squared away

when i first came to malaysia i began talking to locals about where to live. the advice focused a few of the expat areas. ampang was suggested if had children, bangsar if i liked clubs and mont kiara if i wanted an upscale and quiet area. the last alternative was to live in the high-tech backwater at the bottom of the multi-media super corridor. but a town with empty roads, no starbucks and almost no people held less than zero appeal.

i quickly decided ampang was the wrong side of the tracks for me. having an international school handy was not an issue if the kids were going to be in the us for school. the zoo wasn’t something i needed to see, and the hills were having landslides. ampang looked too slow, an area that had seen its day and then watched it slip away.

the next stop was bangsar. i was staying in central area hotels and found banana leaf next to the pasar malam in telawi to be a nice way to spend sunday nights. the clubs have never been a draw for me, but there were interesting restaurants, two starbucks and a mc donalds within walking distance. the place held promise, but the condos were high on the hill and a bit beyond walking distance. there were row house bungalows, but why would i need that much space? i was moving with two hockey bags of possessions a house would have been totally empty.

this was when a friend of a friend offered to drive me around and show me some of the other areas. we went from place to place, and finally ended up in front of a neon red and yellow sign that read hartamas square. in that moment i knew i was in the right area. i knew this was a place i would like to live; no clubs, slower life, and hawker stands near by for a vast selection of dinner choices.

why am i talking about this? i mean who cares why i selected where to live and what does it have to do with now? well, because before you even notice it, things change. i have been here long enough to find places that i really liked, make friends there, find meals i would order over and over as comfort foods and then see them close without telling me first.

at new years room service told me that TSB was closing. i went in and asked and sure enough, the space had been sold and the restaurant was closing. a few weeks ago planter jim’s also closed. i was walking to the bank and saw the gutted space that was once my favorite provider of green curry and mango sticky rice. last week i saw that devis in hartamas was closed, they either had a fire or they decided to do renovations. either way, there is currently nowhere local for me to stop at 4 am for a post-deployment teh tarik.

but the largest shock came this week. the kids and i wanted to do a fast dinner, we could not agree on a tau pow place, and we wanted to spend some time together before my meetings. so we drove down to hartamas and found the neon turned off. there were trucks being loaded with all things mobile. the lights were off, and it was clear they were not coming back on. another comfort zone has disappeared right before my eyes. the neighborhood is changing, and i am wondering if its part of a larger movement that i should be responsive to.

both bangsar and hartamas have recently exploded with reflexology spas, this has come with a closure of many of the best restaurants. other places, like our favorite burrito place in jaya one has recently been painted in bright green and white, but the quality of the food has dipped below the already lowered level of acceptance for mexican food in asia. (i have found great mexican food in australia, indonesia and vietnam, but never in malaysia)

i have begun to wonder if like ampang before it, my neighborhood changed while i wasn’t paying enough attention. or has malaysia in general decided that quality and improved life style does not matter. hartamas square is being knocked down to build yet another row of shop lots or a taller building of offices. but where does one go to have a relaxed and open-air dinner in the middle of expat land? my first hope, as with devi’s, is that the owners were going to put some capital back in and clean things up to improve the space. the trend appears to be to simply knock good things down and build more of the same.

malaysia talks about two things they need to continue to improve and compete. those things are driving innovation and improving life styles to match the growth in the economic opportunities. how does this square up with the expansion of semi-d housing complexes and cookie cutter high-rise apartments that remain empty when completed? innovation and improvement means creating things that are new and not simply copying the same old thing.

hartamas, devis, TSB and jim’s were all places that were different and had character. they welcomed the patrons and gave them something interesting and different. they are all closed now and their neighborhoods suffer for the loss.

if there is an interesting place out there that is high quality, unique in its service, welcoming, comes with choice… but… is not in a mall, has easy parking and has staff who know how to smile and laugh, will you tell me about it?

if you can’t think of something that fits this criteria… consider the deeper meaning.

saying nothing

i am not sure if you have noticed, but i have been very quiet lately. i have not been writing. i have not wanted to write, or when i did want to i did not have anything i was willing to say out loud. this blog began as a safe and quiet place for me to put thoughts; over time it has morphed into something else. this private space has become my most public and enduring method of sharing ideas, and that has changed the thoughts i am willing to share. then again, all forms of sharing have changed for me over the past few years.

when i first started writing i created a few rules:

• no names would ever be used, this is about me and my ideas, never about friends
• i would not discuss anything work related
• i would not write a diary or food blog
• i would not comments on the actions of others, most importantly family

i started this looking for an outlet for the ideas what i questioned and wanted to understand better. the context would be close to mathematician who writes equations on whiteboards to build logical models of a complex world. i attempting to do the same and needed a place to put the formulas.

at the same time, i was building an openly public side in both work and life. i was attempting to connect with people who shared very few commonalities. coming to malaysia limited my access to middle aged, irish catholic, liberal arts majors who have the ability to quote complete scenes from movies that feature dan aykroyd. building anything new comes with making mistakes, and being in a brand new environment adds to the opportunity to make even more. the one i made most often was believing that i could be open with people.

