I left Hong Kong for San Francisco on the 16th of July, exactly a month after leaving Japan and marking my return to the ‘West’ 19 months after I departed England. I was apprehensive about spending time in the US for a few reasons: I’d been away for quite a while and in that time I’d got used to the Japanese, and Asian, way of doing things, I’ve had a love/hate relationship with the US for most of my adult life, and deep down I just wasn’t quite sure what to expect. On the other hand I was also overly excited: I’d always dreamt of visiting San Francisco, I was also going to visit Seattle, New York and Canada and I was looking forward to having a month taking it easy in North America, giving me time to get used to western life again rather than jumping back into it straight after having left Japan.

With all this mind, and more than enough apprehension about having to deal with US custom officials, I spent 17 hours in planes and airports without being able to sleep, crossed the international date line forward, lost 12h in the process, passed the customs with little hassle and landed in San Francisco feeling like I’d done a very nasty combination of drugs. Seriously, screw drugs. All you need is to cross the international date line with no sleep: et voila, instant feeling mashed-up situation.

I somehow managed to make it to my hostel in downtown San Francisco. My body was 17 hours ahead of the clock on the wall, so I decided to fight off the jetlag by abusing the free coffee and chain smoking. And that’s when it all went a little weird. I was standing outside the hostel, smoking a cig, when I noticed a man on the corner of the street a few meters away looking a little agitated. Then out of nowhere, three people rushed him against a wall, pulling out their badges in the process. They then handcuffed him, searched him (yeilding what looked like a bag of non-descript drugs) and hauled him into an unmarked car before driving off. By the time my mangled brain had put two and two together they were gone and I was left wondering where the hell I’d booked myself into.

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written by Laurent \\ tags: America, California, contrast, cycling, Fisherman's Wharf, Haight, Marin County, media, Mission, Richmond, rough, San Francisco, Sausalito, summer, travelling, windy

Moving on with the pictures I’ve got round to uploading my snaps from Borneo, KL and Hong Kong, rounding off the South East Asian end of things.

All links are below as usual, haven’t forgot this time! Next up will the late entries and pics from my North American leg. I’m hoping to have most of them done by next week as it looks like I’m finally returning to the real world, with a new job that’s likely gonna keep me busy for a bit. I’m also working on a couple of new shows for TTR and RI, links will be up in due time.

Anyways enjoy the pics as always!

Mabul Flickr set

Mabul Kids Flickr set

Sibuan Flickr set

Kuala Lumpur Flickr set

Hong Kong Flickr set

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written by Laurent \\ tags: Borneo, buildings, food, Hong Kong, kids, Mabul, Malaysia, people, pictures, sea, Semporna, Sibuan, South East Asia, Tampi Tampi, travelling

EDIT: it seems I might still be in holiday mode, cos I forgot to actually post the link to the pictures. Ha ha. It’s been added.

Continuing my process of catch up, I’ve finally gotten round to sorting some more pics. This time it’s the pictures of my week in Cambodia, including Phnom Penh, Sihanoukville and the in-between trips.

Looking at the pictures it reminds me just how much of a shock to the system the country was but also how warm and friendly its people were. If you haven’t yet you can read in more details about the shock of Cambodia in my recent post.

Next are the pics from Borneo, Malaysia and Hong Kong and then we move on to the North American continent.

Cambodia Flickr set

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written by Laurent \\ tags: beach, Cambodia, food, people, Phnom Penh, pictures, sea, Sihanoukville, South East Asia, temples, travelling

Having left the peace and serenity of Borneo and the Celebes Sea behind me, I had two more stops in South East Asia before my return to the western world, Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital, and Hong Kong. As it turned out they both served as buffers to my return, with a mix of east and west that proved deeply interesting.

Kuala Lumpur was first, with a two day stop-over from Borneo. I’d spent a night and part of the day in KL on my way into the country, but these two days were meant to give me a bit more time to explore the city and get a better feeling for it. I’d been told to expect good things, however the weather turned to shit pretty much as soon as I arrived and I left the city feeling somewhat unconvinced as to its appeal.

The first thing that really struck me about KL when I first got there was how much more muslim it felt on the surface than I ever thought it would. Between the omni present, and at times truly beautiful, mosques, clothes, food, muslim businesses and others, the fact that Malaysia is a muslim country was more than evident within minutes of arriving in the country. I realise that it sounds a little stupid, but the fact is I just didn’t expect it to feel like that on the surface, I didn’t expect it to be so obvious. I’ve never been to the Middle East but I guess to me KL, and Malaysia to an extent, gave me the impression of being very similar to a Middle Eastern country in its appearance, or what I understand and know of Middle Eastern countries through the media and other sources of information.

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written by Laurent \\ tags: capitalism, China, contrast, food, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, modern, mosque, Muslim, skyscrapers, South East Asia, traditional, travelling

Apologies to those of you who do check this blog ‘regularly’ (I’m sure you must be out there somewhere!). The north American leg of my trip proved a lot more hectic than I ever thought and I found myself not doing much writing at all, or sorting out pics.

I’ve now finished my mini world tour and am back in good old Europe after crossing 8 countries and 16 cities. The lack of writing and pics is going to be rectified over the coming weeks with content aplenty. My feature on the new breed of hip hop, which I mentioned a while back, is also done and about to be published so that’ll be online within a week or two as well with pics and more.

In the meantime there’s plenty in the archives and the first few tales of my mini world tour which I wrote over the last two months. And if that’s not enough, make sure you check the recent Rhythm Incursions podcasts as they’ve been popping like crazy with new Dang in Dub mixes and our boy DDay One joining the roster of presenters. Same with Turntable Radio where we’ve finished our series of Japanese video podcasts and started podcasting all 70 original TTR shows, which is a lot.

Oh and if you haven’t yet then go check my recent Wonk Fonk mix as well as the other free music bits in the mp3 and videos section of the blog. No long ting at all.

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written by Laurent \\ tags: Music, no long ting, pictures, travelling, writing