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Published: March 4th 2009
After our Chinese breakfast in Penang we made our way to the bus station from where we caught our "luxury" coach to Kuala Lumpar. Considering my tour was a basix trip, the bus was indeed rather luxury! It had massive seats (big enough for an American!) that reclined nearly all the way back. My seat was over the wheel though, so as I lay back on my side, the bus kept throwing me up into the air a bit, which was not very relaxing!
It was stinking hot in KL, I made the mistake of touching a black rubber bollard and almost burnt myself! We walked a few minutes with our bags to out hotel, which was in the middle of the tourist market. Not selling tourists, but all that fake named brand stuff. Not amusing to walk through with a big bag!
We went up to our rooms, dumped our stuff and met back downstairs for an orientation walk, just as we met though it started raining cats and dogs and sheep and cows, so we arranged to do it later, before dinner. I went off to Starbucks and hid with a book and a chai tea latte
frappucino for a couple of hours until the rain stopped!
In the evening we headed to a restaurant in the Petronas Towers. The twin towers were pretty stunning when lit up at night. Some very cool pictures to be taken! I went to the cinema after this to see Slum Dog Millionaire, brilliant film. The funniest bit was when the film had suddenly cut out when the protagonists were about to kiss right at the end of the film, it was unsuitable for the Muslim Malaysian audiences! Shocking!
More shocking however was that I forgot my camera and when I returned two minutes later to retrieve it, it had already been taken by someone, and not an honest someone who was going to hand it in for me. Great.
Ah well, life goes on, it just means this blog isn't as cool as it could be! Sorry for the shocking quality of photos taken with my phone.
I was going to go to a water park with my group the following day, but decided to sort camera stuff, check I couldn't find it and then get the police certificate so I can claim for it when
I get home. At the police station I met an Aussie guy who went to take a pee during a stop in his bus journey up to Penang, when he got back from the toilet, the bus had gone, with all his stuff inside it! It made my camera seem quite inconsequential!
In the afternoon I went up inside the Petronas towers to the "highest sky bridge in the world" - whoop whoop. Thankfully it was free, as it was much more of an experience to see them at night from the outside!
On my final day in KL, I went with our guide and a couple of others to Malaysia's national mosque. It was quite beautiful inside, unlike the purple robes we had to wear to make ourselves decent!
After the mosque I went to the Museum of Islamic Art, which was actually really good. There was an exhibition called "Muslims in Britain," which was full of great photography and obviously a bit relevant! Another cool bit was a whole load of models of Islamic buildings around the world - I got to see a mini Mecca and Taj Mahal.
In the afternoon we set
off for Port Dickson, which is a resort town in Malaysia. Not much to see there really! I went for another hike with the Canadians, saw some tiny beaches and a light house, went for a swim in the pool, another long walk and then spent some time reading. It was quite cool to look over the Straits of Melecca, which is the stretch of water between peninsula Malaysia and the Indonesian Island of Sumatra, which I could actually see! It is a major shipping channel for the whole of the world basically and has been for years!
I was very glad to leave Port Dickson and head to the ancient port of Melacca, which has now become a nice and busy tourist town with lots of real life left! I had a good wander round a mini Holland, went into a model of a Sultan's palace and looked at the remains of the old Portuguese fort. I had to stop though as it was so bloomin' hot again!
The evening was the last evening of the trip, so we made sure we ate together and had a few drinks afterwards. I in fact treated myself to a
shaved ice with mango instead of beer, much nicer!
The following morning we left at 6:45 for country, island, city - Singapore...
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