Simply cycling around
Howard realised quickly that I like to help and now he comes to me with other ideas :-) I don’t mind. It’s even good because I can have a break working on my future version of my blog and get out of the screen for few hours per day. Howard asked me to build a rain protection on the left side (which is transparent). I’ve done this one and took some time to fixed the sun protection on the front. Easy project :-)
Tonight, we have been eating at the Sikh temple called “Gurdwara Sahib Melaka” and enjoyed the experience of free food. The is part of the Sikh religion to offer food to people who need. Well, we don’t really need but we wanted to try at least one time. Since we arrived at Ringo’s Foyer, we have heard about this place. Several people told us : “This is fine, you can go there and eat”. The food is vegetarian. They give us as much rice as we want plus some different sauce mixed with veggies. The offered us as well some flashy green jelly stuff, a sweet soup, “crackers” and water. Our plates was more than full and delicious food. Actually this is the best food I’ve ever eat in Melaka :-)
When I was at the Thai temple in Singapore we had to wash our plates. Here it’s the same but they have a quite clever way to do it. There is 5 big sinks in a row. The first one has a tap to clean roughly the dishes before dipping them in the second sink. The second sink has dishwasher soap mixed in the water to clean properly the dishes. The last 3 sinks have only clear water in them. We dip the dishes from the second sink until the last one to rinse. That way, they don’t use much water compared to the amount of people who can eat. That’s clever!
This is what has done Arjan when we were in Singapore. He has a done a great job! Using thicker thread make the tyre much stronger naturally. The one I’ve used (the grey one we can see underneath) did work for a little while but was going to collapse soon. I’ve been able to cycle until Melaka but I had another problem though. The thread being thicker, the protection I put inside the tyre was not strong enough so I had three punctures along the way between SIngapore and Melaka. The following images will explain better that my poor english ;-)
Howard (the guy with the glasses) is the owner of the Ringo’s Foyer in Melaka (which is invite cyclist for free). He used to cycle himself and today he welcomes any cyclist who comes around. He started a collection of souvenir pictures that he puts on the wall behind us. The two guys on the right (They are actually 3 people) are coming from Latvia and have been cycling all the way down to Malaysia. They got their bike stolen in Poland only a month or two after they started. They had to work somewhere there to buy new bicycles. That was bad luck! They want to cycle until New Zealand and find a job there. After that, they think about splitting and continuing the adventure by themselves.
When we arrived at the hostel a week ago, I met Howard the owner. He is a nice guy, very relaxed. He showed us what other cyclists and backpackers have done on the roof and any other places. They obviously done that roof protection that is a bit damaged today, just a bit. I offered my help and said to Howard that I would be happy to fix this. I’ve been working through a week, doing this 2 hours per day maybe. It was pretty chaotic at the beginning so I’ve decided to pull everything down and restarted from zero.
Jerome has been cycling from Belgium until Malaysia (where we met) in about 9 months. He wants to carry on until, at least, China where he will meet one of his friend with whom he will be cycling. During his trip, he has done most parts alone and some other with friends. He is carrying a lot of stuff and doesn’t necessary look for quality products. His bike is a simple Decathlon city bike that resisted all the way! His bike had some physical issues (a car rolled over one of his wheel after he felt down) but he made it!
Once upon a time, he did a few weeks trip through Italy where he bought a bike for 50€. Jerome knows how to travel very cheaply.
Few days later, another cyclist came in. His name is Jerome. He has done previous bicycle trips before this longer one. This time, he left Belgium 8 months ago and he is now on his way to Singapore. Then he will cycle back up to Malaysia (east coast), Thailand and all the way to China where he will meet his friend. They started cycling together until India where they split. His friend found a job in Australia and will join Jerome in China later. Jerome wanted to cycle through Myanmar but he did not obtain the visa in time and finally flew to Kuala Lumpur. Tonight we went to the famous Malacca’s night market where he got a Dragon fruit juice. I was more classic, apple and carrot :-)