Malaysian Tiki Tour I

After living in Malaysia for almost 3 years I decided that it was long past time to take a Malaysian road trip, or at least one that involves more than driving to the ferry departure point for a weekend diving. So with the 10 days of Spring Break ahead of us Andrea and I took off to the East Coast in my lovely little piece of Malaysian engineering (fully serviced before departure for an amazing RM39, or NZ $15 including a new headlight). The drive to Cherating, home of Club Med in Malaysia, was a simple one although we quickly discovered in a torrential down pour that the service had not included getting rid of the ear piercing squeak of the windscreen wipers. We decided to go a little upmarket for the first few days (not Club Med upmarket!) and stayed at a Legends, a resort we quickly discovered is mainly used by local Malays that looked at our bikini clad bodies beside the pool with horror whilst they were completely covered from head to toe. Luckily our pool hours were quite separate, they were leaving the pool by the time we had emerged from our rooms and we finished worshipping the sun around 5pm they decided it was safe to come out and not darken their complexions.
So Legends provided us with a nice few days of getting in to holiday mode; lots of amazing fresh seafood, sightings of hornbills, poisonous snakes and iguanas, and about five million mosquito bites currently causing me to want to chop my legs off at the knees.
Today we have driven north to Kuala Terengganu where we have done the town shopping area in ten minutes and are now heading back for a snooze before some banana leaf curry for dinner. Yum! Tomorrow we head further north up the East Coast (when I get a chance I'll post a map for those of you who like the visual props) and head over to paradise. 5 days diving in the Perhentians. Got to love life in Malaysia!

Defending the Honor of the Expat Women

Last night I took to the kitchen in an attempt to defend the honor of my fellow expat women. Over lunch after church a few weeks ago some of my local friends (all males, I need to point out, some of whom in their late 20s still live at home), made some gross generalisations about expat women being unable to cook. Whilst I sprung to my peers and my own defense, arguing that not only could I cook but I cooked very well, I was laughed at. Now I am willing to admit that although I don't cook very often, I am more than capable. However when I can have an amazing meal of tandoori chicken, naan and spinach curry for 10RM (about NZ$4), and to buy the ingredients to cook something costs double it is hardly surprising. But this slur on my honor had the hackles rising and in a rash moment I had invited 10 people over to my place for dinner.
Now most of you who know me well know that I can't take a challenge sitting down, and of course ended up going a little over board on dinner. I will admit that I was also in the process of trying to impress one of the dinner guests in particular, which probably fueled the cooking frenzy a little more. But to cut a long story, which included four Venezuelan circus performers and 45 elementary students, short - I cooked a mighty fine Thai meal; a red and green Thai curry, spicy pork noodle salad, prawn and orange salad and papaya and green beans, topped off with chocolate silk tart and pavlova. So tonight after having even more friends round to eat the left overs (which I will be doing for a few more days), I feel very confident that I have proven my point to my local friends, expat women can cook and damn well if I say so myself. As to whether it impressed a certain person enough, for that I shall just have to wait and see.

A truly Malaysian moment

As I was waiting to meet a friend in KLCC today I had one of those moments when you realise that Malaysia, and KL in particular is unlike anywhere else. The blending of different cultures is evident everywhere. MAC cosmetics were doing a promotion, one that I truly hope is only happening in Asia, involving Barbie. Dressed in tacky blonde wigs, high heels and bright pink lipstick a range of Malay and Chinese assistants (both male and female) were doing makeovers. Whilst that in itself was interesting enough it was the tudong (Malay headscarf) wearing woman, covered pretty much everywhere but her face, being made up to look like Barbie, and to top it off singing along to the "I'm a Barbie girl" song.
It is being filed in the mental memory banks as one of those 'Malaysia truly Asia' moments. You have to love KL!

Kiwi National Dress

Today was one of the 'big' days on the ISKL calendar - International Day! I know that good old Rangi had international days when I was in high school, but it really doesn't compare. At ISKL we have 54 nationalities of children ranging from Angola to Zimbabwe with pretty much everything in between (Kazakhstan and Qatar anyone?). The vast majority of students dress up in their national dress for the day, and even the most annoying child looks like an angel. The range of hanbok, traditional Colombian dress and elegant Thai outfits is just stunning. However it always leaves me a little baffled - what exactly is New Zealand national dress?

