Once all of us had left the tranquillity of Pulau Tioman we hopped on a boat and a couple buses and made our way all the way to little big Singapore. Arriving at this city state, I always feel a bit intimidated. The first thing you get to see is this medieval looking fortress of an immigration point, that screams at you from every corner, that you’ll get your head chopped off for trafficking drugs. Not that I do that. Nor do I spit on the floor or chew some gum or dance naked in the streets. But I find it still a bit unsettling.

All these years of travelling has basically made me an unsurpassed organizational wizard. So I just put it down to plain coincidence that the first ever Formula 1 night race happened at that same weekend that I decided to visit Singapore with my family. Room prices soared and sometimes more than doubled. First I thought it isn’t all that bad. Might even get to see some of that race, while the girls went shopping, but in the end we only heard the race from time to time. Since you’re not actually supposed to see the race for free the Singaporeans came up with public hearings as opposed to public viewings like we had during the world cup in Germany.

Singapore is an awesome place. You get the world’s best zoo and just next door the Night Safari, which is basically a zoo as well. You just go there at night. You get colonial history and some of the best shopping in the world, both for girls and for boys. You get skyscrapers next to 150 year old Chinese temples, souvenir shops in Hindu temples and some of the best food courts worldwide. And then of course there is the Raffles and its famous Long Bar. This is the place to come when you just can’t take the cleanliness anymore. Order yourself a Singapore Sling, which was created in that very bar, and kick back eating peanuts and throwing the shells on the floor. Don’t worry, doing that is even encouraged and it just feels so good! At 22 Dollars a cocktail it doesn’t come cheap though!

Have a look at some of the images we took during our stay there:

Tigers

Animal

Family

Family

Animal

Parrot

Butterfly

BBQ

Tiger

Animal

Kangaroo

Kangaroo

Long Bar

Emu

Long Bar

Orang Utan

Elephant

So after a couple days of being a tourist, the holiday was over for my brother and me. We had to tend to some matters concerning our furniture import business, while my mum and Ji-Young went on a shopping spree that had Singapore buzzing for days on end…

My brother works at the airport in Munich and he gets good travel deals out of it, so when we arrived at their hotel in KL I couldn’t believe my eyes. The thing stood almost next to the Petronas Towers and the lobby was all marble and people calling me ‘Sir’ although I was still in my terrorist disguise. I have to say I did feel a bit uncomfortable, so the first thing I did in that shiny bathroom was shave, head and beard. And maybe shopping wasn’t such a bad idea after all!

In the few days we all stayed in KL we did the usual things. Went to Masjid Jamek, or Little India, had a look at Chinatown, strolled around the Gardens and went up onto the bridge that connects the two Petronas Towers. Mostly we ate, though. KL is one of Asia’s food capitals. We had Korean food, Chinese and Malay food, Dim Sum, Sate sticks and Mee in all its different forms.

Then we’ve had enough of the big city and decided on a little holiday excursion to Pulau Tioman before heading on to Singapore. Pulau Tioman is the largest and most developed island on mainland Malaysia’s east coast, which I thought might be nice for my mum. There’s not much to write about that time. It was just brilliant beach life filled with good food, shy monkeys, bold monitor lizards, waterfalls and large bonfires on the beach. Here are some pics:

Beach

Crab

Footprint

Sunset

Mum

Brothers

Accomodation

Food

Family

Waterfall

Waterfall

Beach

I still had 7 weeks’ worth of beard stuck to my face and my clothes had more holes than Swiss cheese and, although freshly laundered, they looked filthy. During my time on the Togeans my backpack and all my clothes (I only wore my board shorts and my sarong) had started to slowly rot and I had been too busy to notice with all the fishing and snorkelling going on. As I ran through the airport, heavily veiled women shook their heads in disapproval, worried mothers pulled their children out of my path and policemen started fondling their weapons thinking I might be a badly disguised terrorist. But none of this stopped me and even though I was half an hour late neither my mum, my brother nor my sister-in-law were waiting for me.

When they finally came out, all tired from their long flight, the apprehension was gone. After the hellos and the hugs I was very firmly told by the two ladies that I was so lucky they were here and that we were going to go shopping the next day. I absolutely love shopping…

I’m back from the Togeans, just in case somebody wondered where I’ve been hiding this last month. 30 days without internet, without cars or motorbikes, without mobile reception, without luxury but with heaps of rustic charm and some of the nicest locals I have ever met.

Although I spent so long on Pulau Kadidiri, there really isn’t that much to tell. Most days I got up early in the morning to go fishing with Aka, the owner of my homestay. We’d catch huge Barracudas, 4 kg heavy Jackfish, occasionally a Kingfish and sometimes a Tuna. Once I had a shark on the line, but it got away, which I was quite glad about. It bit through the wire at the end of the line and ran off with our only lure, though, which I was quite unhappy about. From then on we only got smaller fish to eat.

In the mornings I read a lot in the hammock, went snorkeling or spearfishing just in front of my bungalow or played chess. After a lunch of fresh grilled fish we’d take the boat and snorkel one of the few atolls dotted around or visited a sea gypsy village. Around 5pm we went out for another fishing trip and the evening was reserved for lots and lots of chess games with beer, arak and kretek followed quite often by a fire on the beach with some more arak.

