Malaysia

The Petronas towers - one of the most famous landmarks in the world

Malaysia so far...We've only been in Malaysia a couple of days but so far, I've not had the greatest impression of the country. We started off crossing the border from Singapore by bus to Johor Bahru. We met a girl in South America who told us that she remembered crossing the border and being taken aback by the difference between the two countries as the bus drove over the bridge. You literally drive from everything being all squeaky clean, shiny and modern, to, well, more of a neglected developing city. 

View from our hostel balcony in Melaka

The good thing was, as sanitation standards went down, so did prices, and for a few pounds, we managed to navigate our way on and off several different buses, before finally ending up in Melaka, the place we had booked a hostel for the night. Queue bad experience number one. When we booked the hostel, they had asked us for an estimated time of arrival and I had just put down 10pm as a guess as I had no idea when we would arrive. Most hostels have someone on the reception 24/7 so it doesn't actually matter when you arrive. Not this one. We got out of the taxi at 7pm and knocked on the door and it seemed no one was in. There was a sign saying 'out to lunch'. Then, two German girls came to the door and said that the owner was out and they weren't allowed to let us in. However, after a bit of persuasion, they let us in to put our bags down and then told us to get straight back out and wait for the owner to come back. The German girls were leaving to go our for dinner and they did not want to leave us in the hostel alone. So, Jemma and I went out to a little Chinese place for dinner, came back an hour later, and still nobody was there, not even the German girls. After a while of knocking, a coy Chinese girl appeared at the door and told us to go away and that she was not allowed to let us in. A this point, Jemma was bursting for the toilet and pleaded with the girl just to let her in for one minute to use the bathroom. She even said the girl could keep her bag as an assurance. No can do – the girl shook her head and insisted that she could not let us in. It was 9.30pm at night by this point, and we just sat on the step outside the hostel and waited. In the end, we had to go to a cafe down the road and wait there. The cafe owner knew the hostel owner's number, so we used skype to call him. A few minutes later, he came and let us in, but not before demanding to know where our rucksacks were. We told him they were in the hall and we had put them there earlier. 'WHO LET YOU IN??' he said. Jemma just said that people had been going out as we arrived and had let us leave our big rucksacks in the lounge. He did not look happy and was actually a really scary man. We finally got to our room at about 10.30pm, and although it was nice enough, it had bed bugs. 

My poor leg covered in bedbug bites

I got terribly bitten all over my legs, arms and back and I really have nothing good to say about Melaka. We went on a boat cruise at night along the river, which was nice, but other than that, there was not much to the city. Its supposed to be a World Heritage sight, and maybe its just because we've been travelling so long that we've become blasé about these amazing sights (I hope not) but, Malaysia really isn't much to write home about.

After 2 days in Melaka, we took a bus to the capital city Kuala Lumpur (4 hours away) and checked into our hostel, which was quite nice. KL however, is not. I am actually really disappointed with KL. I was expecting a slightly downscaled version of Singapore, maybe a little rougher around the edges, but I was really expecting too much. There is not much to do here. Its quite dirty and its really not an impressive city. The most impressive thing is the famous Petronas towers, which are nice to photograph and there is a nice modern mall near bye where you can escape the unbearable humidity, but that's about it. One thing we did do in Melaka, was go to a chicken satay restaurant called Capital satay, where you buy a load of raw meat on skewers for about 20p per skewer and then dip it in the boiling hot satay sauce on the table to cook it. That was an interesting experience!

Cooking our own chicken in the satay pot

 Maybe I am not in a position to be impartial – during my time in KL, I have been covered in bedbug bites, suffered from a bad cold and had a migraine. Also, nowhere was ever going to compare to Singapore, was it? I had a down moment the other day thinking about it all, and realised that maybe Japan is to blame, perhaps Japan has spoiled me for life and no other countries will ever compare (except Singapore). I hope not. I am hopeful that Thailand will be infinitely better and now I am over my cold, I am trying to see the positives in Malaysia.

You can get a mega mac meal for £1.80!!

One positive is the cheap food. Although it could be seen as a negative too: Because its so cheap, we are buying double thus spending the same amount as in an expensive country and becoming fat in the process.

We have met a few nice people here though, including Amanda from Baltimore, who quit her job to go travelling and is writing a blog called 'Amanda abroad'. I have also met 3 other people who are digital nomads (they take their work with them as they travel the world). One is a journalist for a national newspaper in Norway, one edits paparazzi photos and the other does online marketing.

I have just realised I have not actually written much about what we have done here in KL. Mainly because we haven't done much. 

We have eaten a lot of Indian food, and today we went to some caves (Batu caves) where there is a Hindu shrine inside and lots of stray monkeys about pinching people's food. Tomorrow we are leaving for the Cameron highlands. Hopefully I will have something more positive to report about Malaysia from there.

For a few more photos of Malaysia, click here