Frustrations

I know it is Asia, and I should expect the frustrations and difficulties, but after nearly a week, we're being worn down a little. Internet has been the main source of irritation. The inventor needs his internet to get moving on research and communications. He needs to talk to his lawyer and patent attorney and look up articles. I need internet to sort out tenants, and the car that needs to be sold, and of course, to blog. For the best part of the four days we have been here, internet at the lab has been somewhere on the line between unreliable and completely broken. Tonight, though, it is working again, and I have promised the inventor a departure soon- at 8pm, even the fasting Moslems will have eaten by now. It is finally dark outside and I can hear rocks tumbling up the conveyor- work continues, but for us it is time to head home. We seem to have organised to have the internet put on next week, so we will finally have a landline, and, hopefully, a more reliable access to the internet than our handphones (mobile phones) are offering on the Tune network. Phone calls are cheap, though, and once we get internet we'll actually be able to reliably recharge the prepaid phone account!

It also seems that we are not able to open a bank account just yet. Once we have the company papers completed, we will become more acceptable in the eyes of the Malaysian government, and can open an account. For now, we will continue to pay exchange rates as we move money across the ocean.

My job application has been posted. Not by me, but the kindly office staff at the plant. It's not that I couldn't work out how to post it, it's just that I couldn't find the post office. I drove around and about Kampar looking, but for what was I looking? With an almost non-existent command of the local language, it's difficult asking instructions. Combine this with a decent dose of laryngitis, and it's near-impossible to communicate on a noisy street. In the quiet of the Tesco centre I get by, but I keep praying that tomorrow will be the day I wake up and discover my voice has returned.Then, freed from the shackles of enforced mutism, I hope I will be abe to really start living and step out into a new life and language in Malaysia.

Now I will call the hungry inventor, and we will drive back to town to see if our money transfer has worked, or find a meal that can be purchased with the remaining Ringgit notes in our wallets, or the trusty credit card. And try not to get too frustrated- after all, this is Asia!