Mr. Naido had driven me in his taxicab on a previous trip from the airport to downtown. He is a 69 year old retired civil servant who operates a taxicab to get out of the house and remain active. Important for me, he used his taxi meter, which most taxi drivers don't do and thus overcharge. He was confused about my request for him to drive me around to the different cemetaries, but I convinced him it would be fun. So he went along. We first went the old Chinese cemetary which is in the Jalan Belamy area. It is very [View Full Entry]

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Before I left Washington DC, I had been given very precise instructions to get a hijab (the head scarf that Muslim women wear) for a friend. With these instructions, I asked several Malay Muslim women who were wearing a hijab where to get one. This typically involved more sign language and a lot of curious looks and smiles, since a man does not buy a hijab. But they all pointed in the same area: Masjid India. Masjid India means "Indian Mosque" and the neighborhood around it is a mix of Pakistani, Arabic, and Indian Muslim cultures. It is walking distance from [View Full Entry]

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The National Mosque (Masjid Negara) is the equivalent of the National Cathedral in Washington DC. A few obvious differences, starting with the lack of pews, shoes, and Christians. It is a glorious building, but not the kind of soaring one I expected, as in a cathedral. It is open to the public technically but in practice they prefer Muslims. So I wore the cap and carried prayer beads but of course fooled no one with my light skin. My experience was one of tranquility. It was not prayer time so men were praying privately and quietly. Unlike a cathedral, the emphasis [View Full Entry]

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Okay, so it would have a lot quicker to just go to the Caribbean or Florida. The first leg of the trip was 14 hours. Left left Washington DC and few over Toronto, then across the Bearing Strait, across parts of Russia and China and then down to Seoul. It was really just a 24 hour layover, but I was a chance for a quick glance. Maniac taxi driver broke every conceivable law in the one-hour trip to town. Which cost 130,000 Wan or whatever the hell they were. Turns out he was Catholic, and maybe that explains it. Made mental [View Full Entry]

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