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Egypt photo queer

Gay Egypt–A Pilgrimage

Actually, we haven’t made any attempt to find gay life in Egypt. As was widely publicized in 2001, the Egyptian government has developed a record of actively persecuting gay men in the country (with even some foreign tourists caught in raids, although released), and there appears to be little public gay life–not even as much as Iran (see post of 6.6). So far, the only “gay” activity we’ve experienced in Egypt is one somewhat elderly security guard trying to grope Derek in the dark of an underground tomb chamber and numerous disturbingly young boys offering sexual services for money in the tourist ghettoes of Luxor and Aswan. One also reads (although we did not encounter it) that felucca (Nile sailboat) captains offer more than just sailing services and that guards at Cairo’s Egyptian Museum have been known to hook up with tourists. Pretty unsavory stuff, though I’m glad to hear that all those empty sarcophagi are being put to some additional use.

But there was one special place to which I felt a pilgrimage absolutely mandatory: the joint tomb of Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep at Saqarra. I will leave the full background of the mystery to other websites (see http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/20/science/20egyp.html, http://www.egyptology.com/niankhkhnum_khnumhotep/), but the short story is that the tomb (from around 2400 BC) appears to be for the first gay couple in recorded history. (The more/less official line from the Egyptian Department of Antiquities is that they are brothers.) They were, believe it or not, Overseers of the Royal Manicurists.

Below are some pictures we took of the close pair.

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Egypt photo

The Pyramids

I don’t keep a list of places I plan to visit before I die, but if I did I imagine the Pyramids of Giza would be on it. And after what happened to me in Cairo (see post of 9.12) perhaps it’s good that I’m making progress on the non-existant list!

Was I inspired? Was I let down? Some mundane thoughts on the Pyramids, compared to what I knew about them before coming to Egypt:

1. You can go inside. They allow tourists to go inside the two bigger of the three main Giza pyramids, albeit for extra fees. Given the somewhat steep charges, the hot and grueling climbs in (as we were told by others) and no availability for the biggest Pyramid of Khufu, we did not go into any of the pyramids at Giza. We did later go into the Red Pyramid of Dahshur (more below) and another, smaller pyramid located in the Saqqara complex. Inside is, as you might expect, a series of shafts and small chambers.

Inside the Red Pyramid

2. You cannot climb up. I had thought that the pyramids were unclimbable because I imagined that the pyramids were smoothly surfaced, covered in bricks cut at the angle of the incline. Actually, those blocks are mostly gone now (except at the top of the second largest pyramid), and so the pyramids are not smooth at all, and the blocks form more/less climbable “steps.” In fact, climbing to the top used to be an essential part of a 19th/early 20th century Pyramids visit–but it is no longer allowed.

Pyramid of Menkaure–note the jagged “steps” at the bottom and the smooth original near top

“Casing stones” remaining near the top of the Pyramid of Menkaure

3. They are about as big as you might imagine. The Sphinx is somewhat smaller than it appears to be in most pictures, but certainly not a letdown. The Pyramids are in fact huge, although their geometric simplicity makes their size hard to grasp from medium range. Seen from downtown Cairo or up close, the Great Pyramid looks every bit of its 140 or so meters height.

From Cairo’s Citadel

4. They were all built in a surprisingly brief historical “window.” The world’s first monumental stone structure, according to the guidebooks, was the Step Pyramid of Saqqara, built by Djoser (2667-2648 BC). His successor Sneferu (2613-2589 BC) followed with the Bent and Red Pyramids of Dahshur, and then came, in direct lineal succession, Khufu (2589-2566 BC), Khafre (2558-2532 BC) and Menkaure (2532-2504 BC). The era of great pyramid building was thus over in six or so generations!

Step Pyramid, Saqqara

Bent Pyramid, Dahshur

Red Pyramid, Dahshur

5. One of the most amazing things to behold at the Pyramids of Giza is not made of stone but of wood. The barge of Khufu, known as the “solar barque,” was buried alongside the Great Pyramid over 4500 years ago, but has been incredibly well-preserved, its size and condition nearly unbelievable. It has been re-assembled and is available for viewing in a custom-built museum on the site of its burial.

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Egypt

Risk–On Being a Lawyer

I never really planned on being a lawyer–never imagined myself as a Perry Mason or any other paragon of the profession. It was accidental–I took the LSAT on a whim, did even better than I expected and got into a great law school. I wasn’t sure what else I would do straight out of college, and it seemed like a good choice. And, even in hindsight, it was.

