Traveling Hi, My first few days in Malaysia were spent in Kuala Lumpur. When I first arrived I was lucky enough to be sitting next to an Australian on the plane who has a girlfriend living in KL that helped me get out of the airport, onto a train and into

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Hi,
My first few days in Malaysia were spent in Kuala Lumpur. When I first arrived I was lucky enough to be sitting next to an Australian on the plane who has a girlfriend living in KL that helped me get out of the airport, onto a train and into the city which made the first few hours very easy. From Central station i hopped on to a train to a suburb which I heard had cheap accommodation. On arrival I spent the afternoon wandering around small streets, markets and shopping centers. The area I was in seemed to be centered around a textile industry as most shops sold textiles. It also had dozens of cheap food markets selling Indian and Chinese food for a couple of bucks. I eventually found a small Motel wedged between two shops with a cheap room. Exhausted from my flight I was just happy to have somewhere to stay until I found something more affordable. The next day I spent wandering around the city and was constantly amazed at the sight of the Petronas Towers which seemed to form a back drop to the city from every direction I walked in. After doing a lap of the center and spending hours trapped in the biggest indoor shopping malls I have ever seen I headed to an area called Bukit Bintang to look for a cheap place to stay while I was in KL. Bukit Bintang Is a small area in one of the older parts of the city which is a mix of super modern indoor shopping malls and 0ld city streets packed with food markets. After going around several crummy back packers I found a place ran by two Pakistani’s who seemed friendly enough and got myself a dorm. I filled in the arvo by getting lost trying to find my way back to my motel, realising when I got there I had actually walked past it about three times thinking it was further on.
I spent the next few days wandering around KL. I went up the Petronas Towers which gave some amazing views of just how big KL really is, Went to China town to Buy a needle and thread which filled up nearly half a day in its self as I couldn’t find a shop anywhere that would sell me such a thing. Before I went there I was sure it would have to be the easiest place in the world to by such things, as the Chinese dominate all stuff made from fabric, but instead found myself wandering around huge markets selling every cheap piece of shit known to man and streets lined with craft shops that sold every imaginable form of shiny plastic bits and pieces you would use to make cheap necklaces out of. After going into several of them and asking for directions to a shop that would sell me what I wanted, the shop keepers would either shake their head at me or tell me about some shop that didn’t exist somewhere around the corner of the next street. Finally I asked a guy in a bed shop and he assured me I just had to take the next right and left and there would be a shop second in on the left. He sounded quite believable so off I went and ended up in the markets again. I was just about to give up when I peered behind all the stalls to realise that there were ordinary shops sitting behind all of the stalls and I was right in front of the shop I was looking for which sold nothing but Needles ant threads.
After China town I needed some relief from the city so headed on a hop on hop off tourist bus that went out to a massive area of greenery that the city had set aside for conservation. The green area was massive, it has a national park, all the important Muslim and Malaysian buildings like the royal mosque and palace and heaps of parks. I spent the afternoon wandering around the outside of KL bird park which has the world’s largest free flight aviary that covers 20 Acers in area. I also walked around some amazing parks and gardens before getting a bus back to the city from the Royal Mosque.
Not being a city person the next day I left for a small town called Gopeng which has one of Malaysia’s best tourist caves nearby and some good rainforrested surrounds. I arrived in the nearest city to Gopeng that afternoon called Ipoh where I spent the night. Walking from the bus station into Ipoh was like stepping into a city that was trying its best to emerge from the third world. The place smelt of every bad odor imaginable, there were mangy dogs and cats everywhere, homeless people sleeping under awnings and rubbish lining the streets. The first place I thought might be ok to stay brought me upstairs into a brothel ran by a chain smoking Chinese pimp. I decided to check out a room anyway and after being thrown a set of keys I took my self along a dark corridor to a vacant room. The room was definitely not a fit place for a human to sleep so I headed back onto the street and found something marginally better that didn’t seem to have two separate businesses going on inside and took it. Feeling drained by the place I walked down the street and got MacDonald’s for tea as it gave some resemblance of normality.
