Asia, the final days - Malaysia & Singapore

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We have been in Australia now some 10 days and I am well behind with blog, I should have had it done a week ago so here it goes.

Kuala Lumpur

Jan 12th 2010, day 117 on the road and the day we arrived into Kuala Lumpur (KL) and Malaysia. First impressions of KL and Malaysia are pretty positive, the airport was clean and tidy and we flew threw customs and immigration in KL in 20 minutes, one of the best we have experienced. The drive on the coach from the airport to KL was pretty decent, the roads were good but you could see they have cut through what was once dense rainforest, it was impressive looking out the window all the time at the dense green fauna only a few meters away from the road. As for the coach itself, it was clean and tidy and though it took well over an hour to KL (longer than the guide book said it would) it did cost about 15 MYR (approx £3 or $5 USD) to get to our hotel in the Golden Triangle, so bargain.

The hotel was called 41 Berangan and I highly recommend it, for the price it was fantastic, it was centrally located in the Golden Triangle, very close to the monorail, the hotel itself was very clean, good hot shower, free wi fi and an all be it very basic but free breakfast, can't ask for better and the staff were very helpful there too.

Initially we had intended to spend three nights in KL and then head onto Taman Negara for a three day rainforest trek before taking the jungle railway towards Malacca and stay there for a few days and then onto Singapore for the final four days in South East Asia. Unfortunately with me twisting my ankle back in Laos a week ago we had to knock the rainforest trek on the head. I just didn't feel my ankle could manage it and we had read online that it was quite challenging in places, this also unfortunately meant that we had to sack the jungle railway as well. Oh well can't do everything I guess and we will see the rainforest in South America. So instead we spent four nights in KL, three nights in Malacca and six nights in Singapore.

KL I thought was a pretty cool capital city, unlike many others I have been to it seemed pretty chilled out and pretty clean but that could be the fact that we were staying in the Golden Triangle by all the big shopping stores and bars. We visited the obligatory Petronas Towers (once the worlds tallest building) which I did think were very impressive, they were built in an Islamic architectural style and I thought they were especially impressive when lit up at night. The towers have a pretty impressive shopping mall and cinema inside it and as we had time to kill we caught the Sherlock Holmes film, which was OK. We didn't actually head up the towers though, instead we went up the Menara Communications tower so that we could could take in the Petronas Towers in the scenery and they were just as impressive from up high. The area surrounding the Menara tower was pretty fun, they have a rainforest in the centre of the city and you can walk through it (as we did) to get to the Menara tower. They have put in rope bridges and trail walks there for you to go on as well as an exercise park for you to work up a sweat on, however I don't think Tracy enjoyed the short trek as much as she got bitten quite a few times by the mosquitoes. They also have a mini reptile park at the bottom of the tower where we took in a few spiders, snakes and other lizards.

On another day we did a walk around the old colonial district of KL and Chinatown. The colonial district (mainly Merdeka Square) had impressive British style buildings in it, which it was pleasing to see the Malays appreciate for their architectural design and haven't knocked down since they gained independence in 1957. It was also interesting to see that they have maintained the old cricket ground in the middle of the colonial district in Merdeka square and still use it for cricket, bowls and football, pretty grand surroundings to be playing in I can tell you. We would have visited the museum of history there but unfortunately it was closed for renovation work, so we had to make do with the Rough Guides guide book to provide the history, that and the few plaques around the flagpole and the square.

Chinatown was a lot like many other that I have seen, dense with vendors selling fake goods and old buildings that seem like they have seen better days or at the very least could do with a good clean and paint job. We did see a few very nice temples (Kuan Ti Temple and Sri Maha Mariamman) on our walk round that were preparing for Chinese new year (Feb 14th), unfortunately the Sri Maha was undergoing some renewal work so wasn't as pretty as in the guide books. We also took in an Indian mosque (Jamek Mosque) as we just touched on Little India as well, which was pretty impressive.

I know its sad, but being a gadget freak as I am on our third day we found one of the coolest shopping malls I have ever seen in the golden triangle called Imbi Plaza (I think). It was directly across the road from the Times Square shopping mall and had six huge floors of gadgets for sale from phones to TV's to computers to camera's, everything was there and available to purchase and only because Tracy made me but we purchased a canon DSLR as well. However getting the best price we could took some time so after spending three to fours hours procrastinating on the purchase and finally making the deal I had worked up quite a thirst so it was time to visit a local drinking house.