Choices can be deceiving, though. When choosing to attend law school, I thought (perhaps naively) that I was choosing what to do with the next three years of my life. I did not foresee the extent to which that choice would lead me toward so many other choices, decisions that I may not have made (or have wanted to make) had I not made the initial choice to attend law school. And this is what I tell people who are considering law school now: Law school is not simply a matter of getting an education in an interesting field with a wide array of applications, and “keeping your options open”; the reality is that, having attended law school, there will be certain paths set before you that will be very easy to choose, default options that you will fall into unless you to some extent swim against the current. These pre-packaged paths are not necessary bad ones, but given that most of my classmates and I chose one of them, it may be said that when you choose to attend law school you are choosing perhaps the next seven years of your life, and not just the next three.

But this post isn’t about career paths and choices–no, I wanted to discuss a bit how a legal education changes your general behavior, decreases your appetite for certain kinds of risk. Now, it is true that the profession probably draws the risk-adverse simply because a legal education is seen as a “safe” field for moderate professional and economic success. But it is also true that the numerous examples of conflicts, whether in torts or contracts, that a prospective lawyer encounters brings to the fore of his or her mind things that can go wrong, and how hideously and painfully things can go wrong. Yes, I believe that law school and law practice have made me a more cautious, risk-adverse person. In many situations, my mind goes through lists of potential accidents. I consider how language may be misinterpreted by others. When reaching some sort of agreement I double check to make sure that there has been a “meeting of the minds.” I have developed a deep appreciation of insurance.

What has made me think of all of this? It being Ramadan, with most of the population here in Egypt fasting from sunrise to sunset, our dietary schedules have been somewhat disturbed. Although we manage to snack during the day and eat a substantial dinner at night, the erratic eating routine has indeed been challenging, well offsetting what are some “fun” aspects of traveling in Egypt during the holy month (post to come). Well, walking home from dinner last night, we thought we would grab another little something to eat, and so stopped by the McDonald’s located across Talaat Harb Street from our hotel. Derek and I ordered a couple double cheeseburgers and sat down to eat. I was about halfway through my burger when I noticed that I had a hard object in my mouth–I removed it to see that it was a fairly large piece of glass. It didn’t cut me or do any other immediately noticeable harm, but I was understandably somewhat shocked. Derek took the burgers and the glass to the management and explained the situation.

After waiting for a few minutes, I realized that I should probably inspect the burgers and the glass to see if it was likely that there was additional glass, which I may have ingested. I was in disbelief to hear that the store employees had thrown the burgers and glass away. I was immediately suspicious of their motives–were they going to deny that it ever happened? Why did they throw away the evidence? I demanded that the burgers and glass be tracked down–they must be in the garbage after all–and eventually they did find our burgers (though not the glass). I carefully went through each burger and saw that there was no other glass, which gave me some peace of mind that the piece I caught may have been the only one. Nonetheless, I imagined dying of internal bleeding, recalling prison movies where inmates are murdered with glass-contaminated food and Derek’s story about his father killing a skunk with glass-enriched ground meat. I demanded that the garbage be searched again, thoroughly, went into the back of the store and watched an employee go through the refuse, to no avail.

I was, to be honest, somewhat hysterical by this point. One of the McDonald’s managers suggested that it may have been plastic, not glass, and this combined with their disposal of the object gave me concern that they were trying to shirk their obvious responsibility for whatever could happen to me. It was September 11, and I even contemplated the glass not being accidental, having been deliberately placed in the food of the foreigner. Any actual damage to health seemed unlikely, but I wanted the incident thoroughly documented in case any problems arose overnight. Though the hour was quite late, the incident was escalated up the Cairo-based management of McDonald’s Egypt. I demanded that someone sign my statement, confirming what had happened to me in the store. Not surprisingly, they refused, even when I had watered down the statement to say only what my allegations were.

Now, I didn’t really want to go to the hospital. It seemed unlikely that there had been more than one piece of glass. I wasn’t even sure what a doctor could do (given that glass cannot be detected by x-ray). But the operations manager who had been called in to the store suggested that I go to the hospital, and I knew that I could not refuse. However great a waste of time it would be, and however much I would rather sleep and go to the pyramids the next day, I knew that one responsibility on the part of a claimant in a contracts lawsuit in the U.S. is to mitigate one’s losses, and I did not want to take any step (or refuse to take any step) that might jeopardize my position. I did not want to risk being in a situation where I (or Derek) could not claim against McDonald’s because I didn’t go to the hospital when it was suggested. So I went. (Fortunately, Derek was able to have the doctor clarify that having my stomach pumped was not, strictly speaking, recommended.)