The next day after having a taxi driver take me on a bump steer around Ipoh to the bus station I headed for Gopeng. I spent the morning wandering around Gopeng. Gopeng is a small town that mostly relies on mining, logging, Rubber plantations and harvesting palm oil. Apart from the addition of the odd car and many scooters the place didn’t look like it had changed since it was built by a population of mainly Chinese in the 1800's. I spent the next few hours looking for accommodation in the town and was stopped by a friendly Chinese man while looking off an overpass onto a highway. He was quite friendly and after the usual chat of what it was like in Australia and how he didn’t have much work as a logger due to economic bad times, he told me that there was not really any accommodation in Gopeng as it was all up in the rainforest. After being given the info that I had suspected by the end of my walk, I started calling some of the places I had found previously on google that described themselves as rainforest resorts. I had originally disregarded them as the name resort had put the wrong idea in my head of what they were like. I got hold of a guy called David, another Chinese Malay who offered to come pick me up and show me his resort. Upon arrival I was pleased to find that his resort was just a few bungalows with nothing more than a mattress inside and a large roofed communal area. I was also the only one staying for the night. That afternoon David asked me if I could ride a motor bike as he had a scooter and an old dirt bike I could use. After seeing that I could ride, he hopped on his scooter and took me up the valley his resort was on to show me some roads I could go explore that went up along two different rivers in the valley to several small villages. After setting off by myself I ended riding to the end of a road where some construction workers were laying down bitumen in one of the villages. I stopped there and got talking to a group of three men that were standing beside the road while Indian workers spread out the bitumen by hand. They were all very friendly and as usual I was stuck answering a million questions about Australia. In Malaysia these questions are generally about all things money and job related if being asked by someone of Malay decent. When they found out I was a diesel mechanic they were quick to start telling me about their broken down truck that was at the bottom of the valley. They explained that a mechanic had already had a look at it and couldn’t find the problem so I agreed to come have a look at it for them the next day.
That night David took me out for tea and seemed a little happy at the prospect of having someone to go riding with, so suggested to take me exploring the next day on the motorbikes.
We set off firstly in the morning to have a look at Goa Tempering cave. Upon arrival to the caves I discovered that the place was a very popular tourist attraction for local Malaysian tourists. There were busses of school children and Malay family’s everywhere so I suggested to David to go somewhere else, but he insisted it would be ok and once we were in the caves we could break away from the group we would have to join and travel to the exit alone. We entered the cave in a group of about 20 Malaysians. Being part of the tour was hilarious. I naturally assumed that the guide would spend his time explaining how caves and formations were created etc. As he only spoke in Malay I couldn’t understand exactly what he was saying, but the theme was very simple. Every time we stopped to look at all the formations the cave had to offer, the guide would point his flash light at various areas and show images in the caves formations that looked like something in the outside world. He pointed to anything loosely resembeling anything from a chicken drum stick, an old lady with long hair, an indent that looked like a love heart and even to a stalactite that sort of resembled a chicken drumstick. Meanwhile the crowd burst out into loud oos and aahs before laughing hysterically to them self’s. I couldn’t help myself and started laughing uncontrollably every time we stopped to get something pointed out to us. At the end of the main tour the group broke into those who were going back and those who would crawl out through the river passage. It was here I got my first glimpse of occupational health and safety in the Malay tourist industry. The people who decided to carry on through ranged from 50 to 5 years old. Nobody had any safety gear, most were wearing thongs and half of them didn’t even have a flash light. To get down to the river passage you had to slide about 3 meters down a muddy rock bank. At one stage I watched a parent push their son of about 3 years old off the ridge from the top, letting him slide to the bottom. At the bottom he was spiraling out of control and caught just in time by the guide who plunked him onto the ground with a large applause from the Malay people.
Dave and I made our way out from here by our self’s and went into Gopeng for some lunch at his local Chinese restaurant. He then took me to the local Chinese history museum. It was here that I was amazed to find all the volunteers dressed in some sort of mining protest shirt. When they found out I was from Australia, they were more than keen to explain to me that a Mining company from Western Australia was trying to start a Uranium mine in the local area, which would seriously destroy most of the water ways. We then spent the afternoon exploring palm plantations on our motorbikes. The plantations were similar in layout to tree plantations in Australia. They would line most of the lower valleys with rough tracks running through and around the perimeters so they could harvest the trees produce. I would set off first on the "scrambler" as David liked to call it which was an old 80's model Yamaha two stroke 125 to inspect weather his scooter would make it through, then come back and lead him onwards. We reached the top of one of the furthest valleys before heading back down so I could look at my new found friends broken down truck which was parked beside a cafe at the bottom of the valley at 6pm.
