Basketball at Midnight

Let’s take a minute away from the reminiscing and catching up and talk about the present.  I’m hanging out on Tuk Tuk, a little jut of lad off the giant island in the middle of the massive Lake Toba somewhere in the heart of Sumatra.  I think I read it’s actually a massive volcanic crater lake.  Sound a little like Ometepe, Nicaragua?  It  sounds like it, but there’s very little resemblance.  The shore has a constant, high ridge line around it reminding me more of the ridges around my hike in Jasper, Canada, a few years ago.  I arrived in Medan yesterday, and although I’ve read a couple horror stories about it, had a thoroughly pleasant time.  I took a nap and woke up to pouring rain; that helped me decide to use the internet.

My enjoyment of Medan was much less about Medan itself and more about my experiences.  For one, I am entirely sans guidebook, being too occupied with everything else I didn’t have time for in Penang prior to leaving.  My general idea was that this would be manageable once I got somewhere reasonable, and that seemed less and less likely as my flight moved from 6pm to 10pm at night.

In the waiting area and on the plane, some older Malay was moving around to the locals-in-appearance and trying to sell them vitamins from a shop he just branched out to in Medan.  He spoke English to a girl in her 20s and as he was giving his harangue, we made eye contact and I couldn’t help but laugh.  This opened the door to conversation once he moved on to his next victim, and I investigated as much as I could about how the “middle class” of Indonesia fares.  By that I don’t think I actually mean the “Middle class of Indonesia” but the Indonesians who share a western “middle class” lifestyle.  She, ever since her collegiate education, has been working with a successful money changer that has (in a little irony) just branched to Penang (Malaysia) and she was managing the shop there because she could speak Malay.  Although she has neither been to Padang (Southwest Sumatra) or Aceh (North Sumatra), she frequently goes to Jakarta and has been to other places of high interest on Java.  She has been to Thailand, and nonchalantly threw in that she would probably not go to China even though she had the visa already.  Sure, the Chinese have no difficulty giving an indifferent Indonesian a visa, but not me.  Bastards.  To her credit, there was a business aspect to the trip that created the indifference and she might just go to Hong Kong, which doesn’t require a special visa.  She also recounted to me that (wealthy?) people in Medan often will take trips to Thailand to go shopping, very much like people in Malaysia often will make trips to Java to go shopping.  She also said that it didn’t much interest her and cost about the same if you translated the costs; I wonder if Thai people go to Malaysia to shop?

Once in the airport, we parted ways and I sought out the western looking travelers that possibly had an idea where the cheap accommodation in the city was.  The first couple, from Cali + New York, were doing relief work in Aceh (which itself has a really interesting story of separatists that reunited following the Boxing Day Tsunami of 2004).  They were great to talk to, but not terribly informative; I then moved on to a pair of Finnish girls that were doing the backpacker route and split the taxi with them to the area of cheap lodging and leached off their Lonely Planet based knowledge.  They are with me today, by virtue of the LP recommending for them to not stay in Medan (and, since I’m on the schedule I am, knowing I can’t possibly stay there).  I also met a Finnish guy today, which has allowed, Finland, with 5.5 million people, to edge out the USA’s 300 million people in “folks I’ve met traveling” once again.  This is more of an idiosyncrasy, and on the long-scale, there are no mostly-developed countries that don’t edge out the USA in travelers met.  I just like to point out Finland because Tommy L used to talk about how much Russia would beat up on the FInns.  Other than their representative value, I haven’t found much terribly interesting to say about the Finnish girls.  The arrogant Canadian working in Taiwan and the anti-Arrogant-Canadian Pollack that I had a couple drinks with last night were much more interesting (though I’m not going to tell you much about them).

I also fell in a gutter.  It was missing the grate and I was walking around Medan trying to see what I could see, and wasn’t paying attention and in I went, ankle high in what I hope was storm drain runoff since it didn’t reek like sewage.  I overheard that one of the ETAs in Malaysia recently fell into a gutter, and I’m rather satisfied that my reaction to that was “these gutters do seem to be rather precarious in placement and safety.  I wonder how often that happens” instead of “Silly ETA.  How could you not see that.”  I’ve almost not seen badly maintained gutters in the past.  If Malaysia and Indonesia do not reach developed status by 2020, it’s probably because of septic infection of their elite from mis-maintained gutters.

Of other current events that don’t relate to Indonesia, I did have the opportunity to spend an afternoon in KL with special agent R.U.T.H., an anonymous political blogger in Malaysia.  I don’t think I’ve overtly mentioned her before because of that “anonymous” thing, but it is doubtful the Malaysian government is reading my blog very carefully and Homeland Security is still a supporter of limited free speech across the globe (hi!).  But yes, since Malaysia limits both political free speech and the press, there has been quite a movement towards publicizing real issues through blogging and text message news subscriptions that report to your handphones (cell phones).  The special agent has also been responsible for my expanded understanding of corruption, graft, and scandal in Malaysia over the past few months, some of which has probably leaked into my blog.  Perhaps Malaysia could hold me captive if they wanted to and my ability to pass through customs is due to their intense desire to get me out of their country.  I’M COMING BACK, YOU KNOW!  I’M NOT GONE JUST YET!

The generally non-political outing took me around to some points of Indian and Chinese heritage to get me a bit of a broader view on a holistic Malaysia.  Of note, she said that while the (Malay) government has been maintaining and preserving the historically significant European buildings (in Melaka and Penang, for instance), they have been quick to tear down buildings of Chinese (and presumably Indian) origin for new construction projects.  We ended it with me threatening to jump off a ferris wheel into a deep looking pool.  It didn’t happen, but that would have been a lot of fun.  I was recounting the times I’ve jumped off bridges and light houses and the like.

Ok.  My hour’s about up.  Take care (I’m saving the grammar check for the future)!