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Egypt photo

Islamic Cairo

At the most basic level, Egyptian history can be divided into three different periods: Pharaonic Egypt (3100-331 BC), the Egypt of the Pyramids, Sphinx and hieroglyphics; Greco-Roman Egypt (331 BC-AD 640), when Egypt was a part of greater Mediterranean Empires; and Arab/Islamic Egypt (AD 640-), after the Arab conquest and the introduction of Islam. Each of these periods has a geographical focal point in the Cairo of today. For the pharaohs, it is Giza, now suburb of Cairo in which the most famous of the Pyramids and the Sphinx reside, not far from the ancient capital of Memphis. The most concentrated reminders of the Roman and Christian eras are in so-called “Old Cairo,” or Coptic Cairo, where numerous churches (and one synagogue) are crammed into a district that was once the site of a Roman fortification called Babylon, with parts of its towers still standing.

But Giza is just a necropolis and Babylon just a fort and cluster of religious sites. Neither was necessarily destined to grow into the great metropolis and center of culture that Cairo is today. However ancient and lasting the pharaonic and Christian legacies are to modern Egypt as a whole, Cairo as Umm ad-Dunya, or Mother of the World, was a creation of the Arab era. This Cairo is best represented by Islamic Cairo, the name given to the medieval eastern half of the modern city.

To give you a sense of the scope of Islamic Cairo, Lonely Planet, not a guidebook known for its erudition or the depth of its recommended sightseeing, suggests three full days of walks in Islamic Cairo alone. Islamic Cairo stretches from the Citadel of Saladin in the south to the northern city walls, a walk of hours. I assumed the architectural legacy that must remain from being an Islamic capital for hundreds of years to be superb, but Cairo has even surpassed my expectations. The sights, sounds and feel of Islamic Cairo rival and in some ways surpass those of Damascus, a city I hold in the highest regard (see post of 4.7).

The chronologically first, and southernmost, site of Islamic Cairo is fittingly close to the Old Cairo of the Copts. The Mosque of Amr ibn al-As, first built in AD 642 just two years after the Arab conquest, began as an encampment, or “Fustat”, of the Arab generals who took Egypt from the Byzantine Empire.

Mosque of Amr ibn al-As. As in Syria, mosques in Egypt are not necessarily grim, austere places but public spaces for even mundane activities, such as napping. The numerous nappers at the Amr ibn al-As Mosque reminded me of the time I saw a movie at a Midtown New York theater during office hours, with what seemed to be a bunch of white collar workers playing hooky.

Mosque of ibn Tulun, founded AD 879. The spiral minaret is intended to resemble the minaret of the nearly contemporary Samarra mosque in now Iraq, whence ibn Tulun came to Egypt as a governor of the Abbasid caliphate. Well into the first several hundred years of Arab rule, much of Egypt remained Egyptian (as opposed to Arab) and Christian. Over time, Arabic linguistic and ethnic identity, along with the Islamic faith, filtered through into the masses. Today, almost everyone in Egypt identifies as an Arab and around 90% are Muslim.

Cairo’s true greatness, however, was sealed in AD 969, when the Ismaili Fatimids founded al-Qahira (“The Conquerer”) as its capital. The Fatimid dynasty (see post of 7.13) did not last long, being crushed by Saladin in the twelfth century, but its foundations form the core of modern Cairo.

The Al Azhar Mosque and University, founded in AD 971, is the oldest and most famous center of Islamic Studies in the world, spreading what is a moderate version of the religion.

Malay student, Al Azhar. While we were at Al Azhar we met students from all over the Islamic world, from Malaysia to Iran to Bosnia.

Saladin’s Citadel, rising above Islamic Cairo

Building on the Fatimid accomplishments was the slave warrior ruling class of the Mamelukes, who founded an empire based in Cairo that ruled much of Egypt and the Levant. The Mamelukes earned their place in history not least for turning back the Mongols and thereby helping to prevent the spread of the Mongol Empire further west. The Mamelukes were overwhelmed by the rise of the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century, but not before building a series of mosques that rival any place of worship in the world for beauty and majesty.

Interiors of Mameluke-era mosques







Although not quite as dazzling as the most beautiful of Damascus’s old houses, several old houses in Islamic Cairo have been refurbished, including Beit al-Khatoun, a house dating to Ottoman times.

The Pyramids are great, yes, but it is Islamic Cairo that drew us back to appreciate its countless monuments, its medieval atmosphere and the friendliness of its residents. In a country infamous for the harassment of tourists [some posts to come], Islamic Cairo offers travelers opportunities to experience a semblance of authentic Egyptian life and genuine hospitality–friendly curiosity and conversation not always motivated by profit. So come for the Pyramids–most people do. Even feel free to “hate Cairo,” as more than one traveler we met exclaimed–but don’t do it before spending at least a day wandering Islamic Cairo.

