hello from australia...

Only seven people I think requested that I keep blogging here, but I thought i'd do it anyway (although not that often as jonny pays for internet as it is used) as I've become accustomed to it...



Having a great time, very different to Malaysia, very Western... we've been eating a lot, but thankfully doing a fair bit of sport (swimming and tennis)....



We went to a big park in the city today called king's park, which was very nice... it was myself, jonny, and jenny (another leicester friend doing the same thing as jonny)...



We're going away for 5 days to Margaret River which is to the south for a long weekend of lazing on the beach, surfing, wine tasting and bush adventures...



Photos below are of the chapel in the college here, first one is a big of an exposure experiment by myself, and underneath that is how it actually looks...



normal view...

time to go...

I've just finished packing and I leave for the airport in about an hour... had a really amazing time here... I went to the mosque in Shah Alam this morning, which is the biggest mosque in malaysia... it was very peaceful (probably because I was one of a small handful of people in the massive building...)



I've had three people tell me that they wish me to keep blogging for the next two weeks in australia, however i'm not entirely convinced that this is a high enough number... leave a comment if you want me to... if i get up to 10 i'll definately do it :-)



Just enough time to say that i love Malaysia and will hopefully come back some time... (I tried to work out last night if i can save enough in the next year (without having to get a job!!) to come back next summer... but sadly I don't think i can... maybe i'll have to seek paid employment...

farewell...

At alpha last night we had my farewell party... similar to Todd's last week... it was a very nice and memorable occaision... although it has made me begin to realise that I am actually going somewhere... which, when i think about it, makes me feel a little sad... not so much because I' m leaving... as I've left places before and I know its not the end of the world... I'm also heading down to australia for two weeks to see jonny, which I'm very excited about... but sad more so because I feel like I may never see my Malaysian friends again... as i said last night the guys in this house have been like my family for the last six weeks, and its not nice to leave family... the reason for the photo (mr bean's teddy bear) is because this is my farewell gift from Bih Kai and the other guys... Malaysia is absolutely crazy about mr Bean (in fact when Dave Irvine was here they all thought he looked like mr Bean..!) and as a result i've really enjoyed re-living childhood memories of watching mr bean at my grandparents house whenever my sister and I went to visit them...

Among the things I will miss about Malaysia are... Todd... the crazy little bucket shower thingy! If you don't know what I'm talking about you can read about it in an earlier post ("the most unusual shower and breakfast").... the collectivist culture (a refreshing change from the individualistic west)... the guys in the house (who like i said have been my family here)
... my student friends... Keng Yin (and her passion for giving and serving)

All this being said, despite the fact my bags are already packed, I still have a couple of (busy) days left so I might find the time to post again before I go... also... my mum has asked me to keep blogging in Australia... I'm not sure whether or not I will, it depends on my public... If you wish me to do so, please leave a comment to tell me you do....

final week...

I'm halfway through my final week... with only four days to go (busy days though which is good)... I'm going to work my way backwards to bring you up to date...

...so today (wednesday) Chuen Hoe and I have just got back from having lunch with Siaw Chian and Ching Siew in campus (in the Science faculty cafe - which i hadn't eaten at before - good stuff). It was a fun lunch as we ate slowly and chatted lots... we talked about some of the stuff we went over last night in English Class and we talked about why we like to study our respective degrees (Ching Siew and Siaw Chian - chemistry, Chuen Hoe - Engineering, Myself - psychology)... I'm glad Chuen Hoe came with me as it would have been a little strange meeting people on my own without Todd I think...

Earlier today kelvin and I marvelled at Psalm 73 (possibly my favourite... click here) and how relevant it is to our lives... verse 28 is actually going to be our vision verse in Leicester Uni Christian Uni until next easter... we also talked about different issues and temptations that we face as students in our differing countries... I told Kelvin that the writer (a guy called Asaph) goes through three different thought processes in the pslam - envy, bitterness and thankfulness... After reading through it Kelvin corrected me and informed me that there area actually five - envy, bitterness, acknowledgement of guilt, thankfulness and desire to tell others... all in all a good study :-)



Last night I had my last English class (but not the last english class, Keng Yin has found someone to teach after i leave... Praise God for this as we weren't sure what was going to happen) and although I had to lead it alone (as Todd has gone) and although it was a little frightening... it went really well, we had 15 people including myself and had some really good conversations... I invited everyone along to alpha on thursday, please pray that they would come...



