Saya Tidek Jacep Maleyu

Saya Tidek Jacep Maleyu - I don't speak Malay

How it all began

At the crack of dawn Adrian and his father awoke, literally the crack of dawn. The flight was set to leave about 10AM and they insisted on being at the airport by 7AM as it was connecting to an International flight. Now the YEG airport isn't that big nor does it demand much of its international clientele as compared to its YVR counterpart. I stayed in bed. They took a taxi. The journey to Singapore, Malaysia, and Japan had in fact, begun.

My mother woke me up about 7:30 and we arrived at the airport for about 8:15. We checked in, and decided to go eat some piss-ant meal at one of the airport diners. Sleep was far more appetizing to me.

We boarded the jet, and I'm pretty sure if my memory is correct, I slept -for most of the way. We arrived in Vancouver, waited for a few hours in the terminal, where it was insisted that we wander around and take inane picture with various Indian propaganda, and then transfered to our flight to Beijing. That's right you heard me Beijing. Never let anyone who hasn't traveled much book your flight. I would have happily paid the extra $300 to fly direct. I digress. I believe it was about 14 hours later that we arrived at the PEK. I did manage to snag three seats, take an Imovane (a high-tech sleeping pill) and play dead for about 6 of the 14 hours. I should have taken two.

The Peking airport is undergoing vast renovations for the Olympics but there is never enough construction to cease the spread of the hideous Beijing 2008 Olympic Mascots. We toddled around the airport for a few more hours -I believe 2 this time until we managed our flight to Kuala Lumpur. Time count: ~22hours + 1 day. Status: mildly exhausted.

The Kuala Lumpur International Airport is beautiful and equip with free internet kiosks. We trod through its magnificence, past the Pan Pacific Hotel, which to my past experiences boasts fluffy down pillows, duvets, soaker tubs and BEDS. I grimaced slightly as we continued past to catch a taxi-van to the domestic airport - about a half hour away.

The domestic airport also know as a boxy-shit-hole consisted of a giant room sectioned off by a few cubicle dividers and a plethora of benches littered with parasitic people. My sleep deprived brain was thinking survival of the fittest and hoping to take a little piece of the corrugated hard plastic "beds". People here obviously expected waits like ours: 8 hours. That's right an 8 hour layover and a lonely Pan Pacific. I managed to procure a bench and attempt a now hungry and further exhausted sleep. I nodded off periodically but was awaken every 30 minutes or so by the chilled air, the lumpy (non-ergonomic) bench, and my belly's grumble (which I satisfied with the only quasi-edible thing around: McDonalds).

I believe it was about 4AM that we set out through the security (which I took two full water bottles through by accident) claimed our boarding passes and I payed 70RMD or so for overweight charges. I really enjoyed that ringgits are worthless. Eventually, we boarded yet another plane, this time AirMalaysia -in they're beautifully painted red jets. I was so tired and relieved to be in a cushioned seat that I passed out almost immediately and slept through the mechanical difficulties as they fixed them, and the apparently near vertical take off. From what they tell me the basically flew in a giant parabolic arch from A to B in about 30 minutes and the flight was supposed to be an hour or so. I woke up just before we landed, in time to see the giant fields of palm trees and other local crops.

We landed safely in Johor Baru, and I was impressed by the quality of landed we had in the jumbo red jet. The next part is somewhat of a blur, but we bussed somewhere I think, and then left Ady and Aaron in Johor and took another few buses to Singapore. We had to get on an off buses so we could go through customs and immigration, etc. We then hoped on the train to a district of Singapore to meet Papa Lim's brother. And the journey begins. Time count: ~40hours Status: exhausted, not to mention apathetic.