My Life in Words

So I said in my first post that I would give a status update on Greg - the 'unique' Brit in my tour group.  This post started as an aside to a post about my trip, but there was so much to say that its turned into a post of its own. I should start this by saying that the guy turned out to be a really nice, well meaning person.  He may be quite unusual, but his intentions are good and he is a genuinely nice, friendly person.  Its just that he walks a very fine line between completely obnoxious and completely entertaining...100% of the time. To paint a better picture, I'll try to describe his appearance and mannerisms. He is 22 but seems to have quite a young mind.  He chain smokes, eats terribly and quite possibly has never been to a gym in his life (his boobs are legitimately  bigger than mine, but he is not massively overweight).  He asks 1,000 questions about everything and is generally clueless about life. He has been traveling the world for over a ye...

In my last post I said that I didn't know where the idea to come to Borneo came from.  While that's true, it was the prospect of climbing Mt Kinabalu which motivated me to act on the idea. Although I've never done anything like this before, the idea of doing something out of the ordinary while on holiday was appealing to me. At 4095m, Mt Kinabalu is the highest peak in South East Asia and falls in the top 20 in the world.  Similar to Kilimanjaro, it is one of the few top 20 mountains that don't require mountaineering experience to summit (which is good, because I have none!).  Going into the climb, I was told the biggest obstacle would be the altitude, due to the fact that you ascend quite quickly. The route to the top is direct and steep and takes just 2 days. The route to the top is just 8.7km long, which at first glance doesn't seem like much.  However when you factor in the fact that the peak is 4.1km high, you can see that the gradient is quite extreme.  Wh...

Borneo - part 1 I'm not sure where the idea to come to Borneo came from.  It just popped into my head one day in December and the decision was made. Now, I'm aware that most people don't even know where Borneo is, so I'll provide a quick lesson.  Borneo is the third largest island in the world and is located north of Java, Indonesia, right in the geographic center of south east Asia.  The island is divided among 3 countries; Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei (I'm in the Malaysian part).  It's claims to fame are orangutans, Mt Kinabalu, and the very first season of survivor (yes, I'm going to the "survivor" island while I'm here). It also is home to the world's oldest rainforest and it's reported that since just 1996 over 360 new animal and plant species have been discovered here (cool!!) Although not far from Australia, it was a bloody effort to get here because there aren't exactly an abundance of flights (let alone a direct one from ...