The jukebox is churning out pop tunes.
Not Malay or Indonesian, but English pop tunes.
My hearing has become acute.
And the t-shirt I put on, my hotel room attire, is two sizes too small and causing a stir among the Chinese at Country Kitchen.
'They think you are gay,' says Abdul, who works at the Muslim Fast Food stall.
I just can't get them to fit me.
'You'll need 3 XL,' says Abdul's friend who works for the government in the land surveying department.
Enough of that, I say and try and change the subject.
I was in such a hurry to get to Muslim Fast Food for my midday meal, that I forgot to change into a larger t-shirt.
It's trying traveling and even more trying wearing a t-shirt two sizes too small.
The Indonesian waitress is now pulling faces at me.
Maybe she wants to test if I'm gay or straight.
There's big talk by the bubbly Inodesian who runs another warung.
'You have no friends,' she says, as Abdul and his friend excuse themselves. 'But you can join them, ' she says, pointing at the degenerates outside, most of them old drunken Chinese who forgot they should have died a decade ago.
Great advice.
I'm pulling faces at Old Charlie who has a bunged up elbow from too much boozing. He's drinking Oranjeboom, 8.5 percent Dutch beer.
Another few cans he'll be dancing on the ceiling and telling me how he speaks perfect English.
For now, he's subdued, it's only early afternoon, after all.
I pop another pseudoephedrine tablet and order another coffee. The acute hearing has stopped and I'm now grooving to the cool tunes humming out of the old jukebox.
I can't wait for my ears to clear up. I'm not abusing the pills. I only take one a day, just to clear up some of the excessive fluid echoing sounds all over the place.
I need to focus. The Long House needs me, lucid. Who else is going to document the place? Only the brave traveller comes here.
It feels like home now. Is there any returning from this place?
I've gone as low as I can go. I even had to tell the Chinese hooker at The Hoover last night to stop nattering in the foyer area. Her incessant babbling was keeping me away from my beauty sleep.
I'm sure Mary was disappointed I wasn't manly enough to ask her back to my room. The following morning, she gave me a coy smile. Please stop teasing me, Mary.
My Chinese friend is waking up, soon I'm expecting him to go into a song. When he reaches that limit, he starts singing like an Irishman after one too many Guinness.
It will usually be some golden Oldie.
'Somewhere, over the rainbow....'
Right on cue.
Then he stumbles home and is replaced by a Dyak who thinks I'm 76. He''s retired at 55, worked 35 years in Civil Aviation and he thinks I'm 76.
When I tell him my real age, he says, 'You are five years younger than me.'
But he's still convinced I'm around 76 years old. I resolve to look in the mirror when I get back to my hotel room to see if my hair has gone grey overnight.
He had it in his head that I was retired. His retirement age was 55, Australia's was 65, so that made me 76. Dyak logic was never so easy to follow.
It took some time to tell him that I was travelling and spending my savings.It's what travellers usually do, isn't it?
I was feeling drowsy. Whatever they put in those tablets, they have me snoozing shortly after taking them.
I conveniently excused myself and beelined to The Hoover.
I prefer my degenerate Chinese drunk any day to an early retired Dyak who worked 35 years in Civil Aviation and who is moaning that his pension doesn't cover half the costs of things these days.
'Inflation has got us by the balls.'
Well you are only 55, I say and I hear they are looking for a night manager at The Hoover. Very few Malaysians can live off a pension and usually need to supplement it with a sideline job.
Hint hint.
He wasn't listening to me.
Of course he wasn't because you were sound asleep dummy.
Or did he think I was 67?
Go back to sleep dummy, the thinking is taxing you.
It really was.
There's something about the Long House, I just can't put my finger on it.
Not Malay or Indonesian, but English pop tunes.
My hearing has become acute.
And the t-shirt I put on, my hotel room attire, is two sizes too small and causing a stir among the Chinese at Country Kitchen.
'They think you are gay,' says Abdul, who works at the Muslim Fast Food stall.
I just can't get them to fit me.
'You'll need 3 XL,' says Abdul's friend who works for the government in the land surveying department.
Enough of that, I say and try and change the subject.
I was in such a hurry to get to Muslim Fast Food for my midday meal, that I forgot to change into a larger t-shirt.
It's trying traveling and even more trying wearing a t-shirt two sizes too small.
The Indonesian waitress is now pulling faces at me.
Maybe she wants to test if I'm gay or straight.
There's big talk by the bubbly Inodesian who runs another warung.
'You have no friends,' she says, as Abdul and his friend excuse themselves. 'But you can join them, ' she says, pointing at the degenerates outside, most of them old drunken Chinese who forgot they should have died a decade ago.
Great advice.
I'm pulling faces at Old Charlie who has a bunged up elbow from too much boozing. He's drinking Oranjeboom, 8.5 percent Dutch beer.
Another few cans he'll be dancing on the ceiling and telling me how he speaks perfect English.
For now, he's subdued, it's only early afternoon, after all.
I pop another pseudoephedrine tablet and order another coffee. The acute hearing has stopped and I'm now grooving to the cool tunes humming out of the old jukebox.
I can't wait for my ears to clear up. I'm not abusing the pills. I only take one a day, just to clear up some of the excessive fluid echoing sounds all over the place.
I need to focus. The Long House needs me, lucid. Who else is going to document the place? Only the brave traveller comes here.
It feels like home now. Is there any returning from this place?
I've gone as low as I can go. I even had to tell the Chinese hooker at The Hoover last night to stop nattering in the foyer area. Her incessant babbling was keeping me away from my beauty sleep.
I'm sure Mary was disappointed I wasn't manly enough to ask her back to my room. The following morning, she gave me a coy smile. Please stop teasing me, Mary.
My Chinese friend is waking up, soon I'm expecting him to go into a song. When he reaches that limit, he starts singing like an Irishman after one too many Guinness.
It will usually be some golden Oldie.
'Somewhere, over the rainbow....'
Right on cue.
Then he stumbles home and is replaced by a Dyak who thinks I'm 76. He''s retired at 55, worked 35 years in Civil Aviation and he thinks I'm 76.
When I tell him my real age, he says, 'You are five years younger than me.'
But he's still convinced I'm around 76 years old. I resolve to look in the mirror when I get back to my hotel room to see if my hair has gone grey overnight.
He had it in his head that I was retired. His retirement age was 55, Australia's was 65, so that made me 76. Dyak logic was never so easy to follow.
It took some time to tell him that I was travelling and spending my savings.It's what travellers usually do, isn't it?
I was feeling drowsy. Whatever they put in those tablets, they have me snoozing shortly after taking them.
I conveniently excused myself and beelined to The Hoover.
I prefer my degenerate Chinese drunk any day to an early retired Dyak who worked 35 years in Civil Aviation and who is moaning that his pension doesn't cover half the costs of things these days.
'Inflation has got us by the balls.'
Well you are only 55, I say and I hear they are looking for a night manager at The Hoover. Very few Malaysians can live off a pension and usually need to supplement it with a sideline job.
Hint hint.
He wasn't listening to me.
Of course he wasn't because you were sound asleep dummy.
Or did he think I was 67?
Go back to sleep dummy, the thinking is taxing you.
It really was.
There's something about the Long House, I just can't put my finger on it.
