals. i drifted slowly over a big rock near the edge of the sea (not really the shore cause it was kinda a cliff) and in a sandy hole was a big blue ray about the size of a leg sifting about in the mud. i called lissa over and she almost screamed her snorkel off when she spotted the beast. had to leave the sea quickly after seeing that.

so i hear its snowing in wellington... dont think the couriers will be impressed with that. good time to be a barista. we had a real hard time leaving the island. not because it was no nice although that did play a part, but after catching the ferry back to mersing all the bus's were booked till monday because its school holidays. had to go back to the french place and eat 2 more meals of food because it was so good. and stayed in a nasty chinese hotel that had aircon. mok cranked his down to 16.5 degrees, climbed into his sleeping bag, and promptly got the flu again. and we found an internet cafe and played the first of several games of starcraft. real third world this place. hah. so now im going to the river to have a swim, and will write properly about taman negara when i have another coffee, and dont feel relaxed. might be next week.