Woody got Wood

Wanted to try out hitchhiking from Toyo to Osaka but as I really didn't know where to start I ended up looking at a map to figure out what higway I should head for. Needing to be there the next day to meet up with old friends fom the Handai times I opted for a nightbuss. The nightbuss if a budget alternative in Japan and will cost you somewhere from 7-10K yen depending on when you go and what company you go with. I remember sometimes getting 6k yen ticket at the travel agency on Osaka campus 4 years ago. Considering you will save one night of housing which will cost a minuímum of 4k if you stay somewhere else than a capsule hotel or sleep in a manga kafe. The shinkansen (bullet train) that will take you there in a matter of hours will put a dent in your wallet of circa 20k + 1 night of cousing. The uber cheap and super hippe way I guess would be hitchhiking and couch surfing for a price of 0 + 0 yen if you have the resolve to do it. But let me warn you. Communications are an illusion for those of you who rely on wifi. What you really want is a Japanese phone to get in touch with people or someone to led you a 3G modem. A 3G moden to rest from softbak is avialable at 1.5k+ yen a day and is hardly an economical option. Stupid me thinking that I might not need to bring my old japanese phone.

Well in Osaka there is abunch of cool things to do. Like eat for example. Osaka is by many considered the gastronomical capital of Japan and is definetly the center for both Okonomiyaki and Takoyaki. That would be a Japanese style cabbage omelet and the second fried squid in ball shapes. There is a danger here though that most people having eaten takoyaki have experienced. It's hot! Hot, hot hot. Not in spicy terms but in heat. I and almost everyone I know always burn their tough and gums when not having eaten it in a while.

For a flora of options head down to shinsaibashi or namba station and head for dotonburi and the ebisu area. Along the river one can find as many stands as one could wich for. While there don't forget to grab a shot of the very famous glico man as well. Like mentioned before

Japan is a universe of it's own. Machines rule at times and the pervertedness repressed by the asian culture of face has given Japan it's unique qualities. One example are these wending machines selling little dolls. Check out the progress of topic.

But something that we laught at so many times was the fusion of east and west. One could go on and on about it in a range of areas like fashion, culture and economics. But more fun is just showing you this picture.

Chiba the Shadowland of Black Medicne

In Japan, sleep deprived and exhausted I needed to set things right. Remembering this "In Japan, he'd known with a clenched and absolute certainty, he'd find his cure. In Chiba. Either in a registered clinic or in the shadowland of black medicine. Synonymous with implants, nerve-splicing, and microbionics, Chiba was a magnet for the Sprawl's techno-criminal subcultures..." I set my path towards Chiba.

Though modern day Chiba is strangely riddled with love hotels and morally unprude little shops blasted in in a dense semi suburbia my vice of choice was Lemon CC. Lemon CC is a drink mainly sold in Japan and is basically a vitamin C bombarded lime sofa of sorts. I haven't had one of these for about five years now and sipping on it as Iw alked down the street it really hit me. I'm in Japan again. Japan the land of inverse rules. Where things randomly makes so much sense and at the same time not at all.
Every time I come here I'm alawys plesently suprised by the politness of people and also not so plesently suprised with high prices of transportation.
One of these interesting things is that despite having an incredible internet and mobile internet penetration Wi-fi was easier to find in Africa and in remote parts of Indonesia. I do have to admit that if any country would be the first to be taken over by robots and zombies of zenchnology it would be japan.

In fact I think it's pretty munch self explanatory once one has checked out the rice cooker/transformer/robotic wife..

But back to the fixed of reality and less of the cyberpunk universe of the apocalypse which turned out a bit diferently that expected. But not that differently (Fukushima..)

Hello Food!

I'd like to say hi to along missed friend of mine called ramen setto! for a mere 680 yen dug on three plates of food or rather two bowls and a platter. This being a bowl of Ramen, a bowl of rice and a platter of gyoza. Although my home town of Stockholm boast with a godzilllion sushi restaurants it's desperately lacking on the other Japanese departments. So Yay for food.

For balance I'd like to share my experience with a Calpis Kiwi cocktail that was surprisingly good. Not being a big fan of calpis which in Swedish sounds way to similar to veal piss I was not expecting anything remarkable. At lest not in the good direction. I was happily surprised. The kiwi made all the difference and the coctail was remarkably fresh although not much of the white rum was coming out in the drink.

Rise of the Nerds

"Nerd" might not be famous of being the most attractive social status. Specially not in the US. But nerds are defined climbing the ladder of popularity. I was thinking of this because when hearing the mention of games someone at HEC Paris  imminently comented with some stereotyping of elf dressing people in the woods (Clearly "live action role playing" LARP). I remember when I relieved that I did a few of those games. This was followed by my friends great surprise at my nerdiness. For this was back in San Francisco where nerds are nerds but LARP nerds are much greater nerds. But nerds are not the same internationally. For example it's kind of cool to be a nerd in Sweden. Well as long as one embraces it and goes with it all out.

There are also some preconceived ideas of what Nerdery is. Here are two examples.

This first one is a tad more fantasy LARPing with magical powers a la America. I remember when I was first shown this. I have to admit I did laugh quite a bit about the marshmallow lightning bolts. After all what a waste. Marshmallows are for eating.

