Kate: 4, Moria: 1

Kate has far surpassed me in hospital visits. Unless South America hits me with multiple parasites or cases of malaria, she may have the win. She's only been sick twice though, so I might contest her total. It's not my fault it takes two hospital visits per illness before a doctor correctly diagnoses her. The latest illness was strep throat, so Kate is recovering at a steady pace. Do not fret.

Onto Malaysia... we'd met a lot of smack talkers who said Malaysia was worthless. We disagree. Yes, it's Western-ish. We were amazed by the number of golf courses, billboard advertisements, housing developments, and mini malls. But the people have been wonderful, and we've seen some zany stuff. Malaysia is worth a stop, and I bet Malaysian Borneo is lovely.

T(h)ana Rata
Originally, we were supposed to visit a national park in northern Malaysia, but when it became clear that getting there would be a pain, we scratched the plan and opted for the Cameron Highlands instead. It was a lovely second choice. First of all, it rained the whole time we were there. Having lived with three months of constant sunshine and heat, it was nice to get a break. And being in the highlands, it was nice and cool. Ahh. Second, Tana Rata felt like a little mountain village. It was quaint. The whole point in stopping there was to observe countryside living in Malaysia, so after going on a rainy trek of our own and enjoying going at our own pace on day 1, Kate and I signed up for the countryside tour on day 2. The tour included visits to the following:
*A temple
*A rose center
*A strawberry farm
*A tea plantation
*A bug museum
*A honey farm
*The local market

The strawberry farm was underwhelming, but the cuisine was excellent. Kate had a strawberry ice cream sundae, and I had strawberry cake with strawberries and whipped cream. Then we both caved and purchased strawberry milkshakes. The entire town of Tana Rata is decorated in the strawberry motif, and after a day of resisting, I jumped on the bandwagon. Because I had visited Boulder this summer and toured Celestial Seasonings, the tea plantation wasn't of much interest to me. It was lovely to see hill after hill of tea bushes, as far as the eye could see though. The bug museum was awesome, mainly because you could pet some of the gigantic bugs and walk among the also-gigantic butterflies. My favorite part was the weird local bugs that resemble leaves and sticks. It's not a slight resemblence; they ARE leaves and sticks. The local market provided me with corn and butter in a cup.

Basically, I ate a lot in Tana Rata. Our hotel made fresh scones with clotted cream and strawberry jam. They were divine. Since Malaysia is composed of a healthy mix of Indians, Chinese, and Malays, Indian food was readily available. I've taken full advantage of this and scarfed as much as possible.

Kuala Lumpur
The capital city, the big one. It was interesting to enter a city with a skyline composed of multiple mosque minarets. KL is like most modern cities once you get past the heavy influence of Islam.

While Kate went on hospital trip number 4, I went to the Batu Caves (30 minutes outside the city by public bus), which is basically a series of cave temples. After walking up 272 steps, past dozens of rabid monkeys, I entered the huge main cave. It was by far the tallest cave I've ever entered, and it was filled with individual altars to different Hindu deities. It was beautiful inside, especially because of the misty effect the rain added. There was an art gallery to the side of the main cave, and this featured hundreds of brightly-painted sculptures of more Hindu deities. Again, it's been lovely to experience India a second time around by visiting here, and the Indian men have kindly filled my belly beyond capacity. Gotta chunk up for the Australian beaches and all...

I returned to KL and headed to the Islamic Arts Museum. Kate went there after her health was inspected, so we both got a chance to explore this awesome museum. This was one of the most impressive museums I've ever visited. It was gigantic and informative, and all the items on display were well-preserved. The special exhibit on the Koran, stylistic variations among cultures, and its basic layout was mindblowing. The museum as a whole served as a wonderful (if overwhelming) intro to Islam, and I strongly recommend that anyone in the KL area visit it.

Melaka/Malacca
We stopped in Melaka for one night on our way to Singapore, mainly because I wanted to visit the Enduring Beauty Museum. It's one floor of the larger People's Museum, and it's dedicated to all the weird things humans do to make themselves attractive. It was a mix of shoddy photos with broken English captions and actual objects like tiny Chinese slippers (foot binding), corsets, neck rings, and lip plates. The sections that made me cringe the most were the dental ones (can you imagine having your teeth filed down to sharp points?) and the lip plates (HOW WOULD YOU EAT?). The second floor of the People's Museum had a Kite exhibit, which was quite pretty, and the first floor had a Tops (like the toy/game) display. I never knew there were so many tops in existence.

Singapore
We had a whirlwind day of walking in Singapore, chowing our way through Little India and Chinatown, breezing through the shopping district, sniffing our way through the herb garden in the city park, sipping expensive ($18 Singapore dollars!) Singapore Slings, and eyeing Southeast Asian art in the museum. While at SAM (Singapore Art Museum), we met a chatty local man who filled us in on local culture, education and government.

Kate was disturbed by the lack of older architecture in Singapore, and I was surprised it wasn't more like Tokyo (as I pictured it). We agreed that we'd like to visit once again when we have more time though. It was clean and intriguing, and despite the jaywalking laws, we managed to get through without being fined or caned.

We arrived in Newcastle last night, and our holiday socializing is in full swing. Happy holidays to all! We'll be thinking of you while lounging on the beach.

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