In the afternoon, some of the Australian girls took out canoes and got lost. Once again, Aziz to the rescue!

Dinner was a traditional Malaysian meal. The food was similar to the stuff we'd been eating but we had to wear sarongs, sit on the floor, and eat with our hands. It's not for me but some people seemed to like it.

Afterwards, we had a surprise birthday cake for Jitu, who was 27-years-old today.

We wandered to the main dining area - the one with chairs - and all sat around and chatted. We all petted Chuck the cat, and Peter told us that Chuck's friend Tom had been eaten by a snake a few weeks ago.

Penang, Malaysia - February 3, 2000
Paloma braved the cold showers at Suka Suka but I decided I'd just stay dirty until the afternoon, when we'd be arriving on the island of Penang. We had our breakfast and took the boat to go to the mainland. Aziz was going to give us a city tour of Kuala Kangsar.

Asiah and Aziz were both coming along and Suka Suka was deserted, except for Chuck the cat. Chuck leaped into the boat to come along but Aziz had him gently lifted back onto the dock. Chuck turned his back to us and looked for all the world like he hadn't wanted to go anyway.

The trip was a 15-20 minute ride and about five minutes before it was over, the engine cut out. Aziz tried and tried to start it. He pumped more gas into the engine and tried again. Still no response. We all started to look around for oars and discovered that there were none, and there was only one lifeboat.

Worried, we all looked to Aziz. What would we do?

He looked at his wife. We all looked at his wife, curious as to what kind of silent signal had just been passed between them. She pulled a cell phone out of her purse and dialled a number.

We all clapped but a minute later it became apparent that we were out of range and that the cell phone was useless.

Another boat went by. The occupants stared hard at the opposite bank, lowering their hats over their eyes so they couldn't see us. I guess they were busy.

Then the engine started! We started off, passing another boat. Everyone waved. The guys on the other boat waved back.

Just as the other boat was pulling out of sight, our engine cut again. Our waves to the other boat turned into frantic requests for assistance. The other guys cheerfully waved back but then fortunately noticed that we were in fact, not content to lazily say hello - we were all waving a lot, with both hands.

The other boat returned. They pulled up alongside our boat and clung tightly, using their tiny engine to power both of us and our many backpacks. We slowly made progress towards the shore.

There were two vans waiting for us at the pier. They took us to the the Kuala Kangsar Ubadiah Mosque. We had other scheduled stops but there was some kind of bus mix-up due to a school holiday and we had to cancel them.

We traveled to Butterworth where we transferred to a ferry for a short ride to Penang, a large island off of Malaysia.

We took three taxis to the Cathay Hotel. According to Lonely Planet, it's a "well-maintained, grand colonial hotel" that was featured in the 1995 movie "Beyond Rangoon." According to me, it's an old dive with a brothel next door.

I was assigned to room with Jo again, which was a little weird as she was actually traveling with another Australian girl, Sarah.

For lunch, we went to a place call "Blue Diamond" but it looked unappealing and only offered tuna sandwiches and similar stuff.

The group wasn't interested in eating at Blue Diamond so Jitu and I and our guidebooks went for a scouting run and found another restaurant. The Lovage Cafe was a fabulous little pasta and chicken place on Lebuh Campbell that had been open less than a month.

Pratima and Jitu were going to see the Kek Lok Si Temple at night. It's the largest Buddhist temple in Malaysia and it closes at 6pm. Tomorrow night, however, is Chinese New Year's Eve so the temple has been decorated with lights.

Or so they'd heard. Jitu had read it in a Malaysian newspaper at Suka Suka and Dennis the waiter in the Lovage Cafe had confirmed it. The desk clerk at our hotel and the taxi dispatcher had both said, "no, no, Temple is closed." So it was really a 50/50 shot at seeing something spectacular.

I tagged along. We walked up to the taxi stand and convinced a man to send us there. It would be our problem if the temple was closed.

Our taxi driver was a real character. He started out by showing us the "GH." Mystified, the three of us looked at each other and someone (maybe even me) said, "what's GH?"

