Tag Archives: penang

July 20, 1994 – Penang – Journal

April 4, 2025 – 9:28 am

Knocking the door by the Chinese desk clerk of the Swiss Hotel. Danny tells me that I have a phone call. It’s 8:21 a.m. I had difficulty getting to sleep last night. For some reason garlic keeps me awake. I got out of bed wrapped the towel around my waist and walk down the corridor […]

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Penang Gone

August 11, 2024 – 12:21 pm

Sumatra was a lost world in 1990. Tigers prowled the western jungles of Indonesia’s largest island, active volcanoes glowed in the night, and I drank Bintang beer with the ancestors of headhunters on the shore of Lake Toba 1500 meters above the sea and the night air was chilly after months along the equator . […]

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July 11, 1993 Penang Journal.

August 8, 2024 – 10:03 am

Penang Hot “Go with God.” My departing words to Gulie at Penang Airport. She’s heading back to New York, but she’ll have to deal with her separation from Giancarlo, her husband my friend. Her entire stay was under the black clouds of her future. If she expects people to take sides, they will, but she […]

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Singapore To Bangkok By Train

January 10, 2024 – 6:07 am

In 1990 I bought a second-class ticket from Singapore to Bangkok with stops in Penang and Suranthani. The old Pearl of the Orient was too clean for me. The Chinese president had ordered the city-state’s police to fine people for chewing gum or not washing their hands after using the WC. Effacing the walls with […]

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BERENTI MISTAH by Peter Nolan Smith

August 15, 2018 – 4:52 am

In 1991 I bought a round-the-world ticket for $1399 from Pan Express. The owner set up a magical itinerary. “New York – LA – Hawaii – Biak – Bali – overland to Jakarta.” John recited the trip from memory, since he sold hundreds of these tickets every year. “What do you mean ‘overland to Jakarta’?” […]

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