(Countdown: 3 days) Project Preparation and way too much food

Location: My room, home
Mood: Chipper
Music: Wreckless Love - Alicia Keys

After 3 flights, a couple of transits and a hectic day of running around KL, I'm finally home. Its been such a long two days, and its been mad since I got back. I'm with Kellie and Tian, my co-leaders, at the moment. They're busy working on the schedule as I write.

The madness started the minute I got into the waiting area in the airport, where I was supposed to meet Tian, who had supposedly arrived from Texas an hour earlier. I was hoping to find her quickly, since a) my Malaysian sim card was not working with my phone, b) Tian did not have a cell phone on her, and c) I was hungry and so ready for some legit Malaysian food. Recipe for disaster. After a bunch of frantic calls to Gianne (our local contact who was cracking up at the way I sounded more and more out of breath with each subsequent call), running back and forth between the two entrances of the second floor food court (Tian, of course, had to pick a meeting point with two entrances) and seriously contemplating just making a missing person announcement, I decided to just head downstairs to the train and wait for her there. In the elevator, I noticed that there was also a food court on the fourth floor... AH! TYPICAL TIAN. Of course, she had no idea she was on the fourth floor instead of the second. And had just gone a level up to get an elevated view of the arrivals hall so she wouldn't miss me. Oh boy. :)


Tian and I find Kellie at KL Sentral.

The rest of the day quickly filled up with too much food (I love Indian mangos), stationary shopping, project planning and picking up supplies (water, mosquito repellent/coils, soap, toilet paper!). I guess when you're paying 3USD a day for lodging you can't really expect toilet paper. I also managed to get in a couple of visits to my grandparents, which was nice, but for the most part we've been working all day. So far, we've made phone calls to confirm homestays for our out-of-town high school kids, arranged airport pickups for our team, basically reworked our entire schedule, decided on some ice-breaker activities, designed our team T-shirts and sent out a bunch of emails. We also have an early day tomorrow- we're meeting our logistics team at 8:30am and heading to Kuala Selangor to scope out the town/meet with our local partners. Fingers crossed that there's a place for us to do our laundry in town - 2 weeks without laundry would be dire.

Now, let me introduce you to Kellie and Tian, my lovable and awesome co-leaders. I honestly cannot imagine having to plan/run this project without them. After the thousands of emails, freakouts and project calls all over the world at crazy hours (from as late as 4am to as early as 8am), I can just tell that this is going to be an amazing two weeks.



So the one being beaten up is Tian. She's also the one sandwiched between Kellie and me in the first picture. She's Malaysian and from Sugarland, Texas. Also a sophomore Chemical Engineering major from MIT. You would think this would make her intense and sleep deprived, but she actually sleeps a lot (I believe Kellie's description was..."she misses her 10am classes and then sleeps through her afternoon ones") and gets lost a lot (as evidenced by our airport adventure). She's actually falling asleep right now, despite Kellie's clamours of "stay with meeee....stay with meee!" I met her at the SEALNet retreat in Stanford this January, a few days after I joined the project as her co-leader.

Kellie's the one beating Tian up with a roll of paper we bought today... and she's from Hawai'i. Today was my first time meeting her in person. She is also a sophomore Chemical Engineering major from MIT (she sleeps less than Tian, though). She's also a little crazy, and uses the word "fruit" and calls people "fruitcakes" instead of swearing. This video basically sums her up. Watch it! Its worth it, I promise.



Hot. :)

More pictures from my trip.


My gate at HK airport - the last flight separating me from home!


Local coffee - iced. Kopi kemamam, to be specific. Sooo good.


Banana leaf: My choice of a first meal at home. Its basically rice, curry, fried chicken, all sorts of vegetables (the crunchy fried ones are the best) on a banana leaf. I didn't eat with my hands, like most natives do though. Also, I forgot to take a picture of it before I finished it - I was way too hungry and excited about it. By the time I remembered that I was supposed to be documenting my trip, it was too late. Sorry!


Its business time.

Alright, I'm out. Time for bed, we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow. Goodnight, everyone!

Update:// Funny story. A sign I saw at KLIA - "Stop yellow fever from coming to our home." Hahaha what. I got a real kick out of it.