Tomorrow I say goodbye to Bangkok, to Koh San road which I know I'm misspelling, goodbye to Jen and Dimple, and goodbye to paying things in Baht. I'll be exchanging my currency into Dollars of the Singaporean kind, and take the longest busride of my life through Malaysia to Singapore. Almost two days on the road. Even though I'm dreading the sleeping on the bus bit, I'm really keen on going for a plethora of reasons.
Today's impressions:
Stalls with everything my material heart desires. A man on a motorcycle wearing goggles, with a black dog in front of him, wearing goggles. A woman carrying as cage filled with tiny rabbits. A very old blind, toothless woman singing over a microphone while being led by the hand by a guy. Ping-pong.. and all the rest. Made friends with the guy who sells the bags down that other road, and he took us around Patpong. I've wanted to visit this seedy side of this seedy city every since reading about Patpong repeatedly in Tom Robbins novels. Tuk-tuks and people from all over. Sat for over 3 hours getting my hair dreaded while watching a kaldeidoscope of people walk by. Food. Oh, the food.. Always hungry. Fantasy world. Freshly squeezed juice from tiny oranges. Ran into a South African girl I met on Sado Island way back when. You can't get away from the small world syndrome. Absolute randomness.
I've seen so much that I wished desperately I would remember, but it's impossible. I changed within two days of being here. No, actually when I walked out of the airport, I knew I would not be the same after this holiday. And the Thai alphabet is definitely my favourite thus far.
It's 3.51AM, and tomorrow we want to go see the Grand Palace, on which the temple in Bronkhorstspruit is based. So off to bed.
m.
Saturday, December 23, 2006
Friday, December 22, 2006
Thailand, baby.
A short report from the ghettos of Koh San road. Spelling is for the birds. I keep thanking people in Japanese, and I don't understand the English.
Bangkok is a big, bubbling pot of colours, smells and people. With the King's face plastered on roads all over and food from heaven and crazy tukl-tuk drivers popping wheelies to our delight. Night markets and muay thai boxing with beer from plastic cups. My travels have been booked, and with it rooms in Koh Tao and Koh Phagnan. Seeing Hernes in 3 days time in Singapore. Would love to stop i Kuala Lum,pur, because I saw a picture of it, and it looks beautiful.
Through the amazement, Bangkok has a sadness under the surface. The people struggle, the roads are dirty, dogs covered in ticks sleep in forgotten corners. But I love it. It reminds me of Africa. The people are real. Their shoes are worn out and scuffed. In Japan, everyone's shoes look like they just took it from the box. It probably smells like store. I love the realness of Bangkok. I love feeling the sun on my face. I love it that people look me in the eyes and smile. Such a contrast from that other Island I now call my home.
Still on the to-do list; floating markets on the river, seedy sex shows in Patpong, superficial faith at the grand palace, a bus tour through Malaysia, a new city, a scuba course.
Gotta go.
xxx
Bangkok is a big, bubbling pot of colours, smells and people. With the King's face plastered on roads all over and food from heaven and crazy tukl-tuk drivers popping wheelies to our delight. Night markets and muay thai boxing with beer from plastic cups. My travels have been booked, and with it rooms in Koh Tao and Koh Phagnan. Seeing Hernes in 3 days time in Singapore. Would love to stop i Kuala Lum,pur, because I saw a picture of it, and it looks beautiful.
Through the amazement, Bangkok has a sadness under the surface. The people struggle, the roads are dirty, dogs covered in ticks sleep in forgotten corners. But I love it. It reminds me of Africa. The people are real. Their shoes are worn out and scuffed. In Japan, everyone's shoes look like they just took it from the box. It probably smells like store. I love the realness of Bangkok. I love feeling the sun on my face. I love it that people look me in the eyes and smile. Such a contrast from that other Island I now call my home.
Still on the to-do list; floating markets on the river, seedy sex shows in Patpong, superficial faith at the grand palace, a bus tour through Malaysia, a new city, a scuba course.
Gotta go.
xxx
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Praat Afrikaans of hou jou bek.
After the orphanage, we stepped into the shi to do a bit of shopping. I wanted to pick up a backpack for Thailand (now Thailand/Singapore) and a book on Japanese verbs (as verbs are the foundations of conversations. The rest are just bricks and mortar, with the onomatope being paintings from afar.)