So my time in Redang... redang is a paradise island, and in the opinions of a lot of people I've spoken to, the most beautiful island in Malaysia... we (me and JR) arrived at about 11 o'clock on Sunday morning, and all of the tiredness of the sleepless night on the bus was forgotten as we both got very excited to see the white sand and turquoise water... we checked in and went for a swim... then got ready for our first snorkelling trip (as it was a package deal there were organised trips)... so we went to a place on the boat and as there were so many people (95% of wholm were Chinese and were wearing life jackets as they were not so confident on their swimming) we headed away from the group and swam out to sea a little bit... the coral itself was fairly amazing and there were so many fish, far more exciting than any i've seen when I've been snorkelling or scuba diving anywhere else... but the first really exciting moment happened when a shark swam underneath us... not sure whether to feel excited or scared we both kind of shrieked and smiled at each other... it was about maybe 3 or 4 ft long and not very far away (we'd been told that the sharks there were relatively harmless so we followed it for a while before it got away from us)... we swam further out and saw loads of clown fish swimming in and out of the anenemies... some of them were frightened of us and some came out to meet us and even nipped out hands with their little mouths... JR and I somehow got separated on our way back to the boat and we each swam different things... he saw another shark, this time quite a bit bigger than the previous one... and I was swimming along and saw something and thought "wow, that's a big fish" I then realised it was a turtle so I swam quickly to catch up with it, swam along with it underneath me for a while and then realised i was heading out to sea, so i let it go and returned to the boat... I realised back at the boat that we'd both swum about a mile and a half... which was good as i've not had any excercise since they stopped letting us use the gym for badminton a few weeks ago...



When we got back I went for another swim around the "house reef" and saw plenty more sharks, these ones were a lots smaller though (about 2ft)... not surprisingly at the end of my swim i was pretty tired... in the evening we had a massage, which was actually pretty brutal, but afterwards i was so relaxed I went back to our room and fell straight to sleep (even though it was about 10) so it did its job.. I also slept through my alarm so I failed to get up to watch the sunrise at 6... I was up at 8 though and we went for some scuba diving... JR did a discovery course and because I'd done it before I did a refresher (effectively the same thing, except JR was looked after constantly by his "buddy" who controlled his boyancy etc. whereas I was free to swim alone and my buddy just swam about 3 metres behind me... it was really nice and relaxing and we saw more sharks and clown fish amongst other things... as soon as we finished we had to get our kit off (scuba kit that is...) and join the second snorkelling trip to the marine park... where we were each given a loaf of bread to feed the fish with... it was amazing as they were not shy at all, and we swam about constantly with hundreds of fish accompanying us waiting for some food... they ate from our hands allowing us to stroke their sides as they ate... which was pretty cool... there was also a missive eel about 8ft long which came up to see us... was a little scary but i gave it a stroke as well... when we got back we checked out and I walked around the beach taking some photos... then fell asleep in a hammock for an hour or so and then it was time to leave...

todd has gone...

Todd left this morning... which means i'm here alone... it has been amazing opportunity to serve here alongside him and we both fully believe that God had it all under control as we've got along so well... I could have been here with anyone in the world and we could've experienced all kinds of problems... but there were none :-) praise God for that!

We've had another answer to prayer in that I really wanted to visit the east coast of malaysia before i left, and it was looking like if i wanted to do that i would have to go in the last week and cancel the english class and the alpha course... which was beginning to pose a bit of a moral dilemna... thankfully God has found a way and JR and I are setting off on an overnight bus tonight to spend two days at the Redang Island beach resort (search online if you want to see what its like) before getting another overnight bus back on monday night, leaving plenty of time to rest and prepare for English class on tuesday evening...



Big blessings on Thursday night (and Tuesday actually) as attendance was really quite high at alpha, we split into two large groups after the video and were able to have interesting discussion about why Jesus had to die...

