On to Sumatra

I was fairly tired from the 4 days of KL where I got up really early each day to go get visa stuff done or go see places and then staying up til 1 and 2 in the morning so that I could skype my mom since KL had good computers and headsets, and then the late partying two nights in a row in melaka and not to mention walking in all that heat and concrete and malls in KL (I forgot to mention before that one of the funniest things in the malls in KL was when you walked through the swimwear section of the department stores. Back home it usually features the faceless models with scantily clad bakinis. Here the models would be completely covered with only the feet exposed and then wearing a swim cap and goggles). So I had a nice rest day in Melaka as it was quite the chill place. The owner, steve, had wireless and a laptop for free and unlimited use so I sat up on the rooftop balcony and did some internetting and then just cruising around on the web which I hadn't done in a while. It was a very hot and humid day in melaka and then rain so the belgian family and mitch the american and I watched a couple movies and I only ventured out during the day to get some keuy teuw goreng, an icecream, and some fruit juice. That night though we all headed out to chinatown for the night fesitivities and good food though.

Took the ferry from Melaka across the straight of Melacca to Dumai Sumatra. Amazing the difference just a tiny little straight can make. In Melaka, you have such a clean and sort of fancy malaysian tourist town for the local malays (think of like breckenridge or telluride for coloradoans). No one pays really any attention to you and most people are driving nice cars. In Dumai you have a dirty city, though not near as bad as kalimantan, where there are a few cars, lots of motorcycles and then the trishaws (human powered bikes with a passenger seat) for public transportation. It's funny b/c Melaka also has trishaws, but they're for touring the tourists. In Melaka a trishaw ride costs the equivalent of 12 US dollars. Here, that same ride would cost 1 dollar, though of course the ones here don't blare jason mraz and akon on their stereo system nor do they have fancy lights covering the bicycle. But the most noticeable difference is how you definitely feel like someone from a different planet. In melaka no one really gave you a second glance except maybe a taxi driver hoping to score some extra money off of you. but here, everyone noticeably stares at you, some with mouths open (not a whole lot of tourists pass through here as most fly to jakarta or medan or take the ferry from georgetown to medan), but I wanted to see melaka first, so that's why I went this way. Everyone shouts the hey mr. that they did in kalimantan. The english here is noticeably better than in kalimantan, though a far cry from that in malaysia still. It just always can amaze me what a huge difference a border or small body of water can make.