RACONTEUR-ESQUE SCRIBBLINGS

Continued from here It seems that every hot country in Asia which has had a history with British people at some point when they were on a travelling and colonising spree, would be left with hills where people live, grow tea and ultimately end up being a tourist destination. That is perhaps why we found ourselves in Nuwera-Eliya, a settlement on top of a hill with sprawling tea plantations and known to the locals as Little England. We, on the other hand called it a refrigerator. It was cold. Now, I know my previous posts on travels have been lengthy, but I intend to cover this place in one post, and even if it means typing it out in point form, then point form it is: 1. 7 waterfalls en route. You never know you can get OD'd on waterfalls until you actually do. At this point I just grabbed a photo from inside the van 2. Yes, it rained - on and off. 3. We had the quickest tour of a tea factory with the unfriendliest guide ever. 4. We bought a lot of tea. This was in ...

Continued from here It is said that out there in this world (and maybe beyond) there are 6 other people who look somewhat like us. A doppelgänger of sorts. They may be of a different gender, or of a different nationality, but you might someday be walking on the streets of Taipei and think to yourself... "hey that person looks like (insert name of female friend here whom you're sure is back wherever you came from), but it's a he!" My family met a not-so-favourite-uncle's doppelgänger in Sri Lanka. The similarity wasn't just physical. He even spoke like him, wore similar glasses my uncle would have used when he was in his late twenties while wooing my aunt (in the mid to late 80's) and bossed people around just like my uncle. The similarity was freaky but kind of hilarious at the same time (Come to think of it, I should have discreetly taken a video of this man and showed it to my uncle's kids just for laughs)  Due to the rain (I...

Continued from Kandy Part 2. The view outside Adventures whilst trying to check out the tooth relic. To be honest, I didn't see a thing, and had no idea what I was supposed to see! The final activity for the night was the visit to the tooth relic temple in Kandy. I don't know why, but probably it was because of all the driving around, we were all really tired and hungry by then. Nevertheless it was only 6:30-ish pm and we still had quite a bit to see. Now, even though we took a customised tour with a tour guide, his job was mainly to drive us around. He subcontracted us to guides from the respective tourist destination all the time. This time we were in the hands of a slightly elderly man who gave us quite the tour. He reminded me of a disciplinary teacher. Unfortunately due to the importance of this tooth (or some other reason that we never quite understood) we were required to take off our shoes/slippers, go in through a room where were patted down for weapon...

Kandy Part 1 After the delicious spice laden lunch at the spice garden restaurant, we drove on even more to the town of Kandy and checked in to our hotel, which was on top of a hill. That itself may be a clue on the hotel's actual name. Kandy is what I'd call a town, where there were more streets, shops and lots of vehicles on the road compared to Sigiriya. However, with our hotel being on the hill as it was, we didn't really feel like we were in a town. In fact, we were told to not open the windows because there were monkeys who would pay you unexpected visits. And they're always not the best behaved of guests. The Cultural Dance After getting our rooms at the far end of the hotel, we napped and then freshened up and headed out again to town. We had our first cultural experience of the visit here, at a cultural dance show held in a hall. I'm not a fan of dances (neither as a dancer myself, nor as a spectator), but I did think they gave a very good pe...

Day 2. Continued from here A few years back (5, maybe) a (then) random stranger who commented on my old blog told me that he didn't blog because he figured that by the time he got up to posting a post about a certain topic, the topic would have lost all relevance. Today, as I sat in front of the computer, intending to blog about a certain incident that happened recently, I realised that it has lost all relevance. Nevertheless, I am saved by the fact that travel posts may still hold some relevance even though they are more than a year late. At least I hope so.  We left Sigiriya for Kandy, which was another long, long drive through the *unanticipated rain. Now, as mentioned in the very first post , the people in this trip were my parents, my sister and I, all full grown adults, all equally stubborn and short tempered (except for my mom - she's only stubborn, but not as quick tempered as the rest of us) I mention this only because it may explain what I might decide ...

SPOILER ALERT: If you've never bungee jumped before, but have intentions of doing so, I'd advise against reading this post because it may spoil the whole experience for you. Don't get me wrong - it's one of the best things I ever did, but reading this post may spoil the element of surprise. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- You're seated on the platform, while a man, sort of youngish, binds your ankles together. His attempts at small talk is greeted with distracted replies as your heart starts beating wildly upon hearing the screams of the people who jumped from the other platform just beside you not two seconds ago. You realise at this point that there is no turning back and just hope that you don't smash your face against a rock or any of the bridge's imposing beams. Of course you could just calmly walk away from it all and have regrets for the rest of your life as you acc...