Please pray for:

• alpha and english class next week
• a safe journey home for Todd
• a safe and enjoyable time for me and JR at the east coast
• two girls (ching siew and siaw chian) who we bought bilingual bibles for yesterday
• continued bible study with kelvin and chuen hoe even though todd has gone
  

glory...

so i couldn't just leave you with photos form the weekend without giving my God some glory...

He took us up there last weekend and kept us there safely and brought us home safely... that's the basics... that's what i prayed for when we left really late on friday and it looked as if we wouldn't even get our bus... that's what i prayed again when we hurtled up the winding mountain roads... this is what I asked for from my God but He blew my expectations away...

I have friends here... i suppose i had friends here anyway, before the weekend, but now i feel like i have friends, people who I aim to keep in touch with for a long time... this happened I think when we began to move past talking just about the cultural differences between England and Malaysia, and stepped into areas that are closer to our hearts, talking about family, friends, dreams, ambitions... conversation comes naturally now... people are beginning to ask when I can come back next...

To take it to the next level in thanking Jesus for our weekend... I was asked to play guitar for the group... and to be honest I was terrified... not just at the thought of playing and singing in front of people, but more importantly that this was (for a handful of the people) the first time that they would have experienced any kind of Christian praise... and so I felt nervous from the outset... I prayed a silent prayer that God would still my thumping heart and help me glorify Him and God delivered... we had two sessions of worship over the weekend, and for some of the students they sang along.... and others listenend and (hopefully) took in the message of the songs... they were heard to be singing songs such as "the message of the cross" and "consuming fire" to themselves over the course of the weekend... so we praise our God... with no shame and no embarressment as to what people might think of us... please thank God for this...

By this point I hope you have smiles spreading across your faces... but it gets better... we had many "sharing" times over the weekend... in which we explored the meaning of life, and life's values... we were asked questions such as "what our purpose for living?"... giving us ample opportunity to begin to introduce the saving grace of Jesus... the friendship that can be had with the only perfect person to step on our earth... people here began to question life... began to ask some pretty big questions... please pray with me that they will find their answers in Jesus... in His Word... and in His Love...

So I asked Jesus to keep us safe on our trip, to do this He came with us, and stayed with us and came back with us... please pray for some more seed planting before we go... and for continued meaningful friendships with: moon, pei jun, ching siew, siaw chian, kai yit, kelvin, chuen hoe and the other guys in the house

Some things to pray for:

• Continued whole hearted seeking of Jesus is my life each day
• A safe journey back to the states for Todd on saturday
• thank God for English Class yesterday - biggest attendance yet and I got to share what I thought was the purpose of life
• Siaw Chian said last night at English class that she doesn't know her purpose or a good example to follow... please pray that one of the Christian ladies here will follow this up and introduce her to Jesus
• We've got a hectic schedule for the rest of this week as people want to see Todd again before he leaves, please pray that the time spent will be effective and glorifying to God
• Alpha is looking to be well attended this week as its twinned with a farewell meal for Todd, please pray that God's word would reach people there
• Me after Todd leaves
  

crazy week...

it has actually been a crazy week... by that mostly i mean its been really busy (hence the lack of updates) so I've actually scheduled time into my day today to write on here as I've found that just waiting for a spare moment isn't working for me...

I suppose i'd better pick up where i left off, and I apologise to those of you who may have found these posts to be a little bit long, but this is going to be another long one as I have more than a weeks worth of stuff to tell.... the reason for the length is as I want to share experiences with you, and not just tell you the things I've done... here we go...