Here is another example of LARP but the European version, or German to be exact. It tends to seem a little more interesting. Given that the prodigy playing does help. But also the seriousness of the nerdiness. I remember my brother Patrik going to the Czech Republic partly to get a hold of some authentic plate mail gloves for his LARP gear. I figure if you go for something do it properly, at least it's way cooler if your the best at it..

Maybe this is why Nerdery and specially computer games are so well un-nerdy or main stream back home in Sweden. Cause we're good at it? or is it cause everyone kinda play's, making the minority situation defunct?

Here in France it's a tad different though. Nerds are still Nerds and the cool peeps need to wear that trendy shirt or whatever. But it's definitively going our way (yeah the nerdy way). As popular culture gets more and more inspired by movies and video games the experts on these are the nerds. Thus they rise in popularity as they are seen as the originals and early adopters.

But it seems as in cultures where it's less accepted to be nerdy the nerds are nerdier and more well nerdy and well less hard core.. Why might this be?

Anyway here in Paris I tend to connect more with the gamers just like everywhere else. Last night we visited movie maker and game enthusiast Robin to drink wine, watch one of his films and discuss games. I have to say I'm a bit jealous. Seriously where else can you at least drink good wine while you nerd away (also jealous of his radio controlled Wall-E unit). Ok true. back home it's beer but it's just not the same. Although I do love beer it just doesn't seem as refined.

One of Robint's many gadgets of multimedia art. A light saber or shower head, old hand grenade, ancient  handheld flash mount and shower nob. Either way really cool or really nerdy, or Both!

More on games after the weekend as I have a board gaming date with a bunch of French gamers.

Midnight in Paris

Some game at the Chiquito bar

And so it turns out. I go at it, the nightlife of Paris. An leisurely adventure filled with clubs and electronic beats? Well not quite this time. As I have my humble but not unappreciated place to recooperate a bit outside of Paris, it's not easy to get in and out just without further adue. Just a few stops away from Versilles is a whole bunch of stops too many to make it back after hitting up the bars. But the bars are bars, French bars. Bars packed with soul and character. In fact as the clock strickes 04 I get to see quite a few of these characters in and outside the bar I'm chilling out in. Although a coffee isen't available on the meny a plate of fries and a beer are. Not the worst of companions for writing a bit in the night. One of the worst for staying in shape though

=(

Mr.Goodseed (Bongrain) A very french young man in so many ways

After my coffee with Charles Bongrain (goodseed if you choose to translate names) so close to fountain st. Michael that we could almost have been sitting in it it was time for me to head on to the party. The locale of the party was conveniently located at the beginning of rue du Menilmontant, a cozy little place called "Chiquito" would hold most of my night. Beers for 2.50 Mojito for 5 and "Monaco" for 2 are not a bad deal going out. Well at least not coming from Sweden. For those of you that are wondering why I'm even mentioning a "Monaco" it's because this drink is new to me. So from what I heard from my friendly bar-counter neighbour is that it's a sweet beer for girls, her words not mine. In it is fruity sweet syrup, carbonated water or tonic and beer. I could be mistaken on the tonic water. It could have been soda of some sort as well. I'll just have to try it next time I have a bar at my disposal. I'm a bit too afraid to order one at a random bar.

Sabrina the birthday kid and fille extraordinaire (on the left) and Métte also a fille extraordinaire (on the right) two dear Parsisian friends of mine =) 

The Party was in tribute to my friend Sabrina who's 31^st birthday is was. One year wiser and maybe one year closer to death, of age as much as of the unlimited alcohol that was at her disposal tonight. Seriously though, It was a good gathering with plenty of open-minded and social people. And to my delight with varying English ability. Varying as it present to me the opportunity to try out some french. A gift gently wrapped with the boxing glove of unpreparedness my face made out with tonight. It was still fun though and the crowd was a bit from everywhere to even a few Spanish words came to use =)

Tour du France, the intoxicated night version

Walking from no26 rue du Melimontant to place du République is an interesting experience on a Saturday night. Not only because my newly acquired friend tried to talk me into sleeping at a random girls place as a over night solution with the argument that I don't have to sleep with them. After all girls do it all the time(this reminded me about one of those episodes from "how I met your mom"). But rather the social interaction that takes place on the streets in between. Streets like Oberkampf definitively shows a different french society than the touristy one. If you've ever head of french kickers and hudlums, this is one place they might hang out. But it's not that it's shady, only shady. It's also busseling with life and people from clubs and bars. As we three musketeers walked our way onward I received the general explanation of the places and I do have to say that a slightly drunken tour of the quarters of the night is way more entertaining than most tours I've ever been on. And I've been on a few (Yes I have Asian family, but this is not why).

the bar of destiny where all stragglers show up in the dead of night

Reaching my bar of destiny a hounded meeters from the place du République I get to witness a range of interesting characters. Each one most certainly having a untold story of adventure, rise and decline. Well for some mostly decline I guess. One of the more noteworthy "dudes" grabbing my attention is this man in his mid 40's slightly drunk and trying to talk to women walking up and down the street. With slightly drunk I mean the type of drunk where hard balancing acts like walking all the way on a big rode which one has to all himself would be considered a pass. So stumbling up and down the road then. The maybe best part might be that he could't really utter any coherent words. Although it be so that my french is preposterously inadequate to determine this. Either way the shower of saliva would with no doubt plug the targeted ear and effectively block all attempted communication. After a second though the funniest part was probably when the repeatedly pretended to talk to someone on his phone after a failed attempt. And believe you me, they all failed.

