Asia - October, 1997

10/14 - Purple Haze

Well, the haze isn't really purple, but it's real. If you have paid any attention to international goings on lately, you are probably aware of the ecological disaster in Indonesia. Normal slash & burn activity gone amock partially as a result of a local el Nino drought. There was that plane crash last month caused in part by poor visability & there have been airport closures all over the region for the same problem. From what I understand, other countries have it a lot worse than Singapore, but it is definitely having an effect here. Yesterday there was no sky, just a white haze that limited visibity to a few blocks. There did not seem to be a noticable smokey odor & it didn't bother my eyes. Today it was a little better, you could see some blue in the sky. I hear that in parts of Malaysia people have to wear masks. Guess where I'm headed Saturday!

After work tonight I headed down to the courts & met up with my tennis partner of last May, the rich Aussie marine contractor. I will play with him a couplle more times this week. I'll get my butt kicked, but the excersize will be good.

It's going to be a busy week with more action on the project I was working on here in May, plus 2 other hot projects too. At least the May project is finally coming to fruition. It's nice to see the hard work from that visit paying off now. Then I take the same projects to Malaysia & Thailand next week only on a much more compressed schedule, 2 days each location. My friend from China is here this week & is making a case for me to come there pretty soon. I've been told that if I go, I should make it before winter sets in since it gets cold around Shanghai & the air turns yellow with coal smoke.

Well more later

10/19 - Jungle Trekking

Greetings from the jungle! Well, I'm stretching... I just got back from a "Jungle Trek" which amounted to an hour walk up the hill across the street from my hotel here in Penang. Since I am here for the weekend, I arranged to stay at a beach resort. Much nicer than being at a hotel in town. Town in Penang is George Town, but it isn't much to talk about. I think I mentioned last year that it is what Singapore was maybe 30 years ago, ie, a colonial remnant, still emerging from the 3rd world conditions. But the resort is quite nice, on a cove several miles long at the far north end of Penang. The downside is I have about an hour commute to the plant at the far end of the island. But I will probably be getting some work done in the taxi each way. When you have a lap top computer, you can work almost anywhere.

The haze seems to have cleared in this region. I was told that it was very bad until 2 weeks ago, but it is virtually gone now. Tourism is still way down all over this part of the world. The haze was bad the whole time I was in Singapore; the sun was just an orange light in the sky!

Well, I missed playing tennis again with Mike from Australia. Had to cancel one night because we had a dinner with my boss and the other managers. Then it rained the next couple of afternoons. There are courts here. Don't know if I will get to play, but I will at least go work out on the wall later after it cools off a little.

This weekend is going to be total R & R, except for a little catching up I need to do on documenting some of the projects I'm involved in. I went for a walk on the beach yesterday PM, then swam a bit in the pool. The surf is quite warm, like tepid bath water, but there are stinging jellyfish, so I am only doing a little wading. But the beach is very nice. Watched the sun go down at dinner. Then for about a half hour some bats the size of crows came out and patrolled the beach area for bugs. Went for a little jog on the beach again early this AM then after breakfast went on the trek. I guess it qualifies as jungle... lots of greenery, vines, etc. No real wildlife (this is after all a pretty well developed area) except for two 6" long red centipedes that skittered across the path. Of course there were mosquitos & I came back with a lot of bites on my legs.

One thing that I don't like is the growing popularity of skidoo rentals at these beach resorts. All day there is now a constant background noise of doos cruising back and forth in the ocean just beyond the surf. It's like going to a secluded mountain resort & finding a bunch of dirt bikers screaming around. I mentioned going for a ride on one last year in Thailand with my friend there; it was fun, so I understand the attraction. But it is completely uncontrolled & I find it annoying.

Well, I'm going down to the pool for a bit now to catch some rays....

10/20 - It's Baaack...

The famous haze returned today... sometime during the morning, the world turned gray. I guess I was pretty fortunate to have a clear weekend here. The weather has turned somewhat too. I'm told this is rainy season & although the weekend was dry, we did have gray clouds with lots of distant rumbling both afternoons. Then last night (Sunday) around 8 we got flashes & it started to come down. And it really came down! Same thing tonight, only a little earlier. Both nights I had played some tennis (got rained off the court tonight) & came back for my cool down swim in the rain. Imagine a cool shower in warm air floating in a cool pool. Very refreshing after sweating in the heat. During dinner tonight we had a wonderful light show as the lightening continued. Large sections of the sky lit up in purple!