At last Tuesday's English Class we had a blessing in disguise... when time for class arrived... only one guy had confirmed he was coming... so Todd and I discussed the idea of showing him the alpha video "who is Jesus?" rather than going ahead with the planned class... we prayed and decided to go for it... the guy, Kai (far right above picture), has been a good friend of ours for a couple of weeks now and we see him fairly often, he's also very clever so he didn't seem to have too much trouble understanding the video, although he did struggle with Christian jargon words such as "blasphemy" and "baptism"... we also had quite a long discussion about sin... it seems that for Chinese people, something is only considered to be a sin when it is really bad, such as murder or other things like that... so it prooves to be quite difficult to understand the biblical concept of sin: God's standards are set a lot higher, and as a result we all have sinned, but thankfully God gives us a chance to be given a fresh start and a clean record, through believing in His Son, Jesus... as you can see, having Jesus as part of your life does not seem to be a necessity if you don't feel that you have sinned... so it seems that it is really important to talk about the other positive effects of knowing Jesus...

It was a good chat and we met up for lunch with Kai and a couple fo his friends the next day and have seen him again since then, so it appears that we've not scared him off...



Thursday was a really crazy day, it was the date of chuen hoe's konvokesyen (graduation) and so we went onto campus to greet him after the ceremony, it was really good fun and he was really proud and happy, we took lots of photos and also took part in the UM tradition of picking him up (six of us) and throwing him, as high as we could manage, into the air and somehow managing to catch him on his way back down... it was a really special occaision and an honour to be able to be involved in it...



We had alpha on thursday and once again our faith was tested as no-one confirmed that they would be attending... we went through those uncomfortable motions of deciding whether we needed to cancel the evening to do something more productive with our time, or whether we would go and setup and make food etc. in faith that God would bring some people along... thankfully we did the latter as 4 girls came, we also persuaded Kelvin to join us... we broke down into a girls group and a guys group and todd, kelvin and I had a really great chat about what its like to be in a daily relationship with Jesus... I'm aware that the girls spent their time talking mostly about the video translation as they found it difficult to understand the english, they said they would like to come next week...

On thursday evening after alpha I had a go on Kelvin's moped... which was really exciting, after a short brief on how to start and control the thing i set off into the night... well... I actually over-revved the first time and accidentally pulled a wheely and set off on one wheel, only for a second though, before the front wheel came safely down and i drove slowly and in a rather stuttery fashion around the block twice before getting off as Abby had arrived...

Abby is a medical student at Leicester University, and is also from Malaysia, she has a government grant to study in England, I've known her for approximately two years so it was really nice to see a friendly and familiar face... we (abby, myself, kelvin, todd and some of abby's friends) ate mamak (indian food i think, or maybe malay food) and chatted for a long time... it was really really nice to see her... also one of her friends interrupted our conversation midway through and asked me what i thought our purpose in life was, and after praying a short and silent prayer I explained that I believed our purpose was to have a relationship with the God who created us and that this can only be done through knowing Jesus... we talked about other ambitions such as making a lot of money or being famous and hopefully he could tell I was sincere in saying that knowing Jesus personally is what satisfies us, rather than more material ambitions... we also talked about what it meant to invest in what life there might be after death...

As i was having this conversation the singapore team arrived in malaysia for the weekend... but i have to go to campus now so I'll write another long post about our second, and most successful trip to the cameron highlands (including lots of photos) when I get back this afternoon...

we did other stuff throughout last week... but right now I can't quite remember all of it, if I do I'll add it it...

cameron highlands photo blog...

ok so its taken me soo long to upload these pictures that i'm just going to write a caption for each one, rather than describe the whole trip in detail (pictures may not be in chronological order)


Me and Ching Siew with some furry green bean moustaches


JR jumping in the fields at the tea plantation


JR and Kelvin enjoying a stroll down the hill


Kelvin with a strawberry from the only place in Malaysia that they grow


Moon, Todd and Pei Jun at cactus valley


Dave and Todd doing the newly invented "monkey dance"


The group at the tea plantation


Peter (the son of some missionaries we met who went to school in the cameron highlands), Kelvin, Chuen Hoe, Moon, Pei Jun, and JR


Chuen Hoe and Cha Lun


Every guy there (except Todd) sitting on top of Chuen Hoe (from front to back: Alan, Tim, Me, Dave, JR, Cha Lun, Geoff, Bih Kai and Chuen Hoe)


Macrae and Chuen Hoe


Chuen Hoe and Cha Lun


Walking through the tea plantation


Another group photo


Stunning views of the tea plantation


How our much loved tea is made


Quick trip over to England with Chuen Hoe, Siaw Chian, Ching Siew and Cha Lun


Trying some dried strawberries (left to right: JR, Cha Lun, Siaw Chian, Ching Siew, Pei Jun, Moon and Dave)


Me


Group photo at cactus valley


Chefoo Methodist Centre - our home in the highlands


One of the many awesome views on the way up to the highlands

kuala selangor...

