March 7, 2006

East & Eden

For a truly inspiring Asian experience step off the well-trodden path. The top 10 must-visit holiday hotspots by Eric Ellis

TIME FOR TIMOR Do impoverished Timorese a favour and visit Asia’s poorest country. Fly via Bali instead of Darwin (it’s cheaper) and you’ll travel the same route as did East Timor’s oppressors. Avoid Dili’s overpriced Hotel Timor and stay at the funky Esplanada; plug into local gossip around its outdoor bar. Explore from whitewashed pousadas at seaside Baucau, or mountaintop Maubisse, favoured by the elite for dirty weekends and excellent country fare. Suave UN ex-supremo Sergio Vieira de Mello liked to romance his mistresses here before he was blown up in Baghdad in 2003. Befriend some of the grand mestiço (Portuguese-Timorese) families, who’ll invite you to their sprawling but spartan fazendas in the misty hills, where you’ll breakfast on rambutans, mangoes and plantation coffee.

AFRICA IN ASIA Not Kenya but Yala National Park, one of Asia’s biggest, in Sri Lanka’s south-east. And why not a safari to see it? A typical day at Kulu Safaris might start with “bed-tea” – a diehard Raj tradition – before sunrise. Then it’s into a 4WD to see dawn break over the coastal park, prime time for leopard-tracking as they hunt for breakfast deer. With luck, one or two will be spotted, but you are guaranteed sloth bears, myriad birdlife, jackals, monkeys, mongooses, crocodiles and Lanka’s ubiquitous elephants. By 9am you are back in camp for breakfast with tables literally arranged in the cooling shallows of a river. Then a lazy afternoon imitating those sloth before another pre-dusk run through the park, and a riverside barbecue. The “yuppie camping” is all very comfortable, the gear best South African quality and Kulu’s erudite operators will keep you amused with inside tales of Sri Lanka’s many political intrigues. Pack plenty of Oondatje and Kipling, preferably The Jungle Book.

KARAKORAM HIGHLIGHTS Meet some of the world’s most hospitable people in some of the world’s most magnificent surrounds. The Karakoram Highway takes a week to drive by 4WD, starting at Kashgar in western China, across the world’s highest road at the Khunjerab Pass and then south through the Hindu Kush. The food and lodging gets better the further you go. Soaring mountainscapes and impenetrable valleys tell you why Osama likes it around here, and be assured those chunky young Americans aren’t there for holidays. This is the North-West Frontier and it feels like it. Spend a few days at Chitral’s Hindukush Heights Hotel, a true Shangri-La, with hosts Siraj and Ghazala ul-Mulk, descendants of Persian mehtas, the region’s nobility (that’s their palace on the mountain above). Terror, you ask? That’d be the 30-minute flight back to Peshawar over the Lowari Pass. Or a night in Peshawar’s Pearl Continental, where the concierge advises guests to “check your weapons in before entering the coffee shop”.

PLENTIFUL PENANG Ignore Singapore’s self-inflated hype, Penang is foodie heaven; long luxurious laksas at the Cathay Cafe, mouth-watering murtabaks at Hameediyah, Hainan chicken rice at Fatty Loh’s, Asia’s best street food along Gurney Drive. Stay at the newly renovated Eastern And Oriental, Raffles without the theme park neocolonialism. Wander the streets for a whiff of the nanyang, the mythical “southern seas” of plenty for overseas Chinese. Penang is Singapore before Lee Kuan Yew’s control freaks got hold of it; friendly, funky, genuine. Souvenir-wise, try to buy one of the fabulous bamboo-blinds – chicks – or get one made up.

SINGAPORE IN PRINT If you must go to Singapore, better if your art passion is printing and lithography. Wealthy Singapore buys its culture, which is why, $20m later, one of the world’s most renowned exponents of print art, New York’s Tyler Institute, has migrated to the island. Check in and be tutored by the global experts. Rubbing shoulders with whingeing expat wives is a downside but suggest they do their own housework and remind yourself you won’t get access to printing professionalism like this anywhere at this price. Time your trip for the auction season at Christies and Sotheby’s.

YOUR INNER INDOCHINE Pretend you are Catherine Deneuve and her toy-boy and move elegantly between Indochina’s splendid hotels; The Oriental in Bangkok, Le Royale in Phnom Penh, D’Angkor in Siem Reap, Le Metropole in Hanoi and Le Continental in Saigon. Better still, make it a cook’s tour. The Oriental does a great Thai cooking course, though you hazard some more of those desperate expat housewives from Singapore. Tell them they and their Prada handbags are phony and escape to Cambodia and Vietnam. Cambodia hasn’t yet advanced to Khmer cooking class but in Saigon you can learn at the hand of Vietnam’s top TV chef, though I reckon the lady who makes the ho tieu nam van in front of the War Atrocities Museum could teach her a thing or two. “Phnom Penh noodles” are iconic in Vietnam, the dish their army marched on when liberating Kampuchea from Pol Pot’s tyranny. Vive le revolution!

JAVA CALLING Solo and Jogjakarta in central Java are where to find the real Indonesia. The heart of Javanese aristocracy, their privilege evident in the glorious kratons (palaces). Unsurprising, then, that nationalism spawned here, as did communism. Suharto’s grand wife Tien was from here, as are the extremists who inspire Jemaah Islamiah. Neither city is much to look at, but their beauty is within; Solo’s Masjid Agung mosque; Klewer Market, centre of the world’s batik trade. Stay at Solo’s lovely Rumah Koe guesthouse during Waisak/Vesak in May, where Buddhists descend on the breathtaking Borobudur ruins. Gorgeous Amanjiwo is nearby but ignore its $US600-a-night rates. They do deals.

BURMA BY BOAT Like to see Burma but struggle with keeping Rangoon’s narcocratic generals afloat? Try luxury yachting though the pristine Mergui Archipelago. Sail the glorious 300km chain of islands and put only $100 into the junta’s pocket, the fee on coming north from Thailand’s Phuket. The grasping official will probably be the last person you’ll see for a week, save the Mokens, sea gypsies on rickety outriggers whose navigations will guide you to the Mergui’s best fishing. Visit beaches Robinson Crusoe would recognise. Lose yourself.

JAKARTA, TRULY Yes, Jakarta, one of the world’s dirtiest, most difficult cities. But take a deep breath, stay in a good hotel, like the Grand Hyatt, and get inside the Batawis, as Jakartans call themselves. Hire a car and get to know the driver, who’ll take you to the galleries and restaurants of trendy Kemang and leafy Menteng. Study Bahasa in the morning, gallery-hop in the afternoon, then try the Hyatt gym or tennis. Have tea with the orangutans at Ragunan Zoo and if you’re lucky you’ll be invited to join the ancient German naturalist Ulrike von Mengden in the bungalow she’s shared with them since the ’70s. Sup at the sumptuous Lara Djonggrang and La Bihzad. Embrace Indonesia’s democratic renaissance simply by being there.

CRICKET IN CALCUTTA Visit Calcutta when a Test is on at Eden Gardens. Stay at the colonial-whiff Tollygunge Club, organise lunch at the Taj or Oberoi, and take it as a hamper. Buy two tickets each (Eden Gardens crams in 100,000) and smuggle in six litres of water. Just deal with it when baying Bengalis pelt bits of the stadium, food or water, or grab you for an impromptu Bollywood bhangra. It’s all part of the experience, like turning Calcutta Telegraphs into torches in tribute to flannelled heroes. Eden Gardens will be hot, uncomfortable and even a bit dangerous if India’s losing, but live it. The Ashes at Lord’s or Boxing Day at the G don’t hold a candle to it.