All characters here are not remarked by excessive drunkenness, but this one was.

Fellow commuters waiting for the first train out to the burbs

Shrooms

Mushrooms. Magic and delicious but preferably not at the same time. In fact the one and only time I had the magic version was by mistake at the young age of 17. The path there was paved by a many a flavorful meal of the non magic version. Fungi might not sound that tasty but mushrooms can definitively be. A fleshy fruit like body floating slightly above the ground it can truly gold a flora or rich flavor.

"flugsvamp" or Amanita muscaria, A Viking beserker pill

In Sweden we have a long tradition of eating mushrooms. And not only for taste and nourishment. It was a common practice to consume "flugsvamp" or Amanita muscaria a poisonous one that can put the consumer one step closer to a battle rage or a drunken state which was harnessed before and during battles for my Viking ancestry.
These days we pick mostly other mushrooms. One favorite and delicacy is the "kantarell" or chanterelle. quickly pan fried in butter and maybe cream is probably my favorite way of preparing it. It is truly a challenge not gobbling it down too fast as it's soo rich and tasty. The season for picking is throughout autumn and preferably after a wet summer and autumn. Picking it is itself a nice way of spending a Swedish autumn day. Walking along in the Forrest teeming with color with some friends or family has long been a  tradition of most real Swedish people.

Stockholm Afternoons

From the left: Anders my good friend and equally geeky boardgamer, Eva my mom trying out Dixit for the first time

As someone might have discovered reading about my Stockholm nights I'm quite the nerd coming back home. This is the cold truth of is. I am a nerd but not only a gaming nerd. My maybe bigger passion is board games and there are few more enjoyable things than enjoying an evening of board games with friends. Oh chess and monopoly might pop up for you right now but this is not the case. Nor is it "fia med knuff" for Swedish people. Board games are much more diverse and complicated than this. To check out a few good ones one can visit http://boardgamegeek.com/browse/boardgame . The games we played where Dixit and Power Grid. Two very nice games.

Although powergrid might be even more fun on 4 people instead of 3 as we played it. Dixit worked well on 4 people. this even despite the different gaming experience we had.
Autumn nights when the rain if coming down and the wet darkness is creeping in around the cute little Swedish houses board-games are a excellent pass time.

Middle Aged Teen Angst

I'm not sure if you remember the days when girls and boys around you where filled with angst and emotion swelling over and well annoying the shit out of at least me. Those days where junior high school and high school I guess. But not everywhere. In these lands on the south east it's still flowing well in the late twenties. And it's mostly girls. After traveling around here for a while I've befriended quite a few people, on Facebook..
Let me tell you the Facebook life here is something else. Not sure if it's because it's the only outlet of emotion in communication that is allowed or if it's just such a convenient way of saying what you think in a alone against the world fashion that was never available before online social networks.
Either way. Every day I face the horror of emotional outreach towards the world and sadly towards my notifications and mailbox too. Is it just me? Is it just me that think filtering out all a persons messages and post is the only solution left to avoid tidal flows of teen angst from scorns of Asian girls in their "way to old to be writing this"
Ok you might be arguing that it's a bit late since they are all kept at home by overprotecting parents until they are married off and then the parents live with their kids anyway..
Well it's not a uncommon fact that women well in their middle years still fret over uncommented posts, messages and Facebook statuses here. Yes many a time at my office and others have there been intrigue in the air and bewilderment over unjustified neglect in Facebook response... And then comes the teen angst flowing out on the digital tides we all surf on. Personally I think it's one wave to big and too not concerning me to handle but who knows. Maybe it is everyone's duty to listen to this, or filter this shit out.

Highlife: The power of brands

As I walk by Hard Rock Cafe and Hotel in Kuta Bali and see the masses flock outside I'm reminded again of the strong brand focus Asia has. I mean if you want to be somebody you need to look like somebody and to look like somebody you need to wear a brand. Why? well obviously the only way to be some one is to be wear what people things some one should wear.
In the ghetto west and later in street sub cultures like hip hop and such sneakers and shoes became the status symbol. For the rich maybe cars or yachts. Here it's definitively all about clothing and bags but the brand focus and the desire to consume all the is something is just so extremely powerful here. It's ofc better to wear a Burberry jacket in 30+ degrees heat and feed your kids nasi lemak and water every day as you ride around on your bad ass scooter. And then defining a bad ass scooter as one with a few LEDs on. Where did that desire to be unique go? and Why is it better to life in a dump and pay up your butt for a brand on top of the same cotton shirt as your neighbor wears. Yeah the poor one that put his kids to school...

Being a Repair Guy is Obviously Cooler.

I've recently spent a few days with my friends at a nicer resort at the Genting highlands. We've been chilling out and taking it easy. But once in a "nicer" place it's become so obvious. I've been noticing quite a lot and now that I think about it it's really so prevalent in many aspects of south east Asian life. Maintenance, details, and thinking things through. These are qualities that the general populous lack in a large degree here. What struck me was the big, little things or the many little things. One thing is the lack of wifi at a resort suite. Seriously what resorts/hotel only has that in the lobby. I also found the following.