Outside the walls of the Al Azhar

Along Al-Muizz Li-Din Allah Street, Islamic Cairo

Market Street, Islamic Cairo

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Malaysia

Bad Malaysia

Malaysia is a big tourist destination, yes. “Malaysia, Truly Asia” has been constantly advertised on CNN International for years, Penang and Langkawi are resort hotspots and Kuching and Kota Kinabalu are big culture/adventure travel destinations. But, compared to its neighbors, Indonesia with Borobudur and Bali, Cambodia with Angkor Wat, the international hub city of Singapore and of course Thailand, Malaysia pales as a tourist destination. This sort of seems like a fact of life, but why? What about Malaysia makes it relatively unappealing, so lame-seeming? It can certainly be good value, with many services at first world levels for discount prices. The food is excellent. Melaka and Penang have intriguing history and there is natural beauty galore on Borneo. Is Malaysia’s poor reputation unmerited? Admittedly we’ve spent little time in Malaysia, just a couple weeks in Borneo and about a week in Peninsular Malaysia, but our answer would be no. Malaysia just isn’t in the same league.

The first problem with Malaysia is, apparently, violence. I do not know the statistics on this, but Malaysia is the only country in Asia (other than the Philippines) where I have heard repeated safety concerns from other travelers. Yes, you may be conned in Bangkok and there are certainly some government-related issues in Burma and China, but East/Southeast Asia as a whole (other than the Philippines) is extraordinarily safe, one of the region’s many strengths for travelers. Even Jakarta, which I had at one point ignorantly feared, feels astonishingly safe on the ground. In sharp contrast, in the short time that we were in Kuala Lumpur (KL), we heard two separate stories about muggings, and I was physically attacked in the main bus station (more on this below).

The second problem with Malaysia is racism and racial tension. While Malaysia has a history dating from the 15th century or so as a Malay-ethnic sultantate, Malaysia as a modern country is largely the product of colonial powers (first Portuguese and Dutch and then British) and labor brought in by those powers (the Chinese for manual labor and commerce, the Indians for administration and the service sector). Well into the twentieth century, the principal cities of Malaysia were largely built, owned and populated by Chinese, who made up nearly half of the country’s population. The smaller Indian population is augmented by the presence of overseas workers from the subcontinent. Yes, Malaysia is a multicultural society, but Malaysia’s vision of itself as a country where all three of the major ethnic groups live together in complete harmony sometimes seems to be more dream than reality.

The biggest problem, in my view, is discriminatory Malaysian laws. I do not deny that it is unfortunate for your “homeland” to be taken over by an outside ethnic group that has been brought in by a colonial power (the Palestinians certainly can identify with that)–the Chinese minority is still disproportionately economically powerful–but the policies put in by the majority Malay (now some 60% of the population) amount to little other than discrimination against and theft from the Chinese and Indians. Public companies are required to be at least 30% owned by Bumiputras (i.e., “sons of the earth,” or Malays and certain other “native” groups), new housing construction is required to be sold to Bumiputras at a discount, Bumiputras are allowed affirmative access in higher education and many government contracts and permits are given to Bumiputras on a preferential basis. This racist system is enshrined in the Malaysian constitution, and although the provision was supposed to be temporary, and there is occasionally talk of trimming back on its application, it remains in place.

The laws are no doubt both an effect of and a cause of racial sentiment that seems prevalent throughout the country. Malaysia is certainly not the only country with racial tension (Indonesia in particular is infamous for racial riots that have occurred in its history), but, currently, Malaysia is, outside of the U.S., the country in which I’ve felt the greatest amount of animosity among different ethnic groups. Our conflict at the bus station was with Malay-ethnic Malaysians, and Chinese-ethnic Malaysians who were present immediately came to our defense, telling us that as Americans in a position of relative influence we had to report what had happened to us. One middle-aged Chinese woman said that “they” (meaning Malays) commit all kinds of crimes, especially against defenseless South Asians, and get away with it. She was also mistrustful of the police, and told me that I should make sure to keep copies of all reports that we make, to ensure that they are not subsequently doctored. An Indian police officer who handled our matter said that such violence was a “national epidemic,” with the subtle implication that it was a Malay-ethnic problem. A Chinese taxi driver told us not to take Indian taxis, because they would rip us off (perhaps in this case a justified prejudice, judging from our limited sample). Surveys have shown that racial stereotypes are widely held in Malaysia, with people believing Malays to be lazy, Chinese greedy and Indians dishonest.

