JAKATTAA! OR KL!

well i got this temporary job for december/january, it looks like i will be making enough money to TAKE A FRICKIN HOLIDAY AT TET!!!

if i don't burn out and have to cut my regular teaching hours that is. i got really ill last time i tried to take a day job, driving for two bleeding hours in the mad traffic here, bronchitis and tonsilitis at the same time, i nearly died. so instead of dying i quit that gig and lost out on a cool 1550usd extra a month.



it's nice to be healthy though. the hours at this new joint are quite civilized, and only 500 metres from my regular workplace. so i'm hoping i don't burn out.

so yes, jakarta and kuala lumpur are very short plane rides from here, and i've not visited malaysia or indonesia in all these years here, so now would be the time! kl would be more glam but more expensive, and jakataa would be intense and severe and really cheap. i'm leaning to jakarta because it would certainly be a rawer experience, and cheapness is a draw. i'd have to do a little trek to borneo or somewhere.

then again kl would be like a proper holiday, civilization, english language all over the place, bookstores and shit. and kl was also the first place i ever wanted to see in asia since some decades ago thanks to exposure to a comic book called lat's lot.

it might be a pablum getting a trusty babyshitter to stay here though, the baby has really only bonded with my friend simon, and he's likely to be bailing somewhere for the holiday too. libby has her own place in phu my hung, but she likes my place and doesn't really enjoy the isolation of phu my hung, which is 20 minutes out of downtown, and she also sees clients in my place sometimes, she's a shrink and rents my living room from me when clients don't want to travel to her place. so she might be a good thing, except for the fact she might be going to america at the same time. dang.

whatever, we'll figger it out! i just need to make sure this cat is cared for. my vietnamese friends are not a go, they think animals are for eating.


oh i'm so excited now!

jakataaaa.







kuala lumpur.


they're both muslim majority countries, but malaysia is much more melting potty, and a big chinese presence so i suppose the lunar new year will be quite a big deal there.

oh, tet holiday is the vietnamese version of the lunar new yaw, which is celebrated in all of asia, when the entire continent is on the move. i stayed in town one tet, and it was so boring, the entire city empties out and everyone goes home to the countryside. nobody but drunk insolent and overconfident bloated foreigners left over, and the urban poor who can't afford to go home. i went to quy's house and we had a little celebration with his dad and his brother and some neighbours, but his mom and most of his clan had gone to the country, it was more like a funeral than a party. mr. hoang was all lonesome waiting for us to turn up, there was a little table with a whole boiled chicken, head propped up in the doorway, and little red envelopes and red lights and incense and buddhas and stuff to welcome the new year. but their alley was so dead there wasn't even a worry of kids pinching his chicken. lol, so forlorn. i resolved then to bail at tet from now on.

they don't like to be alone the vietnamese.


now xmas and new year here, the whole city goes apeshit mental, there is no exodus. there are like 4 million motobikes in saigon, and on xmas eve every damn one clogged the downtown streets. i went to the grocery about 10 minutes drive from my house, and got caught in the crowds, fake snow blowing out over everyone from the mall, and really magnificent lights; it took one whole hour to get back home.