• Ants
• Gecko poo
• Leaking toilet
• Broken mosquito net at the balcony doors (I have to admit there are no mossies here)

Otherwise the room is nice and even has a Jacuzzi. But going around the resort one sees degradation, piles of rubble and toilets that have obviously been raped by an dirty elephant. It's like whoever is planning the maintenance routine wants to make damn sure there is always repair work to be done. Since it's obviously better to repair broken things than maintenance things for an extended lifespan, visual look and feel.

It's not only here though. It's just that at the other places I've stayed one might expect these things. Well that's not quite true either. I did stay at the berjaya times square for a while. A luxury place in most standards but with broken lights, small cracks in the wall plaster, a water heating system one has to turn on 10 minutes before hot water, unusable wall plugs and interior that might fall apart upon touch.

This symptom is also true for many a bungalow I've stayed at at island resorts and hostels. Somehow it feels more acceptable for a island bungalow to be falling a part a bit. I guess it's the island maintenance problem. An logical defect in thinking although not as much as this.

This issue is also prevalent in Indonesia and other countries in the area. Not only in buildings but also in all aspects of life. Many a time I've seen some nice handy craft or thing I've thought was interesting on first glance only to have my impression spoiled by some small defect they but there afterwords for some reason. One example is some wooden sculptures in which they drill a crude hole and puts a plastic string through.

There are so many cases where actions seem to be determined by decisions of "for the sake of having it". Why would someone have a pool you can't use, or plenty of faulty things and none of good quality? Or having people doing paperwork five times over instead of making a digital copy saving energy and money. Or using a wind power plant that's already there to get power instead of shipping gasoline out to an island to power generators.

I guess they might be doing it to create jobs. Maybe one should tell them that creating jobs that have no better solutions than manual labour could be better. Fuck! Hire a bunch of carpenters and maintenance people to fix all the half broken things with a fifth of the lifespan of a taken care for one. Maybe even do some road maintenance. But hay it's way cooler to be  repair guy than a maintenance dude. Maybe that's what it's all  about?

I guess it's really a culture that likes to do things for the sake of it. I think I'd fail here. I wonder what all my local friends here do about it.

The Holy Book

There are certainly a few way to look at the world. One way is to have faith, or trust in something. Quite a few people trust their holy books, which ever it might be. Christians, Jews, Islamist or Backpackers, yes Backpackers. Although this topic would possible invite to a rant about religion and logic it will not. This time I'd like to share my fascination with effects of holy books like the rough guide or lonely planet. Undoubtedly these books are read by almost every mainstream backpacker I see. And mostly they follow it's recommendations blindly, often missing out on exploring hidden gems. It's true however that they mostly end up safe and sound avoiding many of the hazards. But then what is backpacking all about. Traveling cheaply or trying to find that unexplored and to you, unique path?

Maybe it's more about having a good experience that is very similar to other people's and friends' good experiences so they can compare experiences and decide that this is what it's all about. I know for sure that the Swedish backpacking comunity or maybe more the Swedish backpacking experience is incredible similar. After all we are one of the most homogeneous cultures out there, despite what many of us would like to think. It is not just my fellow Swedes though I see the throngs of young budget travelers gather in the same spots every time. The event that got me thinking about it this time was when I visited the old reggae bar in china town, KL. I went there with a friend who suggested it. It did have a good ambiance but not near enough to attract that many travelers on it's own. As I see a couple of people stopping outside one by one, unleashing the power of the loneley planet and reading about just this place before they sit down, it becomes obvious how powerful this book is. In fact in this area I saw more young budget travelers (often displaying bags on their backs in all sizes and colours) in 10 minutes than my previous 15 days or so in Kuala Lumpur. Mind you it's not like I've been looked up inside a hotel room or anything. I've been out and about exploring the city, with the locals.

I'd like to tell people to throw away their holy books and look at the world for themselfs. But I know how hard it can be and how comforting it is to have all the awnsers written down for you. That way you don't have to think so much and struggle so much with the hard questions in life. Like where to sleep, eat and what to see and do. I know the one place I could have used one of these holy books was in China where it was more than a bit troublesome to communicate. My solution was inspiered by something my dad did when we where traveling around europe as kids. He drew a toiletpaper roll. I'm not quite sure why. After all I was quite young but I'd assume it was an atempt to find one. My solution was to draw cartoons persorming the action we wanted to do in addition to drawing pictures of objects. This worked out just fine. We even managed to get an article in the local newspaper about us. And I'm quite sure I'll remember those times a lot more than the ones where I have followed a holy books guides. So just consider not bringing those books and just go with the flow. I know a bunch of you have already discovered this way of exploring and I'd like to recomend the rest of you to try it too.

That Singaporean

The state of Singapore is a well known state. It broke off or was kicked out of Malaysia and has been economically quite successful since, much to the Malaysian governments annoyance. But who are the Singaporeans  During my visits to Singapore I've me extremely few hardcore Singaporeans. In fact it wasn't untill my last night in Singapore that I met my first true Singaporean. Before this I tried a few different places.

