Appreciating the Differences

Warning: Frank discussion about toilet use follows. It's not obscene, but you may not want to read this while eating breakfast. You've been warned!






(you can click on any of the pictures to make them bigger)


Bet you didn't expect to see that picture at the top of my blog! Comments have been pretty sparse lately, so I wanted to make sure I got your attention.

When Susan Jane and I went to Europe 3 years ago, the tour company sent us reading material to prepare for the trip. One recommendation from that material was that when traveling in a foreign place, instead of complaining about everything like a typical American, you should "appreciate the differences" you encounter in your travels. That phrase became a running joke with us during that trip and I still think of it when I see weird stuff in a new place.

Overall, I'm approaching my time in Asia with an open mind. I'm trying new foods, studying different languages, and learning as much as I can about the culture. But one thing I am not yet comfortable with is the hose in the toilet stall (on the left side in the above picture).

The short explanation for the hose is that Muslims are supposed to perform Istinjaa after using the toilet (cleaning with water). Actually, if you're interested, there is a well written set of toilet considerations for Muslims listed here. I was looking for general information, but I ended up reading the whole page. I mean no disrespect to Muslims or the Islamic traditions and laws by writing about the toilet hose. From what I understand, many countries include a toilet hose in their bathroom stalls (I saw several in India) and many non-Muslims probably use these hoses as well.

My issue is more with using the stall after someone has already used the hose. If you think about it, spraying cold water on a generally delicate area is probably awkward at best. As a non-hose user (most stalls have regular toilet paper too), it appears that water often gets sprayed on the walls and floor of the toilet stalls. I can't imagine that I'd be any more accurate, but I also wouldn't like to be the next to use that stall.

There is a drain in each stall, usually just below the hose. Imagine you are a heavy-set expat using the facilities. After maneuvering yourself into the cramped space, you take extra precaution not to let any clothing you're wearing touch the walls or floor. Then as you are getting yourself back together, your phone accidentally drops and lands on top of said drain. Are you going to think twice before putting that phone against your ear next time it rings? Or are you just going to buy a new one? No wonder phones are so cheap over here!

I'm sure this is the type of thing you get used to when you've lived with it your whole life. After all, every Mosque in the country broadcasts prayer chants over loudspeakers 5 times per day (starting at 5:45 am and ending around 9pm), and people seem to get used to that. But for me, I don't know if I'll be here long enough to be able to use a stall with a wet floor. Just in case, I better stick to bottled water for a few more weeks.

Last week I promised a picture of cars with their windshield wipers lifted up. Here's a picture from the parking lot at work today (there are 3 cars with their wipers up in this picture, it may be hard to tell).


And one more curious item relating to vehicular travel. People on motorcycles and scooters frequently wear their jackets backwards. This may be to keep the front of their shirts clean, but I can't think of any other reason. This is so common, I've even seen some people wear jackets like this inside air conditioned buildings when they get cold. Apparently, they get so used to how it feels on the motorcycles, it starts to feel normal again. I took several pictures during a recent drive home - see if you can make any sense of it. Don't you think this would make it very difficult to drive when the jacket slides down towards their wrists?

Drive right...err, I mean left.

Malaysia was a British colony at one point. This means they use funny words like "lorry" (truck), "lift" (elevator), and "boot" (trunk). It also means they drive on the wrong side of the road (and the wrong side of the car). Here's a picture of how weird it looks - this was taken from the driver's seat!

All due respect to my one British reader, but if Henry Ford wanted us to drive on the left side of the road, he wouldn't have put the steering wheel on the left side of the car!


Surprisingly, adopting to this bizarre driving pattern is not as difficult as it sounds. When you come to an intersection filled with other cars going in the same direction, you go with the flow. Unless you attempt to drive into another car, Malaysians are pretty forgiving of driving mistakes and there's virtually no road rage, despite considerable traffic congestion.

When renting a car, China, India, and the Philippines all require you to have a driver so that you don't get in a major traffic accident or so lost that you end up returning the car in the wrong country. Malaysia is one of the only Asian countries which doesn't provide a driver when you rent a car. Presumably, this is because Malaysian infrastructure is mature enough that an alert driver can find their way around without too much trouble. The roads are well maintained, there are signs telling you're going, and most people obey the traffic laws. Then again, if everything was great, this blog would be too boring for me to even proofread. Submitted for your enjoyment - 10 quirky observations about driving in Malaysia.

