All posts by Rebecca Michelle

Educator, traveler, reader, blogger. Loves learning, black coffee, and friendly people.
Travel Guide

Travel Guide: Kuching x2

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I left Malaysia in the spring of 2015. I hadn’t been back until four girlfriends and I decided to take a quick weekend trip to Kuching, a wonderful town in Sarawak, one of the two Malaysian states on Borneo.

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I visited the area once before (though my photos are way better this time, thanks to a fancy camera) and was excited to go back. Other than booking flights and a hotel, the entirety of our planning took place in the airport.

Friends: What are we doing in Kuching?
Me: Seeing the orangutans.
Friends: Anything else?
Me: Eating. Drinking tuak.
Friends: Cool. Anything else?
Me: Last time, I visited the Annah Rais Longhouse. Really enjoyed it and would go back, but I really don’t mind. It’s a nice town to wander through.
Friends: Sounds good.

And that was that!

As promised and planned, Semenggoh Nature Reserve was the highlight of our trip. We arrived in time for the morning feeding, which begins around nine. I love rainforests (or any forests) and enjoyed the walk to the reserve’s feeding platform.

The purpose of Semenggoh is to teach rescued or orphaned orangutans how to live in the wild, so the orangutans really only come to the reserve for a meal when there’s no food in the forest. They mostly stay away during fruiting season. My last visit was in October and we saw groups of orangutans during both feeding times, but this time around wasn’t as lucky. We did see the resident crocodiles, though!

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We also saw some really cool pitcher plants, which are really fun to look at because a) they’re carnivorous and b) they come in a surprisingly wide array of sizes. We didn’t know it at the time, but we were going to learn more about them later in the day.

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One friend and I decided to leave the reserve on foot, doubling back on the one kilometer path we’d followed on the way in. The rest of the gang went ahead in a car and I thought we’d meet at the gate to decide what to do for the rest of the morning. Since we hadn’t seen any orangutans, we agreed to return to Semenggoh for the afternoon feeding but that was as far as we’d planned.

When my friend and I got to the bottom, however, our other friends were nowhere in sight. We asked the guard if he’d seen them and he gestured vaguely down the road, telling us they’d walked. One look at the two-lane shoulder-less highway convinced us otherwise. We waited 15 minutes and then, as if answering an unspoken cry, a man in a small purple car pulled up and asked if we needed a ride.

We looked at each other. Yes, we did. We got into the car and asked him to take us to the closest town in the direction of Kuching. The hornbill statue indicated that we’d arrived in Padawan and the man in the purple car, who may or may not have been a taxi/Grab, drove off.

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We went immediately to the closest hawker for bowls of soup and noodles and cups of strong coffee. After lunch, we saw a sign for a pitcher plant museum, so of course we went!

Padawan was also home to a wonderful market. I love markets in all forms and we leisurely wandered through it, wishing we could buy some vegetables and take them home. I was less enthralled with the fish and meat, but that’s local life.

The market was also exciting because the lady selling jewelry told us she’d seen our friends! They’d been looking for a short one and tall one, they told her, and that certainly described us. And truly, how likely was it that two groups of white women wandering through a wet market in a tiny town in Borneo didn’t know each other? The woman knew they were heading back to Semenggoh and we went off to join them. The woman didn’t know, however, how we should get back. There was no bus, she told us, and while I had my phone, I didn’t intend to turn it on to call a Grab.

Luckily, my friend talks to literally anybody and after we stood on a corner for a few minutes and tried making eye contact and looking friendly and in need of help, she walked up to a man and asked how to get a taxi. Someone else overheard and told us he’d give us a ride. We followed him to his white truck and hopped in. We looked at each other. All I could think was, “Oh gosh, her husband will kill me if she doesn’t get back!” How I stayed alive in that scenario, I’m not quite sure.

But the man was lovely and pointed out several landmarks along the way. He took us exactly where we needed to be and even agreed to take our money after we asked twice. After all, we would have paid a taxi! We were greeted by our friends and a really cute lizard!

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We saw another neat lizard later on . . .

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. . . and then were back in forest looking for orangutans. In Malay, “orang utan” means “people of the forest” and that’s exactly what they are. Watching the orangutans is breathtaking because it’s like watching evolution. It’s watching yourself in a different form. Watching the orangutans play and interact leaves no doubt that we are very close relatives and that they have been around for a long time. Visiting the orangutans at Semenggoh was, and remains, the single most amazing experience I’ve had in Southeast Asia.

We took a very long bus ride back to Kuching and agreed that we probably should have turned on the cellular data and taken a Grab, mostly because we were all hot and tired by that point. The walk along the water from the bus station, however, which we repeated in the opposite direction the next morning, was really lovely and I was not sorry to end the afternoon there. Orangutans and boats, all in one day!

In addition to being located on the Sarawak River, which I like very much, Kuching is home to brightly colored buildings and a few cat statues (because “kuching” is the Malay word for “cat”) . . .

. . . and a great array of street art. I liked that very much, too!

Our wandering through the street art district took us to a few lovely cafés and one of the proprietors suggested we check out the Textile Museum. We did, and were pleasantly surprised at the range of artifacts on display. Since we decided to have an easy coffee morning and not visit a longhouse, the textiles provided us with a glimpse of traditional life that I think is important for any trip to Sarawak.

