24 East

TALES FROM SOUTHEAST ASIA
carlo convertini
24 east: tales from southeast asia
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24
EAST
tales from southeast asia
written by
carlo convertini
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dedicated to mat and alice
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IN ORDER TO TRAVEL PAST THE

FOLLOWING PAGES I NEED YOU
TO IMAGINE NOT AN EPIC NOVEL
BUT A MUSIC ALBUM INSTEAD.
IN FACT, EACH ONE OF THE

STORIES YOURE ABOUT TO
MEET IS JUST LIKE A SONG WITH
ITS OWN RHYTHM AND
DURATION.
OFTEN THE SONGS OF AN

ALBUM ARE SELF-CONTAINED
AND MADE TO STAND ON THEIR
FEET. IN THE SAME WAY THE
STORIES IN THIS BOOK HAVE
BEEN WRITTEN WITH A
DIFFERENT MOOD, SCENARIO
AND INTENTION IN ORDER TO
WA L K B Y T H E M S E LV E S A N D
HOPEFULLY FIND A PLACE IN THE
READERS MIND.
ENJOY LISTENING.
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8
tracks
introduction 11
1. seven hours, fifteenth floor, six days 16

2. the first lecture 19
3. stomach diversity 23
4. consider the dog 27

5. work in progress 31
6. single season life 35

7. time to get bored 37
8. help me with this pork 41
9. a day in the life 45

10. Spirituality 51
11. Public consciousness 55

12. All weve left behind 59
13. i need a new girlfriend 63
14. spaghetti or noodles? 67

15. jazz red wine apple pie 69
16. fasting and early mornings 73

17. the first picture 77
18. taxi drivers - Act I 81
19. blindfolded 83
20. singapores voice 85
21. the luggage 89

22. that night in India 91
23. the distance 95
24. a dawn called Sibu 97
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25. the lonely traveler 101

26. outdoor bathroom 105
27. a choral goodbye 109

28. departures 113
29. walking Kolkata 115
30. youre a glass of water 121

31. 24 hrs as a buddhist monk 123
32. indispensable 129

33. indiana Jones my ass 133
34. taxi drivers - Act II 139
35. about the city 143

36. this is gonna hurt 147
37. curiosity 151

38. music scar 153
39. five men on a boat 157
40. taxi drivers - Act III 161

41. the woman who knew 165
42. conrads viscera 169

43. the stranger 173
44. footprint 177
45. to the next harbor 181
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INTRODUCTION
Its pitch dark and theres no one around but a

whispering voice:
"youre going nowhere...youre all the mistakes you

could have possibly done...you have to make a move!
Youre almost thirty and what have you managed to
achieve? Nothing much but pieces and leftovers".
Imagine youre driving when suddenly you find

yourself lost. Youve got no map and you cant call
anybody since your mobile isnt working. What do you
do? Wait for somebody to rescue you? Keep moving in
search for a sign? What if you end in a closed road?
You try to go back? Where exactly is back?
I had no answer to any of those questions, so I did

what I felt was the only thing worth doing: I turned
off the engine and walked away. In other words I got
out of my life, I made choices I never thought I could
make, swimming with doubts and solitude, pushed by
those pieces and leftovers and by a question that, at least
for myself, needed to be answered: is there another
way of living?
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Of all the questions Ive made to myself that one was

the most uncomfortable, maybe because was the right
one, it was like a wind blowing in a different direction
until you finally realize you need to let your boat
follow it.
All I had when I was about to leave my life behind at

the security gates was a 23 kilos luggage with a label
this is all youve got on it, clueless about what I was
doing or where exactly I was going. And in that
precise moment a thought grasped into my mind: the
fortune teller predicted it! Hence whatever happens
will be alright.
That thought is related to a story too long to fit this

introduction, but what matters is that a few months
before my departure a stranger you wouldnt give any
credit whatsoever to an anonymous bar in the eastern
side of that marvelous city called Istanbul predicted
what eventually happened to me - in November he
said, something will happen to change your life.
Well, he was right because that following November I
partly found an answer to the question.
Of course I dont believe in those kind of things. Of

course it was a coincidence. However that day at the
airport with a one-way ticket Rome-Kuala Lumpur,
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that thought gave me the strength to walk away from

my past and everyone I loved and make a step towards
something that by all means was unpredictable.
This book is all about what followed that step.
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14
1
seven hours,
sixteenth
floor,
sixth day
Its 10am in Kuala Lumpur and 3am back in

Italy, and those seven hours still matter to me - its like
living in two places simultaneously, with my body that
keeps following the Italian rhythms and my head
trying to focus on the present, hanging from the few
references I managed to put together until now.
You need to start somewhere, so I begin from the

fifteenth floor of the Darby Park Hotel on a Saturday, a
Saturday that doesnt stop the jackhammers. The area
around the hotel in fact is a collection of construction
sites not too far from the Malaysian twin towers, huge
steel and concrete towers, symbolic of a country that
since the mid Eighties has seen a rapid development
and in order to compete with the other Southeast
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Asian tigers rightly thought about building a 451

meters tall icon.
Six days have passed since I arrived and I can still feel
some confusion, maybe because I had no time to look
at the surroundings. Ive been focusing on two things
only: job and house-hunting. Well, mostly the first one
since its a brand new job and theres a lot to do - I
guess its a good strategy if I dont want to get fired.
Among other weird questions, many of the people Ive

met act quite surprised to see me: how did you end
up in this urban-jungle?. Well, theres always an easy
answer but it doesnt say much - who knows how did I
end up here after all, what routes, choices and
deviations took me by the hand in a day like this?
Whatever the answer I know that I was ready, ready to
say yes to a challenge like this.
Back to the present. For the records I had a thermic

shock due to the average temperature which is above
30C, and to the fact Im coming straight from the
european Winter. It feels like Im walking through
something solid, this humidity stands on your
shoulders fighting back each move, and the weather
isnt something you can ignore...like I proved a few
days ago when I had the splendid idea to walk back to
the campus where I work regardless of the massive
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tropical storm that was about to happen. I did indeed

buy an umbrella but when I reached the college they
asked: did you just get a shower?.
Its all about Malaysias location, so close to the

Equator, in the middle of the Chinese Southern Sea
and divided in two - the Peninsula and Borneo -
protected and surrounded by Singapore, Thailand, the
Philippines and Indonesia, with a tropical climate that
you can describe as follows: humid and provided with
a long endless monotone season above thirty,
interrupted by thunderstorms that usually begin at
around 6pm (which is the moment I finish working
and I have to go back home).
Ladies and gentlemen the adventure has begun, now

its all about collecting information, meeting people,
learn by doing and re-invent myself or, in few words,
build the foundations.
I spent the last few years getting rid of things inside

and outside, consequently when I had to pack my
things I didnt really had much. The airline stated my
life weights 23 kilos compressed in a luggage you can
hug - hence I like to say my life is all you can hug.
Now its time to prove, first of all to myself, that there
are other worlds out there, that the only way to evolve
is not to take yourself for granted. In doing so Ill try
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to find the right words to describe this journey in its

raw beauty.
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2
the first
lecture
My very first lecture took place in the BB3

classroom, a not so good looking 4x10 meters, but that
didnt surprise me considering the conditions of the
rest of the college, built out of an existing townhouse,
with couple of blocks added around it.
The classroom name hence was BB3, on the ground

floor I arrived straight from whatever happened to be
before, perfectly on time. Nine oclock in the morning,
I turn on the neon lights, the air-conditioning, the
projector. I connected the VGA cable to my laptop
and since I had no handbook all I could do was to
wait for students to show up - whoever they were.
The subject was, I have to admit it, quite boring -

something like Building Technology and Construction -
a gigantic collection of notions about how a building
works, from the foundations to the roof. It goes
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without saying that to keep the morale high you have

to teach in a clever way, I mean, to talk about floor
sections, formulas and plaster walls means to lose half
of the class in the first ten minutes and the rest of it
within an hour.
Generally speaking the very first class of any module is

about getting them to understand what is all about, an
introduction, but of course I had to explain myself too.
I stared at them and thought what a soup. There was

a French boy, a Turkish girl, a group of five Chinese-
Malaysian, one Indian-Malaysian, one Indonesian and
one Iranian boy. I wanted to make them talk hence I
asked about the best restaurant in the neighborhood
and where I could find a backpack for my travels -
classic questions. Obviously I also asked about their
personal details, trying to repeat their names and
eventually declaring: Ill never be able to memorize
them (which was a lie).
The first lecture was not a full one - I had to teach for
four hours and I couldnt get through the second - but
Ive been honest. Standing in front of them I said:
This subject potentially is quite boring but youll have
fun with me. I thought that was a good line to begin
with.
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That same afternoon I had to teach again hence there

was no time to realize what was going on, I figured
that was all natural for me - the me-teacher, the
projector, the me-talking-for-hours-in-a-foreign-
language. Naturally weird.
When the class was over I repeated there was no room

for lateness and I have to say nobody made me silly
questions - questions like these that eventually came
into the picture:
A) how old are you?

B) are you married?
C) are you on Facebook?
D) can you teach us Italian words?
PS. When questioned how they should call me I

couldnt come up with anything better than Mr.Carlo.
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3
stomach
diversity
More than the color of your skin, more than

religion and language; is the stomach who really
makes a difference.
In a city that by definition is a melting pot of many

cultures quite soon I had to deal with its cuisine-side-
effects, which translates in a wide diversity of food
from all over the world - from Iran to Japan, Australia
to Peru - each corner of the city presents a colored
variety of smells and tastes. There are plenty of layers
of choice: if before it was like choosing in between
different version of the same car, now the choice has
to be made in between different brands, each with
several unknown models. Every single day I have to
face this diversity and in order to survive I had to
embrace a simple formula that I use when I have to
order food: whatever is not spicy-oily-fried-jelly is
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fine with me. And here the stomach, way more than
the brain, comes into the picture.
My theory, so to speak, is that we all grow up

educating ourselves by eating, an education which is
quite difficult to eradicate or ignore since every
stomach has its own limits, designed one meal at a
time. God knows if Ive met people who can eat stones
for breakfast and souffl of glass for lunch without the
need of a digester, but if you have a weak stomach like
myself you really have to be careful with your attitude,
and the fact Im Italian amplifies the whole subject
enormously.
I was having lunch the other day with a few friends -

an Indian, a Vietnamese, a guy from New Zealand
and an American - and while we were having a lovely
conversation, united around the same table, there was
something inside of us that made us deeply different.
My Indian friend, for instance, declared he rarely had
a not-spicy meal, the American said he missed having
milk with all meals, the Vietnamese said from time to
time he used to have a bit of dog meat, while the guy
from New Zealand could have eaten cat food with no
problem. Above the table-level we were talking the
same language, you know, we could easily
communicate and understand each other, but below
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that level there was such a great diversity to make us

equally bizarre and incomprehensible.
I came to the conclusion that if there was a Stomach

World Championship, the Italian one might be one of
the most delicate and wouldnt get through the first
turn. You see, the Italian cuisine is like a language
everyone can easily speak and understand: you need no
translation or interpretation.
Once somebody asked me how would I define the

Italian food and I thought for a moment and then
replied: you can easily recognize an Italian dish
because what you see in your plate is exactly what will
end up in your stomach, nothing weird will happen in
the transaction.
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4
consider
the dog
A house. A place to go back when the night is
closing on you and all youve got is nothing more left
but air filled with water. A remote place that little by
little gets closer, a place that before becoming a
physical place is a corner in your mind, a vision, a
picture wrongly taken.
It took me loads of time, kilometers Id say, wasted

hours, discussions and bitterness along the gums.
House hunting is always a tiring lottery where your
expectations weight like dust: every new door opens
destroy ing what you pictured reading the
advertisement. Gigantic rooms become burials,
mezzanines turn into two pieces of wood hanging
from the wall and balcony turns into a birdcage.
Sixth, twentieth, fortieth floors that when you get

there and look down you see the city spread, crawling,
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fading at the horizon and ask: how would it be to live

in this house?
You find yourself discussing with arrogant Chinese

men about a dive surprisingly inhabited, pushed like
sardine in elevators going up and down, in rooms
where even the light seems too scared to get in.
In time Ive learned to care about the place I live in

and not to underestimate the few hours you spend in
the pits, a fortress where you can close your eyes or cry,
conscious those walls will let everything pass.
Getting in and out of wrong houses I managed to find

it, a spacious two level apartment with a nice kitchen,
garden, swimming pool - that in a tropical climate is a
basic amenity - and an husky (female) owned by my
roommates, a New Zealand-Indonesian couple that all
of a sudden crossed my life with an hairy endowment.
Instead of being surrounded by skyscrapers the

building has palm and banana trees that make the
mornings quite glorious, giving you the impression the
roaring city is far far away.
I cant remember how many houses I had to move in

and out during the last ten years and Im clueless
about the future, but I know that each one of them
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had a face, a smell and a precise cost - houses made of

people too, people Ive shared everything or nothing,
but always shared.
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30
5
work in
progress
Here it comes, one of those famous Monday

mornings youd like to avoid - and you know what Im
talking about. Monday mornings designed to upset
you, with no way out or warning, and when they get
you theres only one thing you can do: a freezing
shower, a double espresso and pretend youre still
living in the weekend.
Sitting at my desk surrounded by tonnes of paper,

scale models from my students, a yellow mug of
instant coffee and a little glass dog*, a gift from a
Chinese colleague, I begin a new working week like
anybody else.
Eight weeks have passed since I entered the world of

education and without noticing crossed that thin line
that separates students from teachers. But I honestly
feel more like Im in between those roles.
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The headquarters of the college I work for are in