Third, Islam is manifesting itself in Malaysia in strange ways. People may think of Malaysia as the more modern and cosmopolitan of the two Muslim Southeast Asian nations, but, it seems to me, Malaysia, far more than Indonesia, is turning to a sort of fundamentalist version of Islam that is bizarrely conservative and reactionary. (I have read that the rise of fundamentalist Islam in Indonesia was at one time called “the Malaysian problem” because Malaysia was the Asian source of the movement.) All Malays are subject to sharia (or Islamic law) courts, which have ruled apostasy a crime. Malaysia is famous for having pursued, essentially as a political crime, a sodomy charge against a former prime minister. Our bus station altercation involved an argument with a woman, whom I had to shake off of me at one point because she was forcefully grabbing my arm and not letting go–a person standing by told me that I should have my hand cut off for fighting with a woman (“chop chop chop,” she cheerfully said, making a chopping gesture with her hand), a demented vision of Islamic punishment. Ideas which are out of date seem even more backward when placed in a foreign cultural setting–it may make sense for some Arab countries to wish to revert back to a more glorious Arab past, but in Malaysia the adoption of the foreign code of behavior feels not only anachronistic (shifted in time) but misplaced (shifted in space and culture).

Finally, however Malaysia may try to sell itself as a developed country, the primitive state of some of its public transport culture shows that it is in some ways still very much a third world country. First, the taxis. I remember, not too long ago, when taxis in Korea used to rip customers off–overcharging foreigners, refusing to use the meter, refusing to go to certain parts of town, etc. At some point, some combination of the government, drivers and customers recognized that developed countries do not behave this way, and taxis are now, for the most part, totally clean. Vietnam is clearly still on the developing end of the scale, according to this metric, while Thailand with its combination of meters and crooked drivers falls somewhere in between. The taxis in KL are some of the absolute worst for ripping travelers off–perhaps the only place we’ve seen worse is Delhi, and that’s saying an awful lot. Drivers in central KL routinely refuse to use their meters and instead quote astronomical rates that are multiples of the proper fare. Rather than turn their meter on or accept a reasonable fare, they will simply tell you to get out of their car. The government apparently lacks the will or the means to clean this up, despite the extremely poor impression it makes on travelers to Malaysia, while the lack of dignity on the part of the drivers reveals a grave deficiency in the le
vels of civics and ethics.

But even worse than the taxis (after all, a common problem, even if not to the level of KL) is the situation at Puduraya Bus Station. Puduraya is the country’s largest bus station and is located right in the heart of KL. If you’ve been in Korea or Turkey or Mexico or any other country with well-developed bussing, you know that bus lines can be extremely comfortable and professional. I recall that the main bus terminal in Mexico City is pretty much like an airport in terms of modernity and efficiency, Turkish busses famously have attendants that give you cologne and Korean busses leave precisely on time, almost to a fault, with many offering 2-1 seating (two seats on one side of the aisle, one on the other). Even Indian bus stations, for all their chaos, are pretty well run, with reliable schedules and fares by state-owned companies.

Puduraya is, simply put, the worst bus station we’ve ever seen. The place is in congested central KL (has no-one thought to move this thing a bit out of town?) and, in steamy Malaysia, not air conditioned. All of the guidebooks refer to it as a den of pickpockets. There are some fifty or so ticket counters–competition run amok with no sense of regulation–and no centralized way to figure out when what busses are going where. Worst of all are the many scams. We fell prey on the one ride we tried to take out of Puduraya and met another tourist who was also an angry victim. Reports online suggest that the scams are extremely common, not only but especially for tourists. It goes something like this: You buy a ticket, and at some point someone pretends to be a ticket agent and tears off your stub. Given the chaos of the station, with literally dozens of companies, almost no-one in uniform and multiple companies operating in each bay, this does not happen only to the naive. Then, when it comes time for you to get on your bus, you are told that your ticket is invalid and your assigned seat has been sold to another passenger.

What happened to us was a slight variation on this. We showed up for our bus exactly seven minutes early, but didn’t find a bus. Bus station employees who were standing at our bay told us to wait, and then tore off our ticket stub. After waiting for twenty minutes, we realized that our bus must have left without us (as we learned later, after filling our seats with other passengers who were charged an on-the-spot premium for getting on an earlier bus), and so went angrily to ask for a refund. At the counter, we were told that our tickets could not be refunded because the stubs had been torn off, despite the fact that we were not the only passengers who had been waiting, promptly and in the right place, and never even saw the bus. Basically, this ploy allows the companies to sell more tickets than there are seats on the bus. In our case, with a typically Malaysian twist it turns out, this dispute led to the crook running up behind me and hitting my head with a heavy walkie-talkie.