One day some of us staying at Lestari took a boat over to Una Una, the local volcano and climbed it. First we went through a dry river bed and then followed the little stream up to the crater rim. From there we abseiled down into the crater, hiked through a swamp and some jungle and finally reached the place where it’s all happening. Sulphur clouds wafted into the air, the sun beat down on us and the active volcano, which last erupted in 1983, started frying my feet from below. We just took a couple snapshots and started the 3 hour journey back. I’m not sure what it is with hiking and me but I lost again a couple toenails, even though I was wearing flip-flops, and had problems walking for a full two days, probably because of the flip-flops.

Here’re some images from the last month…

After such a long time in just one place I was really sad to leave, but I know I’ll go back someday. I didn’t have time to go diving after all…

Martin, my guide for two days

We stopped for about an hour in Kete Kesu, a traditional Torajan village. Here many people still live in the traditional houses with their distinct roofs. The ancestors of the Torajan people came from the north over the sea and they started to build their houses to resemble the ships they sailed on.

A hanging grave that has fallen down

Farmers bringing in the harvest

Martins children

Tau-Tau guardians

The meal was absolutely delicious…

You can find more photos from Tana Toraja here.

A traditional Torajan funeral is a big event for the local people in Tana Toraja. Relatives have usually been saving up for a long time to be able to buy water buffaloes and pigs to be sacrificed during the funerals. For this reason the deceased will be given their own room in a house and are considered still alive until the actual funeral.

Depending on which class the family is from, a funeral can last from a day to a week and the amount of animals to be sacrificed varies also. A family from the low class might only sacrifice 2 buffaloes and a few pigs. A middle class funeral will usually last 3 days and during its course maybe 15 buffaloes will be sacrificed. People from the high class might sacrifice 100 or even 200 buffaloes over the course of a week.

The price of a buffalo starts at about 20 million Rupiah, which is around 2000 USD or 1400 EUR. The price then rises steeply the bigger and the more white a buffalo is, reaching around 100 million in some cases.

The beginning of a funeral day normally starts with the sacrifice of a couple buffaloes. While friends or family members cut up the animals, processions of other family members take place. They receive food and tea or coffee in a special building and move to their allocated temporary built shelters after a while to make place for other family members.

Every group of family brings their own gifts of animals, but not all animals necessarily get sacrificed. At the end of the day every family member will be given a piece of meat from the sacrificed animals.

The majority of Torajans are Protestants and they don’t see any conflict between their old traditional animistic beliefs and their relatively new religion. I wonder, though, what the protestant church has to say on that matter.

The Torajan people are very welcoming and don’t mind at all that hordes of tourists come to watch their traditional funerals. They rather see it as a sign of respect for the dead. Although tourists aren’t required to bring a buffalo or a pig as a gift, every person has to bring something, a carton of cigarettes being the most popular choice it seems.

Below is a short video from the funeral I attended. The deceased woman originated from the middle class and had been dead for about a year.

You can find more photos from Tana Toraja here.

These four girls from the little village of Lamalera wanted their picture taken, but always got scared and ran off. Eventually they managed to stand still for a few seconds.

In Asia you see a lot of girls, kids themselves, looking after their younger siblings. They expertly carry them around on the hip, pick them up after they fell over and feed them rice and some fish.

These two cheeky boys in Dili wouldn’t stop talking. All I could understand was ‘photo’ once in a while. They seemed like tough little cookies. I suppose they would have to be living in one of the many refugee tent cities.

After a few weeks enjoying life as a couch potato in the hostel lounge I grabbed the chance to go hiking with a couple of guys from my hostel room. I was gonna climb up Ben Lomond with Jack aka Clumsy Monkey Boy, an Englishman, and Kevin, the original Flying Dutchman. Now, Ben Lomond was Kevin’s choice and Jack and I just went along for the ride. I would have been quite happy strolling along the lake for a few hours, so Ben Lomond was like running a marathon with no training whatsoever. Anyway, Benny Boy, as his friends call him, is right behind Queenstown and towers about 1400 meters above it, his total height being around 1748 meters.

The day we left started quite badly really. All of us were thrown out of our hostel. We were assured that we hadn’t done anything to warrant that move, but we still have to be out by Saturday. Apparently long termers make for an awful atmosphere. Bummer really, but it gave me lots to curse about when the going got tough on the mountain. The walk is advertised as being about 6 to 8 hours return from the top of Queenstown Gondola. Add to that about 2 hours return to the Gondola and you end up with 8 to 10 hours altogether. We did it in 6.5 (including lots of breaks) from the hostel reception to the refreshing jump into the icy lake at the end of the walk. That either shows that my fitness level is a lot higher than I thought it was or, what’s more likely, that the Kiwis are quite conservative in their estimates.

The scenery was really stunning and the beer on the summit the best I’ve ever had, even if it was out of a can. At points I was ready to give up, but a few well aimed curses helped me through that and it was well worth it in the end. It was an awesome day and that just shows that the best things in life are for free, even in the money eating city that is Queenstown. Here are some images from the hike…