Singapore and in the last twenty years theyve put
together a wide network of colleges all over Asia, with
lecturers and students from all over the world, glued
together thanks to the English language.
You open the door to half of the world, with

colleagues from Poland, Sweden, Lithuania, China,
Philippines, Japan, Scotland, South Korea, etc. etc. and
students from Turkey, Iran, Sudan, Kazakhstan, India,
Maldives, Indonesia etc. etc.
And what did I learn from this until now? Perhaps

teaching is like doing a little daily show in a theater
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for a small group of demanding people, youre like

some sort of actor, but the public here is way more
important than you are: questions, takes notes, records.
You need to keep it interested and interact, listen,
cuddle and instruct it. You cant just jump on stage and
play the best way you can, you really need to pass
something on the other side - actually thats the thing
that matters the most.
One day I came back from a class and found on my

desk a little box containing business card with my
name on it, and below my name I saw this: Interior
Design Lecturer. God, that left me puzzled: this is the
first time ever someone designed a business cards for
me and thats a weird feeling, something doesnt
belong to me. Im pretty sure Id feel way more at ease
if below my name that would have written: Work in
progress, as usual.
* the Chinese calendar links to each year a different animal

and, as for me, Ive born during the dogs year which, of
course, generates all sorts of peculiarities and
characteristics, exactly like it happens with the zodiac.
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6
single
season life
One season, luckily the hottest one. Twelve

months of sun per year erases the ups and downs, the
pauses and the line separating the inside from the
outside. Living in a place with only one season gives
you more space since interior and exterior are the
same thing. Summertime, moreover, brings you close
to your own skin, makes you feel free to move for
miles without worrying about the weather, weightless.
Malaysia is filled with water and luxuriant compelling

nature but despite that the thought of having one
endless season might be monotone. Winter invites you
to protect yourself, to change your habits because all
over you things are transforming and evolving but
here, a tree will always wear the same clothes and will
never feel cold. So how can the weather affect my
habits? How will my body react? Perhaps Ill have less
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things to worry about: whatever I want to do I can

take for granted thirty degrees.
Traveling then tastes completely different too: I am

my own luggage and the necessity of a shelter isnt
really that important anymore. The borders are humid,
easy to cross and get lost in a confusing and ever
present green.
Besides the absence of a natural rhythm theres

another side effect. This is de facto an air-conditioned
life: whether you are in a taxi, metro, office, theres
always an annoying freezing wind with you, creating a
micro-climate, a portable season that you deal with
whenever youre not outdoors.
In a single season life you need no tie and most of the

time you walk barefoot and even when the sun seems
to be that real you can touch it you have to expect a
massive storm, a tropical one.
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7
time to
get bored
When Im done with a class, if I take a moment
to myself and stop thinking Im living in Southeast
Asia, in the middle of the jungle for an international
college based in Singapore, doing a self-taught job in a
foreign language, all I see in front of me is a bunch of
kids spending their lives in between the last Iphone
app, a comment or a picture on Facebook and, with
the time left from the first two activities, watch TV. It
is indeed a painful scenario and I ask myself how am I
supposed to inspire their minds when all the time
theyve got to think is blown away from what Ive
called the Facebook attitude.
Provokingly I use this expression to define the

incapacity of developing a personal opinion, reducing
our thought to an I like it / I dont like it. All of my
students are aware of my pretty low opinion about
Facebook, that I dont watch TV and that I do not
own an Iphone - you should see their faces when I tell
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them things like that, once one of them asked: What

do you do then?.
One day I decided to tell them why Ive been more

lucky than them and what my luck is about - I grew
up in a world where you can get bored.
I told them what does it means to grow up without

Facebook and cellphones, in a moment where PCs
were a rare luxury and video-games were on a cassette
tape and it took you ages to load the game and start
playing. During my time (this made me feel old)
answers were to be found asking people around you or
consulting books made of paper, not in Googles white
page. During my time you spent loads of time outside,
in the streets, living in the real world and not through
an electronic surrogate. During my times you got
bored and the more you got bored the more you found
yourself dealing with your - quite often useless -
thoughts, but you had the chance to think with your
own head calmly at a human-pace.
I got carried away by the subject and while all of my

students were staring at me like I was some sort of
creature from another world (which in part was true),
I shouted at them youve got no space to think! Cant
you see that all of these things are made to steal your
time for thinking? Youre constantly distracted by
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something, you cant focus, everythings entertainment

from dawn to sleep!.
The classroom, for once, was filled with silence and

before leaving I lowered my voice and asked them to
do myself and themselves a big favor: close the
Facebooks app, turn off the TV and literally hide the
phone somewhere and for one or even two hours do
whatever is left or even do NOTHING. Get bored,
give yourself a moment of peace, look around you,
look at the world and the people you live with using
your own eyes and not through a God damn display.
I do know this is a lost cause - but since repetita iuvant

maybe realise one day one of them will listen to me,
recognize my voice and read a book, or go watch an
exhibition, or pay for a movie that wasnt written for a
sponge.
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40
8
help me
with this pork
Im trying to put together a list of adjectives to
define the environment I live in and all it comes to my
mind are words like: mix, soup, crossings, overlapping,
puzzle. Perspectives, cultures and languages overlap
day by day forming the urban textile I have to move
in.
This young country was officially born in the 1963

based on the agreements between the three main races
already living on this territory - Malaysian, Chinese-
Malaysian, Indian-Malaysian - with quite a lot of
contradictions that on one hand constitute a great
diversity and on the other hand generate contrasts
since every race has an heritage that from time to time
might cause misunderstandings.
I live in this soup and thats fine with me because,

regardless of the culture were talking about, diversity
is, today more than ever, one of the most important
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values we all have and, no matter what it takes we

have to protect it, even when Ive been treated as a
walking note or like a silly tourist who gets lost,
incapable of pronouncing the streets names.
My perception of the world around me, the soup I live

in, is quickly evolving and defining itself while the
time goes by. You start off with little details like
explaining to the taxi drivers the route to reach your
place turn left and then keep going straight until you
get to the Embassy of Chile where youll see a white
wall, but mind thats a closed road hence you have to
turn and go back where you came from. It doesnt
really matter that those streets are the only one I truly
know within the whole city because this is the mental
process I have to go through in order to familiarize
with the environment.
When I used to live in Milan I learned that you could

try to fight with a city, you can try to avoid things you
dont like about it, you can try to picture it differently,
but in the long run that will be quite useless: the
sooner you learn to understand and accept it the better
you will live it. And like any other city Kuala Lumpur
has its own rules: how to get a taxi, or how to cross the
road, the places you can or cannot eat, the pace of the
city, how to interpret someone you ask directions as a
start. Then you need to add to that a series of tiles
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related to the local cultures and religions - things you

shouldnt do or say etc. etc.
For instance I went to the grocery store the other day

- an activity I notoriously dislike - and the cashier, a
Malaysian woman hence Muslim, ask me a favor. She
asked if I could help her to scan the barcodes of the
pork I just bought since she couldnt even touch the
packaging.
What fascinates me the most about this city is mostly

all of these layers of culture, a strong smell, a
continuous exchange of small and big rites and
traditions, perhaps bizarre, but always unique and
respectable. I couldnt care less about judging those
traditions, on the contrary, I want to observe and learn
from it to enrich myself as a human being.
By the way it would have been too simple to present

myself with my Italian-European-burden and act like
whatever is around me is weird and a medley of beliefs
I dislike - but it would have been like Im using my
own culture as a shield I can hide behind, when it
should be an exchanging value, an harbor to unknown
worlds. There are no cultures that are better than
others, or right or wrong religions, and there is not a
superior race...if we start playing this game we end up
killing each other. Whenever you find yourself in front
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of a culture that is not yours you have to deal with

differences, at that point you as an individual human
being have to make a choice if what matters the most
is what divides us or unites us.
I smiled at the cashier and tried several times to make

the scanner work and finally be able to purchase my
beloved pork, but it didnt occurr to me to think that
situation was weird or unusual, I just thought Im not
good as a cashier.
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9
a day
in the life
The very first sound is the alarm ringing. 6.53 in
the morning. Hiding in between the bedsheets wont
help. I have to force myself to do the first step out of
the bed. Half naked I walk towards the bathroom. I
take a piss staring out the window to check the
weather. I see no sun.
Wash your face several times.
Post-it on the mirror saying Think therefore I am. I

cannot think about anything. Shower. What day am I
in? Go downstairs in the kitchen. There you are
Bialetti! Second sound of the day: singing mocha. A
full mug of Balinese coffee, orange juice, cereals.
Clothes selection. Ive got class the whole day. Sober
shirt, trousers, sneakers. Put together the handbag.
Wheres the charger? Wear the shoes, it is time to
leave. First good morning of the day to the security
guard. Youre in the streets now. My eyes are still
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halfway opened. I cant think of anything. First

attempt: failure. Second: failure. Third: a taxi slows
down and stops.
Selamat pagi, Jalan Damai, Repples College, Ill show

you the route.
Take a seat. Turn left. Air conditioned equals to

closed windows, I cant stand the music on the radio as
usual. Directions to the taxi driver keep right, turn
here, HERE, now keep straight. Pay the driver and
get out quickly. Third good morning of the day to the
college security guard. Clock-in. A series of good
mornings to various colleagues and students I meet on
the way to my desk with a forced smile on my face.
Do I have time for another coffee? Turn on the PC.
Check official mail. Talk to few colleagues about the
weather.
Coffee begins to do its job.
I can put together a couple of reasonable thoughts.

Collect cables and handbag, move to the next block.
Turn on the lights and air conditioning in the
classroom. A series of good mornings to the students
that are miraculously already sit in. Turn on the
projector, the laptop and clean the white board. Check
personal mail. Open daily files and wait for everybody
46
to be in the class. Scold the late ones and record whos

in or out. Lets start. Many thoughts drain from my
mind, focus on the lecture. The projector helps. Talk
for three hours, keep the attention levels high, ask
questions, make them laugh, tell them stories, jokes,
more jokes! Walk in between them, make them feel
the pressure. Keep talking, explain, make questions.
Breathe now.
I have a feeling Im talking too much, I cant stand

myself talking. Take a break.
Eyes fully opened now. Check the mail again, reply.