The food and drink in KL was generally very cheap for the food and not so cheap for the drink (at least the alcoholic variety). We ate on the very popular Jalan Alor at the hawker stalls, the one we ate at was pretty decent for the price but I wasn't impressed at one of the servers trying to keep our change when we paid the bill. Another evening we ate at one of the Irish bars (Finnegan's I think) on Changkat Bukit Bintang only because they were showing England getting pummeled by South Africa in the Cricket (as it turned out), which didn't help my digestion or the enjoyment of the beer.

Anyway four days down in KL and it was on to Malacca. A two hour coach journey in probably the most comfortable and impressive coach I have ever seen saw us arriving into Malacca (again the journey cost was extremely cheap at 12 MYR) bus station right beside Tesco's, yes Tesco's in Malacca, unbelievable.

Malacca

Malacca was once the capital of Malaysia, it was used by the old colonial powers of Portugal, England and the Dutch as a trading port, long before Singapore was ever thought of and as result grew in importance. As a result it has quite a historic appearance and feel about it with lots of character that many claim KL is missing. The town has a river running right through it and we stayed on the China town side of the river in a really sweet looking guest house called 1511 (they also have a cafe by the same name and the guest house is above it). The guest house was on Jalan Tun Tan Cheng and afforded us the luxury of being able to walk everywhere to see the sites.

On arrival we headed down towards the new area of Taman Malaka that has been recently reclaimed from the ocean. You could tell it was new from the building style and the new shopping malls, but it took away from the beauty of Malacca I thought, the price of growth and success I guess. We also visited the night market that evening, it was OK but not a patch on the night market of Luang Prabang in Laos. On our second day in Malacca we visited and did a walking tour of Chinatown (notice a running theme here). It was pretty cool though seeing the streets being dressed up for Chinese new year and the many different styles of temples that existed. That evening we visited what I thought was one of the best Indian restaurants I have ever come across (Pak Putra Tandoori). The restaurant was full inside and must have had 30 tables outside in the car park that were also full. The nan breads and the tandoori chickens were made and cooked outside in front of you in what looked like big plant pots but were actually cookers (stone ovens I think they are called), highly recommend this place if you visit Malacca.

On our final day we visited the very famous and popular area of Bukit St Paul and Dutch Square. The area was initially colonized by the Portuguese in the 15th Century and they built the fort there called Porta de Santiago. I am sure that it was once a very impressive sight to see, one that was expanded upon when the Dutch came in and took over in the 17th Century. Unfortunately after the Dutch in came the British who pretty much demolished the fort in fear that the Malayans may rise up and use it against them. Shame because what is left of it makes for impressive viewing. On the top of the hill in the fort lies Bukit St Pauls, which is a very beautiful but now old and deteriorating church. Initially it was used by the Portuguese and the Dutch as a church before the Dutch built Christchurch in Dutch Square. The British used Bukit St Pauls as a weapons and gunpowder storage facility, today its just a shell of a building with no roof and with a statue of the Saint Francis Xavier outside it, but still it feels very regal and full of character that many other churches don't have.

At the bottom of the hill lies Dutch Square, it is not as old as it first appears but it is impressive all the same with its numerous red painted buildings and in the center of it is a waterfall that was built to celebrate the diamond anniversary of Queen Victoria's reign on the thrown. The square also has the Christchurch building in it which is a church (and still used today) but the Red facade on the outside is more impressive than the building inside.

The same day we also visited the 'Istana', which used to be the living residence of the Malayan Sultan many many years ago. It was rebuilt not so long ago on the 15th Century design and is impressive in that it was built without any nails what so ever. The building does look impressive with its Malayan sloping architectural roofs and it now houses a Malayan cultural museum that had some mildly impressive displays of Malayan life in the time when the sultans ruled the area before the colonial powers took over.

On our final night in Malaysia and Malacca we visited a 'satay celup' restaurant (Ban Lee Siang). Basically you have a big peanut sauce pot in the middle of the table that is continually heated by a gas fire. You pick your vegetable, fish and meat sticks and you cook them yourself in the big pot of peanut sauce almost like a hot pot or Korean BBQ idea. It was pretty good and damn cheap and as a Malayan traditional dish one we felt we had to have before we left.

Singapore

So the next day we set off at 10am and a very easy four hour coach journey later saw us enter Singapore at the Ban San bus terminal. The border crossing was so smooth it was unreal, we stopped at both the Malaysian border to 'check out' so to speak and the Singapore border to 'check in'. The whole border crossing process took about 30 minutes and that included getting off the bus as the Malaysian border and then back on again after the checking out process and the same thing again at the Singapore border. Organisation and efficiency perfection here if you ask me and we paid approximately 20 MYR (less than £5) for the whole journey on a bus that was half full as it was a private and not a public bus - fantastic.

