Happy Thanksgiving from Malaysia!

 

Unbelievably, Halloween has been, Christmas decorations and carols abound in the stores and for American’s it is time for a Turkey to be Presidentially pardoned and for people to be thankful. This is before too many then rush to the malls the following day (or should we say Thanksgiving evening) to push fellow citizens out of the way for that bargain flat screen TV. But we digress. This post is about what we are thankful for this year and as many know, we are writing this from Borneo, Malaysia.

Malaysia is a stunning country, and much more about it will be featured on this site. The nation has a gross national income of $8,770 USD per capita (2011), making it an upper middle income economy, according to the World Bank. Natural resources, such as oil and gas, can also be found on the island of Borneo. Yet, the discrepancy of wealth in Malaysia is still very much present. Many people live in luxurious penthouse apartments, while others live in shacks with little access to basic amenities such as clean drinking water, let alone their own kitchen. So it is easy for us this Thanksgiving to be thankful (especially since Alex is over his food poisoning!). Here is what we both wanted to share with you, our readers, who we are also very thankful for!

Alex: After my childhood years, and the thrill of opening presents subsided, Thanksgiving surpassed Christmas as my favorite holiday. I appreciated that the day was less commercial and the focus was on families getting together to eat good food and share quality time… and of course football! While it is unfortunate that I’m not in the USA today, I am very grateful to have the experience of visiting Malaysia. I am glad to be spending the day with my lovely wife and enjoying the sun, good food and incredibly diverse culture. And of course, it’s always important to be thankful for good health.

Bell: This isn’t a native holiday for me, but agree with Alex that it has a lot of good sentiment around it. So today I am thankful that we have been able to travel and experience these diverse cultures and experience just how wonderful people around the world, regardless of skin colour or religion can be. I am thankful to have a hubby who *mostly* accepts my crazy plans and ideas! And, that after 9 years of marriage we still know how to have a good time together.

Borneo Jungle
We hope that everyone has a wonderful day today, whether you are celebrating Thanksgiving or not. And for those digging into some delicious turkey today, enjoy some for us!  Happy Thanksgiving!!

 

Author

  • Alex&Bell

    Alex and Bell originally met while solo traveling after finishing university in 2002, in Brugge, Belgium. Alex grew up in the USA and Bell hails from Australia. During our nearly 20 year marriage we've lived around the world, including spending six years living in the Netherlands and Ireland. We have traveled to nearly 70 countries and enjoy giving readers authentic and quality travel tips. Alex is an award winning travel journalist and travel planner, who also freelances for other outlets. Bell is an award winning PhD scientist who currently works for a non-profit lung cancer advocacy research organization called Lungevity. Happy travels and if you have any questions leave a comment or drop an email!

4 thoughts on “Happy Thanksgiving from Malaysia!

  1. I am grateful for my beautiful daughter Bellinda and her husband Alex and I love reading their blogs and following their travels all over the world. I love it when they come home to Aus!!! Happy Thanksgiving and happy birthday Alex.

    1. Awww, that’s really sweet Mum! Thank you for the Thanksgiving and birthday wishes too! They were both special and unique days this year being in Malaysia. We always love returning down under to visit you as well and when you can come see us wherever we are residing in this world 🙂

  2. Happy Thanksgiving to you both as well & happy birthday to Alex as too! Great to see you are enjoying Malaysia, hope one day to follow in your footsteps, so cannot wait to read your upcoming segments on Malaysia. How are the women there? Is gender inequality a visable problem?

    1. Thank you Sun Chaser! Happy belated Thanksgiving as well! We hope you guys had an awesome one in Norway- did you cook a roast reindeer? 😉 As far as Malaysia, Bell thinks women in certain Mediterranean European countries like Italy have perhaps a more unfair playing field. She consulting on Malaysia’s ageing study and the Principle Investigator of the study is female- there are also several Muslim women who are also working on the study. You see lots of Muslim women in work places in Malaysia, some in pretty high up positions…I would say a country where women have it much worse would be Morocco. We only did a day trip there but we saw no women working in Tangier and never even spoke to a single woman that day. Malaysian women don’t have it too bad, especially considering it is such a melting pot…the Chinese girls there love to wear short skirts and shorts!

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