Marks

I sit here / glum / stabbing at the /
kisses the bedbugs / left the night before

Mersing has some good and bad things. Bad things? There's not much to do besides wander the two streets here.  The beach is a ways off, and the jetty has cranes and bulldozers blocking the view. Mosquitoes are rampant. As are bedbugs, I found out yesterday.

There's no stopping them. I discovered one – black, round and shiny – fifteen minutes into the night. Soon enough, I figured, once I turn off the lights, more will come out from cracks in the walls and the furniture. So I layered myself in a long sleeve tee and pj pants, lay an extra white sheet on the mattress, and then cocooned myself in a spare blanket from my pack.  Of course, sweat soaked through the sheets, and I still felt the pinpricks on me.

Jump up. Flick on the lights. Examine the bed. Nothing. Jump. Flick. Examine. Nothing. Jumpflickexamine. Nothing.

And so it went like that for a while before I said "fuckit", threw off the covers and submitted myself to their whims. The Ipod helped. I rocked out to Weezer's "Island in the Sun". But that was followed by Amazing Grace by the Irish Bagpipe Troupe. Way to go Shuffle. It was like listening to my funeral music, as I felt every crawl, every graze on my skin, real or imagined. I really learned to know my body yesterday: every crevasse, every pore, every undulation that was laid bare by the throbbing of a bite.

Amaaazing grace / how sweet the sound / that saaaved / a wretch / like me.

Woke up at 6am to the sounds of breakfast in the kitchen. Small hills of pink dot the plains of my hands, arms, legs and ankles.  Cortisone, I love you.

Enough about that. Good things from the town? I ambled across some kids playing basketball yesterday and got to go in on a pick up game. Shot an airball. They kicked my ass, these kids in flip flops.

Had a dinner by myself with a plate heaped high by crabs smothered in chili sauce. I won't get into it now, but let's say I like to dine alone when I'm devouring crabs; wouldn't want to subject anyone to my grotesque side. The best thing anyone has ever told me was, "Looks like you know how to eat crab." It takes patience and long years of study before you can really enjoy crabs. There's an art to gnawing, cracking, sucking, squeezing and cracking this delicacy. The crabs yesterday were good. Real big. The claws were as long as my arm (wrist to elbow). And there were so many! All for $7.

I felt safe walking home at night in this town. Strange. I wouldn't feel the same way in a comparable town in Vietnam, where I know the language and the customs. It's only been a couple of days in Malaysia, but I do think Vietnam has some serious catching up to do in the personality department.