Semester-break holiday: Malaysia and Singapore

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After Wei-Sheng and I have decided just not to mention at USQ administration that we would be abroad for a few days more than officially allowed in our student visa, at short notice we booked a flight with Air Asia for a reasonable price from Colangata to KualaLumpur. At first, arrived at KL airport, I was overwhelmed by the heat and humidity and those friendly bustling people all around the airport in KL. We took the bus to KL city to meet Anthony, with whom we would stay for a few days, - just across "The Pyramids", a huge shopping centre and adventure park. I was very impressed of life on the streets in this mega city. At first I could not cope with this chaotic system, but after 2 weeks I liked it more and more, as I found out more about the positive aspects. Shopping centres here are just enormous! We've been to Midland's Carrefour shopping centre (-once the world's biggest-), and we literally got lost in it. Shopping centres are very popular in Malaysia. People like to stroll around and meet friends in these air-conditioned places. Most of the mornings we started with Chabati (which finally became my favourite dish here!). Steve had to prepare for his IELTS test, while in the meantime I sometimes explored the surroundings on my own or with Anthony. Batu Caves was definitely one of the highlights at KL! The longer you stayed there, the more you got immersed into spirituality (with all these Indian chants and flower processions...). There I also met a couple from Denmark who after having arrived abroad 4 weeks ago still had to struggle with their airline, as their whole baggage was lost due to London Heathrow Terminal 5 opening catastrophe. My Malaysian friends introduced me to a lot of Do's and Don'ts here, and also to heaps of delicious novel dishes, be it in restaurants, food courts or mama/hawker stalls on the street. Eating and cooking is a very important part of Malaysian everyday life. Then, after around 1 week in KL we took the bus to Steve's home town, Batu Pahat (meaning city made out of rocks). There I could stay a few days with Steve's family (who fortunately spoke a little bit English as they both had been teachers), and also met Steve's girlfriend Annie and other friends of him. They showed me around a lot there, we celebrated Annie's birthday, went out for bowling, shopping, roaming around, they took us to Karaoke and the wet-market, a spiritual ancient fisher village,..etc. Thanks again for that! And whenever you come over to Europe/Germany, just give me a call!!! After approximately one week in Batu Pahat my plan was to visit my study colleague Cindy Lim in nearby Singapore for a few days; Cindy I just have met virtually on the net so far. Singapore city is huge, similar to KL, but things are more stringent and organized there, compared to KL, and all in all, a little bit more like Western cities. I arrived just-in-time, and the party was ready to start, and evolved great, with Ciny's many international friends: barbecue was prepared outside the dormitories next to the pool, just relaxing! The next day Cindy showed me around in Singapore down town, and I stayed one more night at her place, before I had to say good-bye (temporarily) and to go back to Steve's place, as we soon had to fly back to Australia. Eventually, this was my first real-life encounter with SE-Asian culture and life, and it really left a huge and unforgettable positive impression on me! I hope to be able to come back and meet you all again some day!

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