Run to the bathroom, take a piss, wash your face,
ignore the mirror. Dry go back to the classroom,
where are the students? Scold them again. Finish the
lecture. Explain the assignments and wait for a variety
of silly questions. Alright its time to go back to my
desk. Check the official mail. Im hungry. Whos in for
lunch? A call makes me waste ten minutes. So? Whos
in? Two colleagues reply. Walk of five minutes towards
the nearest hotel. What do you want to eat? Chinese?
Thai? Malay? Subway? Mcd? Vietnamese? Vegetarian?
Indian? Italian? The same as usual?
Rice with veggies I know nothing about with some

chicken.
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Pay at the counter. Sit down with your colleagues and

eat whilst having small chats. You have to go to
another class in the afternoon. Back to the college. Its
hot, do not sweat! Move to another block, get into the
classroom. Theres a student nearly sleeping on the
bench. WHAT-THE-HELL-ARE-YOU-DOING??
Wait for the rest of the class. Its a practical class. Give
them instructions. Keep them busy with all sorts of
exercises. Make questions and jokes. Breathe now.
Give yourself a break.
Run to the bathroom, take a piss and wash your face. I

can see myself in the mirror now.
Back to the classroom. Make them laugh. Keep them

busy and call them nicknames. Assignments
explanation. The afternoon is almost gone when youre
done. Back to your desk sit down, relax. Reply to
emails-skype-sms-ringing phone.
Earplugs in your ears = do not break my balls!
What time is it? What do I have to do tonight? I

check the calendar. No plans so far. Its 6,15pm lets go
home. A series of byes and have a nice evening on the
way out. Clock-out. Walk to the supermarket. Buy
food for the fridge. Walk back home with the
48
groceries listening to an audiobook. When was the last

time I did my groceries?
Lucid thought: I hate doing my groceries.
Ive got my head filled with words. The security guard

opens the gates for me. Fill the fridge, get naked and
ready for the swimming pool. Swim, exercise. Back to
your room take a shower. Wear the worst t-shirt you
have, flip-flops and shorts. Back to the kitchen. Do
not be lazy now and cook something tasty. Sliced meat
with arugola and fresh tomatoes (parmesan is a
luxury). Eat.
Lucid thought: a lonely meal might be depressing.
Back to my room. Turn on the air conditioning, check

the emails and the phone wherever it is. Choose a
good good movie. How do I feel? I fall asleep halfway
though, the alarm is set. Theres a new message but its
too late. I turn off the phone. This day is over.
49
50
10
spirituality
Contrasts. Italy is a Monotheist country, at least

on paper, meaning that majority of people take
religion for granted and the way I see it this might
result into an absence of religion, because it is
something that is supposed to be there by default but
nobody really cares to check. Here on the contrary,
religion is perceived in a different way, is one of the
main clusters that defines a culture, has its own weight
in the everyday life because its a Polytheist country
and we might not only have a different stomach but
also a different God to talk to.
Religion is somehow a way to put a label on people, so

Id rather focus on something else, regardless of our
beliefs, features or gods. What Im looking for is a
common ground and it appears to me that we all share
something called spirituality. Spirituality is something
we can relate to, its personal and universal no matter
what culture, external manifestations or words we
belong to.
51
So the question to me is: how we define this thing

called spirituality? Have I ever asked myself that?
Maybe it shouldnt be something related to the
everyday routine, the visible you, the one we show to
the world at any given moment. It should be
something inside of us, or at least somewhere difficult
to get to, a silent place lets say, where you can get only
if youve left the scattered glasses of your life behind, a
solitary place, down there at the end of the road.
It should be a place that in a way is a walk done

barefoot to free your mind and light your heart and its
own messiness. I dont really know if I ever walked
that road, leaving the materiality of the self, those so
called problems, misunderstandings, obstacles, lost
words and hours, days gone without meditating on
who we are or what matters to us. Maybe spirituality
shouldnt be like most of the things and relationships
we end up with: a give/take game. Maybe its just a
walk we need to do towards ourselves, its the hope for
a silence or something that this multitasked,
complicated world simply cannot handle.
It feels like spirituality should translate into

something authentic, sharp, visible only under certain
circumstances and only with your own eyes, even if
theyre closed. If something is authentic then it is also
52
spiritual, it might be recognizable in a person, a story,

even a physical place that belongs to us undoubtedly.
It is a matter of recognizing the authenticity of

something, an assonance in between our inner music
and something out there. So precious and rare, if we
are ever so lucky to recognize it, we should
immediately walk towards that authenticity and
embrace it, hide it and protect it from the dust.
Where is that authenticity? Isnt that true it could be

in nearly anything and anywhere? In the sincere
beauty of nature? And what about countless people?
People maybe difficult to recognize at first sight,
somebody who has no need to wear a mask or talk
bollocks all the time.
In the end spirituality and authenticity are synonyms

and you cant really explain it, institutionalize it or sell
it to anybody. They were born in an inner place -
maybe all of us carry a bit of it our whole life but not
everybody can recognize that, others are aware of it
and decide to ignore it, but it wont be a priest or a
clever story in a book to make me find it because its a
personal walk. Who knows maybe through silence,
experience or waiting we can get there. Or maybe it is
so intimate that you cannot share it but only protect it.
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54
11
public
consciousness
A consideration came to me this morning while

I was staring out the window in the taxi on my way to
the work: if public transportation is the consciousness
of a city Kuala Lumpur would need an analyst for sure
- and it is not the only city. So, lets talk about this
consciousness, lets analyze more or less the present
status of this city in Southeast Asia.
Bus: I never took one, by principle. A Malaysian bus

pops out of the traffic as one of the most polluting
objects Ive ever seen, one step away from dismantling,
they move anticipated by an incredibly loud sound and
a black smoke behind, this is it: the future! Generally
speaking a bus stops where a group of people are
standing and someone, lets call him the howler, gets
off screaming to everybody like fishermen in a market.
Ive seen buses refueling in a gas station with the
passengers on board, Ive seen them blocking the
55
traffic because they were in a tiny road where theyre

not supposed to go.
Bicycle: its a valid option if you bear in mind there are

no lanes for bicycles and roads are a thin asphalt layer
on a living swamp. Without mentioning the ferocious
traffic you have to deal with at any given moment.
Anyways its a good option if you know the secondary
roads and youre prone to embrace a two-states-life:
grubby sweating or soaked.
Motorcycle: most of the things said for the bicycle can

be applied here - the ratio cars/motorbikes is 60/40%.
56
Theyre a good way to move around, well...you know

you have to deal with 140 km/h freeways and tropical
thunderstorms.
Cars: in terms of traffic Kuala Lumpur is slightly

better than other Asian capitals (see Bangkok or
Tokyo) but its a good good competitor due to the
high urbanization and the very bad signage, without
mentioning the road network which have been
constructed randomly. To drive in a city seldom means
to have a relationship with a piece of steel that, even
when incredibly sexy and pricy, is a four wheels cage.
Your legs: why not? Its always an option, I mean, I

walk as much as I can but, even in this case, I have to
explain. Crossing roads is always a game in between
you and the motor-bikers and the sidewalks that at
times are swallowed by the vegetation or the concrete
- in other words you need to improvise. Now, you
might want to pay attention to the wires that hold the
light posts, the draining system along the road, the
open air holes in the sidewalks and the roots of the
trees eradicating tiles and stones like butter - then you
have the countless construction sites and other small
little obstacles ready to get you and make the walking
an exciting adventure. I wouldnt suggest to run on
these sidewalks.
57
Trains: trains work, really, they are the most reassuring

transportation you can rely on. Rates are good and you
have four lines moving up and down, in and out of the
central nucleus. Theres also a futuristic monorail that
reminds me of a nouvelle vague movie. So lets say
trust trains! But not too much though: every line of
train is managed by a different company hence if you
need to change route in a specific station you need to
get out the company A and in the company B, which
is paradoxic: a disconnected public transportation that
should keep the city connected.
Taxi: I should write a surviving book about them,

theyre such an inspiration. Generally speaking taxi
drivers have no clue about the roads and since they
cant afford a navigator they tend to get lost quite a lot.
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12
all the things
weve left
behind
With black & white settings on my camera I'm

walking in a flea market inside one of the countless
and depressing malls of Kuala Lumpur. I'd like to
think that, randomly and superficially, it's here that all
the things we've left behind gather at some point: a
saxophone makes the best of itself next to a fire
extinguisher and a Chinese abacus seats next to stack
of faded postcards. You name it, its here.
Objects don't vanish when we decide to get rid of

them, somehow we all work together to build a
parallel world made of unwanted, obsolete, consumed
things that still have their own lives after us, passing
from hand to hand, trying to come back in the game.
In a display window, right next to an amplifier whos

definitely older than I am, Ive found an Olivetti
59
Lettera 32 in pretty good conditions and I have to

force myself not to buy any typewriter or musical
instruments I don't know how to play and focus on
the shooting. I love shooting old stuff, mute objects
carrying the signs of a distant era, find them lost,
abandoned, lonely and silent, with some sort of aura
around them of a glorious time. Objects like those still
have something to say.
I wonder how the flea market of the future will be -

provided they will still be here - crowded with an
infinite jumble of electronic toys, no old books or
analog watches, hundreds of microchip surrogates
without a meaning, objects designed to be thrown
away and already covered with dust.
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Lost in my thoughts I pause in front of couple of

rotary-dial phones and I reckon a fascinating story:
the first rotary-dial phone was designed by Henry
Dreyfuss for Western Electric in the mid Forties, it
was called the Model 500. Five years (!!!) passed before
the phone saw its first update: five additional colors.
If I compare it with the times I live in I'm sure at that

time people knew what a phone, or a fridge, or a car
was: they had the time to use and enjoy it, objects were
the result of a real need. We waste days or weeks in
order to make the best choice possible and end up buying
things we will use for such a short time before a new
need to buy something will whisper in our ears. How
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many of the things I owe now would be good enough

to be shown in a flea market? Or to tell a story?
I went back home with my collection of black and

white pictures and I had an idea for one of the classes
I'm teaching in which the final project consists of
designing a chair: the first lecture will be at the flea
market. I want them to see all of these things together
and feel the weight of it, the weight of the objects - I
want them to understand how real are the choices we
make and how important is to share a story through
an object.
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13
i need a new
girlfriend
R8 was her name, we met in a shop in the city

center of Hiroshima, she had black skin, lovely
proportions and despite early misunderstandings due
to our languages I managed to have her.
This happened more than three years ago and weve

been together ever since, shes been away only for few
months due to a lenses disease (or I should say eyes
disease), forced to travel throughout Europe in search
for a cure. I have to say when she came back she wasnt
the same anymore, but she was always trying her
best, stoically resisting to our tempestuous
relationship, always frontline, always on the road. Shes
been my lover for three years, my memories, my gaze
on the world.
Weve gone through the toughest times, some drama

here and there, and more than once Ive thought
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alright, Ive lost her, but shes Japanese, shes

relentless, even more than my craziness. It was after
the latest trip that I decided we were on a dead-end.
Its me who has changed? Or its just the way its
supposed to be? You know, it isnt that simple to make
a decision like this, you can get attached to a piece of
metal with a display where many kilometers are
involved...thousands, literally thousands of shots filled
with reality, moments of my life that simply wont
come back if it wasnt for those pictures.
Question is: how can you choose someone else? Im

wasting hours searching, collecting information in a
jungle filled with beautiful girls with short and exotic
names and sparkling bodies - all I need is one good
girl. How can you choose your next girlfriend? A
stable relationship free from skirmishes. Of course
there will be misunderstandings in the beginning, I
have to start learning a new language from scratch,
exploring limits and potentials, but I only have one
chance to make it right.
Its not about money, its about specific needs, a list of

features you want in your next girlfriend, say a
viewfinder, manual focus, touchscreen, interchangeable
lenses - and Im just realizing I can make up this list
because of what Ive learned thanks to my R8. Maybe
whatIm saying is that you can learn way more from
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imperfections than qualities, you can learn what you

DONT want. Alright, Im making a mess here,
mixing girls and cameras. Id rather stop here or Ill
ask the next girl I meet Hi, may I ask you something?
Do you have a manual focus? Can I try it?.
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66
14
spaghetti vs
noodles
During a freehand drawing class I was telling

my students stories from my university years and how
I had to find tricks to save money and still make the
scale models for the projects I was working on. Once,
I said, Ive used spaghetti to emulate the handrails of a
staircase and it worked pretty well. Out of the blue,
one of the students made a question I had no
explanations for:
What came first, noodles or spaghetti?
The majority of my students were Asian, hence they

began whispering Noodles...noodles...noodles..., so I
got curious and paused the class to solve the problem
and search for the origins of one of the most popular
food in the world. It didnt take me too long to find an
answer - spaghetti loses miserably.
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In October 12th, 2005, the National Geographic

reports finding in China of the oldest noodle in the
world, back to 4000 years ago. To make things worse
came the rather suspect introduction in Italy of
spaghetti at the end of the XIII Century by the
Venetian explorer Marco Polo who just came back
from his last expedition in the Far East. At this point
it doesnt really make a difference to know that in the
arab Sicily of the XII Century, after a long analysis of
the land by Abu Abdullah Mohammed al Edrisi - Idrisi
for the friends - he reports the finding in the small
town of Trabia of a dough turned into long strings.
Well, long story short, I had to officially admit noodles

won with great joy of all of my students, but then a
national pride kicked in and I had to highlight the
magnificent things we-Italians did with that string: we
gave it all sorts of forms, we gave it all sorts of fellows
like tomatoes or pesto, we made it a movie star too! I
think about Alberto Sordi or Tot while they duet
with the pasta and I wonder with a spark of
melancholy wheres that joy for life, that sense of
reality today.
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15
jazz red wine
apple pie
When it comes down to live music Malaysia

isnt exactly the best place to be since the majority of
artists prefer to play in Singapore which has a solid
cultural scene and a public ready to invest more
money.
Hence after few months of investigation and

frustration I realized that the only way to satisfy my
thirst for live music was to embrace jazz and, luckily,
ten minutes away from my house theres a jazz club, a
proper one. The feeling you have from the outside is of
a first-class restaurant, the interiors are nice indeed
but to be really picky food isnt great and the tiramisu
tastes like...something else. Beside that they have a
wooden oven, a winery room and a decent stage with a
black curtain embracing the whole space. Since I
found it I go there a couple of times per month
69
because you need to understand music and the only

way to do so is to get close to the instruments.
To be honest Ive never been a jazz enthusiast and I

