son of Goad

Hey, I apologize for lagging on the personal e-mails. Walk past the most obnoxious arcade in your neck of the woods, and imagine that ten times worse, and that's what cybercafes are like here. I think I've come to the end of my appreciation of this form of mass communication, but it is an effective way of forcing me to write down some of these stories, and I figure if they're too annoying, you'll feel free to delete them- it ain't that hard...
Ever since the Malaysian government declared that math and science must be taught in English starting next year, I've become a valuable asset to the Rungus community, and nightly language lessons at my house have taken an intense and energetic and exhausting turn. At the end of the first of these lessons, as we were saying our goodbyes, I tried to teach my three pupils "See you later alligator... After a while crocodile," and they were so eager to learn and perfect this bit of gibberish, that I dutifully consulted the English-Malay dictionary for alligator and crocodile so I could really explain this to them. For ten minutes, we discuss this saying and it seemed they really understood-a very gratifying feeling, so as they were finally walking away, Kate and I wave and yell, "see you later alligators!" and Steven, Jod, and Majintin all turn around and with genuine pride and earnestness yell, "after a while alligators!" and in half defeat and half hysterics, Kate and I cruelly doubled over laughing. Last Thursday I took Kate to the big weekly market for the first time. I had my heart set on buying some fresh fish, but kate was disgusted with the fish scene (as any newcomer would be) and so I had to play it cool, and I found and purchased some live crab. Never before had I purchased a live animal that I would have to kill, and when it finally occurred to me that I was going to have to cook those creatures that were so desperately trying to crawl out of my kitchen sink all morning, I started to feel queezy. Nevertheless, we managed to get through the process of dropping those creatures in boiling hot water, and decided if you're going to eat them, you should have to suffer by killing them yourself. "We are too far removed from the lives of the animals we eat," we said, "and it's time to call a spade a spade." With enthusiasm we declared that "from now on we're going to order 'a slice of tenderloin from the flesh of a cow' rather than a filet mignon, or 'slices of salty pig flesh' rather than bacon." So that evening, our goal for our Malay portion of the lesson was to learn phrases like "Cow flesh," "Pig flesh," "What animal are you going to eat fordinner?" So we are getting through this thinking it's very funny because they are trying to tell us that "saying that makes it sound like you are going to eat a live animal," and to us, that's exactly the point, and then Steven, the most gung-ho of the students starts asking "What do you call son of Goad?" and thinking this was headed toward another one of those religion conversations, we kept acting confused, refusing to say the word "Jesus." We were in this Oh-no!-We're-not-even-going-to-let-this-start frame of mind, but he kept insisting, "What do you call son of Goad? Son of Goad... child ofGoad." Finally after several minutes, we realized that Steven was trying to ask "What do you call son of goat?" With laughs of relief we say "Kid! Kid! Son of goat is kid!" Phew, he just wanted to know the name for a baby goat!

Bird

Chaos is chaos is chaos- in the head or out. My chaos is mostly concentrated to my pasty jungle legs covered in crater bug bites and other battle wounds. You know you're in the tropics when the flies are licking your wounds, and you stop brushing them away. gross,gross, gross. Kate and I say we're over here "playing hard to want." I saw a big snake the other day, and a few weeks ago, I saw a spitting viper- yikes... everybody who comes here to visit (and I'll be the first to admit, I got pretty lucky on that front- as I should have with all those bribes I was offering at the end of the year) is all fascinated with the birds. So when Kabir left, he gave his bird book to the guy that works for me on the plant stuff, and now every day Kate complains that there is no bird book, and tries to make me feel guilty about letting him give it away. There's nothing wrong with healthy curiousity, and I have nothing against birds, but birders are out of control with their life lists and what not. I do have a little something against the chickens that won't stay out of my damn kitchen- they just cluck around, running in circles, looking like they're missing arms and hands if you ask me, and maybe I'd cut them some slack if they'd only
lay me an egg every once and a while. Today, because I am in the city where you can get things like this- I had a nice lettuce omelette. If it sounds wierd, that's because it is wierd. Not that I have anything against leafy greens for breakfast-it wasn't that long ago that I silently declared that steamed kale was my new favorite breakfast item, but cooked lettuce, it brought me back to not so fond memories of my Thai roommate freshman year of college... Am I dead? I am so removed from that life over there, this here is all very real to me, but that there- it's going going slipping away... that's the way the story goes, eh. is that the way the story goes, or am IfI actually dead? take care xxx, betony lee

