Advertisement
Published: December 3rd 2009
Edit Blog Post
Alor Star
View from our hotel window Day 23: Sintok, Malaysia to Alor Star, Malaysia
While attempting to exit the University campus, we somehow ended up on a dirt path through the woods, where before reaching a dead-end, we saw a pangolin, a four foot-long lizard. That was awesome. The campus was huge, with signs listing certain buildings as 5 kilometers away, and busses transporting students from one side to another. We biked back along the road we’d come down yesterday, witnessing tons of little kids getting dropped off at school or getting on the bus to school. It seemed every house we passed had a car in the driveway. We met up with the main highway, fields running along both sides, but otherwise very little interesting life to observe. Some drivers and motorbikers were friendly, waving to us and honking. We ate a lunch of char kuei tiaw, another very popular local dish, of noodles in a sweet gravy with clams and shrimp.
In the early afternoon, we arrived in the city of Alor Star, aka Alor Setar, boasting dozens of beautiful mosques. We visited a few hotels costing 100 riat, before finding the ASRC, a badmitton club that just happened to also boast a
five story hotel above the courts. The ground floor was crowded with badmitton players. (This sport is very popular in Laos, Thailand and apparently in Malaysia too.) There were at least a dozen courts and there was also a giant outdoor swimming pool, laden with children. The price was excellent, at 50 riat, but our room was four stories up. And there was no elevator. We carried our bikes and bags up four double-flights of stairs. But the big bathroom, without shower divider, was perfect for a bike wash, and so the bikes got a much needed shower. Our window overlooked a very modern and tall telecommunications tower, as well as swaying palm trees. Our bed boasted a lovely blue spandex comforter, resembling a leotard.
We headed out to the street to explore, and came upon a Chinese restaurant, right around the corner. It was closed but a family party was just ending. The family insisted we come sit and eat, feeding us fruit, coffee, water, juice boxes, rice and red curry chicken livers and feet. (We weren't crazy about the feet.) Everyone was so nice; they were celebrating the beginning of Hungry Ghost Month, a holiday devoted to
caring for one’s own dead ancestors. Some of the family spoke English, and we told them about our trip. A table of men excitedly debated our travels, in Chinese and Malay. Their chosen interpreter, an obese man, kept coming over to our table to ask us more questions and stare at my boobs. Then, all the guys got in separate cars, at the same time, and departed. The women and kids stuck around to clean up.
A little later, we walked over to the telecommunications tower. Seven girls manned a long desk, though there were no customers. It was at this point that we learned that Malaysia was one hour ahead of Thailand, and we set our cell-phone clocks forward accordingly. The tower would close in about an hour, but if we wanted to go up it was 10 ringit to visit the observation deck, or free to visit the revolving restaurant. Revolving restaurant!! No way!! We were there in a few seconds; literally, as the elevator was super fast! (After a near freak-out by the girls at the front-desk. “There’s something wrong with the revolver!!”, a cry echoed down the line of girls. "It’s OK", we said, we
still want to go up.)
Up at the restaurant, it was just us and three young Muslim staff. The kitchen is in the central area of the tower, and the outer ring, where the customer tables are, revolves. Apparently, the revolver was not broken completely, but just going slower than normal. And thank god, as the revolving was still fast enough to make us nauseous at first. We enjoyed looking down on the lights of the city, a handful of tall buildings, and hundreds of cars, (where were they all going at 10 at night?) The restaurant had finished serving food, and were delighted that we just wanted to order drinks. (We were delighted too, as the food was expensive!) I ordered tea and J coffee. We received an entire pot of tea and an entire pot of coffee. We proceeded to drink the entirety of both pots, becoming quite buzzed, while enjoying our exclusive rights to the whole place.
We spoke with the head chef, who told us the tower was opened in 1997 for telecommunications. He claimed it to be the 13th tallest building in the world, which we both failed to believe, it being only 560 meters tall. They kicked us out at 10:45 so they could close. What fun! Dining atop a huge tower at a revolving restaurant for only a few dollars!
Jazzed up on caffeine, we walked the streets, looking for a bar. Not an easy task, as Muslims do not drink, but there are a few bars, run by the Chinese. And with our luck, we soon found one, filled with Chinese patrons getting rowdy, offering a great selection of Guiness, Heineken and Budweiser. We ate shrimp crackers and sunflower seeds, the bar snacks of choice as we drank our beers. No one paid any attention to us. Soccer was on TV and raging, weird music blasted from the speakers.
Tables of men and women chugged beer out of shot glasses. Three young men with manpurses sat next to us at the bar, playing a drinking dice game. People arrived for a birthday party, all dressed up, took one shot glass of beer, and departed. It was midnight and a six-year old girl in pajamas and pigtails played her Gameboy at the bar, out with her mom and her mom’s friends. She took silly pictures on a camera phone for and of the group. She appeared to be texting somebody at one point and I could only imagine her texting her kindergarten friends, “I’m at the bar. Where are you? Oh, you’re at home? You’ve been asleep since 7? OK. I guess I’ll see you in the morning, in kindergarten.”
We left through the swinging cowboy front doors around 1:30, that little girl now outside, her mom taking glamour shots of her, posing happily on the hood of a car. We walked over to a busy food stall on the next corner, packed with people eating and drinking. We ate me nying, noodles with gravy, chicken and tofu. Our cook came over and gave us a lychee-like fruit to eat, called a drunut. It was segmented, like an orange, but small, and whitish-clear. We went home that night surprisingly drunk for our second night in a Muslim country that we’d thought didn’t even allow alcohol.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.089s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 10; qc: 30; dbt: 0.0586s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb