Canada seems like something in the distant past. Riding round Java on a motorbike feels like such a long time ago and now 7 months spent on tropical islands feels like an eternity. The days, weeks and months are now just one big blur. It’s hard to believe that in 7 months we have been to just 2 islands and briefly one town in Thailand close to the Malaysian border when we did a visa run earlier in the year.
Back in February we had the mind melting decision to make regards heading back home or sitting things out in Asia. Four months later and we are confident we made the right decision. We have been very lucky that Malaysia has continued to remain in some state of “Lockdown” up until now as it has allowed foreigners to overstay on their 3 month visa with no penalty. We can now stay until at least the middle of September, which is great. To be fair from what I have read every Asian country has followed this path. Thailand announced back in March that tourists who were already there on a 30 day visa would be able to remain in Thailand until July. That’s a pretty decent deal really as no countries in this part of the world have opened their borders up to foreigners. But we sit and wait, in hope that soon there may be some relaxation around this and we will able to move on to pastures new.
Don’t get me wrong though, we could certainly be stranded in a worse place than on a tropical island in Malaysia that has some of the cheapest booze in Asia. At some point in the future we will look back on this and go “remember when we were stranded on an island during the corona-virus pandemic?…..what a terrible time that was!”
We are not ex-pats by any stretch of the imagination but we know quite a few of those on the island now. Having been here for 7 months it has certainly given us a feel for what it must be like to move permanently to another part of the world. Our thoughts are that it’s not bad at all, it’s easy going and certainly a good life, but we still find that we get itchy feet. We are longing for somewhere else to open now so that we have a change of scenery. Like I said we have a lot of friends here now and we certainly feel settled in and comfortable in Langkawi. Having cheap duty free booze was great to start with but after this long in one place it’s starting to take it’s toll on us and we almost wish we were somewhere else where we couldn’t afford to drink every day.
The food is great here as well but now we find ourselves craving some Thai or Indo food, just for a change. A change of everything really. A different beach to go to, a different culture around us. I guess this has shown us that we are more than happy to live non-stop on the road but the adventurous side in us tells us that we need to keep moving every once in a while to keep things fresh and different.
We could definitely live in this part of the world if possible, I think we have known that for a number of years now, but probably not to the extent of buying a home somewhere and settling into one place. We love our freedom too much and I hope that if we can start to get enough work teaching to sustain us being able to live then we could just keep traveling slowly. Travel with the maximum length of Visas and maybe spend that full period settled in a place for a month or more, so that we get a better feel for a place and it also keeps things cheaper as you get a much better deal renting somewhere for a month at a time. Also with the teaching we can’t keep moving every few days as we need to have our classroom environment set up in our digs. Pictures on the wall etc. It has to be quiet surroundings so that there is no background noise interference, good internet etc. all these little things that we must have to be able to teach dictate that we can’t be constantly moving.
I really hope it comes together like that. I hate the feeling of coming home from a long trip, it’s gut wrenching. There is an age old adage well known in the back packing/traveling world. When you go back home from traveling people don’t understand what it is like unless they have done it themselves. You’ve been on the road for months or even years. You’ve seen amazing things, met interesting new people, had crazy ‘off the beaten track’ adventures and wasted weeks on idyllic tropical beaches. You suddenly go from an exciting 10 hour grueling motorbike ride up into the steamy mountains of Java to waiting for a bus at Park Lane bus station in Sunderland. From sitting on a quiet Thai beach watching a beautiful sunset with your cold bottles of Chang and not a care in the world to sitting in a cold boring flat trawling through the internet looking for a job. You try to tell people about all your crazy adventures in the wilderness of Canada and they are all excited to tell you that a new Gregg’s is opening just round the corner. I like a good sausage roll as much as the next person but it’s certainly no Pad Thai on Koh Lipe. This isn’t in anyway disrespecting anyone, it’s just how it is for us and it’s hard settling back in to what is deemed a ‘normal’ life when you return. I’m particularly bad for it, Dani not so much. I have a travel/freedom hangover for months or years, it never seems to fully go away until the next trip starts. Hopefully it doesn’t happen soon, but if the lessons we are getting don’t pick up a bit more then the reality is that we will probably be on a plane home come August/September. A sad thought.
In the meantime though we are enjoying every day that we have now, just as we always do. Things have relaxed somewhat here and we are still applying social distancing as much as possible but we have started to venture out a little. We have been out for a couple of meals which was nice and the places we have eaten at have been empty which is good and reassuring. The other night we popped out for a few drinks where we ended up bumping into some friends of ours which was cool. We know we still need to keep ourselves safe but when there hasn’t be a covid case on the island for over 2 months do you feel a bit more safe and confident in being able to venture out a little now and then.
We have also been round to see Billy and Jane our friends that we house-sitted for a few months ago. They made some amazing Indian food and we enjoyed a few drinks and some good company. All of these little things are nice having been stuck at our digs for so long. We have also been going in to the animal shelter a couple of mornings and afternoons a week to help out there. It’s nice to see all the animals and to still feel like we doing something worthwhile with our time.
If somebody asked if we would recommend Langkawi for a holiday, I would say definitely not. If your coming to this part of the world there are far prettier, relaxed islands than Langkawi. Just an hour away on a boat and you are in a tropical Thai paradise on Koh Lipe. There are so many more relaxing and interesting places in Asia to visit than here. But that said we could have ended up somewhere a lot worse. Lockdown’s out here came into effect with just 24 hours notice. Not enough time to make plans to head somewhere. I would much rather be where we are right now than in a big city with no beaches and landscape.
Life isn’t too bad at all really…..now where did I put that bottle of Jim Beam?
