making up syllables: 1m2tm: cameron highlands, malaysia

apparently we made the trip to the cameron highlands in record time. normally a five hour mini-bus ride, we made it in three. our driver was perhaps insane and i know i heard our tires squeal around some of the bends on that rail-less mountain road. still we made it in one piece and i didn't lose my lunch so let's call it a success.

the cameron highlands are a cool, elevated region in central malaysia named for the british surveyor who first decided to explore the area. its locally famous for its tea plantations, strawberry farms, and the fact that jim thompson, famous himself for opening up the thai silk industry, disappeared without a trace in the highlands' jungles.

luck had it that everyone in the mini-bus was staying at the same hostel (father's guesthouse ★★★, father's is one of the original establishments in the highlands and is situated beautiful up on a hillside overlooking the rest of the town of tanah rata. the dorm was pretty spartan with a variety of pillows and blankets and little single person cots. it was mixed and incredibly open so there wasn't much privacy and, more noticeably, noise protection. but it had a lovely garden, a great common space with decent available dining and they played movies every night. i would probably raise the star level had i stayed in a private room) so we were taken directly. this time i would be sleeping in a dorm with about 16 other people in a massive common space.

the highlands are a frequent stopping point for travelers looking to hike in high elevation jungles and has numerous mapped paths. unfortunately for me this was right after i had dropped a scooter on my toe so enjoying the jungle just seemed out of the question. the first day i was there i did my usual activity of exploring the (very small, one road) town and then spent the rest of the day sipping on coffee, reading my book, playing cards and enjoying the cool mountain air. it decided to rain for a little while, and hard (see video below), but there was a sheltered outdoor eating area perfect for sitting and watching it come down. not much else notable happened until later as i was going to bed when i noticed how much more savvy european travelers are than myself. i noticed as they were all undressing to get into bed they had brought their own personal mosquito nets for sleeping in, which at first i thought was interesting because i had never seen them before, but soon i became worried that need of mosquito net meant mosquitos were going to be a problem. the rest of the night i slept covered head to toe in clothes, with my hoody covering my head, terrified and convinced of mosquito infestation. i was going to get malaria or maybe worse, dengue, i just knew it. but morning came and i was fine. i would later learn that because of the highlands elevation there were barely any mosquitos and, in fact, malaria or dengue was not even a problem in most of mainland malaysia (outside of taman negara, the national rainforest, which i reluctantly ended up by-passing also due to my toe situation). i slept better the second night.

the next day i was scheduled to take a tour of the highlands' various offerings - the tea, the strawberries, the jungles - on a full day tour. quick fact about the cameron highlands: it has the most landrovers on the road anywhere outside of the uk, perhaps the highest by volume; somewhere around 10,000 old and new lining the streets everywhere you look. that morning i hopped into a landrover with two french girls and a mom and daughter visiting from kuala lumpur (the highlands are a popular local tourist destination because of the climate). our first stop were the tea plantations of the boh tea company. these tea fields were pretty similar to those in boseong, south korea but either more in season or better maintained because their color was a rich green which popped beautifully against the clear blue morning sky (i sound like bob ross). after a quick walk we hopped back in the landrover and drove to the top of the peak, the highest in the area for a nice view, and then took another short walk through the mossy jungle. this was a little different than malaysia's other jungles because it was a high elevation jungle, which meant no leeches or mosquitos and everything was covered in compost and moss. from there we headed back down the hill and stopped by the tea processing factory where i had a nice cup of tea and an incredible culinary frankenstein's monster called a banana carrot cake, which combined two of my favorite types of bread products. during our hour lunch break i made my startling no-malaria-in-the-highlands discovery which allowed me to relax the rest of the day.

after lunch was significantly more boring than the morning. first we went to a tiny vegetable market which was like any other vegetable market except for the strawberry souvenirs they sold all over the place. how do they sell so many strawberry shaped pillows in a year to necessitate that many souvenir stands i just don't know. then we went to something called the 'time museum' which was malaysia's only or maybe just best nostalgia museum. it had some pretty good tidbits about the area but the rest was like walking into a tgi fridays or some kind of antique stall at a flea market. next to the museum was a butterfly farm which was littered with dead and dying butterflies but the best part were the terrariums full of enormous spiders and beetles. following that we headed to a buddhist temple which was significantly less impressive than those in penang and finally we went to a strawberry farm which was great because i got to sit down and eat a huge sundae with fresh strawberries. i also bought some dried strawberries which made for a great traveling snack. after the sundae we returned to the guesthouse where i spent the rest of the evening drinking beer, reading and playing cards much like the day before. i booked a bus, this time a normal passenger bus, to kuala lumpur for the following day and then i went to bed where, as i said before, i managed to sleep significantly better.