"General Hospital," said the driver, surprised at our ignorance.

He then proceeded to tell Jitu that he looked like a Pakistani film star, after first confusing Jitu and Pratima with Maori's. Jitu suggested the driver visit New Zealand and the driver said, "sure, when you sponsor me for a visa."

We talked about "Anna and the King" for a while. Large parts of it were filmed on Penang after Thailand refused to allow the film crew in. The taxi driver's friend had shaved his head and scored $300Malay a day as an extra Siamese fellow. Unfortunately, everyone wanted to work and there were only so many extras needed so our driver had not been selected.

Jodie Foster had stayed at the Sheraton. Chow Yun Fat stayed somewhere else, I think. I wasn't too clear on the details as our driver was quick-witted and sharp and I was a few steps behind him.

The driver asked where we were staying. "Cathay," we responded. "Ah, there is a famous massage parlor next door. And I don't mean massage like the real thing. I mean the genuine artificial massage. I mean sex. Prostitutes."

We also learned that Kuala Lumpur Chinese were primarily from the Canton province of China, and therefore spoke Cantonese. I had been arguing with Peter about this as he insisted that Mandarin was the dialect of the KL Chinese.

We drove to the temple, but had to walk the last bit of the way. The area around the temple was a giant outdoor market and the merchants were doing a thriving business and the streets were packed as everyone prepared for the Year of the Dragon.

We weren't too sure which way to walk and we asked a nice woman. At great length, she explained the two directions we could walk. She showed us that the one was dark but that we could still walk up in the fading twilight. We followed her instructions. Besides, Jitu and I both had our Maglites.

The temple was brilliantly lit, like a casino. Thousands of red lanterns filled the ceilings, each decorated with the family name of the sponsor of the individual lantern. White strings of lights were strewn across all the plants larger than grass and sparkling lights covered towers and pagodas. We stared in awe and then started taking photos.

A local man stopped us in the parking lot to tell us that we should not go to the nearby Penang Hill as we'd thought we might, because the funicular railroad closed at 9pm. Everyone in Malaysia seemed to be taking an active interest in our welfare and we were quite pleased about it. He explained to us how we could walk down the hill and take the bus back to our hotel. The man told me about his son and daughter-in-law, who worked for major US financial firms. And then I heard him saying to someone else, as we walked away, "she is from New York."

We counted seven pagodas on the courtyard centerpiece, each filled with tiny figures of Buddha. More tiny Buddhas lined the outside surrounding wall. A giant Buddha sat in the middle of it all, the way a Christmas display would have a manger scene in the middle of a front lawn.

We walked through the dark, using our Maglights and trying to ignore the rustling animal sounds. The marketplace was packed but it didn't take long for Pratima to ask a vendor where the bus stop was. Jitu engaged a man at the bus stop in conversation and soon we were sitting on a air-conditioned bus, on our way back to the Cathay Hotel.

The man that had given us the bus information came on the bus solely to give our driver a cigarette. They had a few words and the man went back to standing at the bus stop.

The view of the Chinese markets was spectacular. Everyone was buying and selling fruit and meats and trinkets of all kinds. We drove out of the market slowly and then through Penang, past all kinds of high-rise apartments, small houses with driveways, and Pizza Hut. When we reached Georgetown, our driver was very careful to let us off at the exact right spot. We reached the hotel easily and said good night, happy to be getting a genuine feel for Malaysia.

My roomie Jo was not in. At about 3:30am, she showed up, more than a bit drunk. Some of the other Australian women were downstairs at the front of the hotel, drunkenly saying goodbye (or whatever) to their respect Australian male escorts for the evening, military men they'd met in a bar. Jo had a boyfriend at home and I was secretly proud of her - she hadn't picked up a guy. Instead, she'd befriended a 20-year-old Malaysian girl and her mother. She was going to meet them at 3 the following afternoon for a local's eye view of Penang.

Jo described the scene in front of the hotel. Apparently, there were prostitutes everywhere. Men in taxis, rickshaws, cars and on foot were talking to them, deciding which wares to sample this evening.