Elsie in Taiping

To beat the heat, we decided to head to the Cameron Highlands, but to break up the long trip, we would stay one night in the small town of Taiping. After about an hour and a half, our bus made it to the main bus station outside of town. I wandered around, looking for both transport to the Cameron Highlands and a way to get to the town center. An older (ok, she was old) Chinese woman approached me and offered her help, and before I knew it, Beth and I were ushered into a public bus surrounded by staring, smiling locals. The woman and I started chatting, and suddenly she offered to put us up for the night! Although we were a little wary, after she showed us the errors of the Lonely Planet “places to stay” (one had been out of business for the last 2 ½ years, one was…. missing), we gladly accepted her kind offer. Then it started. She completely took us under her wing – buying us lunch, paying for the taxi to her house (thank god, as it was at the top of a very steep hill!), making us feel at home and ordering us to nap for a couple of hours before tea and sightseeing (tea and sightseeing??!). It was hard to believe – one minute we were riding a crowded local bus, the next minute we were sleeping in a large double bed, in an air conditioned room of a 71 year-old Chinese lady! You would think we would have been uncomfortable, but for some reason she put us totally at ease. At 5:00pm, she woke us up, served us tea, and we were off to the Lake Gardens of Taiping.

The gardens were beautiful – huge lakes surrounded by sculpted land formations topped with exotic flowers and palm trees. For a 71 year old, Elsie was putting us to shame. While we were tired and hot, she was strolling briskly while telling us about the local history. After the gardens, we were treated to dinner – this woman was unbelievable. We had noodles, crab and veggies and she proceeded to give us both cooking lessons and introduce us to fresh fruit juices like star fruit juice, watermelon juice and sugar cane juice. On our way home (before Elsie treated us again to the taxi), we stopped at the fruit and vegetable night market which was excellent. She allowed us to buy some crepes, and then insisted we eat them all!! We had the best sleep ever in the air conditioned bedroom, but when we woke up in the morning, Elsie informed us that she couldn’t get to sleep until 2:00am because of the heat. The room she slept in didn’t have A/C! We felt so bad, but she wouldn’t have it any other way. We were allowed to pick up breakfast the next morning – Indian roti chanai that came to a grand total of 6 ringgit! After we regrettably parted ways, we took a taxi (stubbornly paid for by you-know-who) to the local station, and we were on our way to the Cameron Highlands.

As I look back now, I can’t help compare our brief stay with Elsie to the experience of the main character in the true story (and movie) written by Jon Krakauer “Into the Wild”. The main character in the book, a boy in his early twenties, had taken up a life of solitude and spent a couple of years on a soul searching journey that ultimately ending with him dying in the Alaskan wilderness. On his way to Alaska, he was taken in by an elderly man who lived alone. They ended up sharing a lot and spending a lot of time together. In the movie, when they parted ways, it was very sad – the boy did not appear to give too much thought to their relationship at the time, but he had a great effect on the man, perhaps filling a void is his life. What did Elsie think of our brief stay with her? Were we filling some void left in her life in some small way? I guess we were too young and self-centered to think of those things at the time, but it makes me feel sad now.