Talking about hotels has never been a fun idea of a post, but I seriously thought that this one hotel and our experience with it deserves a special mention as it is the epitome of how everything that can go wrong will go wrong if the circumstances are just right. I suppose the biggest problem of all was that it was raining heavily. The second biggest problem was that the rain was unexpected. In fact, by the time we had arrived, it had been raining continuously for almost two whole days. This website shows how bad it was. The data provided here was from Feb 1 to 7, 2011 . Based on yearly reports from other websites, February is the month that has the lowest rainfall in the year. Our holiday there was from Feb 2 to 6, 2011. Murphy's Law, or a holiday curse? (Please note that the post below talks about the rain and more rain and all rain related disasters and this doesn't even include the burnt socks incident yet) Back to the hotel. Interestingly, the hotel is far ...

The previous post on Sri Lanka ended abruptly with the famous words - "To be continued". There is a valid reason for this. See, back then, I had trouble deciding if I should describe the hotel or Sigiriya Lion's Rock first, without destroying the story telling in any way. Till today, I couldn't come up with a decision, and therefore just randomly picked the Lion's Rock first.  Sigiriya Lion's Rock The Sigiriya Lion's Rock beckons people (and umbrellas alike)  on a rainy afternoon Around 2:30 pm or something, the rain had decided to take a short break and ceased pouring water like there was no tomorrow, so we took the opportunity to go to the rock. It was quite a short drive and we finally reached the gates. It was slightly drizzling at this point, but nothing Malaysians who had to deal with unexpected rain almost every day couldn't handle. The rock apparently was once part of an ancient palace ruin which was recently excavated, and had fo...

About slightly more than a year ago, my sister and I decided to take our parents on a *holiday outside the country. After some deliberation, we finally picked Sri Lanka because none of us have been there before, and it seemed like an interesting place to visit, and (ahem) didn't have any visa requirements. We also got a local tour agent to help us with the booking of the accommodation and recommended places of interest because we didn't have the time to plan one on our own.   Almost a year later, I finally sit down and attempt to transcribe the experience of the vacation that was - the 4 days in an island known to the world as Sri Lanka.  (insert sound of a tape rewinding in an old cassette player) Feb 02, 2011 - Leaving and Arriving Cheap flights come with a price - your sanity and sleep deprivation. Having the flight out of the country so early in the morning meant that none of us slept well the night before. We reached the airport without a problem though. ...

continued from here How on earth do you make a three day trip stretch to 5 posts and you're still only on your second day? Easy. Firstly, make sure that you had your trip more than a year ago. Secondly, because you have forgotten most of what you did (unless you took notes, which you didn't because your initial plan was to actually complete the write-up as soon as possible), you try recalling what you did by looking back at your photos. Thirdly, because pictures scream a thousand words than actual thousand words do, you end up posting pictures (after cutting yourself out of it, or putting a black box on your face first - if you're in it) and caption them with not so funny captions that they are sufficient to tell everyone about what you did or how your trip went. Fourthly, because the posts are loaded with pictures instead of words, when you preview them , they tend to look extra lengthy, and you don't want that because your aim is to actually share your expe...

continued from here: http://raconteuresquescribblings.blogspot.com/2011/11/getaway-to-wettest-town-in-malaysia.html Kuala Sepetang Mangrove Park aka Matang Mangrove Forest Reserve After the jaunt in the museum, where we took a few *illegal photos (see part 3), we drove on towards the mangrove forest, missing the entrance several times before we finally found it - yes, even with the GPS because we had the wrong name - don't ask. Entry was free, and so was parking. Again! The forest reserve is an educational park of sorts, peppered with signboards indicating the different flora (and fauna - but fauna are a bit harder to spot) you could find around you, a platform you could walk on so that the mud didn't damage your footwear, but unless you have enough foresight to think of mosquitoes, without bug repellent, you'd be contributing to a free blood festival for said mosquitoes. You can also choose to stay there overnight if that is your thing - there are chalets there w...

