Meutia Chaerani

i just went to KL for a day trip, and I spent the days eating and eating. Thanks for Fay, Colin, and Trudy for showing us around. Details in http://www.flickr.com/photos/indrani
Not very easy to get around, but with friends with cars, it was a breeze.

I got the tickets to Mexico! Will apply for visa in few weeks time. wish us luck!

I don’t really like 43places so far… Why? because I can’t be honest of what I write here. I can’t express myself honestly. I have to write everything in positive tone. Or else, certain people would come after me and demand that I change my writing to become positive and praising. There are certain people who can be very hysterical towards negative opinions, or too fanatical to certain ideas. I think that 43places.com does not have an open dialogue atmosphere that respects difference in opinion. That is why i rarely visit this website. It is full of praises that sometimes felt a bit too superficial. Of course praises are good for encouragement, but negative opinion should also be allowed as long as it is presented in an objective and non-fallacious manner, without personal attacks (ad hominem) or getting hysterical.

I’m just expressing my opinion here. Anyway I don’t think 43places loses anything with me retreating away from this website.

Oh BTW I like singapore where internet broadband is cheap and always available. The libraries here are filled with good books within your reach. It’s very clean and sterile for sure, which is good, because I can easily go to any clean toilet in town. I love the seafood here. Yep.

Some update:

We got our plane ticket for both mexico and cuba in December. Wish us luck that everything will go well!

We got my tourist card from Cuban embassy in Indonesia. Yay! Liurka Rodriguez, the deputy ambassador, has been most helpful and really friendly (unlike the embassy secretary Ms. Yuli). I’ll write a more complete story about this later if I have time.

Yay, my husband has OKed the plan to go to cuba. He even suggested diverting our route from mexico city to buenos aires, because he had been in mexico 10 years ago. So now i’m hunting for air tickets via buenos aires, and it’s not cheaper than from mexico city. Basically there is no cheap way to go to Cuba from south east asia. As for now, the cheapest option is to fly from Singapore through Sydney, Auckland, and Santiago to Buenos Aires using Qantas (USD1500), then take a flight direct to Havana using Cubana (USD650).

I started to borrow books about cuba from library, and was fascinated by it! It is said that cuban people are really helpful and loves children. Hopefully this will make our trip with little toddler, easier. I personally aim to go around havana, to visit the Keys, go to Trinidad, basically the west central side. Hopefully by renting a car. Santiago and Guantanamo is abit too far to drive, have to fly there.

We sort of plan to go around december, to coincide with the jazz festival and national day. Have to start planning the details now.

I wanna go to Cook Island because my friend William Numanga is a cook islander and he lives there. Also, my neighbor Ioana Vaetoru is from Cook Island as well. Also, I looked at Cook Island photos in the internet and became fascinated by the beautiful beaches and sea.

I want to eat at “The Carnivore” restaurant at Nairobi!

Because it’s the shangrila!

My best friend is one of the princess here, but she no longer lives in bhutan after marrying an italian man. So i have to find another way to get an invitation in order not to pay 200 USD per day.

I am thinking land bound from Darjeeling.

I want to go to Iran before US come and invade it.. I was impressed by the iranian movies I saw. It seems that the country has the simplicity of life. Also, I wanna see Caviar farm.

I hope that they would be able to accept women openly though. I am not well informed about this.

Not much to see, the beach was dirty, the town was tiny, and seem that there is strong conservative islamic atmosphere in the area. Food was really great in the town center! Had chinese food with tiger beer.