1. Being on the wrong side of the car feels very awkward. The leg that usually rests against the door has nothing to lean against, and the foot you use for the gas pedal feels very crowded. The gear selector is on your left side - when driving this is not a big deal, but when backing into a parking space, you find yourself grabbing the door handle instead of the shifter. Also, for some unknown reason, they switched the sides for the wipers & turn signal. No one knows where I'm turning, but my windshield sure is spotless!
2. Crossing the road on foot is dangerous. First, pedestrian right-of-way is generally optional. Second, most of us learned to look left for oncoming traffic, start to cross, look right to see if you can go all the way across, then glance left again to make sure you didn't overlook a truck the first time. If you do that here, when you start crossing, you're liable to get run over. You must look to your right first. Sounds simple, but most people don't think before crossing the road. A coworker was almost hit by a truck moving 25 MPH when he looked left and then started to cross. Fortunately someone grabbed him just as he was stepping into the street.
3. Motorbikes and scooters are everywhere and if you hit them, you're at fault. The riders don't follow many traffic laws, so this makes for a problematic relationship - don't bump into them, even while they sneak up in your blindspot, run red lights, and drive between traffic lanes. Many bikes in Penang have 2 riders (surely more than those little engines can handle), but I'm told in rural areas you can see bikes with as many as 5 people on them at once. I took a few pictures of them, but this hardly does justice to the sheer quantity of bikes on the road here.
   
4. Much like right turns in the US, left turns are easy to make here, even at busy intersections. Right turns here, however, can be very difficult without a stoplight. Not only is traffic coming at you in both directions, but there are motorbikes driving between the cars at unpredictable intervals. Combined with never really knowing which direction you're supposed to be looking before driving into traffic - this is probably the most dangerous part of driving here.
5. Traffic circles are common (there are at least 5 that I encounter regularly). I'm ok with circles (there's one close to our house in Portland), but these are much more chaotic than I'm used to. There are usually at least 2 lanes of traffic through a circle (as many as 4 during busy times and 6+ if you count the motorbikes). Also, you're supposed to yield to the people on your right (another British influence?) - which means if the dude on the inside lane decides he wants to take the next turn off, he can cut through 3-6 lanes of traffic and you're supposed to let him. My aggressive nature doesn't allow me to follow this rule yet, so for now if the guy is on my right he usually misses his turn. Here's a picture of the entrance to a circle on a very slow Saturday morning. Take my word for it, there's not enough room for the 6 lanes of traffic that fill this circle at rush hour.
6. Most speeders are not pulled over. If you are speeding, traffic cameras will photograph you and your license plate and mail you the ticket a few months later. Speed limits are relatively low here (on a 4 lane roadway I travel frequently, the high speed is 80kmph - about 50MPH). I'm told the tickets are not very expensive by US standards. I'm also told that if you are pulled over for speeding, you can sometimes give the officer a 50 Ringgit bill (about $14USD) and he'll let you go. Supposedly that even works if you drive over one of the guys on a moped, but I haven't tried this yet to find out.
7. Gas is cheap. Malaysia exports high grade oil and imports most of their gasoline. Still, the octane at the pump is 95 and 97 - neither of which is available the US as far as I know. I filled up my rental car with 97 yesterday (supposedly they were out of 95, but I'm skeptical) - I got about 225 miles on about $18 of gas (a full tank). Where can you fill up a tank for $18 in the US, especially high-grade?
8. Many people lift their windshield wipers off their windows during the day while their car is parked in the sunshine. The weather here quickly switches between downpour and 90+ degrees which could cause wiper blades to stick to the windshield and deteriorate quickly. This is a practical way to save the wipers, but it looks very odd. I don't have any pictures of this, but I'll try to take some in the next few days.
9. Many outdoor parking spaces are monitored by men in fluorescent vests. Parking is about $0.30/hour in these monitored areas. If you are in a hurry and the parking guy is busy, you can go run your errands and pay when you get back (not sure how they check this - I suppose you could just drive away). Yesterday the guy even gave me a receipt for 30 cents! Sure am glad I got that receipt...
10. Finally, here's something I really like. Many stoplights have timers here that count down until the light changes. This is not everywhere, but it's very cool and I think every intersection worldwide should have it. It makes it a lot easier to know if you can run the light and when to start revving your engine to cut off the guy in the next lane once it turns green.
    
    

Bit of a long entry tonight, but I've been saving this one up for almost 2 weeks!

No new pictures this week other than what's posted here - I'll try to have more next week.

The word for today is "chicken."