When Derek defended me with a quick punch to my attacker, an angry crowd of Malays converged, all siding with the attacker (later we learned that they were likely other resident con-artists who were part of the same gang). But many others knew exactly what was going on. A taxi driver (figuring it best to get out quickly, we opted for an expensive long-distance taxi instead of trying another bus) told us that there’s a “mafia” of ticket sellers and con artists operating at the station, selling tickets to buses that don’t exist and otherwise getting people to pay for tickets that they cannot use. It is equally well known among well-seasoned travelers. To quote Lonely Planet’s Thorntree message board:

“Having been traveling for over 16 months through Northern Asia, Latin America, Australasia and now South East Asia we have seen a lot of bus stations (at the moment we have used over 115 intercity buses on this trip) but we agreed that Puduraya was the worst we had seen so far in terms of ease of use, safety and reliability. “

“Agreed, Kuala Lumpur’s Puduraya Bus Terminal is a hellhole. Those of us who know Puduraya would love to avoid it, but when going through KL [by] bus, there are few options. For a country that pretends to be on the treshold of joining the First World league of nations, it has some of the worst bus terminals anywhere; even India’s are better; Malaysia’s bus terminals are not even Third World, but more like Fourth World. ”

Given these safety concerns, the institutionalized racism and racial tension and “fourth world” transportation hassles, is it any wonder that so many travelers prefer to go to friendly Thailand, rustic Laos or service-focused Bali?

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Indonesia Malaysia photo

Strait of Malacca

As I’ve written before (see post of 5.3), there are some places that you’ve heard of so often that you’re curious just to see them in the flesh. The Strait of Malacca, between the Indonesian island of Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula, is one of the world’s most important shipping lanes, with about a quarter of the world’s trade, including a quarter of the world’s traded oil, passing through. It is also one of the most famous areas of modern piracy, although only smaller ships generally fall prey (50 incidents in 2006).

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faces Indonesia photo

Faces of Indonesia

Some portraits from the Indonesian islands of Lombok, Flores and Sulawesi:

Boys under a tongkonan, Tana Toraja, Sulawesi

Sasak woman, Lombok

Boy in “peci” hat popularized by former president Sukarno, Lombok

Young boy collecting plastic bottles by the port, Flores.

Young Muslim ladies in cover


Girl in traditional dress at a funeral, Tana Toraja, Sulawesi

Boy in traditional dress at a funeral, Tana Toraja, Sulawesi

Older woman, Tana Toraja, Sulawesi

Older man, Tana Toraja, Sulawesi

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Indonesia Madagascar photo

Tana Toraja and Madagascar

Terrace farming, Sulawesi

Terrace farming, Madagascar

As I’ve said many times before, much of what is great about traveling in so many different places, especially within a relatively short timeframe, is that many connections can be made.

As you may know, the Malagasy (as the people of Madagascar are called), although they live just off of the coast of southeastern Africa, originally came not from Africa but from Asia. The Austronesian ethnic group arrived by boat from now Indonesia (across all those thousands of miles of Indian Ocean), and settled on the huge island of Madagascar over a thousand years ago. The island was not yet significantly inhabited by Africans from the mainland, who have arrived since to intermarry with the Asian Malagasy. To this day, especially in the highlands of central Madagascar, people look pretty much Southeast Asian. Even relatively African or dark-skinned Malagasy, as you find on the western coast, are quick to distinguish themselves from “black” Africans, who are thought of as a somewhat inferior race. (One man, who was to us indistinguishable from a black mainland African, when we said that we were American, remarked that we too had “red” people like him.)

Although we had not been to Indonesia or Malaysia prior to our Madagascar trip, some “Asian” aspects of the Malagasy were obvious to us. First, as I mentioned, many Malagasy look Asian. Second, they speak an Austronesian language that I understand is most closely related to a language spoken on Borneo. Third, they grow rice, and not the grains common to mainland Africa. Now in Tana Toraja in southern Sulawesi, I see even more clearly the genuine cultural closeness that the Malagasy retain to their Indonesian ancestors.

The most distinctive and telling of the new connections I have made is funerary customs. When we visited Madagascar in 2005, we had read much about the unusual local traditions, including the infamous famadihana, or the turning of the bones, in which the bodies of the deceased are disinterred so that they can be covered in a clean shroud and reburied. The custom may seem quite morbid to us, but it is really a huge celebration demonstrating the Malagasy connection to their ancestors, a continuation beyond death of the familial relationship. We were in Madagascar during famadihana “season,” but did not have the fortune to be invited to an event, which are, perhaps thankfully in this age of mass tourism, still largely private affairs.

