Perempuan putih gila gila yang naik moto

I did it again today. I looked at a newspaper or something and found myself surprised that it is now JUNE! Partly because I'm missing the usual context clues that tell me its June, as I've mentioned in prior emails. But just as much, I think, because that means that I'm coming up on having been here for four months now. Wow... four months. Hard to believe. It feels like it's been more like one long hot sticky July. A GOOD long hot sticky July... but just the same, it's just hard to believe that much time has passed. When I think of it that way, the year I have in front of me doesn't seem so long at all. Time has a funny way of passing when you're living so far outside your normal existance. Sometimes it's rather difficult to characterize in normal words... but I guess it would be something akin to a dream sequence. For certain, I know from past experiences how far away this place will seem when I finally do return home... and the passage of time... like a blink. It never changes, though time marches on.

Today I took the motorbike to be fixed, and managed to successfully do so using only Bahasa Melayu. It's only in the last three weeks or so that I've started doing important things like talking with doctors, school related stuff, and things like getting my bike fixed using only Bahasa. The reason is simply to be sure that I'm understood correctly. But in the last three weeks or so, I've been able to do so with very little problem. A great confidence builder to say the least. The biggest reason for my improvement was my three day, two night homestay out in rural Pahang. The village is called Kampung Kuala Medang, and is located about 3-5 hours from KL by local buses. Very local buses. The reason that it is 3-5 hours is because the length of the journey depends entirely on the bus you take there and back. On my way there I had a pretty easy trip, on the way back I found myself at the mercy of a 'rosak' (broken) bus, that meant I waited an additional 2 hours just to board the bus, and then, because all of the express buses back to KL were full, I took a local bus, packed with 124 people at one point (capacity limit? What capacity limit? Oh, you know, the one on the wall of the bus that says 64... no worries though... I'm sure it'll be fine...). The bus stopped about every 10 minutes for 4 hours between Raub and KL, the last major city before KKM. Anyway, in the village I was only able to use Bahasa, as almost no one up there spoke any English. And I got to talk A LOT with my host family and their many children and grandchildren who would drop by the house. What was so cool about it, was how quickly all of these words I've been learning, all of the phrases, quickly snapped into place, upon hearing them over and over again. And it's not that I don't hear them here in KL, but living by myself, the interaction is somewhat more limited when I'm not at school. And though I've always tried to speak here, it's only recently that it has begun to feel comfortable, and at least the day to day conversations require far less thinking and translating in my head. Ah, progress... Always a nice feeling when you can see it and feel it for yourself...

Beyond all that, life continues on as normal... study study study... learn learn learn...