In Maruzen, the "English section" bookshop where all the literature junkies go for their next hit, I cruised the aisles in search of my next escape from reality. They had a big sale on DIY language books that looked like someone found it in the back of the storeroom, forgotten after the 1986 sale, before Swahili was fashionable. I was about to turn away from the reminder that there are just too many languages and not enough time on earth, when I saw it. In garish, shiny orange, the koeksisters filled the cover in an almost perverse fashion. And there it was:
I flipped out. In the middle of this strange, foreign country where no one knows what I mean when I say "mos" or "sommer". I bought the book for the price of 2 vending machine green teas, and proceeded to to force-feed some of my friends tit-bits of Afrikaans information. (Tit-bits?)
Who else was going to buy it? I can't imagine some young Jap student going "Hey, let me spend hours on learning a language that is one of 11 in a country that no one knows of, and with this book I'll be able to not even pronounce it correctly!"
So, after this weekend, a series of random people will be all over the world in a few years, carrying with them knowledge of the bastard child of Dutch, the youngest language on earth, thick with history and memories. The language that grew up too fast.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
F.Y.Intertainment
Feedback on the test. Let's get it over with.
It might not have been the best idea to drink the night before. But it was a reunion of sorts, a visit to the dude with whom I missioned around in Tokyo, way back during orientation days. Vincent Vertue. With a name like that, a life of mediocrity is impossible. To my shock, I realised that he stays an hour by car away from me. In inaka terms, he is practically my neighbour. The English is this paragraph feels really bad, but I'm gonna trudge on. Voorwaarts mars!
So, got to his town of 2000 people somewhere in the afternoon, broke open the Jack & lime, went for dinner at this stunning little sushi bar which seemed like it was run from the owners' house. We sat at the bar calling out whatever fish names we could remember. The old man behind the bar lopped a chunk off whatever sea animal we chose an stuck it on a ball of rice, tinged green with wasabi. This was washed down with namabiiru and topped off with sake. Damn, `twas good.
FFWD to the next morning, Fukuyama station, too early.
I realised how futile me taking this test is, when I tried to asked a Japanese girl at the counter what the fastest way to Saijo is. Through my dehydrated mouth, I stupidly fumbled around, saying "uuhh.. kono densha wa.. uhh.. ano densha.. uhm.. ichiban hayai" and straining my nervous system while trying to hear what the price is. Nisenkyuhyakurokujuen sounds like "yoroshiku onegaishimasu" that time of the morning. Crap.
And then I went to write that damned test.
The second realisation of the futility, no, stupidity of the test kicked in when I entered the exam hall, and everyone was speaking Japanese. Sho-sho, `twas a Japanese test, but it was the lowest one, for crying out loud. Where was my question saying "This is a pen"? The instructions were in Japanese. The do's and don'ts were in Japanese. The freaking test questions were in Japanese! I felt like crying. No, actually I felt like having some onigiri and Myprodols. But alas.
The kanji and vocab part I rocked. But then came the listening. I was hoping for sentences like "Mary is a teacher. She is 30 years old. She is an American." You know, beginner level shit.
Instead, it went something like this (translated in English for your convenience):
A: So, Hiroshitakahiro, when are you going on holiday?
B: Oh, I'm going the day after the one that came before last week's yesterday a week from now.
A: So, you mean Thursday the 22nd?
B: No, the 22nd is a public holiday, so I'm adding that to e = mc square and then I do the hokey-pokey and I turn around.
A: Ahh, I understand! You are leaving the week before the day after yesterday's tomorrow which is not a Monday but a public holiday.
B: No, that is correct.
Yah, I almost burst a vein listening to that.
That was followed by intense grammar, where I did not know what to answer cause I couldn't understand the questions! Haha. Was a grand day out in Hiroshima ken. 40 minutes away from the peace park.
Aside from the test, it was rocking. Chatted to a Hiroshima NOVA dude with beautiful eyes and a cool hat, saw some Okayamans (what's up!), caught a train back to Fukuyama with wonderful earthlings, walked around with Kevin for a bit, met up with Vincent again, had korean barbeque, made my way home..
