Malaysia, Part Two: Batu Caves

Remember how I promised all the monkeys at the teasing end of Part One? Time to deliver on that promise. The Batu Caves proved itself to be worth all our sweat and dehydration. A slow, 8-mile train ride away from the center of Kuala Lumpur delivered us worlds away.

The Hindu shrine is home not only to a devastatingly awe-inspiring cultural and spiritual immensity, but also to a population of rather bold monkeys known for stealing valuables and snatching snacks from unwary tourists. They sure were wonderful.

This guy doesn't give a crap about your renewed sense of wonder and majesty.

So. Many. Stairs.

One of my favorite photos I've ever taken. Something resonates about points of light in the dark, the quiet in the heat.

Oh yeah, and bananas. Stereotypes, man.

One particularly feisty monkey made off with a woman's offering of flowers intended for one of the cave-sheltered shrines. I hope they were as tasty as they were beautiful.

I wasn't joking about those snacks.

 

Yikes.

I think this monkey had a big touch of the crazy, but maybe we just caught it on an off day, photogenic-wise.

Then there was this little girl. I feel like if I was a monkey, I'd be her, insecurely fidgeting with and chewing on her own tail.

Surprise bonus? Baby monkey.

My first ever coconut water straight from the coconut. So good.

Next up in Part Three, we take a quick trip to the town of Melaka, where we encounter the next best animals after monkeys: MALAYSIAN KITTENS.

Malaysia, Part One: Kuala Lumpur

One of the benefits of living in Asia is our proximity to locations previously only accessible to us by day-long flights and more money than we had. A short mid-summer break from work (and Adam's 30th birthday) provided an opportunity to jet to one of these places, and so we found ourselves in Malaysia. We first landed in the capital, Kuala Lumpur, and adventured around a bit (this series of posts will be photo-heavy and caption-light).

The rooftop pool view of the Petronus Towers. Not a bad start.

Starbucks, of course, provided ample WiFi for important things like Instagram access.

The Petronas Towers are staggeringly tall - the tallest twin towers in the world, in fact. You'll get a better idea from the top.

See? This isn't even the top yet.

Here's the top. Whoa.

The National Mosque was humbling both in its beauty and its welcoming. Docents graciously provided robes for us to enter respectfully, although Adam could have used a few more inches on his.

  

Wandering through markets led us to one of my more ridiculous experiences involving doctor fish.

  

With thoroughly pecked-over feet, we continued to explore, sweat-drenched but happy. The rest are just bits and pieces throughout the city.

Plumeria, for dad.

 

Next up, Malaysia, Part Two: Batu Caves. Here's a cheeky peek of what's in store (hint: monkeys. All the monkeys).

Cicadas and slumberlust

A flash of sunlight through a wing, a glimpse of glint among the leaves. The heat-spurred chorus of the cicadas pushes past my headphones – music pours into my ears, but the insects flood the stream. The heavy blanket of summer malaise dampens our shoulders and our desires to do much of anything but muddle through until fall.

Here we are: sweat-drained bodies on sodden bed sheets, limp smiles under umbrellas-turned-timpani drums as the monsoon breaks overhead, foreheads never wanting for company with a constant spackling of damp hair. A months-long longing for sleep in the maddeningly inescapable humidity as we wring out a little oxygen from water we breathe.

Through this steamdank haze, an unassuming intensity leans in every so often, clearing its throat in the doorway and sending me flying. The feeling of stepping off a curb you didn’t know was there – that same reeling as if the world slipped out of reality for a moment and took you with it – and the ground, solid and unyielding, interrupts just as you realize you’re falling to meet it in the first place. These breaches through the mundane are basic truths that nonetheless jar me out of placid comfort:

I am very far away.

The people I love won't live forever; neither will I.

We all have a finite number of heartbeats.

The big things, like the little things, don't ultimately matter. Do they?

This season of cicadas and slumberlust offers a warning: In the cycle of song and death, some choose careful dormancy while others burn in passing brilliance. Both paths require sacrifice, and neither is without its unique resistance. Regardless of choice, time delivers us to the same end.

If I ever remember how to sleep - my hopes lay sooner in wine than in September - this strain of memento mori will make a terrible lullaby.

The oldest and wisest we've ever been

A nearly 2-month-long inability to write anything decent - or even coherent - for this space is ridiculous. My thoughts have been weak and my attempts to write them weaker. So, allow me to lift something I wrote elsewhere, tweak it a bit, and lazily deposit it here (self-plagiarism is all the rage):

Today, at 26, I am in a place - literally and metaphorically - I never planned for, even as little as 2 years ago. Right now, I'm working on that whole being-in-my-twenties thing by living life as I can. Some days, it's an adventure of exhilarating reaffirmation that I exist, and other days it's the kind of soul-rending, mind-enfeebling, heart-crippling "What Am I Doing With This Life" wandering that - obviously, and appropriately - plagues all twenty-somethings. I think we sometimes feel like we've reached a point at which we believe we know what we're doing (or believe we should) because - quite simply - each new day, we're the oldest and wisest we've ever been. We have only hindsight to teach us and hope to guide us. We are careful to keep old wounds closed and learn to analyze the scars, pouring over the lines as if they will map out the future. I expect this is a notion that can carry us well into our old age, right up until death, when all our oldest, wisest-ness will be just a comfort, if we're lucky. Maybe we should take comfort now in knowing what we can, feeling what we do, and putting the pieces together as we find them.

Today, you are your oldest and wisest. Let's all have a drink and take it a day at a time, because our days are quick to build the lifetimes we may never see coming.