never had the patience to learn how to play an
instrument neither, but in time I developed my own
vision of what jazz means to me: jazz is only live and
its a matter of form.
As a designer I do care about form and musical

instruments, specifically the classical ones, as they have
the most sensual and balanced form I can imagine, Id
say musical instruments are the human answer to
natural forms. Say theres a contest in between nature
and men: nature might come up with a magnolia,
humans, well, a saxophone. I could spend hours
staring and listening to a double bass because it
reminds me of a man slowly dancing with a beautiful
woman surrounded by soft lights and air filled with
melancholy.
Sitting few steps away from a piano with a glass of red

wine and some apple pie everything suddenly seems to
make sense and performs as black and white keys, a
black and white that played in the right way can
generate an infinite variety of colors.
70
Most of the times jazz is purely instrumental and that

is the best part of it because it leaves you a bit of space,
its like an invitation to join in the harmony and music
and it feels so real and unfiltered that it speaks directly
to your heart.
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72
16
fasting and
early mornings
Each religion has its own rites, moments where

a worshipper has to deal with the very nature of its
own faith. For Muslims this moment happens during
the ninth month of the Islamic calendar that generally
is around the month of August, the Ramadan month.
I may need to remind you Muslims follow the lunar
calendar and not the solar one (which is 11-12 days
shorter), and that the fasting month of the Ramadan
lasts for 29-30 days. Malaysia, in its multicultural
environment has a Muslim majority hence I couldnt
miss the chance to observe and ask my Muslim
friends what is this period about.
A Muslim worshipper has to fast from dawn to

sunrise in atonement and follow the five daily prayers,
so to wake before dawn and only after the last daily
preyer is it allowed to eat and break the fast - that
happens at around 7.30pm.
73
The city itself seems to act differently, it isnt that

difficult to stumble upon bizarre scenes like people
sitting at a restaurants table with the food in front of
them in waiting for the 7.30pm. Fasting is just one of
the things a Muslim has to go endure, it is also
forbidden to drink alcohol, to smoke and have sexual
activities - the only Muslim allowed to break the rules
are pregnant women or in case youre ill.
An entire month that ends with the appearance of the

new moon which marks the beginning of a great
festival called Hari Raya - around the 30th or 31st of
August - when all Muslims gather at the mosque to
prayer and with relatives at home. With the new
moon in the sky and one long month of fasting theyre
rather entitled to go back to their regular lives.
Speaking of fasting I found an interesting thought

about it in a book that Id like to share:
Fasting is healing, she said, but it is necessary to

establish for how long it has to last, how much water
you can drink and with what; for instance with honey
or lemon. Never with fruit juices. Fasting forces the
body to burn whatever isnt necessary, surplus,
malignant things, old reserves and never useful things.
Fasting doesnt burn energies from the body, on the
74
opposite, it makes the body save the energy necessary

to digest food.
From the book Ultimo giro di giostra written by

Tiziano Terzani.
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76
17
the first
picture
Memories about my very first camera is
inextricably linked to the Tate Modern of London, or
to be more precise to the Tate's rest rooms: I went to
pee and I left the camera on top of the toilet
dispenser. It took me about five minutes to realize that
something was missing.
Shooting for me has to do with many other things

aside of photography. It's a vital necessity and I'm
realizing more and more that when I'm traveling for
most of time I'm completely absorbed in observing,
assessing, waiting, chasing the right moment. Its a full
time job. But as I said photography is much more -
take the lenses of a camera, for example. The zoom
teaches you that when you can't focus on a detail you
need to move, you have to enlarge your point of view,
you step back and do it all over again. When you can't
focus you need to look at the full picture to weigh the
77
importance of all the elements - it's like dancing back

and forth.
What interests me most is the metaphor behind the

point of view. Most cameras I've owned were silent
and unnoticeable, that means that whenever you're not
supposed to take a picture it's rather easy to be
unnoticed, hoping to frame your subject and
invariably shooting the ceiling (I should put together a
collection named "ceilings").Now that she has arrived,
with all of her presence and noises: things are
changing.
When I had to buy a new camera one of the key

factors that made me buy a DSLR was the noise
caused by the mirror "moving out of the way" to let
the light hit the sensor: I figured I can't die without
experiencing that. That sound is music to my ears, it
reminds me photography is tangible and in doing so
you're taking a stance towards the world around you -
and what a stance!
In Shanghai I was shooting a man sitting on a deck

chair in the middle of the road and since he didn't
understand why - me neither - he started arguing with
me and it was only thanks to a woman passing by that
we didn't come to blows; in Kolkata for most of the
time people were giving me a look which was saying
78
"what in the hell is so interesting here??"; in Hong

Kong I found myself drinking with a local couple
since I was shooting while they were having McD and
Italian wine; in Phnom Penh I've been invited over for
lunch because I was shooting an old man intent on
picking his nose on the Mekong river.
I took my first photo ever when I was 13 or 14, it was

in Ireland. The day we landed they took us to the
Cliffs of Moher: a spectacular 120 meters cliffs
overlooking the ocean. Arrived on site I immediately
left the rest of the group behind and run towards the
edge to take a picture. The closer I got the harder the
wind was blowing me away, so I decided to lay down
and literally crawl the last few meters: the view was
breathtaking and with great precautions I leant my
camera (with film) over the edge pointing downwards
I shot.
The pictures from that trip got lost but I still

remember what I had to go through when I came
back...strangely shooting from the edge of a 120
meters cliff was considered illegal, dangerous and
absolutely forbidden: Irish!
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80
18
taxi drivers
act i
I came to the conclusion I have no choice. Since

I refused to buy a car and give my contribution to the
daily madness that turned this city into a circus made
of first/second gears, traffic lights in the desert, wild
honking, questionable signs and pollution, I have to
deal with them: the taxi drivers.
But who are they? And moreover who is the taxi

driver in Malaysia? Ive heard of them before, in a
nasty way of course, they say theyre the worst in the
world, they say they always try to rip you off and never
use the meter. And if youre a tourist youre pretty
much done.
You see them around, nearly everywhere, generally red

and white colored, groups, fleets, moving like ants
among the other cars, like blood cells in the urban
arteries, keepers of all sins, secrets, joy and sorrow of
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the people, of the mums with kids, business men,

single strangers with grocery bags.
In every corner they wait, confab and conspire, sleep

and then go! Somebody is waiting, maybe is late, on
the roadside. In every corner they stay...and yet when
youre desperately looking for them, stretching your
arm, fingers, neck, theyre busy, or lazy, or have no clue
where you want to go or just dont like you: youve got
the wrong face.
I came to the conclusion that, whether I like it or not,

to a taxi driver I have to commit my movings, the
need to be on the road, the necessity of exploring, my
joys and sorrows, my returns too late or too early, my
lateness and even my earliness that, miraculously,
happens sometimes.
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19
blindfolded
Youre awake and reversed in a bright white bed.
You cant recognize the furniture, no idea whatsoever.
Youre a stranger among strangers.
A wet piece of bread.
There are bridges to build to establish a connection.
Parts of yourself, your culture, a familiar shadow.
Then it happens to travel,
and its like somebody
is trying to pull away the bends.
Light filters and it hurts your eyes.

A different light from an outer world.
You feel like you belong to it,
but you dont know what it is.
Slowly you gain sight but what you see is different.
Unknown, weird, incomprehensible,
surprising perhaps, fascinating.
Blindfolded we live all our life.

Then it happens to travel,
and its like somebody
is trying to pull away the bends.
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84
20
singapores
voice
My second week in Southeast Asia Ive been
sent to Singapore - five-hours by bus - to do
something theyve called training, and I will never
forget the room with no windows I was staying, gently
provided by my college. Do you want a room with a
window? - they explained at the reception - You
need to pay extra.
The first day was pouring rain because, as many said,

we were in the middle of the rainy season* but despite
that I still wanted to walk from the National Library -
where I spent some more time due to the breeze and
the good coffee - to the bay.
Since it didnt seem to stop raining I collected my

broken umbrella and walked towards the city center.
To reach Marina Bay and avoid as much as possible
the rain I accidentally ended up in the underground
shopping routes where theres no day nor night and all
85
that matters is that you pull out your credit card at

some point. I couldnt last for more than ten minutes -
better the rain than this aseptic environment.
Marina Bay, known worldwide due to the Formula 1

night race, proposes a fascinating scenario. Its like a
vast open theater where the center is the symbol of
Singapore (called Merlion), a weird animal in between
a lion and a fish spitting water into the bay, an ivory
86
totem surrounded by skyscrapers and hotels, bridges

and a surreal silence magnified by the rain and the
absence of people. I walked the perimeter with what
was left of my umbrella until I sat watching the boats
with few tourists slowly sailing the bay which looked
even more rarefied with the drops of water.
For historical reasons, the strategic location and the

limited space, Singapore represents an interesting
experiment about the future of the cities, but despite
the beauty of it, the fascinating, reassuring peace you
perceive when you walk among the skyscrapers, that
feeling just doesnt get through. Its hard to explain
how I felt but like any other city even Singapore has a
voice, a voice talking to its inhabitants - Singapore
seems to be whispering that any imperfection must be
erased by a rich, protected and sterile lifestyle.
Everything's so anonymous and artificial I was kept
questioning: where am I? This could be anywhere and
nowhere.
*Ive never managed to understand what really is a rainy

season. Does it starts in March or November? I cant say -
what I know is that, regardless of the month youre in, if a
thunderstorm suddenly bursts theres always somebody
whos gonna say: you see? Rainy season starts early this
year.
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88
21
the luggage
Carry all you need within you, be your own
luggage, your own house, your own refugee, your own
bookshelf. Carry within you the energy to jump into
any given day with your eyes wide open and quickly
move, collect, learn, observe whats going on and
search for it: search for a bit of luck into the fog, a
spark of beauty in the nights folds, fifteen minutes of
happiness in a week or a sigh of relief early in the
morning.
Hold an extraordinary richness under your skin,

control the thirst, the curiosity of seeing with your
own eyes, loving life for what it has to give you back,
for its own way of wounding you in the beginning and
leaves you in waiting for such a long time.
Feel life unfolding in each empty step before you

finally take the right one, before you stumble upon the
right path, a path that belongs to you, before you
shake hands with somebody youve always known,
before you keep quiet your desire, before you enjoy
89
something without expecting anything, consciously

burning what you have to, consciously being at least
for once where you should be, with the right person,
the right words and at peace with yourself.
Yes then to life is what you feel in your chest, no

matter the cause of that feeling, or how long it lasts,
what matters is to have the capacity to do so, to save
room for something authentic, that has a value that
you cant share with anybody.
The world is a rather small place compared to the

distances we have to walk with all of our expectations,
mistakes, desires, promises, apologies, lies and hours,
days, years spent walking to remind ourselves that
were like traveling luggages.
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22
that night
in india
A river filled with people and vivid colors in any

direction. Women, men and children tie in a slow
wave, a pilgrimage made of short steps, sweat,
humanity, vows and preyer.
Someone mentioned Batu Caves might have been a

particular situation to be in, hence with couple of
friends and a backpack we joined the river late at
night to avoid, as much as possible, the heat.
Thaipusam is a Hindu religious festival of great

importance, its like the new years celebration, the end
of a fasting and thanksgiving period and Batu Caves is
the most sacred place outside of India, fifteen
kilometers north of Kuala Lumpur. You need to reach
the last train stop, take a bus and walk for twenty
minutes in between highways until you finally reach a
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40m tall rocky hill that hosts a little temple for the
god Murunga.
The night creates an atmosphere you can easily drown

in and that night I met something majestic and
frightening: I met a crowd made of thousands of
people moved by their faith. The moment we reached
it within few meters the stream swallowed us, and it
was like walking into another world, a world Ive never
been before called India.
Once youre in the stream theres no way back so all

you can do is to follow it, follow the route to the
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temple until you reach the twohundred - seventytwo

steps carved into the rock. A huge golden statue of the
god stands at the beginning of the stairs youre
stepping up with tonnes of other people that push you
from the back. Halfway to the top I decided to turn
around and take a shot, and there and then I saw it:
this majestic river regenerating itself and moving
towards me.
Heat and sweat bring you to the naked interior rock

that also hosts few monkeys and thousands of pairs of
shoes left outside the temple. Its a mess and wherever
you look you see people getting ready, vowing with any
sort of rite: some of spit fire, others drink milk and
color their body - I cant understand much of it and I
feel like an intruder, but I also feel absorbed by the
multitude, by the smiles around me so I try to ask few
questions, slowly move among the crowd taking
pictures while everything happens in cycles, in this
place, from thousands of years following the Tamil
calendar.
Thaipusam commemorates a mythical episode during

which the goddess Parvati gives Muruga, her husband,
a spear so that he can defeat the demon of evil
Soorapadman. Devotees prepare for the celebration of
this ceremony through a specific body cleansing,
fasting and abstinence. Before my eyes alternate
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bizarre acts of devotion, bordering masochism,