I arrived at the shop to find an old Mitsubishi tip truck that looked like it should have been sent to the wrecker’s years ago. After spending the first half hour trying to jump start it and finding that nothing that was electrical would work what so ever I got frustrated and started probing for more information. I then learned that they had always roll started it and it had never even had a battery. I then tried as best I could to work out from one of the mangers what the actual problem was. He told me that the mechanic thought it had a fuel problem so I started looking at the fuel system. It all seemed good so I asked what sort of symptoms the truck had and soon found the problem to be the fact that the air cleaner was so full of mud it had gone into the engine destroying it. After giving the bad news I was sat down for some more question time over several cups of Tea terak, a Malaysian version of tea that is made out of condensed milk and water and is sweet enough to rot your teeth away within minutes of the first sip. The next morning they asked me to join them for breakfast in Gopeng as I was leaving that day.
That morning David dropped me off and I sat for more question time, whilst being fed tonnes of breakfast and more tea terak. They then explained to me that they had some more machinery they wanted me to look at and suggested that I should come back to Koala Kangsar with them that night and stay with them. After a few moments thought i decided to agree, so hopped into their car and headed back up into the valleys for the day. We stopped back at the cafe where the truck was broken down for more cups of tea terak then headed up unto another part of the valley where they were laying more bitumen. After looking at a few more bits of derelict machinery for them along the way, I spent the rest of the day with the boss and his two project managers. Their days work pretty much consisted of lounging around in the shade watching Indians lay down tarmac. For the whole day the only other things they managed to achieve was getting their workers some lunch and some cold drinks and measuring out a track to a small village they were planning to build a road to. The whole operation was rather interesting and funny to watch. Not even the Indians who were at the very bottom of the food chain seemed to work that hard. They would all wait around for about 40 minutes before a truck would come and dump the bitumen. They would then all hop up and spread the bitumen out by hand, each taking it in turns to do the more strenuous jobs before reclining to the shade again, the whole process taking all of 15 minutes.
When we were having lunch one of the local villages was showing the managers a photo of one of their excavator operator’s sound asleep in his excavator. When I asked them what they thought of this, their answer was that their men are not machines and can’t be expected to work all day long.
After spending the afternoon driving around in a truck with a flat tire and no brakes, delivering bitumen to the Indians, we went back to the cafe for more tea terak before jumping in Syed's car to head home for the day. About 5 kilometers down the road their extreme lack of mechanical care showed up again, with the rear wheel bearing giving way in Syed's car. After a quick inspection at the local mechanics house and deciding it was sort of safe to drive on, we spent the next two hours driving down a highway at 50 kilometers an hour to the town they lived in. Arriving at their town we went and had tea with the Bosses family, where my suspicions of them all being Muslims became true.
After tea I was left in Bosses Company who took me for a ride around his town to show off all its "very beautiful features" as he kept reminding me, before heading back to his house. I have to admit the town they lived in was pretty amazing. Koala Kangsar is home to the states King and Queen. All the main roads were lined with brightly coloured lights along both sides and overhead. The streets were about twice the size of anywhere else I had been in Malaysia and the royal Castle was absolutely amazing. After my drive around we headed back to Bosses place, where before heading inside I had to see his Horse which he was extremely proud to own. He thought himself to be the only owner of such a thing in the whole state. We parked the car so the lights shone out into the forest and five minutes later boss emerged with the most mangiest malnourished half foal half horse I had ever seen. It understandably had a true hatred towards all things human. Going close to it resulted in either being kicked at or charged at in some sort of horse hating man frenzy. Syed tried to give it some water in a bucket and the horse instantly smashed to pieces in protest. He then asked his daughter to come out and give it some food. She emerged with a bucket of old potatoes and food scraps that she threw at the horse from beyond its tethered range.
After showering in the dirtiest bathroom (which doubled up as the males toilet for pissing into) I have ever been in, I slept that night in Syed’s Nephews room on top of some rugs.
Staying with a Muslim Family was a very interesting experience. The women were lovely and naturally did everything for the men when asked. We each had a separate bathroom and ate in different rooms. I definitely found the whole experience to be quite a sexist affair. The Muslim men did treat their children very well, but it did seem that most women who weren’t family or Muslim were mainly regarded as nothing more than a piece of meat. One thing that did really surprise me was their lack of racism. There was absolutely no racial discontent about any other race living in Malaysia and their choices on how they decided to carry out their life, I was told by my new Muslim friends that this was one of the great things about Malaysia and it most definitely is.