incompetent americans undercook jungle yams

Hey,
These cybercafes give me nausea... although come to think of it, the source of that feeling might be the jungle yam that Kate and I poisoned ourselves with yesterday. There were two good things about the experience of poisoning yourself with something you harvested from the forest the day before: the first was that as soon as Kate described the pain as the type you'd experience from eating a bunch of fiberglass, I immediately recalled the plant family it belonged to- Araceae, which is the same family to which dumbcane, Jack-in-the-pulpit, and skunk cabbage belong. These plants all contain a needle-like crystal of insoluble calcium oxalate which penetrates the skin and mouth and feels very much like fiberglass. Recalling that, I calmly and certainly decided we should walk ourselves three miles to the dispensary, despite the pouring rain. I just wanted to be en route when our throats swelled up and in case we stopped breathing. Then as we gathered our raincoats, I noticed a 10 inch poisonous centipede huddled in the corner where I store the bag of Shaws cotton balls that I brought to Malaysia. Deciding to deal with the scaley, deadly creature later, we headed out, and on the way to the dispensary, I stopped at Majintin's hut (he's the one who "takes care" of things like poisonous centipedes and recharging my car batteries every few days) and informed him in a mix of Malay, Rungus, and English, that "we maminow sid dispensary because we makan poison, and here's the key to my house because ada centipede sid onkob." he looked a bit confused, and ran off to borrow the neighbor's motocycle, and then just after Kate and I had hiked up our skirts, and crossed the river (that was rushing and full with water for the first time since I've been here), he pulls up and tells us he can only take one of us at a time- lucky us. That mototcycle ride was the second good thing about eating that poison... speeding down a dirt road in the pouring rain on a motorcycle with Majintin, mud splattering my legs behind, eyes squinting because of the rain and clothes saturated, zooming along to the dispensary- I felt like the heroin of your typical Bollywood film. Kate and I agreed later, and we gargled water to relieve the burn- that the ride made it worth it. We humored all those Rungus more than scaring them- we had only undercooked that wild yam, and they gave us some placebos (I think) and sent us on our way. So then Majintin "took care" of the 10 inch centipede, by hacking it in half with his machete and we recovered, and everyone came by to see how we were.
Later Majintin brought us over a twig with some perfect and delicate honey comb filled with drippy tangy delicious honey to make our throats feel better. Wondering if he climbed a big tree to get it, wondering if he courted his wife like that, wondering how these people got to be this way they are, and wondering if we are the luckiest people in the world to be here in this unreal, unreal situation. love you all, Betony