Time is moving so quickly, it doesn't seem like very long at all since i was last sitting here at this computer checking my emails before we headed off for the weekend... but now i'm back almost in the blink of an eye... had a really great weekend though... this is what we did:

We drove to Kuala Selangor (i think there were 20 of us in total) shortly after lunch time on saturday, and after a night of little sleep on friday (my own fault i stayed up late playing a game with Chuen Hoe) I was fully expecting to sleep in the car like I usually do, and I was tired, but I was also fascinated by the scenery so I strived to stay awake and watch as we drove past forests of palm trees (specially planted to obtain palm oil) and rubber trees... also a fair few sizeable mosques and temples...

We arrived at a quite little town past Kuala Selangor where we were to be staying and got out of the cars... but no-one seemed to know what we were meant to be doing... so we just kind of wandered round a bit, some people disappeared to get bags of cendol (like green jelly worms, served with beans in an ice cold brown sugary drink - very refreshing) while todd and i had a look in a truely awful souvenir shop... after this little stop came to nothing we got back into the cars and drove to our appartment (a deceptive place, on the outside it didn't look like it would house us for the night, however on the inside it was more than adequate with five bedrooms and two bathrooms, it was a little crowded but we got by fine). We played a couple of games to ensure that everyone was aquainted with each other (the kind of organised fun that makes me cringe... I realised pretty early that I had to swallow my pride and join in and we had a good laugh!)

We had tea in a seafood restaurant (Kuala Selangor has a huge river running through it so there is seafood aplenty :-)) and split our group into two tables... I sat next to a guy called Kai Yit who we met in the first week and comes to english class, he's a really nice guy and I had a great time chatting to him while we ate... we had all manner of different seafood... including something called bamboo clams (look a lot like small sticks of bamboo, but with little worm things living inside - yummy!)... after this we got lost driving around and then made it to the firefly park...

This was an experience to be savoured, we split into groups of three and four, clothed ourselves in life jackets and got into little canoes... and a guy standing at the back rowed us up and down the river, which in itself was superb, the river lit only by the moonlight stretched far into the distance and was lined with silhoutted palm trees... to add to the experience the trees on the river banks were lit up by the glittering of thousands of fireflies flashing their lights to attract mates... altogether quite a romantic experience... (just fitting for me and todd and big guy to share!!)

The next day - today - we went drove about some paddy fields (fairly boring as we missed the harvest so they were essentially just empty fields) and stopped at a mango orchard and asked the man tending it to sell us some mangos, which he did... they weren't quite ripe so were pretty hard and also quite sour... but were about 3 times bigger than any other mango i'd seen before...



We then headed to another seafood restaurant, this time a place on stilts over the edge of the river, where we could watch boats sail by and there was a cool breeze making for a very pleasant lunch... a similar experience to the night before... we sat round a table and they brought out a plate of rice each and then filled the centre of the table with aquatic delacacies... which everyone just kind of piled in on, and there was enough for us to eat our fill... new foods from the meal today: little shell fish - not sure what they were - a bit like muscles, and crabs (i've had crab before but not this fresh and not crab accompanied by a set of hammers and nut crackers to get into them - very messy, in fact i managed to make a claw explode all over my shorts!)... Just after we finished the people at the table next to us ordered a big plate of snails to shell (sea snails) and a man noticed todd and I looking on with a mixture of curiosity and disgust.. he reacted to this by pulling a snail out of its shell (with a little stick) and offering it to us, we thanked him discussed who was actually going to eat it before agreeing to split it and both give it a try... intially it tasted quite sweet and had a kind of chewy texture, but once you got through to the middle there was a taste which wasn't that pleasant and remained for some time... we survived the ordeal but I'm not sure that I'll be ordering snails again in a hurry!

