hi

merry xmas! Got back from the turkey/greece trip & drove to east coast for surf the day after… It was good because scored some great swell, but I paid for it the next day because I did not get enough sleep/jetlag/not eating anything…

Turkey & greece were interesting. I’ve also discovered the meaning of “It’s all greek to me” – I’ve been driving on the opposite side of the road, with road signs that have gamma, sigma, rho…

Our conversations were like this:

Me: ok, so what street do I turn?
Brother: uhmmm…ok at the..Y..gamma…pie…O with a dash…ermmm..oh, I think we just missed it.

Greece had a lot of stones…and temples…mostly stones lying on the ground. The description would read ” There used to be a 30m high gold temple in 1000bc” and I would stare at the boulders on the ground & try to visualize it….

Sigh.

anyway in greece I liked these 2 places:

Delphi – cool temple in the mountain, gorgeous views (not that I got to see any, I was designated driver, the roads were mountainous and the greek drivers all had little mazda roadsters & tendencies to overtake at the sharpest steepest bends) Epidavros Ampitheater: 200m diameter & 5 storeys high – but we could still hear each other speaking normally from the other side (200m away)…great acoustics…

Istanbul was good. The rest of turkey..uhmmm…well if you’re in turkey you should just stay in Istanbul. Blue Mosque & Hagia Sophia was good…the palace was a bit of a letdown, except for the holy relics including a foot print of prophet mohammed & his teeth & the severed hand of a 500AD christian saint.

Most of turkey seemed to be enveloped in clouds of smoke from the wood/coal fires….everyone in turkey seems to drive around in little hyundais, travel by car ferry, and have NEVER SEEN AN ASIAN PERSON. We got stared at every place we went to, and entire classrooms of kids on school trips would bombard us with “Hello!” “Konnichiwa!” and ask to take pics with us.

Also a lot of stuff about turkey trying to join the EU & greece stopping them, ha ha. Oh yeah, Brad Pitt’s troy horse is actually sitting in Troy – and it looks more authentic than the 3 storey rocking horse they charge ppl 8Euros to see.

So after arriving 3pm saturday in KL , & with no sleep for the previous 36 hrs, I was driving to the surf at 3am to make it there by 7am. Mozzie bites, crushed finger, washed over the rocks (I provided
that afternoon’s drama entertainment), bruises, blinding rain that physically hurts you & the best trashing I’ve had in a while… I was elated

Came back into KL yesterday to meet my sis who’s come in from syd, mate who’s come in from qatar, buy final xmas gifts & bake xmas cookies! I’m forwarding a pic of some friends surfing last sunday…obviously there are prettier pics of msian surf here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bryannys

http://www.scaryreef.fotopages.com

Tomorrow I’m heading bk to the east coast for the xmas weekend…not starting work til jan so if it’s still good I’ll be there surfing into the new year’s…hmmmm

GREAT STUFF….

merry xmas & happy new year to all!

xoxox
shi.