piercing the skin, tongue or cheeks played with sharp
blades, hooks and needles.
The dawn slowly kicks in so we decide were done with

the heat and leave.
That night will stay with me, those dark womens eyes,
those spirited eyes of men with their back pierced by
hooks, those wide sincere eyes of tattooed children. A
stream of eyes in a warm night where the sky was
officially Malaysian but the ground I walked was
Indian for sure.
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23
the distance
So whats this all about? The meaning of the
word distance puzzles me since distance can be
measured in many different ways...
It can be measured in clouds fading in the perspective,

night lights getting thinner - you can measure it by
counting the pages left to the end of the book or in
coffees you need to have in order to make it.
The distance is the number of phone calls, the ones

you've done and the ones you have to do; the distance
is an absence that matters, is a humid and solitary
pain.
The distance is a standby-state, an indefinite number

of awakenings; the scenes of a movie resembling your
real life and the heavy rain; is about all the trains, the
crowded stations, boats and tickets before the final
destination; the distance are all the people in line
before you.
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We are the distance when we limit our potential

because we're stuck, too focused on our present-life.
The distance is always there - whatever is made of -
its a space to fill, and to fill is a beautiful expression: it
reminds me of an empty glass awaiting to be
overwhelmed, drop by drop.
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24
a dawn
called sibu
There are things you have to do by yourself, it
has to be a volunteer solitude and everything gets
amplified when youre on an island.
Malaysia is a rather generous country in terms of

public holidays, as much as its skins colors, and thanks
to one of these holidays I managed to escape with a
few friends to an island called Sibu, located in the
south-west, and found a silence I havent experienced
for a while.
I woke up and collected few things from the floor and

silently left the room to run after my first Asian dawn,
a rite Im accustomed to for many years now and that
is associated with nature, the cycling wheel and a pure
beauty - Ive always thought theres no better birth
than from the sea, out of a thin line cutting in two
your sight, sleep and perspective on the world.
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An unexpected freshness was waiting out the door, the

palm leaves where covered by humidity and within
couple of minutes I was on the shore surrounded by
the nights leftovers. A moons slice welcomed me to a
show we underestimate: its quick, free and happens
every given morning. Few other experiences can wash
away lifes frenzy, the anxiety with which we deal with
it and the fear of being left behind like the dawn does.
I think I opened my eyes only when I sat on the

humid sand, moving from the air-conditioned sleep to
the Chinese seas strokes.
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The first thing I noticed was that time seemed to

move slower. The show begun with reflections on the
clouds, then a few colors depicted the sky with a soft
pink and a dark turquoise - like when you cant see the
train but you can hear it approaching, feel the
vibrations, in the same way I started feeling the
presence of the sun, a never changing wild animal,
eyes staring at us from a mesmerizing distance,
changing the way things evolve, touching our skin to
the point they give us color, to the point they light a
black and white picture.
Suddenly a dot of intense light shows up where the

sky and the sea, still in black and white, meet. The
contrast increases, the clouds assume any sort of shape
you can imagine: I recognize a dog on the right and a
flying carpet up there, everything moves and is
changing now.
The sun frees himself from seas harms and makes its
entrance into the infinite sky, hes back home now, a
home we share, a home that without him tells a
completely different story. A ball of fire comes out of
the water tracing a line of burning light that reaches
the bottom of my eyes, that line is like an hand
inviting me to join the show.
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Ive been watching the dawn in many different places

and times, with a variety of moods: theres you,
insignificant and small, and theres the most
spectacular manifestation of nature: it helps. It helps
not to take yourself for granted, to deflate the volume
of your life, recognize that after all, that cycle never
stops and is keeps including me.
Dawn is a word you can use only in a singular form,

because there is only one dawn and the sun will always
find the will to immerse himself into the sea. Every
morning then, wet and breathless, the sun will always
find the strength to color our skin: mine, yours,
whatever the color.
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25
the lonely
traveler
It is rather healthy to spend some time alone.

You need to learn how to be alone and not be defined
by another person.
Oscar Wilde
Spending a few days on a lake in Myanmar, cut

off f rom the world and any possibility of
communication, living confined on stilt-houses forced
me into complete isolation. But mine wasnt a real
loneliness because theres no loneliness if youre
leaving.
Loneliness - the negative idea of it - is something you

feel when you stop, when you quit running after
something or when your life is tasteless, hence being
on the road alone never bothered me and in doing it
Ive learned things about me I would never had the
chance to discover otherwise.
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I begun appreciating all the little opportunities that

flourish when you run away from your little world and
immerse yourself in a vaster world, and in doing it
without anybody around, any observer ready to point
out what you used to be back in your everyday life.
The lonely traveler appears in every place for the first

time and yet he has the opportunity to become
whoever he feels like because hes surrounded by
strangers eyes that see him for the first time ever. And
the world is filled with people that watch and wait,
details you might have to pay attention to, quiet voices
in tiny streets, and it is only when youre traveling in
your company that paying attention to those details
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becomes easier to the point you stop worrying and

thinking and feeling the weight of your life, you can
almost ignore it altogether.
But to embrace the road you still need some sort of

companions and everybody has these. After loads of
miles I begun to recognize them like people you know
youve seen before somewhere, and since I realized
that I carry those companions with me wherever I go:
first of all a good good book, because books speak only
if you want to, then something I can write on, because
traveling alone makes you think a lot but you cant
hold everything, you have to let thoughts go away
from your head, and finally theres the music - and you
really need to make an effort choosing the good stuff.
Theres nothing more I need, really.
Music, notebooks and a good book fit easily in a

backpack together with few other things and, of
course, the camera: the additional memory. Then
theres you and the journey itself that, when youre
alone, is always on the verge of changing, on the verge
of being.
It is traveling alone that you might find space when

you thought you had none, space for breathing when
youve been running for too long, and roads, new roads
in every single direction youre looking at.
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26
outdoor
bathroom
Stifled by the noisy urban rhythms as soon as I
get the chance I jumped on a flight to Bali, a pretty
big island located in central Indonesia. Bali recalls a
number of different ideas: surfers, candid beaches,
meditation, alternative lives and uncontrolled tourism
to which was exactly the thing I wanted to avoid. I
wanted to be off the grid.
Lucky enough I did find what I was looking for in an

area in the center of the island called Ubud. To get
there from the main airport of Denpasar down south,
you need to hire somebody to drive you up the hills
and along the tiny local streets. Ubud is the cultural
center of the island, in fact once you get there youll
notice many craftsmen and artists (both local and
westerners).
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I found my own little Ubud hosted for few days on

the ground floor of an Italian couple living in a typical
two-stories Balinese house on top of a hill.
I loved staying at their house, sleeping on the cold

floor, after months of tremendous heat, and with an
open air bathroom I always dreamed of.
Despite the fact Bali has tons of attractions worth

visiting, the day I arrived, I decided that I wouldnt go
anywhere but the rice terraces that surround Ubud, it
was love at first sight: all I wanted to do was to spend
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my days talking with the local artists and watching the

rice harvesters working until the sunset.
Bali is a unique place but most of all has a unique

atmosphere you wont miss noticing and thats because
of its religion Hindu-Buddhist which is different from
the rest of the country (Indonesia is 90% Muslim).
That translates in a completely different set of temples
and traditions you wont find anywhere else embedded
in Balineses life, like when you walk in the streets and
you can easily stumble upon (youre supposed to pay
attention) little daily offerings to the gods and spirits
called Banten, theyre everywhere, they offer all sorts of
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things in carefully folded leaves containing some food,

money, little objects and even cigarettes - the idea of a
smoker-ghost is quite interesting. But after a brief visit
to a temple I couldnt wait to go back to my rice fields
following these people half way sunk in the mud to
collect the rice.
Those days spent in Ubud, a simple life without a

mattress, in contact with rurality and the reflections of
the sunset at a slow pace, one grain at a time, was an
unforgivable panacea, it squeezed the citizen in me, it
made me appreciate the sense of belonging and, for a
moment, grasp the possibility of a balanced life.
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27
a choral
goodbye
Hanoi said goodbye in a choral way while I was
in the taxi to the airport - 6am - with the sun slowly
rising on the other side of the lake and in every single
square, street, sidewalk I was passing by tonnes of
people were coming out with the sleep still on their
shoulders.
A woman waking up early to do jogging before she

goes to work is not something astonishing, but when
you see an entire city, first thing in the morning,
literally filling whatever is considered outdoor to
exercise is really something unique but most of all tells
the story of a city, a culture that for many reasons close
and far away in time, is extremely fascinating to me.
Hanoi lives in the streets, thats why the first thing I

did when I arrived in the old district was to rent a four
gear motorbike: youve not really experienced Hanoi if
you dont try riding in the craziness of the jam, or
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crossing a junction where everybody seem to have a

personal lane - yes, you might say its crazy if youre
not a local, but its only when youre in the middle of it
that you can see some sort of law in the chaos.
Hanoi is the calidity wrapping you at all times, the

open houses with kids on the floor watching cartoons,
the crowd in wait to see the mummified Ho Chi Min,
is the narrow and long houses that look like corridors,
is the red bridge on the lake that hosts a centenary
turtle whos dying due to the pollution. Hanoi is in its
theme-districts: helmets, carpentering, animals,
funeral flowers, bamboo in all shapes. Hanoi is a train
passing by few steps away from your laundry
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interrupting for few minutes the everlasting madness.

Hanoi is the rusty and decadent bridge on the Red
River, is a nocturne tango in a nameless square while
the Communists speakers diffuse a melancholic music
and whoever - like myself - joins open air dance
classes.
Hanoi is the capital of a Communist state where the

national sport is honking, where McDonald, Facebook
and the Chinese are not welcomed, where you live a
simple life under the shadow of the red flag with one
star, where the victory gesture has a more than real
meaning (at least for them), where the food is simply
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delicious, the fridge is a luxury and the chickens walk

on the roofs.
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28
departures
Some are painful and carry a sense of loss,

others are liberating and the only possible choice.
Sometimes they're unexpected while others you can
see them happening from a long, long distance.
To depart means to open up to something, to take a

decision and embrace risk.
Perhaps a departure is the moment the plane lines up

to take off and you quickly move from a terrible
stillness to a brutal acceleration. Or perhaps it's the
moment we feel we need to get out of here and from
that moment onwards it's a countdown to the
unavoidable.
A departure perhaps takes shape when the luggage is

opened on the floor, with your underwear scattered in
between your clothes and the book you're reading
ready to follow you everywhere. Or maybe it is the
luggage itself, a luggage that has its own trip and
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leaves even before you do and magically appears

upside down.
Departures have to do with a look. The look of you

leaving turning your head backwards, and the look of
whoever is watching you disappearing behind the
security check or behind a slamming door. It's the
moment you hold your breathe realizing you're leaving
everything behind, maybe a comfortable life or a
nightmare still burning your skin.
Th e d e p a r t u re h a p p e n s a n d b u r n s a l m o s t
unconsciously, immediately absorbed by the clash of
the road, by the movement towards its alter ego: the
arrival. Strangely to depart doesnt always mean to
arrive, sometimes you leave to an elsewhere wrapped
in mystery.
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29
walking
kolkata
As soon as I got off the plane I jumped into the
in-discussed symbol of Kolkata: the Ambassador. The
majestic and bombproof yellow taxi, a time machine
that sometimes makes you feel like youve just stepped
into the Fifties. They are the moving reference point
for the city, because everything moves here. The
restless city is pushing you all over the place, overfilled
in the sidewalks, the air, the smells, the food, the rivers
and bridges - hence youve got one choice only, join
the stream and get carried by it.
Kolkata is an open air circus where nothing is unreal;

youre witnessing day by day, street by street, the fair of
humanity. The ring of life is represented vividly and
and at times the horrifying layers of human dignity
and whether you're prepared or not you have to deal
with it. You'll need to listen and try to answer the
question I've seen in the eyes of the people; what are
you? How do you feel about this?
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I like to think that there are no places not worth

visiting, you never know how you will be react exposed
to a certain situation, Ive humbly embraced the strong
sights Ive seen in Kolkata, walking for hours in the
heat of the sun, with my feet covered with dust and
my white skin screaming for attention.
Quite often when I am back from a trip somewhere

people ask was it beautiful?, like you can only
witness beauty in this world, or like the only good
reason to travel is to see beautiful things. Well, my
answer to that is that Kolkata is not beautiful in a
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conventional sense - it is not the place you want to be

if youre looking for a relaxing environment, shopping
and museums.
While I walked amongst trash, beggars and

sickeningly smells, little by little I begun to see reality
exactly as it is, without judgement nor fear, in my
mind I begun to see the other side of the coin: if on
one side you have cities like Singapore, sterile clean
and ordered, still and monotonous, on the other side
you have Kolkata, the counterpart of that reality. It
gives us balance and contrast on ourselves, they give us
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the chance to think about what is good and bad, what

is too much or too little.
I would be a liar stating my heart was broken before

that poverty, before people who live with nothing -
but my reaction was a calm acceptance: when Ive met
these people Ive seen no affliction in their eyes, on the
opposite, theirre well aware of their situation and
exhibit an extraordinary dignity. That overwhelming,
vital, noisy and intense circle somehow closed and
generate itself in a way that, as a passer by, as an
external observer I couldnt fully understand.
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Kolkata taught me there are places that push you to do

a journey within a journey: a journey within yourself,
into your culture, your life and your path. There are
places that challenge what we take for granted on a
regular basis, push us to appreciate values as dignity,
education and respect. Kolkata reminded me, way
more than other place, that my skin has a color, a color
that is speaking on behalf of me without the need for
words. It showed me the world as a blanket that is too
short.
I came back to Kuala Lumpur like Ive been on

another planet. The following days I felt physical and
mental tiredness, I needed to elaborate on that walk, I
needed to have some silence in my mind after all the
questions Kolkata posed me. While I was talking to
couple of students asking me how do we get out of
here? or when I walked for an entire neighborhood
with three kids hanging from my legs or when I
bought an orange juice:
I dont get it, how much is it - to a drinks peddler.

