We Have Fleas

Seriously. We are both covered in big red itchy bites that are increasing exponentially. As I write, I have a tube of anti-itch cream beside me. I bought it 2 days ago. It is almost gone.

It all started in the jungle where I was bit almost to death, despite the use of repellent with deet and mosquito nets at night. For those of you that know me well, this is nothing too unusual as I have lived most of my life as a juicy biting insect magnet. Fine. Comes with the territory of being in the jungle where there are bugs absolutely everywhere.

So then we moved on to the big city of Kuala Lumpur where I thought that my itchiness was simply left over from the jungle and Scott thought I was probably overreacting (which I am known to do from time to time). That is until he woke up one morning and started scratching, and saw that between his armpit and hip on one side of his body he had thirty some bites!!

This revelation was followed with much internet research and msn conversations with people who have had previous bed bug experience and of course my mother the community health nurse with twenty some years of experience in third world countries. Her diagnosis...fleas. We are working to eradicate the problem.

Other News

On a happier note, we have had an interesting few days in Kuala Lumpur. We somehow managed to arrive here at the same time as the Formula One race, so the city was in a pretty festive mood for the weekend. There were all sorts of outdoor stages with live music and dance, fancy cars on display, free drinks and posters, and even a Miss Malaysia F1 contest. It was also unbelievably hot which drove us to seek out the safety of all places air conditioned. And I am embarrassed to say that once again took us to, you guessed it, the malls. But in our defense, going to the mall seems to be a national pastime in this part of the world and you know what they say about being in Rome and all.

Best thing to do in a mall when it is 40 degrees outside? Watch a movie of course. We saw the new Mr. Bean and laughed a lot. There is one scene involving an opera song that is just pure genius. So very very funny. An interesting aside about the movie theatre, everyone else also seeks relief from the heat in this manner and so getting tickets is a bit of a competitive sport. None of this showing up at the last minute and expecting a seat business. You need to line up long before the show or better yet, buy your tickets online. And, they assign seats and actually stick to it. Allow me to illustrate how we learned this:

One ridiculously hot day in Kuala Lumpur, Hav and Scott decided to go see a movie in the overly air conditioned mall. Looking at the listings, they saw a movie about to start in 10 min. Perfect. They decided to split up, Scott buying tickets and Hav buying some snacks. They meet up at the entrance and have a little conversation.

Scott: I think we got the last two seats in the theatre!
Hav: Really? How strange. It's 2 in the afternoon on a weekday!
Scott: Yeah and our seats aren't even together.
Hav: What!? We're not even sitting together? How are we supposed to share our corn in a cup? (yes - corn in a cup. A popular and tasty little Malaysian movie snack)
Scott: Oh don't worry. I'm sure nobody actually sits in their assigned seats.
Hav: Then why would they bother assigning seats?
Scott: Oh it will be fine.

Enter theatre and see that it' s only half full. Most prime seats in the middle of the theatre are free.

Scott: See? Look at all these great seats. Let's sit here.
Hav: What if someone comes in and has the ticket for these seats?
Scott: Nobody looks at their tickets! It will be fine.

Lights dim. Previews start. More people begin to enter, look at their tickets and take their seats.
Hav: Oh dear. They're coming over here.
Scott: No they're sitting over there. Relax.

Movie starts. Hav decides to relax. Another couple comes in, walks to the same row giving Hav and Scott dirty looks.

Hav: Oh sorry are we in your seat? We can move.
Scott: Just slide over so that we can all stay in this row.

Theatre is now almost completely full. Sure enough another couple follows the first and comes to the same row.

Hav: I'm sorry. There must be assigned seating. We didn't realize....

More dirty looks. Hav and Scott get up, look at their tickets and humbly make their way down to the first and second row where they are seated behind each other. The crowd begins to twitter and a few loud guffaws erupt. They are not laughing at the movie.

Another big event was spending a morning at the fancy Petronas towers ,the tallest twin towers in the world, (see above) where we got to watch a movie with 3D glasses on the construction of the towers along with some oil company propaganda. Scott has taken a liking to local picture posing customs as can be seen here with his 3D glasses.



This was followed by a trip to the viewing deck only halfway up, but pretty cool nonetheless. As I'm sure you've gleaned from the story above, Malaysians are real sticklers about rules and so our tour of the towers was organized to say the least. It was an elementary teacher's dream field trip: people sectioned off into color coded groups; lining up to watch a security film; then proceeding through security in an orderly fashion much like the stilted people shown on the film; riding the elevator in silence under the stern glare of the elevator lady who asks you to move away from the buttons; and looking out the observation windows for exactly ten minutes before the next colour coded group gets their turn. (Note the yellow neck band- yes we were in the yellow group)

We also braved the heat a few times and took some long walks through Little India, Chinatown, and into some of the older buildings in the area. Chinatown market by night.



On Friday we found saw a church near our hotel and decided to attend the Good Friday night service. We went up to the door and saw people entering the church in suits and ties. Oh dear. We decide to "follow the rules" this time and ran back to our place to dig out our "wedding clothes" from Guy and Anja's wedding. We race back to the church, go inside and realize we are seriously overdressed. The people in suits are on the stage. Everyone else is in their everyday clothes, jeans, shorts etc. We feel dumb.

Our highlight on Easter Sunday was a trip to see the Malaysian Philharmonic. We read about a dress code online and so this time we were suitably prepared. We were in our "wedding clothes" once again. The best we have got with us. I'm sure you can see where this is going. There was some mention about having proper shoes (no runners or flip flops). I had a few concerns about Scott's shoes falling somewhere pretty close to that runner category, but he assured me with a confident "It will be fine." When we go to buy our tickets, the lady gives us a quick once over and says we had better check with the ushers to see if they will let us in before we buy our ticket as they are non refundable. This was embarrassing. We made our way to the door of the hall and sure enough we don't make the cut on the basis of the shoes. Lucky for us they keep a few extras for just this purpose and Scott joined the line of other inappropriately dressed foreigners to exchange his footwear. Unfortunately, most Malaysian men have small feet so there were no shoes that fit Scott, but the lady at the coat check assured him that they didn't have to actually fit. As long as he could walk through the door that is all that mattered, and it would be fine if he just stepped down on the heel of the shoe. So we finally got in to see the Philharmonic and heard an absolutely beautiful performance of Elgar's Enigma Variations. And to top it all off we had yet another lesson in following the rules.

The shoes that saved the day.

Sunday proved to be a musical type of day as we then spent the evening wandering the ritzy section of town watching all the free live music that was there for the F1 (which by the way we didn't go to as we were too cheap). We saw 3 live jazz bands and had a good chat with a sax player from England who now lives in KL.

We also had fun watching the very rich, beautiful and possibly famous elegantly exit their cars (that probably cost as much as some small countries), and sip cocktails in romantic middle eastern inspired lounges. Meanwhile, Scott and I stood and watched from the sidewalk hand in hand soaking it all in, and occasionally reached to gently scratch a flea bite.