And, of course, there were temples. We only stopped into one and it was lovely and colorful, which is really the best way I can describe the city of Kuching itself.

All in all, it was a great weekend. Kuching is a quick hour and twenty minutes from Singapore and there are cheap flights that leave after work. It was fun to be back in Malaysia both because of what I remembered (accurately and inaccurately) and what I’d forgotten. It’s fun to experience a bit of your own past every now and then.

But most importantly, this trip to Kuching was a great break from real life with a wonderful group of women. Thanks, ladies!

Singapore

Along Geylang Road

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Sometimes Singapore feels like the rest of Southeast Asia. I live in Geylang, a neighborhood heavily steeped in Malay culture and historically also Singapore’s red light district. When I tell Singaporeans where I live, they’re often initially skeptical and it usually takes a second before people remind themselves that “it’s a lot better now.” And when that takes too long, people are usually satisfied once I qualify “I live in Geylang” with the specific intersection and local landmark across the street. It’s kind of like talking to people who have only experienced the New York City of the 1980s or who once visited a cousin on Staten Island (sorry, Staten Island).

Due to its Malay history and heritage, Geylang Road is also home to the Hari Raya night market that lasts through the month of Ramadan, similar to the Deepavali market that I always like visiting in Little India. I watched lights appearing for a week before the market started and wandered down the street last Sunday night to see what there was to see.

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(Spoiler alert: There was a lot to see!)

The night market sells everything, as night markets do. Most of it was inside tents and pavilions under absolutely garish floodlights. There were stalls selling clothing and shoes . . .

. . . home goods . . .

. . . henna and other accessories . . .

. . . and fun decorations. . . .

And then there was the carnival for kids with a range of prototypical carnival rides like a carousel, little roller coaster, flying animal rides, and bumper cars. The whole thing reminded me of the summer fairs at home, though without the prizewinning animals on display.

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And, of course, there were lights everywhere, including the interior of Geylang Serai Market to match the exterior festivities:

My favorite part, though, which is true of every market, carnival, fair, or general mass gathering of humanity, was the food. I was too busy with my camera to buy anything but I loved the sheer variety of offerings. One learns a lot about a people and culture from food choices, and I loved the diversity of offerings at the Hari Raya night market. Globalization at its finest.

Shout out to these two guys who saw me taking a picture of their sign and couldn’t help but wave hello:

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One can say a lot about Singapore – that it’s sterile, repressive, oppressive, and dictatorial are common criticisms. But Singapore is also a place where different groups are allowed to celebrate who they are and invite everyone else along with them. In my experience here, though taxi drivers and older Singaporeans often tell a different story, there’s a real love of multiculturalism here. Perhaps manufactured, perhaps gilded rather than golden, but it’s there. And I’m glad.

Ramadan Mubarak, from Geylang Road.

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On My Mind

On Happiness

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I’m teaching the culture part of a unit on sociocultural psychology. We talk about values and norms and the ways that people in different cultures remember, learn, and express what they know. We talk about learning how to behave in our own cultures and becoming part of new cultures. We talk about expectations. We talk about what it means to be happy.

Most of the time, happiness for me actually means contentment. It means feeling okay with and good about what’s happening immediately around me. Less “Wow, how awesome!” and more “This is really nice.” In the book How Emotions Are Made Lisa Feldman Barrett explains that there’s a difference between North American “happy happy joy joy” and East Asian tranquility and equanimity. We don’t all conceive of happiness in the same way and those differences are very important for the way we view the world. I was in the musical You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown back in high school and the closing number, “Happiness,” got me every time.

Though we sometimes forget it in the age of Instagram, Buzzfeed Top Ten lists, and selfie sticks, happiness is in simplicity.

I’ve been thinking about that a lot recently. Several times over the last few weeks, a conversation from half a year ago has returned to mind. I was with a friend who I’ve only seen once or twice since, neither of us speaking much that day. We were both concerned with and unsettled by the future. We were uncertain. Jobs, choices, change, moving, moving on. After some moments of silence, my friend asked, “What makes you happy?”

I remember it took me several seconds to respond. I remember the knot in my stomach and how I had to acknowledge it, experience it, and admit to it before I could let it go. I was not feeling happy in that moment and answering the question took time.

“Lots of things,” I replied, intellectually knowing this was the right answer even if I couldn’t quite feel it.

“Like what?”

“Oh, you know, things.” It took a moment, but there’s a lot to be said for state-dependent memory (and learning). Once the ideas came, they came quickly. “The smell of coffee. Sunny mornings with a breeze. Being outside. Books. Writing. Taking pictures. Being with friends and family. Intimate moments. Traveling. Learning new things. Delicious vegetables. Making food for people.”

That conversation has come back to me strangely often in the last few weeks. I’ve been experiencing a sort of mental shift, I think, one that started when I was in Europe at the beginning of April. Over the last month, I’ve grown more accustomed to the calm and quiet that my mind has found. Sometimes I find myself feeling okay in a situation or with thoughts that would have bothered me just weeks ago. This is good.

Maybe this is what it means to grow up. Maybe there’s wisdom in letting go, in observing, and in accepting today without judgment. There certainly seems to be freedom there. The only thing I know for sure is that a better version of myself is one who sees happiness in all the small moments that occur every day, and I’m glad to be there right now.