We are now in Tana Toraja (the “land of the Toraja”) in central south Sulawesi, and learn that they have similar funerary traditions, including a ceremony remarkably similar to the famadihana. Again we did not see any such disinterment, but we were fortunate enough to be invited to and present for part of a Torajan funeral–alas, tourism here has caught up to tradition. Upon the death of a loved one, the body is left within the home for up to one year (and continues to be treated as a member of the family), until an elaborate funeral ceremony is prepared for after the next harvest. The Torajan relationship to the dead to be at least as intimate as the Malagasy one. Some pictures of a Torajan funeral:

The elaborately decorated coffin and the “emcee”

A team of women working a local drum-like instrument

The location of the funeral, a rectangular lawn surrounded by traditional houses. The people walking alongside the left of the picture represent one of many delegations paying their respects to the deceased, bringing with them gifts of livestock. One water buffalo has already been killed and skinned. We were not there for the day of the great slaughter, but were told that up to fifty animals would be sacrificed.

The Malagasy and the Torajans are also similar in their unusual choices of burial locations. We saw cliffside tombs in Madagascar, and, in Sulawesi, coffins in cliffs, caves and trees. All in all, most unusual.

Tombs cut out in a cliff, Sulawesi

Detail of the “tau tau” effigies protecting the tombs

Coffins hanging on the side of a cliff, Sulawesi

Tree tombs for babies, Sulawesi

Cave tombs, Sulawesi

Cliff tombs, Madagascar

There are many other connections. Both the Torajans and the Malagasy have caste systems. Both the Torajans and the Malagasy excel at terrace farming of rice. Both the Torajans and the Malagasy place great value in the ownership of cattle (water buffalo, especially albinos, in Sulawesi; zebu in Madagascar), the number of animals in particular being a primary indicator of status in excess of the actual utility the animals provide. If there was any doubt that the Malagasy indeed came from Southeast Asia… The persistence of culture over hundreds of years and thousands of miles is truly astonishing.

Zebu market, Madagascar

An albino water buffalo, the most prized of all, Sulawesi

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food Indonesia photo

Food in Indonesia

Why there are not many Indonesian restaurants all over the world is a great mystery to me, as Indonesia is one of my favorite countries in the world for eating, hands down. From the lesehan of Java to the numerous Padang-style rumah makan, delicious food is always steps away in Indonesia, dirt cheap and full of flavor. In this post, just a few Indo-staples, along with a couple regional dishes from our trip.

There are three “dishes” that I would consider the holy trinity of quick and dirty eating in Indonesia: nasi campur, nasi goreng and mie goreng.

Nasi campur, which means “mixed rice,” isn’t really a dish per se, but a sort of table d’hote–white rice served with whatever dishes are on offer that day. A nasi campur often includes some vegetables, fried tempe (a sort of meat substitute made of grains and pulses), flavored boiled egg, chicken curry or fried chicken and sambal. Nasi campur is the absolute most basic food that is available anywhere–since you are just served what is available–and cheap (around USD 1). It is, along with its Malaysian cousin nasi lemak, one of the tastiest, cheapest meals known to man.

At a restaurant in Lombok. Fried scallions are a common seasoning.

If you’re in the mood for something hotter/more freshly prepared, a good step sideways is Indonesian fried rice, or nasi goreng (literally, “fried rice”). Nasi goreng packs a bit more flavor than Chinese-style fried rice and almost always comes with a fried egg for extra protein.

Served on a leaf

Somewhat more simple and less tasty is mie goreng (“fried noodles”). Mie goreng is essentially a sort of dry instant noodle, often very salty but always appetizing.

A fourth typical dish, and Indonesia’s most common and unique vegetable plate, is gado gado, a plate of blanched vegetables served with peanut sauce and usually a shrimp chip or two. To be honest I don’t like it too much, but Derek does, comparing it to Chinese cold sesame noodles.

Some more localized specialties:

Seafood is common in Indonesia, with fish often baked in banana leaves. This dish was from Flores.

From Lombok, a spicy chicken dish, flavored in part with kaffir lime leaves

From Tana Toraja in Sulawesi, pa’piong, pork and chicken cooked in bamboo

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India Indonesia Iran photo queer

Waria, or Transgendered around the World

In much of the first world, the battle for “gay rights” is largely won. Gay men and lesbians can legally marry (or enter into some contractual facsimile of marriage) in many Western European countries, as well as Canada and some of the most important of the United States. Even if public acceptance is not yet totally here, and some anachronistic laws remain, the overall trend seems clear, and young people today find little astonishing or controversial about sexual orientation (as Derek’s then nine year-old niece remarked, even SpongeBob is gay). This is of course not the case in many other parts of the world. Even if east Asia lacks much of the religio-moral condemnation of homosexuality, most gay men in Japan, Korea or China are deep in the closet, with “Brokeback” marriages the norm. In the macho-er parts of the developing world, gayness is perceived as weakness and shunned. In some parts of the Islamic world, homosexual activity can be a capital offense.