Night life

Night life in singapore is vivid and definetly doing its thing. The streets are filled with people and music is flowing out onto the streets from the many speakers inside all of the clubs and bars. The people though are mostly expats. This must be the place with the highest density of forrigners anywhere in asia. Those who aren't expats are tourists and a few local singaporeans could easily be statistically discarded in this sea of non-Singaporeans.

China Town

Although there are plenty of chinese people here I'm not sure if they are locals. After all the onces I've tried interacting with usually had some story of originally coming from somewhere else. And the once I failed talking to only spoke some form of chinese. Hence can they really be singaporean. Official language being englisha and all?

Random people on the street

We could have met some Singaporeans here but I guess we didn't interact with too many random people. We did however find a a chinese looking guy working for shell who was most unfriendly. Maybe this is the true singaporean? Bitter, tiered and working at a gas station? Somehow I doubt it.

A house party

Americans, Germans, Norwegian, Swedish, Indian, Indonesian, Australian, New Zealanders, Pakistani, Finish, and finally A singaporean!! Ok they had grown up somewhere else. Studied somewhere else and I think lived somewhere else. No this does not qualify one to be a true singaporean. Where was that grass root singaporean who I was looking for.

After going here and there trying to find one I finally gave up. Maybe those Singaporeans that I interacted with during my time at the Royal Instetute of Technology in Sweden where going to be the only ones I would get to meet. Sad. After all I should have met one here in Singapore.

Giving up and going for a last meal in Little India close to our hotel it happened. Joking around and having a generally good time, except for the fact I the search for a Singaporean utterly failed I apparently charmed one. Born and raised in Singapore, owning a bar and having a reunion with one of his old army buddies I found him. The Singaporean. The singaporean is a middle aged man of Indian origin with a love of food. Thank you mr.Singaporean man for treating us to chocolate cake.

The High School Party

I recently attended a high school party. Well not really. The apartment was a little too baller for that and there was no mom and dad that would come home. Age wise I think most people should have been out of collage but it was still a high school party.

It was not what I was expecting but it was a nice opportunity to observe. As the night went on the music became louder. The conversation became less audible and less coherent. But what was interesting was the interactions fueled by sexual drives. getting laid was definitively in the air. Or in a lot of boys minds anyway.

Hour 1

The crowd is divided into groups of girls and boys with a few mixed ones. quite a random mix.

Hour 2

A few more beers has been consumed. The DJ has increased the volume with a good 15%. A good portion of the boys are scanning for pray. A few girls are doing the same.

Hour 3

More than a few sips of alcohol later it's quite clear who is looking for some action. The girls on the prowl definitively have had a few too many but they are still kinda functional. The boys are displaying the characteristic change in interpersonal skills. Volume has increased with another 25%.

The interesting part is taking place during hour 3 and 4 of interest. This is where a gradual change of approach is noticeable. From shy or maybe overly humoristic and clearly masked approach to start with and ending up with a near verbal nincompoop for intelligent responses using mainly body language to charm the ladies. The lack in ability to read the opposite visual response leads to a dance roughly described with the following example.

1. Person A: leans forward says something he already said a few times and tries to smile.
2. Person B: moves away a little but tries to listen anyway
3. Person A: moves closer and asked for some irrelevant detail
4. Person B: moves away and interacts a little with a nearby bystander, or a fried, or a boyfriend
5. Person A: tries to move in close to break the personal space
6. Person B moves away
7. Person A tries again or changes targets

After all sometimes it leads to success. Sometimes the initial success is aborted and proceeds to intimate relations with the toilet bowl. Then Person A or B might try again. Or not. Either way, the relationship between alcohol consumed, degradation of verbal skills and rise in confidence is interesting. Where is the golden balance? Where is the tipping point of where one shall not go any further?

We did stay a little longer than this tipping point for sure. But left quite swiftly as large parts of the premises became occupied by high-schoolers. 

Naturally this did not happen to all of the visitors. But to enough for me to notice. The rest of the gathering was very nice and I did have a few good conversations with random people from, well everywhere.

Beware of the dangers outside the BOX.

I was lucky enough to time my arrival in sigapore with the opening of a new terminal at woodlands trainstation. But I was a little dissapointed by the meagere lavishness decorating the welcoming of Singaporean ministers on their walkthrough at the station. Compaired to the general attiere of suits and gray cameramen I was definetly a illuminator with my colorful day-pack, bumming past in my newly attaind quickslivers slippers. Maybe these won't get stolen as fast as my "brand" ones. Then again it is a totally plausible to expect slipper thives to be illitarete. Maybe I have to take care of these anyway.
"Mafa la" as they say here in Singapore. (originally an Chinese expression of boring but is also used as an expression of tiring in Malaysia and Singapore)

The easiest way to get around on a budget is using the MRT and the Buses. If visiting for more than a day or two I'd recomend getting a electronic ticket card that you can top up instead of single tickets. It's a few dollars more expensive but it's very nice to have. Specially when there are lines to the ticketing machines or on buses where you otherwhise need exact change. One of these cards can be aquired through any ticket counter at the MRT.