The next morning I spent driving around Koala Kangsar in Bosses Fiat convertible (another possession he was very proud of, telling me on a number of occasions how rare his car was in Malaysia) with his 1 year old son. We went to the local park, ate more food and he took me around all his business developments. We then picked the kids up from school and went back home. After more eating Boss decided we should go to his Casino to play “slot machine”. Boss believed that he owned the only Malaysian casino in Malaysia, the rest being owned by the Chinese. We drove for half hour into a grubby little Chinese town and pulled up out the front of a building with a solid steel door. Arriving at the door we buzzed and the manger came out to let us in, the whole thing looked very illegal. Entering the casino was like walking into a large online access center. Inside was was a large room with a bunch of tables set out in a big rectangle shape in the middle of the room. All the computers were lined side by side around the perimeter of the tables. There was about 15 Chinese men sitting around playing the same sort of games you would get in Australia on poker machines but on normal pc computers and the room was so thick with cigarette smoke it stung my eyes. Boss chucked ten ringgit to the manager who allocated us two computers. we sat down for three very long and very boring hours watching a computer screen display poker games that you could either control with a mouse or set to auto pilot, leaving you to watch your money disappear without even lifting a finger. I did manage to come out with a 100 ringgit tho, unlike boss who seemed to do nothing but loose his own money back to himself. After going back to bosses place for dinner he informed me he was going to Thailand for the night (for some action with the Thai ladies) and that I would be spending the night with Syed. Once boss left, his nephew took me to his local cafe where he went every night after work to catch up with his friends. It was a welcome relief after a day with boss to be with him and his friend. They turned out to be not that dissimilar to guys their age back in Australia. The main differences I could pick being of a similar age to them between our two cultures, was the fact that instead of going to the pub to catch up, they went for satay chicken and fruit juice at cafes and women were something that at the age of 24 were still regarded as mostly unknown creatures, except for some visits to Thailand of course.
When Syed came along he announced that we were going to karaoke for the night and we left to pick up his brother who was a Police detective. We left Syed’s brother’s place with them both overly happy about going out for the night. I soon realised that I was heading out for on interesting night. Policeman had a look of super corruptness about him that was backed up by the regard to driving he had whilst driving his brother’s car. Seat belts were for looks, we ran red lights, he texted on his phone while driving in the middle of the road and all rubbish was thrown onto the street. To top it all off we were driving around in an old Mercedes that looked like something you would see in a movie driven by an African war lord.
I found out along the way that Karaoke was in Ipoh, the dodgy city I spent my first night in before heading to Gopeng. When we reached Ipoh the night started becoming all a bit sus as we drove into a very poor looking suburb and started going up and down tiny little streets with houses that had bars across all the windows and kids looting about on most corners. We then pulled up outside a house and Policeman started honking the horn. A few minutes later out emerged some woman who came over and started talking to policeman. She left and came back several times before another woman emerged and jumped into the car. Fearing the worst I sat in the back wondering if I was better to spend the night with a dodgy cop and what I suspected to be a hooker, or jump out of the car and be left in a suburb that would probably have me robbed of everything I owned. I think the only thing that stopped the latter was the fact that my bag was in Syed's boot and I had known him long enough to have some sort of trust. After trying to stop and eat some more bloody food at a nearby restaurant we were stopped by our new found associate who was ducking her head in the back so not to be seen and looking rather stressed, we moved further out of town to find a more suitable place. After eating yet another meal we finally went to the Karaoke bar for our singing session. We went into a darkly lit dinghy bar then on through a door leading into a hall where we sat in our own private room that was set up with some old couches, a television that displayed the karaoke music and blared its way out through some extremely loud and very poor quality speakers. Syed sat and sung along to a heap of terrible 80's pop songs surprisingly well, while Policeman sat and tried to chat up the very uninterested girl we picked up from some back street. After a few hours and several attempts at making me sing we left. We dropped the girl back much to my relief and headed home to Koala Kangsar at 4am. I never quite worked out what the point of picking up the girl was about. I decided by the end of the night that she had some sort of relationship with policeman and that maybe he liked to be seen in public with someone much better looking than he was capable of being with so he could feel more important than he really was, but it’s still hard to say.
The next day, tired and relieved I was leaving, I had breakfast with Syed before he dropped me off at the bus station. I travelled north to the west coast from Koala Kangsar to a city called Butterworth which is located on an Island just off mainland Malaysia. It was probably one of the nicest city’s i went to in Malaysia and was beside a beautiful National park I spent a day walking in. after a few days in Butterworth I headed back across to the west coast where i spent a couple of days on the Perentian Islands before making my way up to Thailand.
I crossed the border into Thailand at Hat Yai. The only thing Hat Yai has to offer is Muslims bombing people on a daily basis and lots of prostitutes to service Malaysian men. When I crossed the border it was pouring down with rain so I walked to the nearest bus station and asked the two German's waiting out the front when the next bus left. It left in 5 minutes so I brought a ticket with no clue where it was taking me but knew it had to be better than Hat Yai.

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