The dingiest place we ever stayed in

Remember the time your mother told you never to take anything from strangers and you thought she was probably being overly suspicious but you still agreed with the advise. Better safe then sorry, right? Probably no one ever offered anything to you. Maybe you did get offered a few things and nothing wrong happened. Was mother wrong then? No, never, mothers are never wrong and you are never grown up enough for her advise to not apply. We learnt it the hard way. Well, it could have been worse.

One evening, the first evening of our South East Asian odyssey, we had taken a bus to Penang from Kualalumpur and found our self in Butterworth from where we took a bus to Georgetown. As we were looking for hotels a tall, bald man approached me (Ishwinder) and said he could show us a room for 22 MYR. Now that is about INR 440!

“Great!” I thought. If you are in Malaysia, you should know that there is no such thing as budget! Most rooms were upwards of 40 MYR so we were happy that this guy who though a little dubious stopped us in the street and then walked a good kilometer with us to show us this guest house which at first we thought was his but later realized was owned by a Chinese man. It was at the edge of the Love Lane and was surrounded by multiple other more upscale guest houses. Although the whole place itself was falling apart, we decided to stay just for the spirit of budget travel and the smile of the man at the reception.

It must have been someone’s old bungalow built in a colonial times and obviously it received no attention in the modern day. Anyhow, we still decided to stay in this guest house which was dishearteningly run down guest had only a single shared bathroom but also had a large roofless porch with potted plants to hang around in the evening.

It was in this large roofless porch with potted plants that the tall, bald guy walked up to us again and introduced a friend of his who was traveling with him and was staying at the same guest house.

From there on wards, everything became fishy.

They claimed they had first met in Bali four years ago and now after four years were meeting each other for the second time in there life in Penang.

For people who have met only twice, they knew surprisingly a lot about each other.

Where were they from?

“I am from Paris and he is from Greece,” told us the friend of the tall, bald guy. While the tall,bald guy stayed silent most of the time.

“Well, but he said he is from Libya.” I pointed smilingly not to seem mistrustful. Honestly, I wasn’t.

“Oh yes, he is half Libyan” the friend responded.

“Oh, so what is Libya like?” I asked seemingly more curious about Libya than Greece.

“He doesn’t know, he has never been,” the friend said.

“I see. Where are you from Greece?” I asked the tall, bald guy.

“You wouldn’t know it is a small village.” The friend said.

“Well, I have been to Greece.” I said.

He looked at me awkwardly and stayed silent.

“But of course it is a huge country.” I said to make him feel better.

I had to keep the conversation going. So I went on and on about the places we could see in South East Asia. What to see in Malaysia and all that. And somewhere during the time we were offered chocolates. I didn’t want to refuse. So I told him I don’t eat chocolates but I will take one for Vikram who was again offered chocolates. Both of us took the chocolates and kept them. After the point, I refused chocolates both men got awkward made an excuse and left the porch but kept returning to keep a watch. I thought it was my incessant interrogation that irritated them.

The next morning we found them missing. I felt guilty probably I irked them enough to check out of the guest house and leave Penang altogether.

But we kept those chocolates. You see, budget travelers are grateful for everything. Two weeks later, Vikram had those chocolates after a 3 hour long hike in Cameroon Highlands. Within 15 minutes, he passed out in a restaurant and woke up after 3 days.