Is Traveling Easy?

Monsoon season in Kuala Lumpur

If you can carry a 30-40 pound backpack to and from transit stations and you’re not shy to ask questions or for directions, then yes, the travel portion should be easy. You already quit your job, left your home, sold and stored your things, and said goodbye to your friends. Everyone’s well wishes, travel stories, itinerary questions, and jealous teasings have already given you the energy to start the journey in what you feel is your right state of mind. You met interesting travelers, befriended many locals, saw amazing things, read books you thought you would never have time to, and have funny stories about that time you got ripped off by a taxi driver, again. 

Foodie Friday

Enjoying our 75 cent lunch in Jogyakarta

We LOVE to eat.  We love food. We love talking about food, eating great food, cooking nice meals, and telling stories of meals we’ve eaten with others.  As such, we introduce you to Foodie Friday, where we bring you gastronomic delights from half way around the globe.

Just because we are on a tight budget doesn’t mean we aren’t eating well.  In fact, cheap, good food is one of the reasons we came over to this part of the world.  Indonesia has been filled so far with lots of fruit, rice, noodles, curries, chicken, pork and fish.

Kiasu

On Day 2 in Singapore, Amando asked our host (and his old college roommate) Chris….”what’s the word you once told me for someone who is at a buffet and keeps piling food on their plate so that they don’t miss out on anything?”  Chris answered, “kiasu”.  “YES!”, yelled Amando.  Then quickly turned to me in the backseat and said “that’s the word I’ve been wanting to call you ever since I heard it 10 years ago!”  Insert eye roll from the back seat and laughter from the front of the car.  Chris went onto explain that we should all have a little bit of Kiasu in us, for it also means “fear of missing out on life”.  Wikipedia describes Kiasu as a Hokkien (a Chinese spoken variant) word that literally means ‘fear of losing’.  Many of you that know me well are either at this point shaking your head “yes” in agreement or laughing at how spot on this description is of me.  So I will indulge you… 

Snap Shots Along the Way

Cremation Procession

Pulling out a camera to capture moments isn’t always convenient when you’re trying to remain in the moment. Plus it rains often and the camera is heavy, so perhaps laziness is the more appropriate excuse. Still, every now and then I don’t feel like a tourist. The other day Erika went into a shop to purchase a much needed t-shirt. The one’s she had brought on the trip were all dark, and a lighter colored one was required. I sat on the sidewalk and people watched.

Its raining

Well its raining.  But the rain is good because it means you sit under a roof, on the beach and meet new friends.  And its nighttime which means you also drink Bintang beer and play cards games….new Dutch card games you learn from you new Canadian friend.

We are currently on Gili T, a tiny island (in a set of three), off the coast of Lombok, the island east of Bali, for those of you that haven’t memorized the 17,000 islands in the Indonesian Archipelago.  🙂  We will be here for one more day, circumvent the island (which should take all of 3 hours), then head back to Bali, specifically Ubud.

Traveling has been good to us so far.  We started off in Singapore with Amando’s roommate from college, Chris.  Please see Amando’s FB page for awesome photobooth pictures they took together.  Starting the trip off with a friend was priceless.  Singapore is beautiful, lush, metropolitan, and the food!  OH the food!  We had, if I remember correctly, about 6 different kinds of cuisine.  After 5 days in a big city, it was off to Bali to start using some of those Marriott points.  And since then its been beach, beer, good friends, sun, and lots of walking.  We’ve quickly discovered that we: a) don’t like moving around as much as we thought, b) its important not to by a return boat ticket before you are sure that you will in fact, return, c) plans can change literally in a matter of hours, d) and that the snorkeling/diving around here is like looking down into an aquarium.

Look for some pictures coming soon and please feel free to share with your friends and family!  We are also hoping to, at some point, have guests posts involving others who have done similar things to us (traveled, fulfilled a dream, etc), so if you have anyone in mind, please send us an email.  We hope to inspire all of you, as so far, we have inspired ourselves.  We are incredibly grateful to be here and thank all of you for what you did to help us get here!