Whilst I would love to have a pui-pui, and other traditional Maori trappings, I don't. I also have that little thought that it isn't really my cultural dress. So what do I do? The last couple of years I have warn my All Blacks jersey. It is definitely recognisable to most as belonging to New Zealand, but it makes me wonder about the depth of our 'kiwi' culture - is it really just rugby and beer. Partly because of this, and mainly because an AB jersey designed to wear to a night game at Eden Park in the middle of an Auckland winter is damn hot on a sunny Malaysian day in March (we hit 39 today!), I decided to do something a little different this year. I looked through my wardrobe, and those of you who know me well know that this is hardly limited, and was stumped. I have several NZ/Aotearoa t-shirts - koru designs and cute outlines of NZ all over, but once again not exactly national dress. In the end I decided to go for something truly iconic - the classic black singlet and jandals, topped off with my koru pounamu to add a bit of Maori culture. All day I have been asked if I was off to the gym/beach, but truth be known, I felt kiwi. Admitably as I stood next to students and colleagues in glamorous saris, kimonos and kilts I did feel like a bit of a scruff. But then perhaps that is the essence of Kiwi culture - we don't really care what other people think, we are comfortable being us bare feet, black singlets, board shorts and all.

So tomorrow I am off to celebrate all things Kiwi again, it is International Fest. I am running the NZ booth, tattooing (moko) small children and teaching them how to make poi and say Kia Ora. Perhaps we have some culture after all. At least I don't have to spend the day teaching line dancing like my American colleagues!

Gong Xi Fa Cai

Happy Year of the Pig! I've just got back from spending Chinese New Year in Singapore, where unlike Malaysia they are happy to proudly announce it to be - the year of the pig (Malaysia has to be careful not to offend the muslim population, if the year has to be mentioned it is the year of the boar)

Some happy chinese piggies

Golden pig money boxes - what every good home needs!

As you can imagine the crowds in Singapore for CNY are pretty large. In anticipation of these Andrea, Diana and I decided to take the overnight train to Singapore instead of the regular bus. Whilst it takes twice as long on a normal day, and involves trying to sleep in a moving vehcile with a lot of Malaysian families, it seemed to be the better option when compared to the possibilities of ten hours trapped on a bus with blarring videos playing and one small toilet the size of a shoe box. Actually the trip was not too bad. Although a word of advice - if you do ever book a sleeper train ticket in KL, try not to get one too close to the bathrooms. The smell can wake you in your sleep.

Saturday evening was CNY eve, and after catching up on some zzz's and high tea at Raffles (it has to be done, a trip to Singapore isn't complete without a sling!), we bravely headed into the masses in Chinatown. There we joined the thousands to see out the dog, and in the pig, well to be honest after a while we actually joined the smart people in a bar overlooking the thousands. One of the traditions is 'bumping' the bad luck out of you, and it gets kind of tired after about the 30th time!

An unusual quiet spot on the road

Some of the new year goodies for sale

The crowds from my handy viewing spot

Although I have been to Singapore several times before I also got to do a couple of things that were new. We took a day trip to Sentosa, a little island off Singapore, you take a cable car out and spend the day with thousands of day-trippers on manmade beaches and tourist attractions. Although I did see one of the most unusual creaures I have ever seen at the underwater world.

The amazing waterdragon!

Unlike Sentosa, the Night Safari is something I would highly recommend. It is attached to the Singapore Zoo, but is a separate zoo full of animals that come out in the night. It is an amazing chance to see big cats and many other nocturnal animals prowling around, instead of sleeping like they normally are. I had a wonderful bonding experience with 3 stunning leopards, got up close (maybe a little too close) with some big bats, and saw a slow loris for the first time. All very call!

Another year older!

Today was my b'day - 32! I got to spend a great day with a lot of good friends - celebrating with some good food (got to love the cuisine in KL!), and good company. To top it all off we tossed a few noodles in the air for Chinese New Year, as I am a CNY baby it seemed like the thing to do (Yee San is a tradition here - messy and a lot of fun. The higher you toss the noodles the better your luck in the new year), and then when the staff discovered it was my birthday they arrived with a party hat (Disney Princesses - the girls would be proud), poppers and hooters. As if the locals didn't have enough to look at with 10 noisy expat girls.
To finish the celebrations and keep the family tradition of February 11 birthdays going on my cousin Christine had a baby boy. Welcome into the world Hayden James Poad!

Yee San tossing

Caught by surprise!?

Pink Panther and eye liner

I have spent most of the last week doing make-up for our middle school show - The Pink Panther Strikes Back. Stage make-up is one of those things that I really enjoy doing, as it is so different from most parts of my day to day life. I also like that small sense of corruption as I get to introduce innocent little 11 year olds to eye liner for the first time - seeing their eyes light up, and imagining their parents horror. There is also the fun in the shock of the pre-teen boys as they realise that they are expected to put on foundation and eyeliner, and wear lipstick. It never fails to amaze me how the lad that cringe the most at the first application are bust telling me that they don't have enough blush on by the last night. Some of them are just a little too comfortable in make-up. How do you respond to a 13 year old Korean boy in a pink panther outfit, wearing a pink panther outfit and doing a sexy pose asking you, "do I look beautiful?"