Continued from The Wettest Town Part 2 (Note: This trip happened waaaaay back in July 2010 - no kidding, but I had forgotten to continue with the write-up for so long for so may different reasons. A friend's recent trip to Taiping reminded me of the place and here is the continuation - scheduled post) By the time we got back down to sea level after another stomach churning ride down the hill by land rover (and going down is scarier by far, I think), it was almost time for lunch. We headed out to Taiping town to our hotel to chuck our stuff, and freshen up just to head out again for lunch. This time, we picked a Thai restaurant recommended by the GPS. The food was OK, but extremely hot - good for the taste buds (mine), not too good for the digestive system (my sister's) We drove out of Taiping after that heading towards a town called Kuala Sepetang because it was recommended by the caretaker of the bungalow up at Maxwell Hill. Kuala Sepetang was once also known as Port...

Burnt socks! The skies were supposed to be clear. Yeah right. Instead, the skies opened up and literally poured water all over us, in varying degrees of showers, drizzle and plain old rain of the cats and dogs variety. Without water proof raincoats, we were just wet and miserable. And cold. I can assure you that wet shoes and socks are not fun at all. The only other not so fun thing I can think of, which is worse than wet socks and shoes is a wet jacket which is supposed to protect you from the cold. Wet jacket, cold wind - totally beats the purpose. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention, and through previously successful rain soaked garb (my sister and I always end up in mysteriously rainy destinations) drying endeavours in other hotel rooms, we decided to follow the tried and tested formula of drying the wet socks on the lamp. It works like a charm and leaves your socks all warm and toasty.  Not this time, though. The socks were left to dry on one of the ...

continued from The Big North Sumatera Adventure Part V Although I had not mentioned anything about geothermal activity throughout any of the past posts from the Big North Sumatera Adventure series, Lake Toba and the areas surrounding it was actually once a very active area, so active indeed that whatever it was that formed Lake Toba was a supervolcano that erupted over 73000 years ago.  Mount Sibayak and Mount Sinabung are both located near Berastagi. While Sibayak spews out sulphuric vapour every single day, having last erupted in 1881, Mount Sinabung had erupted just slightly less than 2 months before our visit. There also happens to be place where they had pools of hot water from the geothermal activity in that area. It looked like it was an extremely popular thing to do (so many people!), but we didn't take a dip there.  We went back to the now cleaned up hotel, and stayed in for the rest of the night after dinner. We found a creepy looking 'mini house' wit...

continued from here: The Big North Sumatera Adventure Part IV   The Journey to Berastagi  The lake ends here We left Samosir Island right after breakfast the next day by hopping onto the ferry and sailing out of there, bidding farewell to the lake. However, we still had a long journey ahead of us, once again through the winding inland roads, and through some really magnificent scenery after a rather early lunch. One thing about Lake Toba is that it's elongated (check out the map above), and even as you drive away from it, you keep getting glimpses of the lake from the long, winding road, until you reach a certain point, that is, where the lake ends.  The moment you drive out of that road, there's no looking back, and no more lake. I don't know about my sister, but I did feel a wee bit sad when we had to leave that final bit of the lake. Near the end point of the lake, however, is the Sipiso-Piso waterfall, named as such due to the narrow stream of wat...

Continued from here: North Sumatera Adventure Part III While the name of the hotel escapes me, the memories of it will remain forever. There it was, right in front of the lake, the cold, chilly wind blowing against your face. Everywhere you look, you see the dark blue and green hues of the lake. But before anything else, we'll begin with something we observed behind the door of the room. Tired? Or just a lazy ass? Ha Ha! As I mentioned in one of the earlier posts, Lake Toba is one of the most relaxing places on the face of the planet, and there is nothing you really want to do other than relax, although I did read a bit at night, I was knocked out cold by 9:30 pm. That night I had a dream. I was sleeping or at least was under the assumption that I was, firmly wrapped up underneath the blanket because it was cold. The wind was blowing, and the curtain billowed a little. It takes me awhile to realise there's a lady in the room. Slightly old and small sized, and dress...

Continued from here Simanindo is another part of Samosir Island. Here, we sat down under a small house-like structure to watch a local traditional dance. The dance itself had 7 steps and while at that time we actually had a paper explaining each step to us, the paper is nowhere to be seen now. Yes, I had not taken notes during this travel because I didn't want to get all touristy, and just wanted to sit back and relax, so I'm afraid there's not much information here. ONE thing I can tell, though is that at the end of the dance, the dancers will beckon you to join them in their dance. My two left feet trembled in fear. Would it be polite to decline? Could we just run away? Thankfully, it started drizzling there and then, and me and my two left feet, (as well as the sister and her two left feet) were saved from having to dance, and the dancers were saved from having to witness the worst dancers ever. So, it was a win-win situation. The dance. It was still shining at thi...