Kind of an interesting side note here for you Star Trekkers: The Rasa Sayang Resort I am staying at is located at Batu Feringgi. You have to wonder if the Star Trek writers ran across this name when they were dreaming up their Ferengi, the big eared galactic entrepreneurs.

It is very noticeable that occupancy at the resort is way down; I'd guess this place is no more that 1/3 full. Don't know if that is partly the season (not cold yet in the northern climes plus rainy here), or just due to the haze. But I noticed that almost all the western tourists are Brits. I wonder why that is... By the way, with the currency devaluation (the other big story in this part of the world), this room costs only about $70 a day, not bad for a first class resort!

Saw some wildlife since I wrote yesterday... There was a spectacular bright yellow bird about thrush size perched in the palm trees last evening. He had black eye & wing bands. Saw a small band of monkeys perched on a bank by the road while I was riding back to the hotel tonight. Cute guys. I gather they are something of a nuisance hereabouts, raiding garbage cans, etc. Also noticed that there seems to be great numbers of night lizards that come out. You can see them on window panes and walking across ceilings of the covered walks.

Today was a very productive day here. I had an entourage of about 8 guys with me almost all day, soaking up my every word & asking lots of questions. One more day here, then off to Bangkok.

One other note: You know all those computer ads you see of people with their laptop computers working away by the beach... Well, late yesterday afternoon, that was me. Worked for about an hour out there. It was great! Late afternoon sun, warm ocean breezes, the sound of the surf, the whine of the skidoos!

Hey Tim... 2 wins for the 9ers while I've been gone... good going!

10/23 - Back in Bangkok

Not much different from a year ago. The construction continues everywhere... snarling traffic, creating dust & as far as I can tell, still not getting to a state where there is any positive result for the long suffering populace here. Although I guess there is actually a decline in new projects & some current ones are suspended because of the financial crisis here. The Baht has lost about 35% since I was here last. It used to be 25 Baht to the buck, now it's 40. That means that something that cost $40 then is $25 now. In other words, for a US visitor this is bargain city. For the locals it is bad news. Thai politics is in an uproar too. The Finance Minister resigned the other day & the Prime Minister is just about at the end of his rope. It will take many months to sort this all out & who knows how it will resolve itself. The Hong Kong stock market crashed today, so Asia is in big trouble.

I'm at a different hotel this time from where I usually stay here. It's a brand new Sheraton & it is really first class. Best hotel I have ever had. I had a memorable meal here last night too. Really good Chinese with the accompaniment of a pretty lady playing the Chinese harp. She told me the name of the instrument, but I don't have very good retention for foreign names. Anyway I enjoyed it a lot.

Speaking of foreign names, I spent today training 6 Thai guys on some of our software. Three of them were Vikorn, Asakorn & Thepakorn (given names). I asked one of the other guys how come there were so many "korns". He said korn means hand. In the case of the last guy, Thepa means Buddhist, ie, Buddhist hand; he didn't say what the other hands were... I didn't realize before that Thai is derived from Sanskrit, same parent language as most Indian languages & one of the mother tongues of all Indo-European languages. Anyway, I thought that was interesting.

My friend Madan here has gone off for the weekend (it is a Buddhist holiday today, although these guys worked the day specifically because I was here) to an upscale Thai beach resort. He's trying to convince me to spend the weekend with him at the beach house he's rented & go home Monday. It is really tempting, but I really want to get back to the house project. I still have a lot of painting to finish.

I'll probably write once more on the plane... Bye for now.

10/25 - Over the Blue

I'm on the way home, first leg between Bangkok & Tokyo, out over the Western Pacific. Clear & smooth. We flew over some mountains on the way & just guessing from looking at the map, it must have been Laos or Southern China. All tree covered & looking remote & pretty much undeveloped.

I'm glad to be homeward bound, but as always, a little reflective about leaving my friends behind & with new experiences to digest. I never really covered any new ground on this tour, except maybe for the beach at Penang. But the work was satisfying. Instead of the sales mode I was in last year, introducing them to our software & trying to convince them to use it, I was in more of a consultant mode, helping them install & use it. I guess I must have done OK as a sales aguy, because there is now lots of demand for me on the service side. I could easily have stayed another week at each location to really solidify the implementation projects we worked on. But I need to get home & get the house back together. Also need to focus some time on my other job, year 2000. But I would not be surprised to find myself back this way before too long, except that since the company is kind of on a down trend right now, expenses are being closely watched. Not like last year when I could travel just about wherever & whenever I wanted.

The plane just started its descent & off to the side some small islands are coming into view, so I guess we are getting close to Japan. That means only about 12 hours or so to go.

Anyway, I guess that's a wrap...