free thinkers

Greetings from "the land below the wind", where in this past week, the winds have reached 100 km/hr speeds every night and blown rooves(roofs?) off houses and uprooted trees and sent coconuts falling from trees with the force of grenades. A little funny thing: everybody here expects everybody else to be religious, and most people around where i live have converted to Christianity, so I'm constantlybeing asked if I'm Christian or what religion I am. My new answer: "I'm tolerant." But I've said things like "My grandfather was a minister"or"I celebrate Christmas" or "Culturally, yes." or "No." To one man I said "No," and he asked, well then what religion was I, and I told him not any religion, really, and he said, "Oh... That's okay, I have many Chinese friends who are free thinkers." ...Everytime I think of that, I laugh out loud. It's much fun to have kate here, we're able to be more bold and adventurous with the open-air restaurants and other such venues because somehow you just feel like less of a fool when everyone is staring at the two of you rather than just solitary you. and since one person is obviously more approachable than two, and i was just about at my wits end putting up with all the people concerned about me traveling alone, and thinking that it must mean i'm in desperate need of company of any kind. i feel like a real blob when i just ignore all the "hello girl, hello!" I always think to myself, why can't I just graciously smile and return the greeting? But giving them even that inch, and they'll take a mile more, seeing it as an invitation to shoot out their other english phrases- spanning from "where do you stay?" to versions of "hello, i want to sex you." when you ignore them you feel not only like a blob, but like a victim or an object of their verbal beebees, so with another person, it's easier to return the greeting as obnoxiously and as sincerely as they give it. kate's great at it; she just looks at them directly and says in her subtle southern accent, "HEY, HOW YA DOIN' TONIGHT?" and that really startles them, and while they're recovering we can just maintain our pace and resume our conversation with smirks of victory. today, we were strolling down the street, and we started approaching about five big army trucks and several scores of soldiers, and kate asks me if we're about to get kidnapped, and I told her pshaw, these were the good guys, the people fighting the abu sayaf kidnappers, and we just marched right through
it did feel a little wierd to be surrounded by all that camoflauge and those guns, and i wondered why i didn't just take us on a slight detour around their whole possey. but again, we emerged on the other side with little grins of awe and accomplishment at having remained unphased. so i've taken to staying at the nice 4 star luxury hotel, because i somehow managed to sweet talk my way into getting the government rate ofabout $22 a night. we spend a few hours each day in the pool, the sauna, and the gym which has a rock climbing wall treadmill. whew! it's fun, but not really that easy- you can set the speed, and if you fall, it's never more than a meter or so, but it's pretty embarassing to fall off of it in a crowded gym of buff malaysian men. kate keeps saying that this isn't what she imagined borneo to be like, and she's trying to get all the pampering in because we're heading off to the village tomorrow. but to be honest, i'm really glad that i live in the village and vacation in the city. I prefer the peace and simplicity and the routine of the village- harvesting heart of palm or young bamboo shoots while we're out plant collecting and eating them for dinner because the eggplant I bought at the market two days ago is already rotten from the heat ...and eating papayas and bananas right off the trees. Waking up to the sunrise at 6, and wrapping up the work day as the sun sets at 6:30, and the bucket baths and the beautiful 10 inch lizard that lives in my kitchen and screeches "TA-KO, TA-KO, TA-KO,TA-KO" all night long, ...and sitting on edge in my kitchen after dinnerof rice and vegetables and dried fish, anxiously glancing out the back door wondering if the ants are going to invade again. The ant invasions are fascinating, frightening, and slightly mysterious. Episodes smaller in scale, but nonetheless comparable to those described in "Out ofAfrica" and "The Poisonwood Bible." i'm tired and sore from that rock climbing vertical treadmill/torture device, and feel the urgent need to return to the luxury hotel for a hot bath. hoping and thinking you're all well and dandy xoxo, betony

the lady and the lord in orang putiville

So I met this women who is head scientist of this british ngo called greenforce (dorky name) on a island near here. they have paying volunteers come out to learn about marine biology and collect biodiversity data. so i decided to take her up on her casual offer to come out on a saturday because they always have a party. not knowing quite what we were getting into, kabir and i set out early yesterday morning, ate a large breakfast at a whole in the wall chinese restaurant by the ferry port, and set out looking for a group of "orang puti"(white people). we got to the main island of Banggi and luckily collided with a girl who is working for them, and got a ride in a speedboat out to the island where they stay- the 12 or so of them are the only inhabitants except for one lone woman who lives on the other side, some monkeys, otters, crocodiles, and wild boar. the whole scene was very"Survivoresque." Anyway after I did some quick talking, they were quite welcoming, and we spent the day relaxing while they had their diving lessons and algae identification classes. Then the night was spent playing "parlor games" with two teams- "the upstairs people" and the"downstairs people"- or the aristocracy (scientists and researchers) and the servants (the paying volunteers). Kabir and I got to be upstairs people (to balance out the teams, I assume). Lord Kabir and LadyBetony. Other characters were Stableboy Nick, who was probably the wittiest, Count Carl, Handmaid Gizelle, Baroness von Billy, etc. We played some variation of chirades, and I found them all to be slightly eccentric, but wildly animated and extremely witty. I was in histarics nearly the whole night. Kabir's take on it was slightly more reserved, thought maybe they had some chemical imbalances. Maybe I'm always drawn to slightly insane people. Anyway this morning we got a ride back to the main ferry and then back to mainland Borneo, and I'm sitting in a hot and extremely chaotic cybercafe, probably sundays draw more of the videogame players than other days- shooting war noises and countless pop songs strike me from every direction. take care all y'all. love bet