Some in the world may still try to deny the existence of hard-wired homosexual orientation, or its “legitimacy” to exist and manifest itself, but some facts of life are impossible to deny, and it is sometimes quite surprising to see how well-established the transgendered identity is in seemingly unlikely locales, including three on our itinerary: India, Iran and Indonesia.

Homosexuality as an identity in India may be just barely nascent–even the megalopolis of Bombay does not support one proper gay bar–but there is an ancient class of transgendered persons, known as hijra. Either male or intersex at birth, hijra assume essentially feminine identities, going so far as to “marry” men (either with or without having undergone castration). Some hijra work in the sex industry, but they are also known for performing a sort of exorcising role at births and weddings, to ensure the masculinity of male children and promote fertility. While hijra are not exactly “accepted”–they suffer a great deal of discrimination and are also feared as a sort of cursed race that may, if you offend them or refuse their services, curse your children to suffer their fate–they are a well-established community, a category of person, which has its defined (albeit difficult) niche within Indian society.

The second place on our itinerary that has a sizable and recognized transgendered population was, believe it or not, Iran. While Iran executes (or at least Iranian law calls for the execution of) gay men, Iranian doctors and theologians apparently have found no religious reason to deny the existence of transgendered people. Even if being a transgendered person is not exactly “well accepted” by society, the state recognizes it as a medical condition that can be “remedied” by the surgery of the sex change operation (partly covered by the national health insurance), and Iran is, after Thailand, a world center for that procedure.

Southeast Asia as a whole seems to have an unusually large transgendered population. In Thailand they call them kathoey or ladyboys, and many a male heterosexual traveler has mistakenly fallen for one (they can sometimes be, as U2 would say, even better than the real thing, in terms of sheer knockout beauty). The visibility of the transgendered population of these countries may have some genetic component or, as likely, may be due to widespread public acceptance, especially in Thailand and some of its neighbors. Indonesia may be the largest Islamic country in the world, but in terms of its transgendered population, and seeming acceptance of their gender identities, it is very much a part of Southeast Asia.

In Indonesia they are known as “waria,” which is an amalgam of the words for woman (“wanita”) and man (“pria”). I have read one estimate of fewer than 30,000 waria, but in a country of over 200 million it seems likely that the real number is far higher, and simply traveling about Indonesia one sees them everywhere, from the seedier parts of Bali nightlife along Jalan Dhyana Pura to quiet Labuanbajo on Flores to Islamic Makassar on Sulawesi. I have also read reports suggesting that many or most waria are sex workers or have at least engaged in the trade, and while of course there are some (such as the ones on Bali) who are, most waria I have seen in Indonesia seemed like regular people doing regular jobs. Waria are often quite friendly and outgoing with travelers. Labuanbajo had a sort of waria hangout (the Matahari–two English guys in our dive group seemed to hang out there quite a bit). We saw some mild teasing of waria by other locals but no open hostility, given the warias’ very open presence.

I am inclined to think that transgendered people, in India, Iran or Indonesia, or in some Native American cultures (whose transgendered people were at one point called berdache and now, “two spirits”), are accepted in part because of the indubitable existence of people who are born intersex. It is a fact of nature (up to 1% of all human births, according to some studies) hard to deny the existence of, that it forces the creation of a category. Presumably, once the category is created, it admits not only those who are born physically ambiguous but those who, psychologically, are transgendered.

I wonder: In societies where the transgendered identity exists and is tolerated, is there any pressure on non-transgendered homosexuals to try to squeeze themselves in? That is, if you are a gay male, would you be tempted to identify as a hijra or waria to be able to express your sexual preference? I would think not, because gender is a much more core aspect of identity than mere sexual preference, but it is clear to me that there are different “kinds” of homosexuals, and it is possible that some may be tempted by an open identification. If indeed culture helps shape sexuality, to what extent can sexuality be affected by the gender/sexual roles available in a given culture? Does the existence of the category of waria or hijra affect the number of people who may come to identify, in their adolescence or adulthood, as transgendered or homosexual? These are difficult questions, of course, but one thing is clear: “deviance” from the male/female heterosexual norm is incredibly widespread, and recognition of this fact has existed from time immemorial.