Fear Is NOT An Option -- Day 5.5 (WARNING: Explicit Content)

Sitting at the airport in Siem Reap, Cambodia about to board Malaysia Airline to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Yes, you read right Malaysia Airline to Kuala Lumpur, the morning after the downed Malaysia Airline plane over the Ukraine that was headed to Kuala Lumpur then on to Bali. Our exact flight pattern and destinations! WTF can we do?

Fear is not an option. My first thought was (of course) ‘Wow, we are at the center of it all, maybe we should file a report for someone when we reach the Kuala Lumpur airport!’ CNN? Al Jazeera? BBC? CNBC? Huffington Post? Okay, how about Babs Blabs?

Reporting Live (thank God) from Malaysia: “Things are quiet here this mourning as people are in shock at yet another downed Malaysia Airline plane. Passengers are being blessed by all forms of priest and monks before boarding the aircrapt. A traditional healer has been brought in to take the curse off Malaysia Airlines.”

#monksbelike

Monks be like: I'm coming, I'm coming

Monks be like: Blessings my child but that's my window seat

Nah, forget reporting, I’m on vacation.

My darling daughter is taking another Malaysian Air flight from Phnom Penh to Kuala Lumpur then to Bali—I’m more concerned for her than myself, but hopefully we will all end up at the beach in Bali having a wonderful time.

Actually no one here seems very concerned—we have a few flight delays but that will just give us more time to see Kuala Lumpur and their twin towers –The Petronas Towers.

One of the queens at airport

On another note--Why is there a big ass Dairy Queen at Siem Reaps little airport? Why not a Jackfruit Queen? Or an Angkor Queen? Never mind, one just walked by, dressed quite well I must say. Love your pumps girl!

Overheard Malaysia Airlines new theme:

“Because we suck, everyone can use our 1^st class lounge—if you can find it.”

BeAts

Made it safely to Malaysia on a horrible smelling plane. It was a scary, bumpy flight but my Dr. Dre noise reduction Beats headset (mine are BeAts) got me thru it.  They didn’t have much good music on the plane but I did take a walk down memory lane with Burt Bacharach’s Greatest Hits. (Hey that was the only name I recognized) OMG he must have written all the music of the 1960’s &  70’s! He wrote Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head and Walk On By to name a few. Dionne Warwick sang most of them. They deserve a lot more Respect (he didn’t write that) and admiration than we have remembered to give them.  Dionne Warwick was doing Whitney Houston before her little cousin was. Whitney was really Dionne-2.0.

I am where?

WTH. They are now telling us that our flight will be delayed by FIVE hours because as of July 1 planes cannot fly into the Indonesian airport between midnight and 6am. WTF They’ve known this since July 1 and they couldn’t have told us before now? An email, message on their site, a change when we look up our tickets? Something!

Now what? A ten hour layover?!

Oh, they are putting us all up in a hotel and there’s a special shuttle to take us there AND they will wake and pick us up in the morning? Ok, I forgive them the horribly smelling plane we just got off of. They are so nice about it all.

hotel

Wait, (screeching in my tracks) Oh no, all is not forgiven! It takes 40 minutes to get to the “hotel” and it is, to put it mildly—A SHIT HOLE! We ask the front desk what it would cost to go into the city. They tell us it’s too late (9pm) for public trans and a cab would cost us $100.

F-it take us back to the airport, we’d rather sleep standing up than stay here. Back on the bus…

racing luggage carts

At the airport there’s nothing to do so we play race the luggage carts and look for a bar—this is no small feat. After hours of wandering we find one in another terminal.  

Where's the bar?

We board our plane at 4:15am and it’s a pretty full flight. Yes, finally on our way to Bali. Greg & I aren’t seated together and, of course, I get a kid in the middle seat next to me. He’s about ten and keeps bumping and kicking and squirming—isn’t it past his bedtime?

Hopefully this plane will get us to paradise soon-–the one on earth (this is Malaysia Airlines I need to be specific.) 

We made it to paradise in spite of Malaysia Airlines.

Grade for Malaysia Airline: a big fat F-

I understand that you lost a plane this morning, which was absolutely NOT your fault (the other one earlier this year was your fault.) If you are upset, which no body seemed to be, then ground your fleet and get it together. We will understand, really we will. 

But is it too much to ask that you clean the plane before each flight? The plane from Siem Reap to Kuala Lumpur smelled like (excuse me if this is offensive) deep fried funky azz crack! I was hoping someone would fart to freshen the air. The second flight from Kuala Lumpur to Bali had horrible service. I was given hot water to drink and when I asked for another it had something floating in it. Hmm maybe I’m not that thirsty.

My advice dear travellers: Don’t fly Malaysia Airlines, not because it may fall out of the air but because you may fall out in the air.

Africa Is Everywhere -- Day 4.5

My tour guides

I’d asked Kidist when she first went to Cambodia if people were amazed to see an African-American. (It had been 40+ years since the Viet Nam war.) “Not really,” she told me, “because the people are so dark themselves that dark skin is not unusual.” Now I see what she means, most of the people (especially in Siem Reap) are darker than African-Americans. They also have flatter African noses and straight thick (Indian type) hair. Sometimes I’d have to do a double take, cause I thought I saw someone from the ‘hood’ aka ‘America.’ They are not all dark, some of them are pale, but the blacker ones intrigue me. Mother Africa always smiles through her children…and we are ALL her children, some of us just look more like her.

I  know, I know, you're darker than me. 

I slept in today and in the afternoon I go to see a floating village on Tonle Sap River, the Chong Khneas village. One of my tour guides thinks it’s funny that I say I’m Black because he is so dark that when he puts his arm against mine he is so much darker than I am. This cracks him up. Then the lighter guide puts his arm against mine and says, ‘Me too” and yes, he too, is darker than I am (even in my now most tanned state.) They are loving the fact that they are blacker than me—so I change the subject!

When I tell them I’m from Chicago they say that they love Obama cause he is a friend to their president and to the Cambodian people. They also know about Lake Michigan and the great lakes. They know they are fresh water lakes and that they go up to Canada. This from a guy who says he’s only done six years of school so far. (We definitely need a better education system in the U.S.A.)

I have a lot of fun with my three guides, one who looks like he is about 12 years old but says he’s 16. They say that’s how Cambodians are--small but old.

Solar panel

The floating village was interesting—people living on boats but they still have phones and televisions. There are floating markets, schools, churches, a police station and even floating basketball courts. Many people use generators but bigger places are using SOLAR PANELS! America is beginning to seem a little 3^rd world to me…

He looks 12 to me!

Rasta 

Police Station with 2 hammocks

We make stop at one of the floating NGO’s that supports kids that were orphaned from a tsunami type flood.  They have large 50 & 30 pound bags of rice and/or candy you can buy for them.  Everyone usually buys rice for them, but I of course bought them candy. I know everyone is thinking ‘those poor kids need rice for nutrition’ yeah but they are kids and they also need candy. After your purchase your boat takes you to the school to give them your gift. When Greg bought the rice he just went to the class room to the school room and gave the bag to the teacher, who hardly looked up from her work. All the children say ‘thank you’ as they continue to work from their books. But with the candy I went to each kid and let them pick out what they wanted. I got to meet and interact with each child and they were a lot more interested and happy about my candy donation. So HA, candy wins out!

One of my guides asks me if I am on Facebook and if he could friend me. Even in a remote floating village people are on Facebook.  Zuck, Zuck, Zuckerberg you ARE the man, even in Seim Reap, Camboda!

Dinner, drinks and YES another foot massage, this time $4 for an hour plus free beer and a short shoulder/neck massage. I really could get use to this….