Its 27 rupie - said a woman behind me.
Oh, thanks mam, heres 30...what he is talking about
now?
He says you need to pay 10 rupie more in case you
want to keep the bottle
The bottle? No, I dont need it...
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Well then, give it back to him

Back? But I have to drink it here and now then!
Yes, thats right!
I pounded the orange juice in couple of minutes in the

middle of the colored traffic jam. A sixty year old man
is staring at me with a worried expression on his face
while the woman leaves smiling. I finish the juice and
give it back to him, smile at the peddler and leave
thinking to myself: thank God it wasnt a bottle of
whiskey.
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30
youre a glass
of water
Out there: spaces, women and men weve never
seen before, with stories weve never heard of and
truths no one will ever talk about. They will not knock
at your door or appear on a website. The only way to
really understand them is to get out of your house, hit
the road and leave everything related to you behind.
The misconception is that if you leave the place you

were born you have to give up pieces of yourself
behind - hence this step is lived with a sense of loss.
Thats a dangerous thought. Looks like you belong to a
specific kind of neighborhood, street, mentality,
culture and that defines you, thats who you are for the
rest of you life. Really? Oh! if only it was that simple...
Say you belong to a bigger place suspended in a vast

cold void you know very little about. Youre not just
part of it but profoundly tightened to it, youre made
of the same substance and have a destiny to share. You
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might have a place you were born and raised, a place

you call home, but what if that place is just a starting
point - like the label on a map that says you are here
- thats your hometown and you know it all too well.
Being aware of your birthplace generates a
fundamental question: should I stay or should I go?
Not surprisingly I thought about this a lot and came

to the conclusion that staying or leaving has a lot to
do with the rain and a glass of water. If you stay you
keep the water you already have, safe under your roof,
hoping nothing is gonna take it away from you. If you
leave you need to get rid of some of the water because
its easy to move around and plus you have to expose
yourself to the randomness of the weather. Some days
will be raining and youll gain new fresh water, some
days will be so hot youll miss the roof in despair.
There is no right or wrong answer to this question, you

are the glass and you have to deal with the water.
When you look closer you realize that some people
like the rain and others dont - and that makes all the
difference in the world.
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31
24hrs as a
buddhist monk
Moved by compassion the Buddhist nun paused

her meditation to grab a plastic chair and hand it to
me saying "try with this one". Embarrassed, I've tried
to apologize explaining that I can't focus on my mind
if I'm struggling with my whole body. Of course she
knew it since in the first twenty minutes of meditation
I've changed my posture ten times, miserably failing
one of the simplest tasks ever: count to ten breathing
in and out: breathe in, breathe out - one - breathe in,
breathe out - two - and so on.
Trying to calm down my own mind was a lucid

nightmare, it was like trying to trap the clouds or a
wild animal out of control.
The guided meditation session was just one of the

physical trials I had to go through during my day as a
Buddhist monk in a temple in the woods nearby Seoul,
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at the feet of bare mountains, made even more

mysterious by a late spring.
Together with my traveling companions, after a brief

tour of the temple and an introduction to Buddhism,
we did a two hour hike in the woods, purple-red
dressed like apprentices. Soon after we ate vegetarian
meals offered to the temple by the whole Buddhist
community and shared with homeless people or
whoever wants to come up here and have an healthy
meal (eat-it-all is mandatory of course).
One by one we all had to wash dishes in the kitchen

and when my turn came and I found myself in a big
kitchen paired with a monk who, unfortunately, didn't
speak English, so we found a way to communicate
that sounded like this: I was soaping and he was
rinsing. Once I've finished I curtsy respectfully to the
monk who - smiling - pointed a stack of dishes
behind me...I rolled up my sleeves and went back to
the washbasin, I thought it was part of the training
like in karate kid.
Dinner was on the table at 4,30 pm and after a brief

hiking session we re-joined the nun in an empty
classroom for our first meditation class followed by
the evening chanting with all the monks who live
there. Properly trained we bowed and sung doing our
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best to look decent, showing the first signs of

weakness.
8pm to bed since we had to wake up at 4am sharp for

the morning chanting (with more bowing), followed
by the second meditation session and finally by the
breakfast (which suspiciously looked a lot like the
previous meals). Needless to say my plastic chair
meditation (a worldwide premiere) was even worse
than the previous one: I've spent an hour fighting with
an abnormal quantity of useless thoughts - How big is
this room? Why did they choose these materials?
When was the last time I woke up at four? Did I miss
the sunrise yet? How in the hell she's able not to move
at all??!? - instead of focusing on the current task
question & answer: (breathe in) Who am I? (breathe
out) I don't know.
Alright, trust me, get up at an ungodly hour followed

by hiking, bowing and meditation without even the
shadow of a coffee's drop in my veins might be
demanding.
As a conclusion of this personal journey we had to do

one of the most important practices in Buddhism, the
well known 108 bows. Basically you have to prostrate
every time the monk evokes something like "I
prostrate for each time I've been disrespectful towards
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the only Earth we all share" and so on. In order to give

you a more precise idea of why it was so painful Id
like to share an accurate description of it:
the bow opens standing with your hands in hapchang position,

then you gently kneel on the meditation mat, place you hands
in front of you on the mat, with the palm of your hands down,
also place your left foot on top of your right one. Meanwhile
turn your palms up and bend down until your forehead touches
the mat and lower your gluteus too in order to be as close as
possible to the floor. *
Every single bow - up-down-up again - happens

within 5 seconds and Ive done it at 5 am in a
complete agonistic trance.
With my whole body in pain I'm pretty sure I

understood how strictly connected in Buddhism the
body and mind are, and before we left we had the
chance to spend some time with the nun, drinking tea
and rice based sweets, talking about ourselves and
about the monk's life. We discussed for an hour and I
loved how she replied when, answering to my friend's
question "how do we understand others?", she said
"understand others? you better try to understand
yourself! it's almost impossible to do that!" and talking
about relationships I realized we were on the same
page when she said "the best way to learn a language
is to find yourself a girlfriend who speaks it!".
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When we went back to our lives and clothes, in the

cold outside the temple, I realized how many things
we had done and it was only nine o'clock in the
morning. I felt in pieces, absolutely unfit for the
monk's life, but I promised to myself to stay closer to
me, to try to calm down the wild animal within me
and to live more at floor-level.
* from The Sacred Art of Bowing by Andi Young.

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128
32
indispensable
Traveling to me always means traveling light,

hence every single object I carry needs to fit a limited
list called Indispensable. Hence the obvious question
is: whats the most useful item? The one that fulfills
the greatest quantity of functions to keep in your
luggage? Well, to me the answer is quite
straightforward: a scarf! In order to prove you that I
made another list of all the ways and meanings a scarf
can be used - Ill be glad if you can participate
suggesting other functions:
1. keep your neck warm in air-con-rooms to prevent a

cold or neck-pain (say on a bloody plane);
2. fold it to form a pillow;
3. fold it around your hand and punch somebody, or
break glass in case of necessity, or clean something;
4. tie it around a wound;
5. stop an hemorrhage in case youre bleeding
6. cover your face or your hair
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7. cover your mouth in case of smoky situations or if 8.

youre robbing a bank;
8. wrapped around an object to hide or protect;
9. you can wrap it around your chest and keep
something in it;
10. a catapult to throw objects;
11. as an extension of your arm to grab, pull
something;
12. tie to things - say if your car is broke someone can
pull you;
13. a skirt;
14. if big enough could be a toga;
15. cover a draught;
16. play stretch the rope;
17. a tablecloth;
18. a bag;
19. a towel and a beach-towel (indeed);
20. a football: fold it around something heavy and
rounded;
21. swimwear for him and for her (I assume so);
22. if youre dressing like a superhero you can use it as
a cloak;
23. as a sponge;
24. you can use it as a flag;
25. in case of a emergency you can wave it to focus
attention;
26. Im not suggesting this, but you can always see
what happens shaking it in front of a bull;
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27. tie it around your head imitating Rambo (Ive

actually done this);
28. give it to somebody saying Im giving you the
most useful item ever made;
29. to hang something;
30. tie somebodys ankles while he/shes sleeping and
then wait for him/her to wake up (hilarious);
31. diaper;
32. you can fix it on the wall as a decoration;
33. a curtain;
34. a bed sheet;
35. the biggest napkin in the world;
36. play catch the flag;
37. a tie;
38. a rope to escape from a window;
39. folded several times could be used as a spacer;
40. a parachute for a low-height-jump; *
41. sexual games;
* number 40 clearly shows a luck of imagination.
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132
33
indiana jones
my ass
(talking to myself )
Easy man, easy! its alright now, just keep going

straight and itll be alright...just focus on the runaway
and dont m....F)=M.!!!! **!!
When it comes down to swearing we all do it in our

mother tongue, isnt it? But to be honest with you I
had to put some English words too. There was just a
moment down there, in that murky water that I like to
call for obvious reasons Nescaf water, and I went there
together with my precious camera. Once I got out of it
and recognized what was happening Ive heard
somebody laughing not too far from me: Are you
alright my friend? You missed it, didnt you? Ahahaha
- American accent, hes enjoying himself, but I cant
think about anything else but my dripping
camera...and he goes on - Im sorry but do you mind
if I take a picture of you? - clicks and disappears. In
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that moment I had the lucid thought of asking him to

send me the picture of my angry-incredulous
expression but hes gone already and theres no time to
exchange business cards anyways.
Alright, lets contextualize here. Im pretty sure we all

end up sooner or later in situations like this, situations
during which you hear a tiny voice within you saying
how in the hell did you manage to get yourself into
this?, well, Ive heard that voice many times.
My days in Siem Reap, Cambodia, were great and

nothing wrong happened considering the city was
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flooded due to the fact it was the rainy season and a

week before my arrival they had to rescue 200 tourists
with the helicopter because they were stuck in Angkor.
All I had to do was to wade across the Nescaf water to
reach a temple in the deep jungle, half naked and with
no idea of what was swimming in that water to put it
nicely.
I was with couple of friends and, on the route to the

temple, Ive lost the rest of the group immediately
after we begun to wade the pond. Everything was fine
to the point I felt the urge to shoot some pictures in a
Indiana-Jones-situation, so I took out my camera and
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kept walking. Twenty meters later I reached the

immersed runaway at the entrance of the temple so I
confidently stepped in it.
Due to the dirtiness of the water I couldnt see much

so I had to move carefully - all I have to do now is
keep going straight in order not to miss the
runaway...and I miss it, my right foot is five
centimeters away from the edge and it goes down, and
unfortunately I am attached to that right foot so I
follow him with the rest of me. I perfectly knew that
was about to happen, I felt it the moment I was
falling.
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Here it comes the drama. My camera is gone and I

think about all the moments we had together, the
kilometers of shots we collected. Shes my memory
and I thank her while I walk the last few meters
before I reach the entrance where my friends question
where was I. But they immediately understand what
was going on and burst into laughter: they cannot see
the despair in me, I have to save her! So I took off my
t-shirt and decompose the camera and place every
single piece on the limestone to let it dry. Many
tourists came and laughed at the half naked man with
sad eyes.
Like a cave man I found myself a rod in order to have

a safer walk back and in fact nothing dramatic
happens. I waited one long long hour before I finally
decide its time for the truth: will my camera turn on
again? Will she come back to me? will I have
memories again? I press the button and a very weird
noise comes out of it, then the lenses make a move,
stretching and finally opening. The display turns on,
She works! She works!!
Things I have learned thanks to this experience:
1. You never know when youll end up in underwear

hence always wear good ones.
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2. If water is involved, for Gods sake, hide away any

sort of electronic toy.
3. This is a classic case where it is not the destination
that counts but the journey itself.
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34
taxi drivers
act ii
You know these nights, where all you really

want to do is to go back home, and in order to do so
you need to rely on them, to their skilled sharp hands,
often irritating hands too.
Cant remember where, but in a night like that I was

somewhere in the outskirts of the city and I was
looking for a taxi to go back home - at that time I was
hosted by a dear friend of mine from the Philippines.
So all I had to do was to wave at the traffic at two
oclock in the morning.
I stretched my arm and I noticed something was

wrong: 1) I found the taxi at the first round; 2) the
passenger seat was occupied by somebody. But the taxi
stopped - I thought - surely its a relative or
something! who cares! So I get using the rudeness
strategy, the only way of dealing with those guys and
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deter them from ripping you off. It worked and we

agreed on the fare but then I saw her: a smiling
woman was staring at me, in her opinion,
provocatively. The taxi driver assured me she was a
friend and we left directed at home: I was in a taxi
with a prostitute.
The run was quick and they/she knew it so she didnt

waste time and quickly asked if I knew that place in
the city centre filled with Westerners and
prostitutes...I knew where she wanted to go and I said
yes, Ive heard of it and I am not the right guy. But
she didnt believe me so she changed strategy:
Do you like me?.
Yeah...but just take me home for tonight: alone.
At that point the taxi driver got in charge of the

situation and came up with a brilliant idea: loud disco
music to turn me on! Im in a taxi with a prostitute
and a taxi-deejay-driver in the middle of the night:
jeez, I need a picture of this.
I tried to calm them but she was really into it and kept
going on and on:
Hmm, really? Italian ah? And do you like girls in
Malaysia?.
Well, of course I like them...mostly if I dont have to
pay them.
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...and what about later?.

