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03/02/06 - Something I've wondered about Asians lately is their shyness to speak English... I've encountered a number of people who say they can't speak or speak very little English, yet still manage conversation with them. Broken English doesn't bother me too much, as it's still easy to understand and I just speak it right back at people, even speaking slightly worse English then them sometimes. I'm especially impressed with Ratha's English, though the first time I met him he said he couldn't speak it, and Durgi/Sugin's mother said she spoke very little, yet we talked a bit the times I've been round here house...

Well I'm in the middle of some travels at the moment. Had a nice time in Borneo, though it was a shame NJ was quite busy, but I enjoyed my time round the water villages of BSB. It was also nice meeting Kate and Claire in Miri, and now my travels take me back to Port Dickson. I'm not really sure if I'm much of a traveller anymore, these two weeks of holidays are return trips to places I've been and to people I've met. The hours of loneliness on my travels on Monday sucked, how will I cope for fourteen hours going back to the UK? Maybe I just need a travel companion for now... but who?...

10/02/06 - After spending a wonderful week in Port Dickson, I've now started to wonder the differences about language learning abilities... After a week with Nadia and a few months with Rachel, I'm trying to think who's the better English speaker. Nadia is able to speak in full and formal sentences, where Rachel speaks a lot of broken English, yet Rachel has a larger vocabulary and is much easier to talk to (providing you speak broken-ish English back to her). I think it's much easier to speak a language just simply knowing the key-words rather than having to speak 'Queen's English', that's something you can try to master later on...

But also further to my point last week about Asian's shyness of speaking English, I find it a little strange in how Sumatri (Mazlan's wife) can understand English, but is unable to speak it. There wasn't much communication trouble between us, though she seemed to make Nadia do most of the talking to me, which made things a little strange when I was ordered around...

Other differences I'm starting the wonder are between Malays and Indians (forget the Chinese, they're just like Westerners...). Nora/Norsha's father (that's a point, haven't seen the twins in a while) doesn't like Malays as they're too secretive about things, and Mazlan doesn't like Indian's because of their egos... I'm not really sure on what to judge as I've spent more time with Indian's, though they do seem more open then Malays...

But just one last point on Malays, comparing them to Westerners, I still remember the conversation between me and Mazlan about me not 'joking' with a 15 year-old. This is a fair understanding lying all upon respect of a growing woman, but it's just such a horrid contrast into comparation of what a Western 15 year-old is worth. So lets just say the age is 16 (as some laws change at that point). So, Malaysians, can't joke with woman unless I marry one. Western, can just have sex whenever with however many and leave them to raise a child on their own (and just forget the age-16 barrier too)... Yeah, this is why I'm preferring Malaysian culture right now...

17/02/06 - So... Chris, Sam and Charlotte are all gone, all flying away from Malaysia in one go, all within a few days of each other. I'm sure all three will be missed by the church. I didn't see Chris a great deal over his time here, but we had some time together in Singapore and met over Christmas and last week, but I'm sure Mike, Sam and Nick will have the fondest memories of him going to the bar with him...

I was little taken aback by Sam's character at first, but once our problems cleared up we got on a lot better, though it's a shame it all happened towards the end. She did a lot of good work for the church, and I wish her good luck in the future... and Charlotte, it was great meeting her. She's done so many good things and has been to so many great places (and is still travelling for the next couple of months), and is even going to Tamil Nadu to do more work later on this year (possibly even with Sam). She's got some good aspirations and a good future set ahead for her...

So it's out with the old, and in with the new. With Charlotte gone, I'm now the new 'long running' Gapper (or former one atleast) in KL. From the stories I've heard, these new folk certainly seem more fiesty, especially from their jungle stories (where they got treated a lot better than us). This group is much younger than ours (no 'oldies' like Silja, 26, and Sam, 24), it's Club 18-20 (I think), but I think I preferred being with the older and more mature group.

We have Emily, Victoria (Care Work), Dave and John (Medical) in KL... I still find it crazy that John lives in the same area as me, not even a mile away. Despite this 'ASBO' World Challenge have tried to put on me, I think it'll be a tough challenge not bumping into someone who only lives down the street from me. I wonder if he knows all the cool people in Ashford that I know...

24/02/06 - I found two very interesting things whilst browsing through my Tamil dictionary (making every effort I can to speak to the mother of the flat I live in). The first find was Dhaevi, which means Goddess. I think the name Durgadevi is actually two words, so I'm guessing goddess is part of the name for the TW2 and Batu Cave Durgadevi's. And the other interesting find was the word Paavi, which means Sinner. Was Pavitiran meant to be born that way? And just one last stupid find, Hyena means Kazhudhie Puli, and translating those two words seperately creates Donkey and Tiger...

But it was nice to be told earlier in the week that my Tamil is improving. It's just a shame that it's really only this month that I've really been trying to learn Tamil, but then I have spent most of the rest of the time trying to learn to read it. I'm sure if I stick around at Taman Wahyu long enough, I should be able to fluently read Tamil by the end of my trip...