Laos, via Malaysia

I have an hour before I will be picked up by my bus that is taking me to Kuala Lumpur. It's a 5.5 hour ride versus a 1 hour plane flight, but I'd rather not deal with getting into KL from the airport, especially from the LCCT. Until they do something about making the LCCT linked via rail, and making it cheap in the process, Singapore is probably the better hub to go through if you are not just making a same day flight connection--as long as your flight leaves after 730 am, and you make hostel reservations in advance.

TMW, I will be flying Air Asia flight AK612, leaving KUL at 1510, and arriving in Vientiane at 1645, thus accomplishing my goal of avoiding bangkok, but paying a pretty penny to do so.

What will I do in KL? Mainly stock up on things that may not be available in Laos, like the basics including toothpaste, another toothbrush (i had to throw one out because it got contaminated with cambodian tap water, and I didn't want to risk the cambodian version of montezuma's revenge), and bug spray.

Otherwise, I'll just hang out and relax for the less than 24 hours I will be there.

Singapore, and southeast asia as a whole, has gone world cup crazy, literally counting down the days until the games begin--21, according to today's tabloid. What's interesting is that they are world cup crazy even though the closest country to qualify for the tournament is Australia. The closest asian country? south korea. If you use the newspapers as a prism for which to understand singapore as a whole, the favorite team in these parts is decidedly england.

I have to admit that I feel a little bit of American soccer guilt. The U.S. has qualified for the world cup, and will be playing in it, but most Americans could probably care less, or at most, are ho-hum about it--the mindset being: yes we qualified, and I'm happy that we did, and I hope we do well, but if we don't, then its no big deal...it's only soccer after all. Compare that to SE Asia, where people would probably be dying of heart attacks if their team actually managed to qualify, and entire countries would likely shut down to watch the games when their team took the field. I mean, I'll probably watch some of the games, but the only time my heart rate will actually flutter is when I get off the couch to get either a drink or go to the bathroom.

So, I decided to stay for two more weeks. I clearly must not be homesick (I'm not), but there are some things I kind of miss from the U.S. Quite honestly, the only thing that I truly miss is the food (no offense, mom and dad)--tex mex, barbecue, and pizza. Maybe having my own laptop and own music playing system--I have an ipod, but I haven't used it for at least 4 years, and I've been travelling without one--and doing the nytimes sunday crossword puzzle and wsj weekly crossword puzzle, but those things can be easily accessed via archives.

Otherwise, I really don't miss all that much. It would have been nice to be at the airport to welcome home my brother, since I haven't seen the kid in five months, but if I'm pretty confident that if he were in my position, he would have done the same thing. I know for a fact that he certainly wasn't shedding any tears over missing me while he was gallivanting all over europe (rightfully so, btw).

Just for the heck of it, walked down the road in one of singapore's red light districts last night, and it really wasn't all that impressive compared to Cambodia--although they actually do use pale red fluorescent lights in some dark alleys to let customers know they are open for business. You see some girls lined up in stairways, and hear some husky voices of those that probably weren't born as biological girls, but that's as extreme as it gets.

Understandably, certain places, like along raffles place and in downtown, have a new york feel to them--lots of people wearing button down shirts with black slacks and punching stuff on there blackberry while standing outside and having a cigarette.

What is bizarre is knowing and having read about the mess that Bangkok has become, you'd think that other places in SE Asia might go down that path or at least start to get people in other countries all riled up, but nothing could be further from the truth. It's business as usual everywhere else, including other parts of thailand not named Bangkok--meaning that everywhere not named bangkok is no different than how it was before the protests started.