We got back in our cars and I once again kept myself awake so that I wouldn't miss anything on the ride home

I think I'm getting a cold, please pray that it'll leave me alone fairly quickly as I'm really having a good time and don't want that to spoil it...

salvation...

From The Pilgrim's Progress:

Thus far did I come laden with my Sin;
Nor could ought ease the greif that I was in,
Till I came hither: What place is this!
Must here be the beginning of my bliss?
Must here the Burden fall from off my back?
Must here the strings that bound it to me crack?
Blest Cross! blest Sepulchre! blest rather be
The Man that there was put to shame for me!

thoughts...

At some point since I've been here I've looked over at dan hames' blog (click here) and I came across a post that has been a real help to me in Malaysia, and will surely be a great help when I get back, and possibly even for the rest of my life...

Dan simply posted a quotation from John Piper's book Future Grace...

Sin is:

"... what you do when your heart is not satisfied with God."

So I've been thinking about this a lot... and whilst here... there has been a lot of temptation, especially when I've been feeling really tired, to think about things that are not Glorifying to God.

To explain - Jesus said the greatest commandment is to "love the Lord your God with all of your heart, and with all of your mind and with all of your soul and with all of your strength" (Matthew 22 v 34-40 click here) this is a command from God, disobeying a command from God is considered to be sin... How little then are our hearts satisfied with God then if Piper's thought is true?

Sin begins in the mind, we see this in James 1 v 14-15 (click here) "but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death." Serious business then.

Back to Matthew 22 v 34-40. Our minds and thoughts are precious to God. Psalm 37 v 4 (click here) has also been of inspiration. The verse says "Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." It can be seen that God is not wishing to punish us by dominating our thoughts.. He will is to bless us, to enable us, as Jesus put it, "have life to the full" (John 10 v 10 click here). This is good news, we learnt in alpha that the word "gospel" means "good news".

It is often so hard to delight in the Lord, and think of Him and His glory. However it is referred to again and again in the new testament so I feel it is safe to say that it is an important practice. We these instructions in Paul's letter to the Colossian church "Since, then, you have been raised with Christ... set your mind on things above, not on earthly things" (Colossions 3 v 1 and 2 click here).

Its not a new thing, just for people of our generation, to find this to be hard. I've started reading The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan, which was written in 1678 and was interested by this short poem conscerning Christian's effort to climb the Hill called "difficulty":

"This Hill, though high, I covet to ascend,
The difficulty will not me offend.
For I perceive the Way to Life lies her:
Come pluck up Heart, let's neither faint nor fear;
Better, though difficult, the Right Way to go,
Than Wrong, though east, where the End is Wo."

I feel that this poem encaptulates effectively (once you can get past the old English) what I'm aiming to communicate. Jesus also didn't cover up the difficulty encountered in the Christian life: "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." (Matthew 7 v 13-14 click here).

We can take comfort in knowing though (if we do indeed know Christ - if you're not sure about this read this) that Jesus is with us every step of the way. "And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (Jesus speaking in Matthew 28 v 20 click here) also see Psalm 73 (one of my favourites!) verses 23 to 28 (click here) He is continually with us, holding our hands and guiding us with His counsel :-)

I'm thinking back to Psalm 37 (see above), and thinking of how good God is (for an in your face example of God's love click here and here) that He would wish to bless us and give us the desires of our heart, all the mores so that He would wish to know us and have a relationship with us despite what we've done and how many times we've broken that most important of the commandments. When I catch myself thinking of the things of the world I'm finding myself asking "why am I not satisfied in God right now? What is there I could want that He can not give me, either now or at a time and in a circumstance that is much better for me?

When I was in Southampton for the orientation day for this trip I went to a church there and the man preaching said "So often we pray that God would change our circumstances because we are not entirely satisfied with them, rather than asking God to change our hearts" God puts us through tests to refine us and to help us grow to be more like His Son Jesus, who certainly didn't have an easy and comfortable life. Please pray that I would learn to delight myself in my Lord, and I will pray that you will too...

Our thoughts matter

melaka... etc...

