Kuching

Lo, Meghans friend met us at Kuching airport and lead us off to his car. I was walking when I heard a "Sumimasen" behind me, I turned around and got the biggest shock of my life. Behind me were Meghan and Christophe. They had decided that we couldn't go to Kuching without them and decided to surprise. I was totally surprised and I almost cried. So into the car all 5 of us got and Lo took us to dinner at an amazing seafood restaurant. He had dropped off a fish earlier and we sat down to a feast with lots of beer.And catching up with each other. I was totally amazed at how well they had kept the trip secret from Betsy and I.I was impressed.After dinner we went off to a corner cafe to meet some of Los photography club friends and more beer. Little did I know that beer would be a very large feature in my Kuching life.
June 20th,Lo picked us up around 10am and we went off to breakfast. The breakfast special in Kuching is Laksa, a kind of noodles in a spicy sauce. So, that's what I had for breakfast and it was good.Lo showed us around a little, we went to the cat museum. Kuching is Malay for cat, so there are all of these cat statues around the city and a museum. We also stopped off at the local mosque, which is a beautiful building in its own right.Then it was back to our guesthouse to get ready for the Hash run later that day. Lo came back and got us and off we went to the start location. When we got there, we signed in and started drinking isotonic drinks, so we wouldn't get dehydrated. A good thing really as we had had plenty of beer the night before and there was definitely some more in our future that night.
The Hash run is a run set up by Kuching expats in the early 60's and it now has about 150 members. There is a Sat run, a mens,womens and kids run. After the Sat run there is always an On On (party) where people have to do down downs (drink a beer in one). But first the run itself, you set off through the jungle, up and down hills and through streams. It can be wet,dirty and slippery. Luckily it hadn't rained the night before and I didn't get too dirty on my short run. Betsy, Meghan and Christophe opted for the medium run and so I was able to welcome them back to the start when they finished.
After the run, we got changed in a field, then it was off to a Chinese restaurant for dinner, drinking and of all things, kareoke.I thought I had left kareoke behind me, but no, so yes,I sang. A good night was had by all and Lo kindly deposited us back at our guesthouse to sleep off the effects. And this was only my 2nd night in Kuching.