My Inaugural Blog Entry

Phew... It's harder than I hv imagined to start off a blog. Finally after many hours of clicking here and there, I managed to do it. First of all I wanna welcome all of u to my blog. If you are reading this, it means you somehow already know that I am embarking on a 6 months backpacking trip across South East Asia countries namely, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar alone. YES! You heard it rite. ALONE.

Backpacking has always been my dream for quite sometime now and finally I have the chance of realizing this childhood dream of mine. As to why I am doing this alone, well just think of all those around you. Is it easy to find another person who is as crazy as me to do such a thing? Even if they are willing to do so, $$ and time might be a problem. Tht's why rather than spending time to look for a partner, I hv decided to do it alone. Furthermore backpacking alone is also much more fun according to many blogs I read.

Some ppl might think I am very rich to go on a trip like this. I dare not say I am rich but wht I do dare to say is that I hv managed to save up a little after working in SIngapore for nearly 2 years and I believe I am able to survive for the next few months without working to go backpack. I would also like to highlight to u that backpacking is unlike touring. I am also not a tourist but a traveller. Therefore staying in star rated hotels, buying souvenirs, and eating expensive good food is not in my to-do list.

When I decided to quit my job in May to go for this trip, it was very tough. Where will I go with a limited budget? I keep having offers from my friends and aunt to ask me to go US. Well naturally as Asians, when we decide to go sight seeing, we will choose Western countries to experience different things but after my recent trips to Thailand, Vietnam and China, I discovered the South East Asian option. During my trips, I noticed that even though we may share the same skin color but culturally, we are very different. My main objective of this trip is to experience life and I figured out that if my country and the countries surrounding it already has such diverse cultures, why am I not visiting these countries instead? That's why I chose SEA and it fits perfectly into my budget as well.

I will be traveling by foot, busses and trains starting from my homeland, Johor. I will then make my way up through the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia because this is the least travelled part of Malaysia for me. I will then meet my cousin in Pangkor and go up further into the northern states before going into South Thailand. I will be spending 3 weeks in Thailand then I shall go into Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and my last destination will be Myanmar. I will spend approximately 3 weeks in each countries. These are all just planning and I will go according to my mood. If I feel good in a certain place, I might stay longer, otherwise I will cut short my time there.

My last destination Myanmar is also quite controversial at the moment because of the recent cyclone Nargis. Tht's why if I am not able to go into Myanmar, I shall be going to Philippines. I hope to be back in Malaysia by the end of the year as I have 2 very important weddings to attend. But it's hard to predict wht might happen huh? I might be enjoying my trip so much that I decide not to come back or I might be back after a few weeks because I can't get used to the life of backpacking. Everything is possible.

During my trip, I have arrangements to meet up with different people as well. Now I have arrangement to meet up a friend in Bangkok and I will be meeting my cousin in Pangkor as mentioned earlier. Therefore, if any of you are planning to visit the countries I mentioned above this coming 6 months, do let me know okay? It would be great to meet up in other countries.

This blog serves as a very important medium of communication for me during my trip. It is a way of keeping my mum and dad informed of my whereabouts and also to let my family and friends know that I am still alive and kicking. If you are interested, feel free to bookmark my blog to read about my adventure and I promise to blog as frequent as I can as I won't be able to access the Internet very often. If you know about RSS you can RSS my blog to receive realtime updates of my entry at
feed://xentria-journey.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default?alt=rss
If you prefer to see more than reading, you can follow my journey through photos at
http://www.flickr.com/xentria
You can also subscribe to RSS on flickr as well.

That's all for now. One last thing. If you don't have anything to do? Please click on the google advertisement you see on my blog for me whenever u log in. The more u click the more money I earn. I need this money to fund my trip. HAHA. Thanks hor.

Ciao.