..which is the part where I decide to take a new route back home, in the dark, in the deepest inaka, in the lightly falling snow, just me, very tired, super paranoid, scared of the trees, and end up getting lost for 2 hours. There were no lights. No double-lane roads. No signboards. No houses. Just trees and concrete blocks and mountains and darkness and scary roadworks next to dangerous cliffs.
But that's another post altogether.
It might not have been the best idea to drink the night before. But it was a reunion of sorts, a visit to the dude with whom I missioned around in Tokyo, way back during orientation days. Vincent Vertue. With a name like that, a life of mediocrity is impossible. To my shock, I realised that he stays an hour by car away from me. In inaka terms, he is practically my neighbour. The English is this paragraph feels really bad, but I'm gonna trudge on. Voorwaarts mars!
So, got to his town of 2000 people somewhere in the afternoon, broke open the Jack & lime, went for dinner at this stunning little sushi bar which seemed like it was run from the owners' house. We sat at the bar calling out whatever fish names we could remember. The old man behind the bar lopped a chunk off whatever sea animal we chose an stuck it on a ball of rice, tinged green with wasabi. This was washed down with namabiiru and topped off with sake. Damn, `twas good.
FFWD to the next morning, Fukuyama station, too early.
I realised how futile me taking this test is, when I tried to asked a Japanese girl at the counter what the fastest way to Saijo is. Through my dehydrated mouth, I stupidly fumbled around, saying "uuhh.. kono densha wa.. uhh.. ano densha.. uhm.. ichiban hayai" and straining my nervous system while trying to hear what the price is. Nisenkyuhyakurokujuen sounds like "yoroshiku onegaishimasu" that time of the morning. Crap.
And then I went to write that damned test.
The second realisation of the futility, no, stupidity of the test kicked in when I entered the exam hall, and everyone was speaking Japanese. Sho-sho, `twas a Japanese test, but it was the lowest one, for crying out loud. Where was my question saying "This is a pen"? The instructions were in Japanese. The do's and don'ts were in Japanese. The freaking test questions were in Japanese! I felt like crying. No, actually I felt like having some onigiri and Myprodols. But alas.
The kanji and vocab part I rocked. But then came the listening. I was hoping for sentences like "Mary is a teacher. She is 30 years old. She is an American." You know, beginner level shit.
Instead, it went something like this (translated in English for your convenience):
A: So, Hiroshitakahiro, when are you going on holiday?
B: Oh, I'm going the day after the one that came before last week's yesterday a week from now.
A: So, you mean Thursday the 22nd?
B: No, the 22nd is a public holiday, so I'm adding that to e = mc square and then I do the hokey-pokey and I turn around.
A: Ahh, I understand! You are leaving the week before the day after yesterday's tomorrow which is not a Monday but a public holiday.
B: No, that is correct.
Yah, I almost burst a vein listening to that.
That was followed by intense grammar, where I did not know what to answer cause I couldn't understand the questions! Haha. Was a grand day out in Hiroshima ken. 40 minutes away from the peace park.
Aside from the test, it was rocking. Chatted to a Hiroshima NOVA dude with beautiful eyes and a cool hat, saw some Okayamans (what's up!), caught a train back to Fukuyama with wonderful earthlings, walked around with Kevin for a bit, met up with Vincent again, had korean barbeque, made my way home..
..which is the part where I decide to take a new route back home, in the dark, in the deepest inaka, in the lightly falling snow, just me, very tired, super paranoid, scared of the trees, and end up getting lost for 2 hours. There were no lights. No double-lane roads. No signboards. No houses. Just trees and concrete blocks and mountains and darkness and scary roadworks next to dangerous cliffs.
But that's another post altogether.
Countdown to wonderland
For the first time in this round of my existence, I saw snow.
The way I imagined it would be, this first sighting of something I've only ever seen in pictures, was stupid picture-book material. In my head, I would have been standing by a window, seeing flakes fall from the sky. I would have opened a door to run outside, giddy, and catch flakes on my tongue. Maybe Christmas music would have started playing in the background, or a sled pulled by flying deer would have silhouetted past the full moon.
That was the expectation. This is the realisation:
Sunday morning, Vincent and I had our alarms set for 5:45am. I woke up in disbelief, Jack Daniels and sake still coursing through my blood. It was still dark outside, and bitterly cold. He came downstairs, we brushed our teeth, and ventured outside to take the road to Fukuyama, from where I'd be catching an early-morning Shinkansen to make it to Saijo in time to write a test in a language I don't understand.
