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Published: September 6th 2008
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Petronas Towers Crew
Allison, Almas, Michelle, Eryn, Rachel, Brendon Our last morning in Kuala Lumpur some of us woke up early to go up the Petronas Towers. It's possible to go up to the bridge that connects the 2 towers about half of the way up. The tickets are free but they only give out a certain number each day. So, we thought we would have to get there really early to get tickets so we left our hotel at about 7. When we got there the line wasn't even very long! So we got up really early for nothing! But at least we got to go up on the first tour. From the bridge we could see pretty much the whole city which was neat!
After that we took the public bus to Melaka. Melaka is a port city and was recently named a UNESCO World Heritage City (on July 7, 2008 to be exact). We did a trishaw tour that took us to a really old Chinese Temple (Cheng Hoon Teng Chinese Temple), a river, another church, and the historic part of the city. Trishaws are like tiny tuk-tuks that are pulled by a bicycle. The Chinese Temple was really ornately carved! There was a lamp in
it that has been burning for 485 years! At the river we saw monitor lizards. I always thought they lived on land, but apparently they don't. They are pretty big and look a lot like dinosaurs! Even more than crocodiles do. The Church of St. Francis Xavier was the other church that we stopped at. It was built in 1849 and now is leaning to one side. So no, the picture isn't crooked, it's the church that is leaning. Our guesthouse was the Kancil Guesthouse. It was basically like a little bed and breakfast run by a Melaka Islamic family, basic, but comfortable.
We were only in Melaka for one night so the next morning we got on the bus to Singapore. Singapore is a nice city! There are trees everywhere, which I love, and it's really clean! If you're found littering you are put on cleanup duty and have to pick up trash/litter around the city for a certain amount of time. Public humiliation AND the city gets cleaned up! I think it's perfect! There also isn't any smog which is amazing for a city. I'm not sure how they do it! There are a couple quays along
the river with a bunch of restaurants and bars. Some of the restaurants aren't too ridiculously expensive and you can eat outside. It's nice for in the evening. I like cities with areas like that! Walking streets I guess they're called...
A weird thing about Asia: McDonalds delivers! How weird is that? As if people who eat McDonalds need to be any lazier. You can get it delivered right to your couch. Disgusting!
Fruit: I finally tried mangosteens. They were pretty good! Not my favorite, but good nonetheless. I also had langsats which were alright. I never got to try a durian which was disappointing. Supposedly they taste alright but smell disgusting. A lot of hotels have signs saying no durians allowed!
Our last night together as a group we went to Ministry of Sound, a club that is supposedly worldwide. All the girls had to go buy shoes beforehand because none of us were really expecting to need heels in Asia. We sort of said goodbye to our group, but most people are in Singapore for a couple days so some of us still stayed together.
On the 4th we (Brendon, Allison, Paul, Yan, Louise, Helen, and I)
went to Sentosa Island, the resort island of Singapore. It is basically just for tourists. There's a beach, an aquarium, animal shows, a luge, etc. We went to the aquarium (Underwater World) and saw the pink dolphin show. The aquarium has one of those underwater tunnels where the fish and sharks just swim all around you. It was really cool! The sea dragons are my favorites! And the nautilus. Also on Sentosa is supposedly the southernmost point of mainland Asia. However, Sentosa is an island so I'm not really sure how it qualifies as mainland Asia. I guess since it's connected by a bridge...
Yesterday Brendon and I did the Singapore Hop-on Hop-off bus tour. The tour guides were pretty interesting and we now feel like we kind of know the layout of the city. We went to the Asian Civilizations Museum but we didn't have much time to spend there. It was a really neat museum and I could've been there for hours! We also did a short boat tour on the river, ate gelato, and saw both the old and new Parliament and Supreme Court Buildings.
Singapore is basically like a city in the United States
Chinese Temple
This lamp has been burning for 485 years! with a lot more Asian people. The prices are similar and practically everyone speaks English. It's good we're only here for a few days or we might be broke! 😊 After Thailand it seems especially expensive!
Today we're headed off to the zoo for our final day in Singapore and then tonight I fly to India and tomorrow morning Brendon heads off to China. A lot of people that we've met think it's weird to have a brother and sister travelling together. Most people say they wouldn't want to travel with their siblings. It's been good travelling with Brendon though. It's nice to have a travel buddy and both of us like to do a lot of the same things so it works out well. There's always another person who would much rather eat the local cuisine than McDonalds! We've been asked a couple of times if we're on our honeymoon. We of course quickly set them straight.
This whole Palin VP thing is really annoying because it's the only thing people know about Alaska! We say we're from Alaska and people say "Oh, that's where McCain's VP is from." I would rather people know Alaska for it's
Church of St. Francis Xavier
No the picture is not crooked, yes the church is leaning wilderness and coldness, that's how it was before. Now everyone's going to judge Alaska by Palin. And so far she isn't giving us a very good image...
It's good we got out of Thailand when we did! There have been a bunch of protests against the Prime Minister. In Bangkok there are a bunch of people camped out in his yard and supposedly it's escalating into some violence. Strikes across the country have closed airports and railway stations. In Krabi all the flights have been cancelled. That's where we were less than a week ago! Good thing we left before it got shut down! It's mostly upper class Thai's that are protesting the Prime Minister saying he's corrupt. I don't know a ton about the situation but I do know that they say he's in cohorts with Thaksin, the one thrown out in the last coup. Rich people didn't like him because he made a lot of programs that helped the poor. I wonder what will happen with these protests. Hopefully not another coup...
All of you who are now at college I want to hear how it's going! And all of you still in high school... I
hope intensives were fun! Everyone else, hope you're having a good September! Miss you!
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