My next stop was Singapore. There is not much to say about that, partly because I only spent two days there and partly because it’s just a very western, very clean, efficient and boring place. Well, I don’t know about boring - I’m sure it has stuff to offer but that will have to wait till I return. I was supposed to go from there through Indonesia to Bali and fly from there to Australia but, with all the troubles of Indonesia, I changed that and now fly out of Singapore. In the meantime I am spending time in Malaysia and Thailand.
My first stop in Malaysia were the Tioman Islands, off the East Coast of Malaysia. I’d met up with an Australian girl on the flight from India and we both wanted to go somewhere we could lie on the beach for a while. Tioman was perfect for that. On our way up to Thailand we also stopped in Rantau Abang, a place on the coast where leatherback turtles come to breed. It’s quite rare to actually see the turtles but we got lucky. At 4am we were woken up to calls of "turtle, turtle" and driven out to the part of the beach where the sighting had been made. I hadn’t really known what to expect and was amazed by its size: it must have been one and a half meters long and apparently weighed 300kg!
I’ve been in Thailand about a week now and so far I really like it. We’ve managed to stay off the tourist trail by visiting towns less frequented by western tourists and I think that has added to the charm. In Narathiwat we met a lady who lives there and spoke English (rare in that town). She kind of took us under her wing and invited us to eat at her house etc. It was a really nice introduction to Thailand. Then we got lucky in our second town, Phattalung, where we again met someone who took us to her home. I’m sure these things helped influence my liking for Thailand. In many ways Thailand is not dissimilar from India with its points of interest etc. but the people are so much friendlier and less likely to hassle or overcrowd you. It has the good things of India without all the negatives. Of course, I haven’t hit the tourist trail yet so that may change - we’ll see how I sound in my next letter!
About a month ago now I went to a Buddhist meditation retreat for 10 days. I'd been travelling with an Australian girl and she wanted to go to this thing and I thought: "why not?" and went along with her. I'd never done any meditation before nor knew much about Buddhism so it was going to be a learning experience all round. It turned out to be amazingly interesting. It was held at a Buddhist monastery and there must have been about 80 other westerners there. Normally that would be a recipe for disaster in terms of cultural learning but, as this thing was done in silence, we didn't get to talk to each other and that was good. At first I had thought it would be hard to keep the silence for 10 days but it was okay - though I must admit that some of the girls (me included) broke the silence before the end. It seems the guys were better at it than us (we were always separated).
The retreat was basically about learning how to meditate using your breathing as well as learning about Buddhism and Buddhist morality. There were different speakers for each: a Thai monk for the meditation tuition, a Thai layman for the talks on Buddhism and an American ex monk (from that monastery) about Buddhist morality. He was a very interesting speaker and I found he had a lot of interesting things to say - not necessarily things I hadn't already known but still an eye opener in certain respects. I guess in the way he would relate it to your own life and how you could adopt some of it a little.
There had been a lot of talk about "stuff coming up" during the meditation and about learning to deal with it and let it go. To be honest I hadn't thought that would apply too much to me, as I'd felt I'd gone through a lot of that "stuff" in India. However, I was wrong, and the 10 days were partly used by me to go through some of those things. It's hard to explain what I mean here without going into too much detail but lets just say that I saw things in me I wasn't keen on, reactions I was having, judgements I was making, and it was good to become aware of those and try to become less critical. I don't know how much it worked but I do feel a lot more aware of it now than I had been.
So, I felt I got a lot out of it in those respects. In terms of the meditation not so much - and that shows in the way I haven't once done any since leaving - but that doesn't bother me so much. I got what I needed out of those 10 days and I learnt a lot about Buddhism which I definitely found interesting. I like learning about a country's religion whilst there - in the same way that I learnt about Hinduism in India. It makes it so much more interesting than doing it from a book at home.
After the retreat Alex and I went separate ways and I headed to Bangkok. I spent just a few days there - enjoying the luxuries of being in a city whilst also hating it for being a big city! No, it was interesting and a few days there were good to have. I enjoyed using the riverboat taxis but couldn't help being reminded of James Bond each time I saw some of those colourful boats and remembering some of the scenes in one of the films using those boats.
By this stage my Thai visa was up so it was time to leave the country. I headed for the Perhentian Islands off the East Coast of Malaysia. I had hoped to meet up with some people from the retreat there but it looked like we'd missed each other. It didn't matter though as I had a great time anyway. I did a diving course whilst there and that was amazing. I had done a dive once before but had forgotten how incredible it feels to be breathing under water. One of the coolest things is the weightlessness your body takes on whilst down there. It is like there is no gravity. I really enjoyed it. The coral was really great and we'd see things like sharks, giant turtles etc. as well as some really cool colours down there. I don't know half the names but it didn't matter as I was just enjoying the beauty of it all. At times the coral took on the look of a giant flower garden - it was so spectacular.
After the course I couldn't just leave the diving so I went on more "fun-dives" and ended up spending 10 days on the islands. It was a lot of fun and as always the people around helped make it so enjoyable. The diving school was basically run by travelers and the place we stayed at was a bit secluded from the rest and we got to know the staff etc. really well as well as the other guests so it really felt like home for a while.
After tearing myself away from there (running out of cash is always a good reason to go and find a bank) I left the people I'd been spending time with to go to Thailand and I went to Penang. There I met a girl I'd met in Nepal in May and the two of us came across to Sumatra a few days ago. It's been fun here so far. In many ways it's reminded me of India, the way you have the little hole in the wall shops or the rickshaws, even the touts (and there are plenty of them). But, in other ways it's really different, no cows, no rubbish everywhere, nicely manicured lawns etc. It's really rather pretty.
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