Ill be sleeping.
...tomorrow then!
Work.
Come visit me!.
Hell yeah, Ill find you in the yellow pages!.
The situation, I admit was quite funny, the only

downside was my headache caused by the loud music.
But I got home and paid what we agreed, I got off and
told the woman - Ill see you soon! She said goodnight
while the taxi driver was shaking his head. After all
they took me home to a fair price trying to sell me
some sort of extra service.
A taxi then is like a box of chocolates: you never know

what youll get.
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35
about the city
He didn't really care about the scenario but
mostly about the wind passing by and when he felt
like, all of a sudden, he would just stop, sit down and
watch her breathing, listening to the sound of the
people passing by, the way she wiggled and barked.
Every city - he used to say - has its own beat, its own
way to come and go, and the only way to catch it is to
sit down and listen, it might take some time and a bit
of luck, but if you stay still long enough something its
gonna happen and for a moment you can see her face.
A city is a matter of faces - but you need to know
where to look for them.
Markets were the answer. A market is a matter of

hands and if you want to see the real people, the
citizens, you need to find out where markets are
happening, the hanging flesh, the half-dead fishes, the
birds in the cages, the pyramid-shaped fruit, the slow
pace of elderly, the morning glory and the swarming
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of plastic bags...and then hands again...that pull, grab,

count, scratch, collect and arrange.
Like the palm of an open hand, to see the future of a

city, before he even got there, he loved to get lost in a
concert made of notes, lines, words and maps,
crossing, unrecognizable names, labels, lists and
itineraries. Taking notes was his way to walk the city
in his head.
He knew that was pointless because every single time

he got there, once the real walk was happening
everything was different and every single note proved
to be wrong. But being wrong was great, that feeling
made every single step meaningful, every street, every
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building and scenario...the reality - he used to say -

was way more tasty than my imagination!
The size of a city...that's a very complicated task.

Indeed you could have a look at the map but only
when you're there that you begin to understand,
because only then it becomes personal, because of all
the roads you've walked only one is Tokyo or
Melbourne or Kolkata and only your legs can tell you
about it.
Landing after landing cities began to fascinate him -

the dust, the waits in between strangers, the sound of
trams or ferries, the smell, the billboards and the
porches, the way a woman can leave a trace in the air,
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the depressed faces and the closing doors, the jams

and the loudness, the position of sun you can't never
figure out and the night with its vortex and taxis.
At the end of the day all of those multitudes end up in

lines waiting to pay a ticket. He used to think that
when a city is pregnant it can really be a warm place
where things happen, when real conversations happen
and where one day or another you could have found a
door, a staircase, a roof where you can close your eyes,
finally safe.
You escape from and yet you return to a city - it is a

beehive where everyone's connected to everybody else
even though they really struggle to notice it.
Meanwhile, he loved to sit down in a spot without a
name staring to all of those solitudes passing by.
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36
this is
gonna hurt
Sitting on this bench I can see far away the

Habour Bridge - Ill go there later - as for now I just
want to enjoy the view of the bay in front of me.
Cities talk to you but you need to find the right spots
to take a break and watch things happening, maybe a
sound, a face, a gesture or cars passing by or coming
back. This is a Monday in Sydney, lunchtime.
Im hungry and the wind blows like a woman gently

passing next to you, but I cant ignore the noises made
by those guys behind me playing football on the grass
of the Darling Harbour - from here it feels like theres
more space, the sky is a bit bigger due to the
reflections on the water.
Nope, I cant concentrate longer due to the noises,

hence I collect my things and decide to ask these guys
to join them, theres also a woman playing football and
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she asks where do you come from, stranger? - Im

Italian, Im just arrived from Melbourne. Then
another guy adds: ...and the very first thing you do is
to play football. Why not! I reply.
Winter has just begun in Australia hence I have to

take off two of the three layers I have on me and with
excitement I join these guys aware of the fact that
most likely theyre pretty good.
We play for half an hour and despite that Im

completely out of shape and cant remember the last
time I played, I feel good and Im amazed by how
good the woman is. Im kind of disappointed when
they stop due to the fact they have to go back to work.
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We greet each other and I assure them Ill be here

tomorrow for another game.
I laid on the grass barefoot enjoying the sun and the

heat and of course recovering my breathe, thinking
how that was a small example of how Australians are
people who enjoy themselves and this, more than
anything else makes Australia a unique place to live.
Shortly after my friends left to go back to their offices

another group of call me, they were playing rugby
right next to us. My belly is empty and Im sweating
already...rugby then...thats really a bad idea, Ive never
played rugby anyways...
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This is gonna hurt I whispered before collecting my

shoes and join them...
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37
curiosity
How does a rhinoceros make love? What's the
smell of a sunflowers field? How does it feel to walk
barefoot in a mosque? How sparkling is the Tour
Eiffel? Where was the genius of Salvador Dal born?
How many steps you can count under the tropical
sun? What's the shape of a volcano? How's life in
Myanmar? And the desert, how spaceful is its night?
How spiritual is to stand on the Potala Palace in
Lhasa? How might it be to ride a horse in Mongolia?
how do you get there? And what about this
mysterious Bhutan and that Buddhist temple hanging
from the rocks? How many stories are enclosed in the
continent where man and the coffee were born:
Africa?
Maybe Curiosity is nothing else but the Art of asking

Questions.
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38
music scar
On the 25th July I flew to Taipei (Taiwan) but

this time it wasnt just another exploration trip to an
unknown country. What I was doing in reality was to
fulfill a duty. I had to meet someone: I had to meet a
part of myself I havent seen in a long time.
I was nineteen years old when I went to my first

Radiohead concert with my beloved sister in the
magical Veronas Arena. That night, beside the
emotion caused by the event itself, left me a reminder
for the rest of my life: a scar on my left arm. In the
attempt to reach the best seat possible together with
thousands of other people I scratched my arm against
an uncovered wire. I was bleeding when the music
began but in that moment who could care less about
it?
Music and blood: I cant even describe how I felt that

night, but I understood something back then, I
realized why we like or dislike some music - maybe
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theres a frequency inside of all of us, a precise

vibration. We like a specific band or musician because
they play that frequency. So all of a sudden, for
whatever reason, something, someone out there is so
mysteriously close to us. You listen to some music and
you go I love it! I love how it makes me feel, its like
it was written for me!. It is truly something magical.
That night I understood that you dont go to a concert
because of the band, you want to be there for yourself.
Imagine the intense feeling of your frequency played
in a stadium that sounds exactly like you do, doesnt
that makes you feel part of something? Something
bigger than you are?
Eleven years have passed since that night. I was a kid

back then with a future made of confusion, but I
wasnt confused about music. In the past eleven years a
storm has passed over my head, pushing and pulling
me in any direction, changing my perspective and
shaping every single opinion I have, but if my
excitement is still as pure today while I'm jumping and
closing my eyes with thousands of strangers, hand in
hand with the music, well,I think I should recognize
the value of it all. No, not the value of Radiohead.
What Im talking about is the value of a life with a

soundtrack - a good one - which despite the odds, the
mistakes, the turns and the blood, has saved
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something, something you have to reach, you have to

chase, even in a hot night on the other side of the
world.
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39
five men
on a boat
Five men on a boat flying away from the rocks,

the dust, the black sand and the sulfurs smell.
Through my five dollars sunglasses I cant stop staring

at the smoking crater, paying attention not to bang
into something with all of this shaking. Five men
sharing a silence balanced only by the noise coming
from the back of the boat, crashing against the waves
while were crossing the strait in between the
Indonesian islands of Java and Sumatra to return to
the mainland.
The captain fears nothing and pauses the engines only

when were are literally flying suspended in between
the sea and the sky - I cant remember his name, hes
not a talker but hes a great smoker. Ba-ri, our guide
on the island, never thought about wearing a mask
while hes going up and down the volcano Krakatoa
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breathing sulfur. The third man is a young boy: he

smiles, sleeps and from time to time the captain sends
him on the boats nose to pull the anchor. There are
still two men in the count, me and my American
friend: a necessary ballast. Five men on a seven-meters
fishing boat, pushed by a double Yamaha Enduro 40
engine: a representation running due to the tragic and
fascinating story of an infamous volcano in the middle
of the sea.
Once upon a time an happy band of three volcanoes

lived in the middle of the sea - picture a big mountain
with three tops. One of them, with some sort of
personality problem, one day decided to show off and
burped in a biblical way. It was the 1883 when he did
158
it and it was so loud that they noticed him even in

Australia (some 20000km east). His erupting
personality, among other things, caused a tsunami that
killed more than 35,000 people and when the show
was finally finished very little was left of the band: in
his rage the bigmouth volcano destroyed himself and
the volcano next to him, half of the third one was
chopped off (you can still see today a perfect section of
it). But what seemed to be a dramatic but closed story
was in reality only the first act.
In fact, all of a sudden, in 1925 Krakatoa emerged

from the waters spitting fire and smoke and, ever
since, little by little, he came out of the water growing
exactly in the same position he used to hold. Fast
159
forward to 2012 and what you have is a 400 meters

mountain thats keep growing.
The volcano-island is officially active today and with

the rest of the crew we camped one night at his feet, a
sleepless night at least for me - but what an
astonishing dawn we saw at 5am! And what an
astonishing tiring hike in the sand we had to do.
When we reached the top we were welcomed by the
sulfurs smell (at least in the morning is a bit less
intense) and the amazing panorama around us. I cant
even describe what I saw, it was like standing on the
shoulders of a giant - a powerful, silent and dangerous
giant in waiting for its own destiny, surrounded by the
sea and the leftovers of its fury, and if Im here writing
this story it is a clear sign that luckily while we were
there its destiny wasnt around.
Ten days after we left the volcano-island crossing the

strait and jumping on the waves I received a message
from my guide who, quite excited, urged me to go
back since the volcano was erupting and I had to see
the night lightened by the lava.
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40
taxi drivers
act iii
Kuala Lumpur is filled with places you can only

define with the expression in the middle of nowhere,
and Ive found myself in those places a few times, like
the other night.
I was crossing the city from side to side at the slow

pace of a taxi driven by a middle-age Indian-
Malaysian man. We have a small talk while he stares
at me through the mirror, asking my personal details. I
try to see his face too while he lowers the radio and
shares his bitterness - he calls me Carlos like many
others do.
Dear Carlos, its a tough life over here, really

difficult...this city is too expensive and its too hard to
live here...theres too much disparity today, but once it
was better. You see, driving a taxi isnt what I want to
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do, I use to be a good engineer....but now...well, I just

want to leave.
Leave to...where? I ask trying to hold the
conversation.
I dont know, just away from here...maybe I can go to
Italy! You come here and I move there! OK?.
Fair enough, I can see some sort of cultural balance in

that. Then I try to ease the situation confessing Ive
left Italy for similar reasons, but he reacts weirdly at
my words, like he is hurt.
What do you mean? This is not possible! Italy is a

beautiful place! Everyone loves Italy!.
Yeah, it is beautiful indeed, but sometime beauty isnt
enough, most of all if you have to live with it...in a way
its like with women....
Waiting for the traffic lights the car is still and while
hes listening and starting through the windscreen the
taxi driver nods, but I dont think hes convinced -
someones calling, he answers. A long call in Indian-
English-Bahasa (the local language) begins so I take
the chance to get closer to the window and get closer
to the city.
The meter makes a beep each 10 cents and the night is

hotter than usual. I feel the weight of the week and
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my head is filled with useless thoughts so I decide to

hold on Rameshs words. How could I run away from
Italy? I never did it, really, how could I do something
like that? How can you run away from yourself? Your
culture, a lifetime attitude - at the most you can be
physically far from it but its like a tattoo: itll always
stay with you.
Sure I could have made another choice, the choice to

stay and keep doing what I was doing, but when I
looked in front of me I saw the fog and I understood I
had to give myself a chance, put myself into my hands.
So I flushed the toilet and it was not a simple one, it
never is, and by now I can say it worked. Like Ramesh
I had no clue of where I was going but guess what, I
ended up somewhere, always with the risk of being
left in the middle of nowhere.
Pull over Ramesh, do you see these trash cans? Right

there. I wished good luck to Ramesh who turned to
me and smiled while collecting the money. I told him
that his country isnt that bad as he said, to me its
interesting.
The passenger gets off the taxi whos doing a U-turn

swallowed by the darkness of the night. All thats left is a
silence made of low lights and emptiness. The gates close
behind the passenger while hes walking back to his life, the
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taxi driver is gone now, maybe hes really thinking about

