Fermented and Flailing - Langkawi, Malaysia

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A long walk to the ferry terminal and a relatively uneventful speed boat from Georgetown on Penang Island put me on Langkawi Island on the West coast of Malaysia just South of the Thai border. I wanted to spend some time on the beach as I had had enough of cities and believe it or not hiking in the mountains. I was ready for a change. Showing up on Langkawi I was able to share a cab with two other travelers to the main beach town of Pantai Cenang and ended up staying at the hostel that they were headed to. I love it when things work out and I get sorted at a new location with little or no effort. I went to the beach straight away.

Now this blog is not going to be very interesting (not that any of them are) as I've succumbed into a routine here full of apathy and just down right laziness. The reasons why I have fallen into this trap are what I believe to be the following: 1.) I'm tired from just under 1 year of traveling. Why bother moving if you find a good spot to stay? 2.) My accommodation costs $6USD a night. 3.) My most expensive meal I have had here was $7USD - with drinks. 4.) Beer costs $0.50 per. It is cheaper than water; enough said. 5.) The beach here is amazing, not crowded, and the sunsets are spectacular.

So for the past eight days or so (I've seriously lost track of the day and date) I basically have been sleeping till around 11 or noon. I'll wake up, watch an episode of Breaking Bad on my Netbook and then have my "morning" tea. Then I will pack my day bag and head out for lunch at the same Malaysian curry, chicken, and rice buffet stall at the end of town. I try to make my lunch last as long as long as possible. Really what I am doing here is killing time for when I can go sit on the beach. The sun is so intense that anytime before 3pm it is to much to sit in. Once three rolls around I'll go to the store grab some beverages and set up on the far end of the beach with my sarong, iPod/speaker combo, and daily news paper. A few swims here and there are sprinkled in with a nap or two and before I know it the sun is setting. Once my duty free cans of Skol are gone it's off for dinner, a quick surf of the web, then to sleep and repeat the next day.

And that's it. That is all I have been doing. No activities, no culture. Just laying around. I have met some cool people but they all move on and I remain the only constant. Then I met Celine. Celine is a lovely French woman who happens to live and work on a sailboat here in Langkawi. This weekend there are plans being made to sail around the islands on a couple of day trips. I am ecstatic to say the least. I was trying to come up with a plan to enter Thailand and figure out what to do and where to go from there, but again I just can't be bothered to leave, and now with Celine things have got more complicated. Langkawi has me clutched firmly in her grasp and here I lay fermented and flailing.

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Photos

women
It just doesn't seem right to have to go to the beach like this.

karsts
The famous limestone karsts that are everywhere in this region. When I ever make it to Thailand, these should become more of a familiar companion to me. You'll also notice in some of my photos that their is a small black dot in the upper left side. My camera has developed a speck of sand or dust inside of the camera on the lens that I cannot get rid of. If anyone's got any suggestions, I'm all ears.