On the topic of public transportation though the neighboring countries could really pick up a few hints. Besides having a modern transportation system where people actually manages to get on and off, most of the time, they also exhibit a range of maps and other services that makes life easier getting around. The best part is however the ridiculeous zealously when it comes to signs and telling pople what to do. It is quite obvious it's a Chinese run state. Like a Chinese parent who likes you and wants to take care of you, like the little child you are. The singaporian government kindly explains where to go, where to eat, where to sit, where to stand, how to stand, where not to stand and a whole range of other funny things all within box life.

Like a good parent the singaporian government also want to make sure you don't speak no evil, hear no eavil or do no evil. Providing free wifi in most public places is the wireless@sg wifi network. To register one has to have a local number in most cases. To aquire a local number one needs to buy one and registering it with ones passport at the same time. It is possible to register a user with a forign number at certain location. One of these is the changi airport. So if you are ever around it might be a good idea to take care of this before you leave the airport. The cheapest prepaid phone number is 8 dollars and can be provided by either Starhub or Singtel. In most shops these are "sold out" but I'm not sure if it's only cause of the very "limited edition" of these allegedly existing cards. The more comon ones are the 15 and 18 dollar ones.

I recently heard of a Swedish guy and a Chinese girl who studied in Singapore. Getting a bit too drunk and loosing a bet they went outside naked for a prank. It's a good thing that the Singaporean government didn't overreact and only kicked them out of the country. I mean, such heinous criminal acts should at least been met with some caning.. Good thing they never caught me, Mowhaha.

Help Wanted; strong hands needed

Are you a inspired and diligent worker that wants to interact with people and service the community? We offer a career where you get to work on your interpersonal skills as well as keep fit on a every day basis. You will also have the added benefit of travel as you will be working in close relation to Kuala Lumpur transportation.

We are looking for people with a good work ethic who are eager to engage people and clients. You should be of average or bigger size, work out regularly. Having a smile in your arsenal is considered a merit.
Possible previous employments are:

• sumo wrestler
• line guard
• wrestler
• sales person

if you are chosen for this position you will have the title of transportation optimizer. You work will mainly concern the maximisation of cargo and clients for logistical purposes.

Send your CV now to subwaypusher@jobsinkualalupur.com

This is what I felt the transportation system in Kuala Lumpur needed today. Subway pushers aren't something new and they can be found in places as Tokyo where white gloved men will make sure as many passengers as possible will get on the trains during rush hours.
Kuala Lumpurians are different though. As Japanese commuters instinctively move along in the carts and squeeze in to let other people on board the Lumpurians do almost the opposite. Chaotically bustling in random directions, sometimes completely opposed to logic there are often giant deserts of space while people are standing on top of each other, in 15 layers! OK maybe not but that is the feeling of it. Keep in mind that the public transportation system here is actually operational and working most of the time in difference to a vast number of countries. Many states of the US being in the list of non operational ones. Just try taking a buss there.

Transportation is cheap though. This is especially true when considering the value you get for what you pay.

Monorail will cost you about 1-3
Trains around 4 in the city
Taxi starts at 3 and the usual ride will cost about 10 or so.

All prices in Malaysian Ringit.

KL lacks the vast variety of transportation of other cities in the South East Asian region. I say this is for the better. Still they need to implement a more efficient way of adapting capacity during hing and low demand. In other words; Subway pushers for the win!

The People of the After Work

Nightlife in KL is best kicked off with a after work in my opinion. Starting the night with a few cold ones to keep the humid heat at bay en enjoying some good company. The people of the after work are a expat and business oriented crowd. It consists largely of:

• Europeans and Americans
• Chinese Business People
• serial-cultural empyed locals

Europeans and Americans have a culture of after work and happily donates large chunks cash for the perks of sin taxed alcoholic beverages. Not only do they provide a physical cooling sensation but also loosens the nots in ones shoulders after a hard day at the office. But more than shoulders are loosened. Yes tongues are loosened as well and it's during after works (AWs) that a lot of stories are told. If you want to get the lay-down of a bunch of random things just sit down at a bunch of random tables close to a bunch of random expats and listen in on their stories. Sometimes quite entertaining and sometimes apparently quite inviting. A buddy of mine and his company was randomly approached at an AW by people looking to recruit. It's a place where business and pleasure kind of blends together and you never know when you will meet one of those friends of yours that might not be the best to introduce to your business partners.

Chinese hare are quite similar actually. Although from what I've heard their conversations seem to tend to stick to business related topics a lot more. And when they don't they are often filled with wisdom's related to business. In fact the Chinese here are very business oriented. Sometimes in a quite hilarious way. I recently heard about the Sun Tzu's art of war applied in business approach. And spectacularly the small snippets of "wisdom" and how they are proclaimed in lose statements and how to's are sometimes not too far away from conversations at after works. Exchanging experiences in the Chinese business life can be quite interesting. Non related but worth a read is A story of zen. Naturally these are not the only conversations but they are the more notably conversations. Another interesting thing here is how they have trophy wives and girl friends very openly and which is sometimes seen as a status symbol. Sitting there without joining in in the conversation I'm not sure a European expat would bring that trophy girl to this gathering.

