From: David Jarman [dsrjarman@hotmail.com] Sent: 02 February 2002 10:00 Subject: goodbye yellow brick road good evening. i get the chance to find my feet in adelaide for the next few weeks while working for the fringe festival. funny how the same acts, and even the speigeltent, keep popping up from edinburgh – visit www.adelaidefringe.com.au for more details. i'm going to reserve judgement on the city until i've been here a while, but of the dozen or so newlyweds celebrating by the river earlier, i'd swear at least half of the Happy Couples looked as though they were enjoying themselves; which is encouraging. had a fantastic week in malaysia. my plans quietly evaporated as sandra, rick and i made our way north. we took a late bus out of kuala lumpur - watching the sun set behind rain forests and monolithic sandstone hills - and an even later taxi ride with yeap across the island of penang. lo and behold, we woke right next to the beach. not the cleanest of beaches, or the finest sand, but a beach. nothing else for it but to sail a hobiecat around, work on the tan, and discuss cult movies. and if you get tired of one island, head for another, with squeaky clean sand, more good food, and bigger boats to sail. (60ft, two masts, more sunbathing as the eagles soared overhead.) this was langkawi, a duty free island awaiting its big-spending visitors. maybe they need to publicise their attractions better - once i'd found the 'seven worlds waterfall' i was in heaven. should really have broken my ankles while falling down it, or at least rick's camera, but all might just be ok. so, not happy with my first attempt at injury, i tried again. the wounds are healing from the second fall (much quicker thanks to sandra's help) but i may get my elbow x-rayed all the same... seems as though most folk are happy to skip through malaysia at the moment. singapore's the main route in, and you head north to the delights of thailand and vietnam. a shame really, as there's much going on in places like the night markets we kept finding, and you're never short of a rip-off manchester united kit. spent one night in thailand after travelling to the glorious town of hat yai. picture postcard stuff round every corner. really. but it's the best place to get transport back south, and if you have to endure an hour or so of foot massage, you don't really notice the smog much at all. more good food, but bad sleep thanks to the night time drilling and construction: road workmen must need the peace and quiet of the early hours in order to concentrate. sandra tried to get valium over the counter - once possible but no more - so we resorted to the local brew as a trusty bringer of sleep.

what better way to follow that than an overnight ride to singapore, and an overnight flight to melbourne. unimpressed with the drop in temperature i'm afraid, but got through my interview with the melbourne comedy festival, met friends for drinks, and look forward to heading back that way. (although they don't have caves full of monkeys, like kuala lumpur...) if you want to send an sms/text message, my new mobile number is: +61 405 223 408. happy burns night, australia day, lunar new year,... it's all good. david.x