Cargo at Malacca

The harbour at Malacca is the loudest place I have ever painted. Every wharf is stacked: tea chests, coils of hemp rope, bolts of cloth, timber still black with tar. The air tastes of salt and black tea and wet rope.

I spent two days drawing the hands of the men unloading tea. They count in three languages and never lose the thread.

A trader from Sarawak was selling gaharu from a locked box. He burned a sliver on a coin to show me. The smoke was dark and sweet, like leather left in the sun, and it hung in the room long after he had gone. He would not sell me a piece, and I could not have paid for it anyway. I painted the sliver of wood from memory that night.

The cook at my lodging house wraps rice in pandan leaves before steaming it. Her kitchen smells green and nutty, then of coconut, then of palm sugar melting in the pan. She let me sit by the window while the cakes cooled, on the condition that I painted her cat.

Tomorrow, north.