Joining these two groups are locals employed by foreign or international companies that have gotten used to this type of corporate and social culture. Many of which are serial-cultural employees. And to define that term that means people taking job after job in companies from a certain nationality or with a specific corporate culture related to one. One can see many people working for one Swedish company and then another and then another.. I'm not quite sure where to put these guys. Sometimes being more western than not and sometimes still being very local. Mostly being very western. Maybe that says something about the importance of corporate culture and how it can be more dominating in ones life than the cultural area and sphere one inhabits during off hours...

the Ninjas Are Everywhere

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Putting my dirty flip flops on Malaysian soil I was eminently greeted with a small walk to the main terminal. In KL Air Asia has it's own airport a little bit away from everything. This is quite a normal thing. What was less normal was the amount of ninjas I spotted spotting me. It was not without trouble I bobbed and weaved to stay clear of their sneaky sneaky ways. Although they weren't that good at sneaking around at all.
I'm my elusive tactics I utilized the non regular buss to get to KL sentral. This is the place from where the airport buses will take you to the Air Asia airport or the monorail can take you into the city.
Only a few monorail stops away lay safety, my couch in KL with by Swedish buddy. This was my belief until I discovered the hordes of ninjas that surrounded Beryaya Times Square, my temporary headquarters. They where there in all shapes and sizes. Short, shorter, slim, round, slow, fast, surprisingly sometimes with colorful high heals underneath the black garments and usually carrying ninja-packs for their ninja tools. Usually these ninja packs say Gucci, Prada, Armani or something like this on them.

Malaysia is a prime destination for middle eastern Arabs who like many others enjoy the climate, low prices, good verity and religious homieness. Malaysia is a Islamic state despite only having 60% Malay (these are the people who are mainly Muslim.) the other big communities here are Indian and Chinese. Regardless the Arabs see it as quite close to paradise away from home. For the women there is great shopping to be done without having to be regarded as totally alien, even though they do look like ninjas who forgot to use a belt sometimes. I wonder what came first the ninja or the modern day Burka?
For the Malay the Arabs means, monies! It's not strange when they pretty much get's it handed to them from the government back home. If fact there are laws that require you to employ arabs when you run a company in many middle eastern states. When you do, they often don't do anything and end up being sent home since they are more in the way than not. Still they get better payed than the people who actually perform the jobs. Like the Nepalese, Bangladeshi or others. So well payed often without doing much they come to Kuala Lumpur to have fun. Often is during the Arab holidays that the great sales of Kuala Lumpur starts. This means it's also a great time for you to shop.

An interesting thing is that when Arab men travel alone to Malaysia the first thing they usually want to see are the brothels. It's time to pick up some prostitutes. Mind you this is nothing I'm making up but seen or know from reliable first hand sources that work with Arabs coming here (no it's not the prostitutes). What does that tell us about absolute and strict rules of behavior in society as a shaper of minds. Well it seems that it makes the mind more prone to just the things that is so harshly forbids. Depraved of sensual stimulation and untrained to cope with the availability of it, they go wild when presented with options. Like kids in a candy store...

Binge with a capital M

Those of you being families with Indonesia will know that there are some difficulties going to the movies there currently. When I first arrived I was way excited to go to the movies properly. The island in Thailand where I had spent my previous two months was too small to host a movie theater so I was looking forward to the big screen in Jakarta.  I was up for a surprise though. No big time movies where available. Apparently Hollywood had decided to not ship movies any more. But why!?
Turns out that the Indonesian government, always in need or tax money or bribe money decided to put some extra taxes in for the foreign movies. They claimed it was money that was going to support the domestic movie industry. Which by the way is in horrible condition. Movies made 15 years ago are way better than the crappy horror comedy (comedy part non intentional) movies that air today. They are so bad that parts of Indonesia ban then when they showcase their area in them. It seemed to be much confusion about what taxes or fees had in fact been put on these importers of movies. Eventually people seemed to conclude that if was a extra tax put on all distribution, which makes up of a very large part of movie costs in Indonesia.
I guess that's one way to really encourage pirating DVDs and downloading. I mean if it's the only way to watch movies that's what people will do. Good job Indo government.
Anyway getting out of J-town and flying to Kuala Lumpur, with a brief stop over in Bali, I'm again in a nation which likes movies. And not only are they available here, they are cheap too. There are also a range of different classes of movie theaters. The most interesting one being "gold class". Gold class is a theater class with really big and comfy sofas that serves food and drinks during the cinematic experience. of course the air con is way cold and thus you have blankets to boot.
So far I've seen Transformers 3D, the Green Lantern and X-men. Will definitively have a look at what else is available over here. Movie Binge here we go!

Death to all the Humans; the BBM aproach.

Love it or hate it. It's definetly conquered Indonesia just as many others before it. The Dutch wanted the spices, The Japanese wanted an empire, the Arabs wanted their minds and BBM wants their souls. In no other culture have I seen such a profound glitch in human relations as caused by BBM. It's like nothing I've ever seen before. It leaves men, women and sometimes even children apathetic to the realities around them. The semi glazed over eyes as they make a stint of an effort trying to break the BBM trance state as one tries to contact them while BBMing.

For those of you who does not know what BBM is. It is the Black Berry Messenger, and application that enables cheap text messages to me fired upon the people unfortunate enough to have started to create relations with you or sometimes also the ones that have strategically tried not to.

Their slogan goes it's like they're right next to you. The reality goes, it's like they're not right next to you.