While I was putting on my yellow Crocs, he came back inside, saying the car's windows were frosted over. Wow, pretty damn thick frost, I said later, drawing spirals in the white layer on my car's windscreen.
Just as we were about to leave, the car's headlights illuminated that.. things.. were falling from the sky. Like rain, only.. not. I noticed that in all the turns and corners, nooks and crannies, were coloured in in sparkly white. The further we drove, the more convinced we because that it's actually snow. Intelligent comments like "do you think.. yah dude.. I really think this is snow.. weird.. this is.. kinda.. shit man.. snow.." prevailed. I was both amazed and freaked out. It was like a harsh reality kicking in. The reality that I'm gonna be freezing my ass off. The reality that I won't be able to drive my car recklessly. The reality that summer is still a long way from here.
It wasn't quite jingle bells and snow angels, dashing through the snow on a one-horse open sleigh. It was miserable, dark, and I was sick and hung over, not even kipper enough to use the English function in my brain. But I was with another South African who was also cold and sick and hung over, and that made the experience more perfect than I could ever have imagined it.
The way I imagined it would be, this first sighting of something I've only ever seen in pictures, was stupid picture-book material. In my head, I would have been standing by a window, seeing flakes fall from the sky. I would have opened a door to run outside, giddy, and catch flakes on my tongue. Maybe Christmas music would have started playing in the background, or a sled pulled by flying deer would have silhouetted past the full moon.
That was the expectation. This is the realisation:
Sunday morning, Vincent and I had our alarms set for 5:45am. I woke up in disbelief, Jack Daniels and sake still coursing through my blood. It was still dark outside, and bitterly cold. He came downstairs, we brushed our teeth, and ventured outside to take the road to Fukuyama, from where I'd be catching an early-morning Shinkansen to make it to Saijo in time to write a test in a language I don't understand.
While I was putting on my yellow Crocs, he came back inside, saying the car's windows were frosted over. Wow, pretty damn thick frost, I said later, drawing spirals in the white layer on my car's windscreen.
Just as we were about to leave, the car's headlights illuminated that.. things.. were falling from the sky. Like rain, only.. not. I noticed that in all the turns and corners, nooks and crannies, were coloured in in sparkly white. The further we drove, the more convinced we because that it's actually snow. Intelligent comments like "do you think.. yah dude.. I really think this is snow.. weird.. this is.. kinda.. shit man.. snow.." prevailed. I was both amazed and freaked out. It was like a harsh reality kicking in. The reality that I'm gonna be freezing my ass off. The reality that I won't be able to drive my car recklessly. The reality that summer is still a long way from here.
It wasn't quite jingle bells and snow angels, dashing through the snow on a one-horse open sleigh. It was miserable, dark, and I was sick and hung over, not even kipper enough to use the English function in my brain. But I was with another South African who was also cold and sick and hung over, and that made the experience more perfect than I could ever have imagined it.
To all the beautiful people
I came to a wonderful realisation that I've grown to love some of my new friends in Japan.
And, to all the amazing humans that left comments on my page, and noticed that it never showed ("no show!", just like boobs in Japan.. harhar)
That's cause I switched over to another version of Blogger.
And I saw this one section saying
"you have 5 unmoderated comments
you have 19 unmoderated comments
you have..."
And today, while typing up Action Plans for my JTE's, I happened to click on it.
Thanks, you dudes rock.
And, to all the amazing humans that left comments on my page, and noticed that it never showed ("no show!", just like boobs in Japan.. harhar)
That's cause I switched over to another version of Blogger.
And I saw this one section saying
"you have 5 unmoderated comments
you have 19 unmoderated comments
you have..."
And today, while typing up Action Plans for my JTE's, I happened to click on it.
Thanks, you dudes rock.
Friday, December 01, 2006
And I still can't speak it.
Four months ago I wouln't have been able to read my own handwriting. Ahh, how we grow.
I've been saving a bunchload of money staying in and studying until my eyes burn and my back hurts. That being the result of studying on the floor (kotatsufied.) in bad light.
Only one more sleep to go till Hiroshima, and two more till that darned test.
Tis gonna be a good weekend.
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