Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

23 NOV 08 - Chinatown, Kuala Lumpur


Before you travel to developing countries, do yourself a favor and pack as many bottles of Pepto Bismal as reasonably possible. Because at one point or another, you will find yourself pushing, frantically, your way across a city looking for a public toilet. You will be like the drunk guy at the holiday party looking for a place to puke because he can't drink like he used to in college. Except it's not puking you need to do; compared to what's about to happen, puking in public almost seems polite. And be prepared to conduct business, when you finally do find a toilet, to do it at a place like this:





And the thing about this kind of stress is, you aren't so bothered by the fact that the entire bathroom is sopping wet. You don't care that the bidet is covered in wet toilet paper. You don't care that you are only wearing flip flops while you are standing in this 1/4" deep standing wetness. You're only thoughts are focused on managing the mechanics of this operation...

Needless to say, Heather and I have been taking turns with stomach bugs for the last two weeks. I am not sure if it's been the same demonous bastard stomach bug, but it hasn't been pleasant. But on the bright side, I think we're onto a new diet fad. The foundation of this diet is to fear everything you eat; so you don't eat too much when you do actually work up an appetite!!!

Kualau Lumpur

In all seriousness, have you even heard of Kuala Lumpur? Without looking at a map, can you even give a vague description of where this city is? Because I certainly could not have before 48 hours ago, but this city is awesome! It is South East Asia's version of Chicago and that's no whistling dixie. It is home to the world's second tallest skyscrapers and the world's 4th tallest communication tower, it's public transit system is incredible and it is easily the most obviously diverse city I have been to.

Descent into Malaysia: I'm pretty sure this photo is strictly forbidden but you can see the never ending expanse of palm trees. Unfortunately these palms are not natural. I read that upwards of 65% of Malaysia's forests have been deforested to plant palms.

KL (Kuala Lumpur) has both a sky bridge train and a subway system. It reminds me of the 'L' in Chicago or the tram in Seattle.


Heather and I were very relieved to find a very nice and affordable room to stay in while we are here. The fact that the room is clean, secure and air conditioned forgives the fact that the walls are acoustically terrible. You literally can hear everything going on in the surrounding rooms; and I mean EVERYTHING... I've never thought of privacy from an auditory perspective.

MENARA COMMUNICATIONS TOWER:

As you can see, KL is huge and looks like it could be any city in the world. And this is only one view from one side of the observation deck. There are 15 other views to see from the 360 degree platform. From here, I spotted the building we are staying in. It's in the lower left hand corner, about 1" up from the empty lot.

A zoomed in view of the building. It's the short building in the center of the picture.

Great view of the Petronas Twin Towers from the viewing deck of the 421 meter tall, Menara Communications Tower (4th tallest comm. tower in the world). The Petronas Towers are the headquarters for the nation's petroleum company. This building is iconic in the Architecture world. I've seen it countless times in books and in lectures but never really paid attention to where it was. I always figured either China or Singapore.

SAME SAME BUT DIFFERENT

Traveling is cool for many reasons. It can bring you to tropical venues. It can introduce to you people with completely different views and opinions. But the best thing traveling does is it rewards you with valuable perspective.

Thailand was totally unlike home; I hoped and expected this. Everything from infrastructure to food, things were just strange in very good ways. And so there really isn't anyway to compare Thailand to home. But Malaysia is different, or at least Kuala Lumpur is. This city is so developed and clearly influenced by capitalism that seeing similarities is oddly comforting. Even though seeing McDonald's and Starbucks staring at each other from opposing corners makes me sick, I can appreciate the good things the free market brings; like developed human waste management.

And because this city is so superficially similar to any US city, I forget that I am on the other side of the globe... that is, until an alarming cultural difference slaps me in the face. For example:

Korner Restoran in Little India - I was stoked to find out KL has a Little India district. I was sure we could get some amazing authentic Indian food for cheap. So on our way back from the KL Tower, we swung into little India for lunch. We did find a corner restaurant that had a buffet style menu. The food was very tasty but, overall, the experience was one of the more horrifying ones yet.

You see, I had always known that some middle eastern cultures, to include India, don't use utensils to eat. I had also always known that this clearly was apart of cultural tradition. And although I had never witnessed food consumed with fingers, I was ABSOLUTELY POSITIVE there had to be a tactful way to eat with your hands. But let me tell you, there is not.

We sat down and I ordered, as non-chaluantly as I could (thinking I was mister big shot), a Tikka Masala. I knew this dish purely from my experiences at North American Indian Restaurants. The guy shook his head and went to get our dishes. My comfort zone was being challenged a little bit because not only were we the only white faces out the 30 people there, but all 60 male eyes where scoping Heather. While I was realizing this I also noticed something else: everybody was using their hands to eat. And and that moment, it was like series of quick scenes from a movie.

...Flash to a handful of curry covered rice being shoved into a mouth...

...Flash to rice pieces lodged between the finger webbing's of another hand...

It was not the kind of tactful finger eating I had always figured it had to be, but before I realised what was going on, our food arrived and there was no turning back.

I was thinking, "Get it together Madden, when in Little India...be cool"

When we received our food, I asked for two pieces of Naan bread (like a fluffy, delicious tortilla) thinking I could use the bread as a spoon. But to my dismay, it is customary to only eat bread in the evenings because it is light and will not make you bloated. So rice it was with my chicken and... fingers.

...Flash forward to bathroom scene...

KLCC MOVIE THEATRE: JAMES BOND - QUANTUM OF SOLACE
Last night, Heather and I enjoyed a slice of American Pie. We discovered that the huge (8 stories) shopping mall beneath the Patronas Towers had a movie theatre and we went to the late showing of the James Bond flick. The experience was mostly the same as back home except the seating is assigned and during the movie a small child was crying and numerous men yelled out for it to "shhhh!!!"

PERSONAL SPACE AND PRIVACY - are totally differant here. Cutting in lines is common social practice and appearantly it's totally cool to sit down next to somebody using the computer and share what they are viewing. I'm not making it up, it's every person for themselves when trying to order something. And if you are not right up on someone's ars, another person will step right in front of you. This is even if there is clearly a line formed in which you are standing in. I've had to question myself numerous times if I was actually just standing in a que for people who like standing in lines.

On our way to visit the top of the Menara Communications Tower we took an urban hike through the city wildlife preserve-- it was at least 95F but the trees and greens gave great shade! Only after we had hiked through did we see the sign identifying the dangerous species to look out for. We didn't see any though Mike was hoping to.

Typical day at the market in the heart of Chinatown, KL.

At night, more vendors set up and you can find anything from designer sunglasses/handbags/suits to claimed spa treatments to fresh pomegranates and roasted chestnuts...and they will try (very intensely) to sell you all these things.

Mikes new favorite desert discovered at the mall... I asked for 1 scoop of Neapolitan
ice cream and received this!! It was tasty! (You will be suprised to know that this is a very scrumpcious snack.)



Just a few re-cap pics from Heathers camera on the islands of

Koh Tao and Koh Samui

Fresh seafood is shown off out front of all the beachside resuraunts to entice customers in. I didn't try the Shark, but the bbq crab and fish were great!!


We rented scooters for the day and rode just out of town to a monkey preserve.
I only saw this little orangutan, but you could hear them everywhere- it was awesome!

Took a day hike to the waterfalls.

Until next time

M&H