Penang, Malaysia

Almost missed the connection at HK. Thought 70minutes would be long enough, but only JUST: with yet another x-ray and hoards of mainland Chinese in the way and jumping the line. I did make it to the plane (second Cathay Pacific flight I'd been on that day) to find the seats on this one were just as awful as the last flight. Lots of leg room, but there was a bit at the back of the bottom seat cushion that chafed my rear end for the entire flight. Quite a contrast to the Business Class upgrade on the flight from Taipei to Seoul, which was SWEET! Nice smiley service, but even my jaded color palate rebels against the batik-inspired turquoise and green of MH.

Malaysia has a colonial history, which may be apparent from this roadsign. Which placename does not fit with the others, children?

OK: it's Malaysia, so the immigration forms were the usual ones cunningly psychologically designed to weed out miscreants. "Are you bringing in illegal drugs?" Why would anyone with a greater than room temperature IQ (and yes, I am talking Celsius) even ASK that question? A different KIND of "stupid" is required to ask this one: "Have you visited any countries that the WHO has designated as centres for H1N1 virus? Yes or no? If you are caught lying you are liable to imprisonment." WTF?? YES or NO??? I am on a plane in mid-flight: I can not "phone a friend", nor look it up on the web. So what to do? Hmmm... I just put a big "?" in the middle and said I had no clue, as I was not a member of WHO, and listed the countries I had been in, in the last seven days. Seemed to work. This was a recurring theme throughout my trip: customers doing a quick thermometer check of the forehead or ear, and asking in a big form if I had stayed in "any countries that the WHO has...". Again, I don't have Peter Townsend's phone number, plus by the end of the trip, the local death toll from H1N1 went from 18 to 36, and I was pointedly writing "Malaysia" down as my guess at a WHO designated flu hotspot.

Anyway: got out of customs in Penang with no issues, and met my old friends Dave and Damian who had booked me into the G Hotel on Gurney Drive, Penang. More anon.

Tijuana Trip

I've been to Mexico (Mexico City, Guadalajara and Chihuahua) many times before, and have never had any difficulties in getting into the country; even doing some development work for a short time over there. However, two months back, I had my first time being driven into Mexico, via Tijuana. I had not anticipated any difficulties, after asking our local rep firm the week before "Will there be any problems?".

The first hint of trouble was when we could not find anywhere to park, to go through the documentation procedures. "They've gotten rid of all the parking spaces!" said Rick (the driver), so we parked in a zone where it was clearly marked "Do not park here", and Rick coughed up $10 to a shifty-looking guy who held a sign saying "I will watch your car and make sure nothing happens to it". The art of the grift: and we were just 100feet into Mexico! Then we found out (with Mexican immigration's poor English and my awful Spanish) that I needed a "Letter of Invitation" from the company I was visiting. We finally got one faxed through and 2 hours later were on our way. During my time in the office I noticed that all the notices were in Spanish, except for the one taped to the table saying "Non-US citizens must have a letter of introduction", but since you would have to come here to read that it was hardly a pair pre-warning.

Anyway, $23 each got of us a short-term visa and on we went into Tijuana: which was as poor and run-down as anywhere I've been in Mexico. The cops were going round in pairs, since the recent arrest of a druglord had angered the local cartels so much they had started shooting up police stations. Godspeed to all those non-corrupt, hardworking Mexican cops.

Lunch with the customer was interesting: Mexican version of Chinese food (wantons like dried vermicelli). I had to warn one of my companions, as she was about to put ice in her glass and fill it with soda. "Just drink it out of the bottle". A lot of people make the same mistake - avoiding the tapwater like crazy, but forgetting what goes into the ice, and what is used to wash the glasses.

Later that day, we drove back fine into the US: slow but no real hold-ups. I also noticed for the first time all the carefully-bilingual signs and notifications on the way back, paid for care of the US taxpayer.

Safe travels! Des