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| This is a fortune telling parrot. He's usually used for gambling purposes. He sits in the cage, and when prompted he comes out and picks out a card from the deck. |
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| This lizard had a huge belly, and was may in the middle of a plantation . Maybe just feasted on a wild chicken? After this pic, he darted into the underbrush, and circled around behind me. Scary. |
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| Stuck lorry on a kampong driveway. Brought the whole village out for entertainment. |
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| This is the go-to hawker stand for Rose and I for 2015. We've eaten here too many times to count. They all know us. |
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| Curry Laksa. The oily spots are from Coconut Milk. It's delicious. |
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| Me and Ken, my best friend from Johor. I'll miss this guy. |
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| The above series are all from Bandar Seri Alam Rides. See it while you can. It's a beautiful forest area, surrounding a reservoir, and it's shrinking by the day. |
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| Restoran Hill Xuan. This was our local restaurant. |
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| We had Currry Leaf La La every time we ate there. Look at all those curry leaves. |
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| Wild Boar Curry. One of the best curries I've ever had. |
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| Chapter 1's dessert specialty. They hollow out homemade bread, cover the insides in butter and honey, bake the break again to make it all toasty and crusty, and cover it with fresh berries, strawberry sauce, vanilla ice cream. It takes 20 minutes, and it would be worth it if it took twice that long. |
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| Was almost home one day from a 40 km ride, when I ran into this big group of school kids. They were heading out into the plantation for a 20 km charity ride. Many of them were on fixies, road bikes, all sorts of bikes that shouldn't be in the plantations. They had huge smiles, and were having a blast. I joined them for a bit. Cool kids. |
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| Fresh Henna, and Hakka Fermented Soy Bean Deep Fried Portk. MMMMMMMM. |
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| Handmade cards from Rose. |
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| Mango cake, and Raspberry loaf. |
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| Two of our favorite local drinks. Sweetheart 3 layer tea for Rose, Hot honey lemon for me. |
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| Rose's first day of Chinese Tuition. |
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| Fried Popiah from a biking buddy's hawker stall. |
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| Plantation roads like this are where I spent a lot of my time in 2015. This was my training ground, my playground, my church, and my sanctuary. |
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| Some of these plantations even contain secret little single track lines. They are the MTB equivalent of dork lines from skiing. |
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| Unfortunately, these plantations are vanguards of environmental mismanagement. And yet, in the middle of them, there are still little slices of jungle havens to be found,. |
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| Secret Hindi temple on the border between pineapple farms and palm plantations. |
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| Limau Ais, Nasi Ayam Penyet, Pan Mien, Satay |
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| Ayam Penyet is all the rage right now. It's originally Indonesian street food. You marinate the chicken with tons of turmeric, coat it with a very crispy batter, and fry it. It's served with extra fried crumbs, hot dog or meat balls, sliced cucumbers, and some sort of veggie. The star of the dish, in addition to the chicken, is the chili paste. It's made with fermented shrimp. It has a stunning depth of flavor, and a heat that creeps up on you, such that by the end of the meal, you're pouring sweat. |
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| Pan Mien: a Johor specialty. It's a simple anchovy based fish stock. Some spinach, fish balls, and extra anchovies are added. Then it's mixed with fresh, hand made noodles, just out of the hand crank machine. The noodles are the star, and they are perfection. |
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| The second place dude at Kek Seng 99.9 bike race. The following week he crashed out, but he's a hell of a rider. |
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| Fatbike champion; 23/1100 overall. My best result ever. Until a week later. |
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| Shrek in his natural environment, with his cohorts. |
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| The Pink Panther. |
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| Rose showing off my winner's jersey, medal, and trophy. |
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| Oh yeah!!! Droppin' teeth!!!! |
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| The jumping off point for the finished product. All the bundles of palm seeds are brought here by the tractor load, after being picked by dudes with scythes on the end of 10 meter long poles. Then a lorry drives up under this ramp, and the lorry is loaded up for a trip to the processing plant. The palm oil price is dropping because people are catching on to the fact it's super bad for you, and bad for the environment. But it's still used in a lot of cosmetics, and this industry isn't going anywhere. Don't eat palm oil. More importantly, don't support Indonesia. BOYCOTT INDONESIA!!!!!!! |