A lot of people have asked me about the food, so I figured I’d write about it a bit. Penang is actually well known in Asia for its food. People in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s capital, apparently dread when Penang residents come to visit because they have such high standards for their food. I’ve even been told that people actually travel from other countries to Penang just for the food. I don’t know if I that’s true, but it sounds unlikely. Surely there are less humid places to eat!

There is a lot to say about the food over here, so today I’ll just focus on the meat selections.

Since Malaysia is a Muslim country, many Islamic laws affect daily life. Most restaurants (including Intel cafeterias) observe Halal. If you’re curious, you can read more about Halal food standards here. Suffice to say, it bears some similarities to Kosher (at least to the average Christian, they seem similar). The most obvious impact is that it is difficult to find pork in a restaurant or grocery store.

I’m not the world’s biggest pork fan, but when the bacon and hot dogs are made out of beef, it just isn’t the same. There are places to get non-halal food, but it can be a hassle. For example, if you go to a supermarket with a non-halal section and buy bacon, it has to be paid for and wrapped so that it doesn’t contaminate the rest of the store. I’m ok with that as a rule to follow, but it’s just as easy to not eat bacon.

Meanwhile, Malaysia is very accepting of other religions. Buddists and Hindus don’t eat beef and there are a fair number of both in Malaysia. Halal beef is pretty good when bought at the supermarket, but it isn’t served in some places (including the Intel cafeterias).

So what does that leave? Chicken and Fish. Fish (including shrimp) is served whole – heads, eyes, shell, antenna… it’s all on the plate. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen shrimp eyes, but they are huge and black. When a whole shrimp is staring at you from your plate, suddenly you aren’t that hungry any more.

So basically, I have chicken every day. Fortunately, there are MANY variations on chicken. In my freezer, there are 5 different chicken options – and that doesn’t include any spicy selections. It does go a bit far with the chicken snacks – how much chicken does one person need? I haven’t seen chicken ice cream or cereal yet, but I’m on the lookout. I did finally eat fish today by accident - turns out it tastes like chicken.

If you haven’t seen pictures of my apartment food selections yet, you can view them here.

And if you use an RSS reader, this link should work for you to track this blog.

Well, my adventure has started.

I don't know if a blog is the best way to do this, but I figured I’d try it for a while. I’ll write a little bit in each post so you can decide to read whatever you have time for.

I could do this in a one big email to everyone, but I was thinking this might be easier. This way if you’re not interested in a post, it doesn’t fill up your inbox.

The flight over started in the afternoon on Thursday in Portland. I flew down to LAX and then took the direct flight to Singapore on Singapore Airlines before taking the connection to Penang. I believe LAX to Singapore is the longest non-stop flight in the world, clocking in at over 16 hours. In case you haven’t had the chance to fly Singapore Air, it’s the best airline I’ve ever been on (I’ve heard there are similar quality airlines in Asia, but so far I’ve only flown Singapore).

What makes a great airline? Well, their flight attendants are all nice, helpful, and friendly. Their meals are the best airline food you’ll ever have – it’s still airline food, but there’s a lot of it and most of it tastes really good. Between meals, you can walk to the back of the plane where they have water, fruits, and other snacks. All the alcohol they offer is free if you want help falling asleep, and you get hot towels after takeoff and again before landing to clean your face and hands.

But the best part of flying on Singapore is their “KrisWorld” entertainment system. You get a full remote control (similar to a Tivo or “on demand” system). You get a HUGE selection of movies, including recent releases like King Kong, Underworld: Evolution, Failure to Launch, and Pink Panther. You can also use the remote to play 36 video games, plus foreign language lessons, current flight path and tons of music selections. If you have to sit on an airplane for 16 hours, this is the only way to do it. You can start any of the movies at any time, pause them, rewind them, etc. Amazing. And there’s a power supply in each armrest, so if you get bored, you can fire up your laptop and play some video games.

In between the meals, I had time to watch Crash, Pink Panther, Layer Cake, and Shaun of the Dead and play some games on my laptop. Of course, the flight was so long, I also managed 6 hours of sleep, but at least while I was awake I was entertained.

I landed on Saturday at 9:30am local time. Then the challenge is to stay awake and busy all day so that I can get my internal clock reset. More on that first day later, but I did manage to sleep from 9pm to about 4am and took a nap 7am – 9am. The time difference from Portland is 15 hours, so I find it even harder to adjust to than Israel.

I go to work tomorrow for my first day, so hopefully I’ll get a good night’s sleep. Normally, I’d take sleeping pills to help get my clock reset, but I managed to pack them in boxes I sent over before I left which haven’t arrived yet. So looks like I’m going au-naturale.