Italy, of how he is gonna put together the money he needs,
but for now all he has is a steering wheel and the will to
change.
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41
the woman
who knew
I read somewhere that the morning in Hong
Kong must be seen from one of the famous double-
decker trams still operating on the island. They move
east to west since 1904 and its hard to believe the city
would be the same without them. So I forced my
friends to wake up at 6 in order to be there on time. I
was looking for the city awakening, emerging from
the night before, I'm not sure but probably that was a
Sunday morning.
The hotel was on the mainland so we had to cross the

river to get there, skip breakfast, take the very first
train south and once we reached the empty streets my
friends asked: so what now? I smiled, looked in the
direction of the red tram approaching and dragging
itself with all of that noise and said: were getting on
the tram and ride until it stops, I want to see where it
ends.
165
We reached the end of it and all agreed that was the

real Hong Kong. There were no tourists and little
English, a beautiful market was happening and with
some difficulties we had freshly made egg-tart.
My friends enjoyed the ride so they proposed to go all

the way to the other end. One of them felt asleep but I
moved quickly to sit on the back seats of the deck.
From that seat the perspective on the city was great
and the slow-rigid-pace of the tram felt like you're not
just looking outside of the window, you're actually
filming.
Going back the empty roads little by little became

more vibrant I noticed that another tram was
166
following us, it was green and I noticed a woman

sitting in the front seat of the deck: she was my
counterpart. I stared at her and waited -
metaphorically speaking since I wasnt indeed driving
the tram. She noticed me with the camera at one stop
and I didnt miss the chance to take a picture, a series
of pictures, while she got closer to me at the next stop.
She noticed I was there but she didnt smile or move
to another seat - she just posed for me. For two
endless minutes she's been my partner in crime, for
two minutes during which two strangers found
themselves playing opposite parts of a movie.
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42
conrads
viscera
I couldnt have lived in Malaysia without seeing

whats going on on the other side of the country, the
Borneo, the jungle of the jungles, a vast and
mysterious place with the richest species biodiversity
on the planet. When I chose the National Park of
Mulu as my first - and only - expedition I couldnt
guess I was about to meet something else besides the
powerful tropical jungle.
The Mulu National Park is a special area due to a

number of millenary caves scattered within its
territory - including enormous caves, vast cave
networks, rock pinnacles, cliffs and gorges - and when
youre moving around it almost feels like youre
exploring the jungles viscera, silently entering in a
sacred place shaped by a gigantic quantity of water.
And it is in one of these caves that Ive met the
darkness and I immediately thought about Conrad -
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who by the way had really been in this area - I

thought I had a sense of what he described in his
books, the complete absence of light, the dreadful fear
you feel when youre waving your hand in front of
your face and you cant see a thing perfectly knowing
your eyes are wide opened.
Equipped with an helmet and the right shoes I joined

an expedition in one of the caves and at one point our
guide suggested we take a break, we stay silent and
turn off our flashlights. It was there that I have seen
the darkness, and what is it then? The darkness means
Ive felt my eyes being worthless, worthless because
there was nothing I could have seen. The contrast in
between the outside noisy thick overwhelming jungle
170
and the silence of a cave populated by bats, snakes and

stalactites was immense: in the jungle youve got
thousands of eyes watching you while in the caves
theres no use for your eyes.
Those few days in the jungle I felt a tension running

around me the whole time, the tension of a place
exploding with life and hostile in a primitive sense - I
felt like I was out of place, at the mercy of a higher
presence, way stronger and more unpredictable than
any human being. Dense, slimy, everywhere the jungle
makes you feel surrounded with no way out.
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Mulu is the biggest caves network on the planet,

including the second biggest cave in the world that I
uselessly tried to picture, called Deer Cave, which is so
big a small Cessna could fly inside of it for a couple of
hundreds meters. The roof is literally covered with
millions of bats waiting to go out for dinner - which
usually happens around seven oclock every day - a
swarm of mammals comes out of the mouth of the
cave in a spectacular way.
Borneo is home for these and many others creations of

nature, and I strongly believe this place is the main
attraction not only of Malaysia but of the Southeast
Asia.
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43
the stranger
I always knew Ive been at ease in the ever-

changing role of the stranger: he whos always coming
from a mystic and distant place called elsewhere; he
whos always passing by, running away, out of place
and out-rooted. The stranger is like a flower in a vase,
you can carry it around, keep it in the sun or hide it in
the shade.
If being a stranger was a job it would be filled with

alibi! As a stranger its easier to live with the fact no
one understands you, of being the other one, identified
with a luggage, with the fact you should go home at
some point, of being always at a certain distance from
something or not being able to speak the language, of
not having friends, being the one missing, of walking
alone with yourself in the wind.
If you live in your own context/place it is a bit more

difficult to recognize yourself in a role while as a
stranger you are guaranteed of, at least, one position,
173
one exclusive point of view, you will have a small part

in the scene, you wont be left out, lost in the outskirts
with dirty shoes because at any given moment you are
entitled to raise and say: wait a minute! I am a
stranger!
But of course there are downsides too, first of all

because you are by definition a minority, a minority
who might become unicity, youre alone, uno, single,
with an identity that decides on behalf of you, with an
accent that leaves no room for doubts and raises in
tonnes of misunderstandings - that is at a superficial
level we might be this or that but the moment we
speak out were done! Exposed!
Exposed to the curse all the strangers: the stereotypes.

So when you least expect it, the fair of silliness begins,
the racisms, the gestures, the MODI DI DIRE, the
youve lost that game..., the is it true that girls
from... and on and on and on up to the point youve
been identified with the stereotypes that is really like a
ghost youve never met in person, but he stays there
with you, disturbing, slipping into all the
conversations, a little fly in your ears. Yes, it is true that
from time to time that curse might give you a hand,
and being the other is a positive thing - because, you
see, that ghost is a representation of a long wire that
goes back straight into our roots and has to do a lot
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with something called belonging, with all the steps

done by somebody before us, with the place you were
born and the blood, with having traditions and poetry
in your shoes.
It takes time to learn how to be a stranger, in

understanding a tenth of the information around you
and yet still surviving, in living with the weight of the
distance on your shoulders and the smell of absence in
your heart. It takes art to be your own island in
unknown waters. It takes art to reach out for reference
points even though youre lost, because the stranger
will always be a flower in a vase, an uncomfortable
vase at times, a fragile one but at the end of the day a
stranger knows that vase has to become home for your
short roots.
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44
footprint
Guns, germs and steel by Jared Diamond is one of
my favorite books. The initial part of the book he
describes the dawn of Man, the way he managed to
move and conquer more and more territories; from
our mother land Africa he spread like a virus all over
the globe. According to the book the apemen firstly
moved towards Southeast Asia one million years ago
as you will appreciate in the following illustration.
177
This made me think that technically the evolution of

Man is nothing else but a long walk and that,
unquestionably, the need to explore is inherited in
every single human being. It also reminded me of my
everlasting love for maps.
At this point I naturally found myself questioning:

what about myself? How big is the area Ive covered
during my journey in Southeast Asia? Theres any sort
of relation with what those apemen did? How big is
my footprint?
If some of those questions are nonsense, others give

me the chance to play with numbers and maps, and
more precisely to figure out and draw the size of my
personal footprint. So I did and as you can appreciate
in the following illustration, I measured the land Ive
covered using x and y axes, where x is Kolkata-Tokyo
and y is Seoul-Melbourne. As it turns out the overall
area is some 44,000 sq. mt.
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It might seem quite a big area to you but Id like to

suggest you look at it in a different way. When I look
at this map what I see in reality is this:
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In this map youll see a vast dark area, much much

bigger than the orange one. That area represents all the
unseen places Id like to go, all the places Id like to go.
I look at this map and I think: the road I still have to
walk is long and I do not have a million years...
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45
to the next
harbor
Its pitch-dark and the time to leave has come.

Calm is the water and there is no reason to rush.
For twenty four months Ive been living in this harbor
moving back and forth like a spring.
All I had was a ship and my thirsty eyes,

and we took every single chanceto go and see,
and weve seen.
Thick jungles, ancient temples, volcanoes,

mysterious eyes, majestic caves, snakes of people,
a zillion cultures, religions and hands.
The journey was rich, the experience pure,

but now the wind has changed,
and its time to sail away to the next harbor.
Its pitch-dark now but soon the sun will rise,

and Ill be able to see the horizon once again.
181
Shall I point East or West? For how long will I be sailing?

Will I get lost in the attempt to find a piece of land?
Like waves questions come and go endlessly.
At the moment I have no answers to share,

but if I close my eyesI can feel the breeze, sniff the air,
and that is fine with me.
I called the ship Lightness

because everything has been left behind.
A ship made of memories and lessons learned,
nothing more, nothing less.
The wind has changed and its time for a new voyage.
I cant see whats next, I can just sail away,
and wonder what will happen.
Sometimes you need to be far away from everything,

to the point you see no land.
And only there and then your thoughts will take a rest,
so youll be finally be able to understand,
if you should sail East or West.
182
183

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TALES FROM SOUTHEAST ASIA

dedicated to mat and alice

IN ORDER TO TRAVEL PAST THE

IN FACT, EACH ONE OF THE

OFTEN THE SONGS OF AN

1. seven hours, fifteenth floor, six days 16

4. consider the dog 27

6. single season life 35

8. help me with this pork 41

9. a day in the life 45

11. Public consciousness 55

13. i need a new girlfriend 63

14. spaghetti or noodles? 67

16. fasting and early mornings 73

18. taxi drivers - Act I 81

21. the luggage 89

23. the distance 95

24. a dawn called Sibu 97

25. the lonely traveler 101

27. a choral goodbye 109

29. walking Kolkata 115

30. youre a glass of water 121

32. indispensable 129

34. taxi drivers - Act II 139

35. about the city 143

37. curiosity 151

39. five men on a boat 157

40. taxi drivers - Act III 161

42. conrads viscera 169

44. footprint 177

45. to the next harbor 181

Its pitch dark and theres no one around but a

"youre going nowhere...youre all the mistakes you

Imagine youre driving when suddenly you find

I had no answer to any of those questions, so I did

Of all the questions Ive made to myself that one was

All I had when I was about to leave my life behind at

That thought is related to a story too long to fit this

Of course I dont believe in those kind of things. Of

that thought gave me the strength to walk away from

This book is all about what followed that step.

Its 10am in Kuala Lumpur and 3am back in

You need to start somewhere, so I begin from the

Asian tigers rightly thought about building a 451

Among other weird questions, many of the people Ive

Back to the present. For the records I had a thermic

tropical storm that was about to happen. I did indeed

Its all about Malaysias location, so close to the

Ladies and gentlemen the adventure has begun, now

I spent the last few years getting rid of things inside

to find the right words to describe this journey in its

My very first lecture took place in the BB3

The classroom name hence was BB3, on the ground

The subject was, I have to admit it, quite boring -

without saying that to keep the morale high you have

Generally speaking the very first class of any module is

I stared at them and thought what a soup. There was

That same afternoon I had to teach again hence there

When the class was over I repeated there was no room

A) how old are you?

PS. When questioned how they should call me I

More than the color of your skin, more than

In a city that by definition is a melting pot of many

My theory, so to speak, is that we all grow up

I was having lunch the other day with a few friends -

that level there was such a great diversity to make us

I came to the conclusion that if there was a Stomach