i found that openness is not always a good thing. even, or most especially, with those close enough to be trusted. opening the veil allows others to see inside. the lesson learned was that those openings could be shared with others. unless you are ready to share something with everyone, you need to keep yourself shielded by opaque covers. the downside to this is the realization that the burqa obstructs the wearers vision even more than the vision of the eyes trying to be kept out.

this brings me back to my writing. i started this as semi-private way to discuss semi-private thoughts in a semi-anonymous way. these were the thoughts i would previously have shared with loved ones in the privacy of home. but, living far away limited the access to this safe outlet. the last time i had felt this type of need was in college, when i carried notebooks with the same kind of writing. those notebooks were labeled “reflections on malthus”, and also focused on the fast learning of strange ideas i was collecting by spending more than 20K USD per year. money spent to be forced to read, write and think, something i was now doing for free.

craving to have someone listen to you, while you are far away and disconnected, is a strange feeling. but the ability to control the conversation and complete a thought before someone tells you that you’re “being silly” is a powerful drug for someone in recovery. even more so when you realize the reason you are in recovery is that you had burst a seam from the pressure of not exercising this freedom in the first place.

so why have i not been writing? as usual, it’s basically a mix of three things:

1. i have been too busy to exercise in any form
2. i have not had subjects bubbling to the surface, waiting to be discussed
3. i have not felt comfortable with the semi-privacy i have built

someone wise once said, “if you don’t have anything worth saying, don’t say anything at all”. that didn’t make much sense to me then, but lately it has been spot on. when i came close to saying anything, i found i second-guessed myself. normally when i am unsure of the way to go, i crash forward just to see if i was right. lately it has been the mute on the other side of my conscience that has been telling me that “less is more”.

but, this week is different. i am on the beach with the kids, i have a list of titles i want to share, i am close to breaking two of the 4 rules i built when i started. i miss the process of sharing thoughts, and am reminded that veils are like locks on doors; they only keep the honest man out.

saying nothing does not stop the ideas from coming. if is for me to decide for myself that i am “being silly”; and its for others to decide if they want to listen.

phase two

when i first started this blog, i wanted to talk about the new things i was experiencing with each new day in a foreign land. i have now been in malaysia for almost five years. i still experience new things, but most of my days come without surprise. i have been there, i have done that, i have gotten the t-shirt. maybe i need to find a new focus for myself or my writing.

some of these feelings of change may be related to changes in how i feel about the state of the state. when i first came to asia, i had high levels of guilt for getting out of dodge. i had left a party because i was shown the door, but leaving was a purely selfish act. i did it to get away and put the mess behind me. i did it to stop from making an even bigger mess; but that is another story.

as i left the country, i talked to friends on the phone while standing in the airport. i spoke to others while waiting to board the plane, but the last conversation i had was with myself as the plane began to take off. it was a rainy day that matched my mood; cold, windy and gloomy. i had spent all day dreading and second guessing this take off. the moment was now here and i needed someone to tell me it was okay to go forward rather than back. i was worried i was making the final mistake of a series and that this one would seal the future.

all of the actions and decisions leading up to the moment had brought me to this conversation with myself. i had allowed those i cared most about to close the door on me, and now i was hopping on a plane and heading for a far off land. i felt as though i was abandoning those i had promised to never leave. i worried that i was making the worst mistake of my life. but i knew i had been unhappy for a long time; that happens when those around you are unhappy and you blame yourself. i knew i needed a change of time and space, and i needed to be able to recover from the past few years.

i sat back in my seat and watched the rain stream down the window. it drew lines that i could almost feel; it clouded my vision and carried my eyes downwards. the plane was climbing off the runway now, there was no chance to turn back, the streaks were blown back off the window by the rushing air and i imagined the past mistakes being blown away with them. the future was the now; i had been saying for years that one day i would be happy, and i had no excuse to not do that now.

as i realized that i was committed to this change of location. i was going to live alone, travel, learn new things and meet new people. i missed the people i was leaving. i felt a hole in my chest from the space they used to fill, but that space would need to grow over and be filled with something else. i knew i needed to embrace this, because there was really no other choice any more.

i instantly felt better, but with lingering guilt for choosing happiness. this was the instant the plane burst out of the clouds that had covered my day. sunlight broke over the wings and bright blue sky filled the air. as we continued to climb, the fluffy white clouds stretched as far as the eye could see. the next 30 hours would be spent flying to the other side of the world, but the path looked soft and comforting as i looked into the future.

that was the moment i began to accept the changes that had been forced on me. that was also the pivot moment for me accepting that many other changes would also need to take place. some i have liked, others not. some things have been tried, and reversed because they were wrong to try in the first place. others have been tried and will never be forgotten because they were wonderful and i was blessed that i was given the chance in the first place.

that gapping hole in my chest has healed over. i have built up the scar tissue needed to cover it over. it would be cliché to say that asia has changed me. the truth is that i think i have figured myself out in the past 4 ½ years. i am more comfortable with who i am. i have found the ability to be completely independent and lost the guilt of youth. i have also lost the guilt i felt for coming here. i needed to leave the party, and i am glad i did.

it was good to find a quiet place to find myself.