The Last South East Asian Days... Kuala Lumpur, Melaka and Singapore

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I am now writing to you from Australia!! Eeek exciting times! A lot has happened in the last week, and I will now update you on my recent antics!

So making a swift exit from Penang before causing any more trouble we took what for us seemed like an incredibly short 5 hour bus ride to Kuala Lumpur. Here we would find a whole new level of heat! Just before we disembarked from the bus there was a typical short burst of powerful rainfall. When we went outside not only did the familiar heat wave hit us, but the puddles that we were walking through felt like hot bath water. Extremely intense heat. Kuala Lumpur, apart from Singapore, was the most developed city we visited. Very clean, with an efficient train and mono rail service, the mighty Petronas Towers dominate the city skyline and look spectacular at night. Although we saw them unfortunately we were not able to go up them. However we were able to go up the Menara Kuala Lumpur, the fourth largest communications tower in the world, and if anything the view was better from up there than it would have been from the Petronas Towers. Most of our time was spent ambling around the city, and a notable highlight was eating with a monkey. As we got some lunch on a street side stall we noticed a big monkey was sitting on top of a drinks machine. We naturally assumed that it was the owner's pet and so we asked what its name was, to which the guy said that it was actually just a wild monkey and it was sitting there to avoid the rain! Must have been the most chilled out wild animal Ive ever seen. A major setback with Kuala Lumpur though was our accomodation, probably the worst place we stayed throughout the whole of our five weeks in Asia. Highly rated by our Bible of a Lonely Planet Guidebook, it seemed like an obvious choice to stay at the Pondok Lodge. How we cursed Lonely Planet afterwards. Although the room was no bigger than a match box, the main problem is that it was directly above a club with a thumping sound system. Now having been a student sleeping with loud music is something I have become used to, but genuinely I think it would have been easier to sleep with a fog horn constantly blaring in my ear. On top of this there was the most powerful air conditioning unit in our room in the world that couldnt be switched off. Now while this was bliss after a long days walk through the hot streets of the city, in the middle of the night it felt like you were sleeping in the Arctic with little more than a towel for cover. So dont believe everything Lonely Planet tells you, although most of what it preaches is gospel. Whilst Kuala Lumpur was a nice city, it felt like it lacked a soul to me. Clean and neat streets with nice parks, there was no inspirational feel of history or presence about the city.
Melaka was our next stop, and we went from staying in the worst guesthouse in Kuala Lumpur, to the best one here. I can't recommend Tony's Guest House enough. Located in the center of Town it was incredibly cheap, amazingly decorated with cool and funky paintings all over the place done by Tony himself, and Tony was unbelievably nice and helpful. Melaka much like Kuala Lumpur was scorching, however where Kuala Lumpur lacked soul, Melaka had mountains of it. Having been an important base for the Portuguese, Dutch and British in the past, Melaka had a strange but quaint dutch/mediterranean feel about it, not feeling south east Asian at all. However what did feel Asian about it was the food. These past five weeks I have eaten unbelievably well, and am desperately going to miss the incredible cuisine in this part of the world. Melaka saved the best till last - every meal we had was amazing. Our first was a curry in a restaurant called Selvum and was totally delicious and authentic, served on a banana leaf and eaten with your hands. We also tried lots of Baba Nonya food which is original malaysian cuisine and is basically a fusion of chinese and indian cuisine. However, a restaurant challenging for the best meal of the trip was Capital Satay. Much like the legendary Ba Le Well in Hoi An, Capital Satay on server one dish - surprisingly enough its Satay. With a boiling pot of Satay sat in the middle of the table, one went up to a canteen-esque counter and chose anything you wanted to cook in it - chicken, liver, pork, beef, chillis prawns, pretty much any type of meat. As the Satay was so hot, all the ingredients were raw and we cooked them ourselves in the middle of the table. Incredibly tasty and addicitive, the owner was so impressed with our efforts that he gave us several of the biggest prawns ive ever seen as a reward. It was then he said that if we beat the record amount of sticks (all the meat was served on sticks), a whopping 182, he would give us our entire meal for free. Having already had 30 each and feeling pretty stuffed, we cursed having eaten earlier in the day as this challenge seemed extremely appealing to us. However not wanting to reach 170 sticks and not being able to eat anymore only to be given a massive bill did'nt appeal to us either. Capital Satay is also one of the favourite places for rugby and basketball players from around the world, as the owner showed us pictures of him with various England rugby players. We felt pretty chuffed when we got a photo with him that he said he would put on his wall. Again Melaka was a nice place to just wonder around, as we strolled round the old Portuguese fort and shopped for some bargains in Chinatown.
Our last stop on our South East Asian Tour was Singapore. Here family friend's of Tom were extremely kind enough to give us a lovely place to sleep, which I am extremely grateful for. Singapore is an amazing city. Hi tech, super advanced and wealthy, this is what the other cities in South East Asia aspire to be like. The day Tom and I had there we spent just as much time underground as above it, as underneath Singapore not only is the cool MRT network, but also massive shopping malls that are incredibly easy to get lost in. Tom and I also took the opportunity to check out a few of the city's top 5 star hotels, having a tap water in the swish Fullerton, and scraping together all our last pieces of change to indulge ourselves with a Singapore Sling in the Raffles Hotel. Swanky. A total fusion of East and West, it was a gentle way to get us ready for Sydney and to say goodbye to a truly amazing part of the world that I feel sad to be leaving. I know that this will certainly not be the last time I will be in the area, as although we have done so much, there is still so much more to do there. However while I am sad to be leaving, Im just as excited to be in Sydney! Have settled in nicely so far in the Bahlmain Backpackers lodge and have already got my australian sim card sorted and have looked around some appartments, some of which look incredible!! A more detailed account of my Australian happenings I will give to you in a few days. I will also give a short list of must-do's for South East Asia in another Blog.
Hope you are all well, one love xxx

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Comments

[iris]

HI
Hi you two, It sounds like you had the most brilliant time and I can't wait for the your next installment. From you fanbase in Crouch End. XXX