The dog has brought ticks into the house. A lot of ticks. Especially inside our bedroom, where the dog has often slept. There are ticks everywhere: in the mattress, at the walls, among the clothes, even inside the power outlets. And of course on the tick host itself, the dog.
The ticks come out at night to such blood, preferably from the dog. I have not noticed any tick bites myself.
I and the Dragon are on our long way back from Oslo to Jakarta, and are having (right now) a few hours stopover in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei. It’s the first time I am visiting this sultanate, so I get to increase my country count by one.
We took a taxi from the airport to the city, a short trip of only 10 minutes, which cost BND 25. According to the taxi driver, there is only 15 taxis servicing the airport, and 19 taxis servicing downtown, a total of only 34 taxis in this city.
We will take the same taxi back to the airport at 22:00. Flight to Jakarta is at 23:15.
Sunrise over China.
Moscow – Hong Kong.
Mosque, Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei.
After 3 1/2 years I’m making a brief trip to my home country Norway. On the way here, I and CME made a stopover in the Philippines from 16 to 27 February. “Superman” had already arrived in Manila from Norway just before we arrived there from Jakarta, and was waiting for us at the airport. Together the 3 of us took a flight later in the day to Kalibo, and then a bus (1.5 hours) to Boracay, where we spent most of our time in the Philippines. Boracay has changed tremendously since the last time I (and CME) visited, 13 years ago. I must say I miss the “old” Boracay. It was hard to find a reasonable room, and we ended up paying PHP 2000 per night.
On the night to 25 February we took the same route back to Manila, and had some time left for sightseeing before leaving for Hong Kong and Oslo on 27 February. I picked the “Dragon” up at the airport on Tuesday morning, 26 February. She is coming with us to Norway. Superman was staying behind in Hong Kong for a couple of extra days.
Town in Boracay.
Puka Beach, Boracay.
We did a sailing trip around Boracay island in this boat.
American cemetery, Manila.
A few weeks ago we went for a long weekend trip to Belitung, a relatively large island east of Sumatra. We rented a car, and one of the days (26 January), when I and CME were driving on a small gravel road, we stumbled across some tin mining activity along the way. The tin is extracted by using a lot of water to pump it up from the ground. The heavy tin will sink to the bottom as a residue, while the lighter solids are washed away together with the water.
Tin mining.
Tin mining.
Tin residue.
Equipment used to pump water and tin from the ground.
Yesterday turned out to be a bit unusual. We went out at 07:00 to buy some parts in Kota, but in jl Sudirman the traffic was already totally gridlocked. Since the rain had stopped, we continued on foot all the way to Kota, a distance of around 10 km. At the Hotel Indonesia traffic circle we had to cross a bridge between two buildings because the water level was too deep. We were lucky to bring along a camera to document the day. On the way back from Kota, we were able to catch a couple of buses, and finally a taxi from Tanah Abang.
Tosari.
Tosari.
Sarinah.
Glodok.
Kota. Even the cockroaches are escaping the water.