Ok now you're thinking how bad can it get. Well I'll take an example of the BBM influence on dating. If on a date you or I might be familiar with it's maybe one with not too many phone calls or maybe even a turned of  phone.. I'll try to Illustrate the acceptance these disconnections with reality have approached. I've chosen to use and form of human interaction which normally requires some larger part of ones consciousness to engage in the activity to better demonstrate the state of human to human interaction degradations without and interface to translate. The situation is a Date.

The different curves display examples of BBM activity in percentage of total attention to the BBM machine. Each color ha a label showing how well you are doing during the date with that type of BBM disruption pattern.

Above you can see the activity over time for three separate timeline and below is a better experimentation for total activity over time and how it's distributed. The area covered by the curve would be the time times activity. 

This example is just to show you to what devastation this technological virus has struck Indonesia. But why is it hitting Indonesia so hard while it's not at all as prominent in other cultures? America had it first.. There only the business people have it. In a world otherwise ruled by the all mighty Apple in the sky, using design and interaction design to brainwash this is and interesting phenomenon. Regardless this seemingly very high tolerance for being disconnected from reality or maybe need to be connected digitally might make other extreme techosocial experimentation "fun" in Indonesia.

Either way it seems as this necessity and dependency on their BBM enabling devices are in fact making, well not Androids but maybe the worlds first real Cyborgs. Part man, part machine they need both parts to survive..

Sexual Quantum Leep

The mating and grooming habits of the Indonesians or specially the Jakartoon is something that needs a peek at. First of all one should be aware of that the heavily religious nature of the country tends to foster prudish notions. So a conception of sex before marriage being inferior to sex after marriage is the status quo, on the surface. In reality many young couples engage in sexual activities.

For me it's more the way there and what other implications this brings that's interesting. As the image, surface or face is what counts it is ofc seen as very obscene and maybe too exciting with public displays of affection (PDA). But there are modern and cool people that may hold hands while walking and things like that. For making out, you can forget it. This is way beyond the J-towners borders. You will however see foreigners doing this with small or no attempts of prevention by the locals. This lack of displays of affection has even seemed to enter the private domain. What I mean with this is that few attempts to engage in physical interaction will occur before there is a clear indication the coupleing. This gives rise to an interesting process of sexual exploration. Which I call the Sexual Quantum Leep effect. Here is small summary of what might happen during courting.

1. you get her number from a friend
2. you text, cause it might be so scary for her if you call out of the blue...
3. you call
4. you go for dinner, coffee or something like that
5. you repeat this and also engage in lots of BBM activeties (black berry messenger. Yes, I too was hoping for a more exciting explination to this ebriviation)
6. maybe you get introduced to your respective friends
7. Eventually BAM! you are a couple
8. Now it might be considered ok to do the down and dirty, if he or she is open to that at all.
9. Sexual Quantum Leep --- Sex, touching and kissing follows.

Now it might be me, the traveller from a coulture far, far away that got some of this wrong or right and I'm just unused to the schematics of it all. But for you, my compañeros in exploration to understand my notion of this casm I'll copare to the process I'm used to.

RELATIONSHIP PROGRESS	SAMPLE PHYSICAL PROGRESS	JAK BBM PROGRESS	JAK PHYSICAL PROGRESS
Live Conversation 1	Non sexual physical contact	Moderate	N/A
Live Interaction 2,	Kissing, Making out	High	N/A
Continued Live interactin	Sex	Very High	N/A
Coupeling or non-coupleing relations	Sexual Exploration	Extreamly High	Sex

The Americans use a baseball analogy to help quantify the sexual progress in a given senario. to help us define this sexual progress leep I will also use numerics. from 1-4. Since the relationship building progress seem to share sertain characteristics these will be used as a base measurement.

As you can see the rate of sexual advances is significantly higher for the Jatowneese than the sample population of my experience. This means that when it comes to that last step it's a all or nothing situation where there is little previous experience to build on. One can easily make comparisons to a vast amount activities like flying an airplane with no previous training in a simulator and such but I will refrain from that. Instead I'd like to highlight some side effects of this environment which might me interesting.
So stay tuned for a second report of social interaction and grooming in Jakarta.

The Hood, The Turf.

I'm not sure about you but in a whole bunch of places people define them self by the location of where they matured or live. In Stockholm we have the snobby posh peeps of Östermalm or maybe Danderyd. In Oakland, CA the hood defined it's crews but here we have something else. Here we have the people of the malls.

Don't know if you've read my previous post of the prominents mall culture of Inonesia and Jakarta but lets just say it's a very dominating part of life for the middle class and well off in Indonesia. Instead of beloning to a crew or living in a selct neigbourhood one is often described why what mall one frequents and what mall one lives close to.

We have our Yupies and business peeps (pacific place), Our soccer moms (pasar raya), suburban shoppers (mall ambasadeur), OC brats, (taman angrek), chill outers (semangi), and many many more. As a funny note there is a kids attraction at PP named Yupi land. Quite fitting if I do say so myself. Having Pacific Place in my back yard forces me to endure the snobbiest of all malls in Indonesia. Seeing families with more nannies than kids here are not at all uncommon. Needless to say they have at lest one part of designer strollers for their kids. Kinds like home, in Stockholm I guess but with way less of a fasion sense.