I've just spoken to my mum on the phone and she said it would be better if I updated here little and often rather than in really big occasional stories... I'm not sure if this is going to work... as quite a descriptive person, i find it fairly difficult to tell stories (as many of you will be all to aware) briefly... to single out the important points and stick to them... ensuring that the focus of whatever i'm trying to say gets across to the listener (or reader)... also as I write this blog I get excited that people are actually reading what I'm putting on here, and as a result of this excitment i don't want people to feel like i'm selling them short, so i try to cram in as much detail as possible...

however, in spite of all this, I'm going to try to update everyone on the events of the weekend as well as what we've been doing since, briefly and concisely...



so we (myself, todd and a guy called JR who is from the phillipines and currently doing a masters degree in engineering at UM) set off for melaka on saturday morning... we encountered a strange thing at the bus station, we got a certain type of ticket for the bus, which whilst really cheap... seemed to be a bit of a gamble... if there were spare seats just before the bus set off then we were allowed to occupy them... and if not, then we didn't and had to go and buy new tickets (we only found out this is how they worked after we payed for them)... as it happened there were three seats left as the bus was leaving (that's right! the perfect number for the three of us!) so we took them gladly, rejoicing in our thrifty good fortune...

I'll spare the details of the coach journey except to say that it was during the trip that I saw my first wild monkey, just sitting at the side of the road... it actually made me feel a little excited...



Melaka is a very historical city so we walked about in blisteringly hot heat looking at historical stuff, we saw the malaysian independence memorial, a dutch and a portuguese church, the ruins of the church of st paul (in which was a local busker, singing a fairly good version of Hotel California by The Eagles)... we had lunch, which was Malay food, unfortunately it was too spicy for me to eat on such a hot day, after lunch we walked about some more and saw some more really cool stuff... we had our picture taken with a massive snake, which was both scary and fun... reducing the three of us to nervous giggling throughout...



We were crossing a bridge over a river and looked over the edge and saw a collection of absolutely MASSIVE lizards either on the banks of the river or swimming about in it, I didn't even realise they existed that big, but there they were, totally wild, swimming about...

We went to a really cool night market on a street called "jonker street" which is famous for its antiques as well as its night market... there was so much brilliant stuff so it was a good opportunity to do some souvenir shopping... we also saw some stalls selling pet scorpians and tarantulas...



The next morning (we stayed in a questionable hotel, suffice to say that we had no window in our room, and although it advertised having television this was questionable as the television didn't actually work) we went to Christ Church Melaka (as it was Sunday morning) ... its a Anglican Church and the service was thoroughly enjoyable... encouraging us all...



We went to a replica of the sultanate palace, then had some lunch (the famous chicken rice balls - which we agreed that we weren't quite sure why they were so famous here, only to be told later that we got them from the wrong place)... it was so hot though and we'd seen a lot that we decided to get the bus back to KL and have a look round there in the afternoon when it was a little cooler...

KL was pretty uneventful as it was raining... we rushed through china town and then had a quick look round the central market but we were all pretty tired so got a bus back to Millennium Court (where JR lives) and then said goodbye to him and got a lift back here...

I realise that wasn't really that brief and yet I somehow managed to miss out a lot of stuff that we did (for example i didn't explain the differing interiors on the coach down to Melaka and the coach back up...) sorry mum...!

I'm tired now so won't explain what I've done since the weekend... although English Class went very well last night and the number of people attending doubled from two to six :-) Thanks for your prayers!

Hang on a second... I got my hair cut on Sunday evening and I have to tell about it...

The place was pretty cool... while you waited you had headphones and could pick which of 4 different televisions on the wall you wanted to get the sound from... The guy had a little difficulty knowing what to do with my thick, curly hair so in the end he just shaved it off... when he finished he got out a hoover (vacuum cleaner for our US friends) and proceeded not to hoover the floor but to hoover my head! and... my face! very strange! Then (which I found a little wierder)... he got out a big, dry, yellow, car sponge and wiped my head with it, I really couldn't tell you why... finally he showed me to a self-service hair washing station, which i managed to use quite successfully without getting my clothes all wet!