First impressions of Singapore were of a very slick, clean and efficient country, also of a pretty small country. I think this because we arrived close to the centre of the downtown area of Singapore at the bus station within 20 minutes of crossing the border at Woodlands (which is near the Malaysian equivalent of Johur Bahur). Indeed Singapore is about twice as wide (East to West) as Bermuda is long at 42km and about 23km North to South. So not a big place at all but with a population of 4million expected to grow to 6million in the next 20-30 years tells you that it's quite a dense place.

We stayed at the peripheral edge of the red light district of Singapore in Geylang near the Kallang stop on the MRT. You knew instantly that you were in a slightly shady area when you saw people on the street with suitcases selling cigarettes and the hotels (including ours) advertising the normal daily room rates and hourly (or as they like to call it 'In Transit') room rates. The hotel was called “Fragrance” and to be fair it was fine, it was clean and pretty quiet, the only complaint would be that the bed was covered in plastic (no prizes for guessing why) and it felt a bit weird to sleep on as a result.

In Singapore we visited the zoo, we took the open top bus tour, visited a city planning museum (known as the URA Gallery, I'm into that sort of thing), we did our traditional visit of Chinatown and the Chinatown Heritage Center Museum and of course we generally mooched around the colonial district and the quay's.

Singapore apparently has a past reputation for just ignoring heritage and tradition and bulldozing the past in favor of building the new, apparently this has happened many times in creating the clean modern Singapore everyone sees today. Well walking round the colonial district I was amazed at the beauty and the number of the old historic colonial buildings that are still on offer there. This included the very famous Raffles hotel, the brilliant white St Andrew's cathedral which incidentally was built with money donated to Singapore from Scotland in 1862. The famous City Hall with its Corinthian style columns and the old supreme court that looks a little like St Paul's Cathedral in London and apparently it was built to last a thousand years. I say the old supreme court because it is no longer used, Sir Norman Foster designed the new supreme court (which is right behind the old one) but looks like a building with a huge flying saucer on top of it. I'm not saying the building is not impressive and probably necessary but I can't help feel the regal characteristics of the old supreme court looked a far better place as delivering justice than the new one. Both city hall and the old supreme court are presently vacant but are to be turned into museums in the next few years.

Directly across from city hall and the old supreme court is the 'Padang' a big field just like the one at Merdeka Square in KL, but probably even more impressive with the 1850's Singapore Cricket club at one end and the Singapore recreation club at the other. Whilst on the Bus tour one day we went past it and saw football and cricket still being played on it and thought it looked great and could possibly bring me out of retirement if I lived there. There are numerous other buildings, new and old that we saw, far too many to mention them all but one I must is the new Sands casino. This is Singapore's first super casino, it is massive I can tell you and it is connected to Raffles avenue by a new road and footbridge that was made to look like the human DNA strain, very cool.

As I said earlier one day we went to Singapore's top attraction (according to people who use and vote on trip advisor), the Singapore Zoo. I have to be honest, it was extremely cool, its been quite a while since I last went to a zoo and I thought the layout and openness of the Singapore zoo was excellent. We saw many many different animals, I especially liked the Orangutans that where allowed to freely roam the parks and trees above the walkways that we were on below. Of course Tracy loved seeing the penguins. I should also mention the beautiful white tigers that we saw, they are like many other species, highly endangered and apparently they all live in captivity now (which is very sad). They all descend from one tiger owned by an Indian maharaja Prince, can't help but thinking they are not going to make it long term but I guess time will tell, still all very sad though.

The URA Gallery and China Heritage Museums could not be further apart in terms of what they are showing. The Heritage museum showed how the people in Chinatown came to Singapore from China in the early 18th Century in search and hope of a better way of life and generally found it worse getting hooked on opium and many getting into prostitution (things have obviously changed now). The housing/apartments they lived in were generally very small and not pretty to say the very least. The URA Gallery on the other hand is a museum about Singapore's town planning, where it came from (i.e. being a port town founded by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819) to the town you see today to the future plans for the city (its this bit that I especially like). Again their are heavy plans ahead for Singapore with more land reclamation on the cards, much more new efficient housing (remember they are expecting a 50% population increase in the next 20-30 years) and a massive expansion of the public MRT train system. The MRT system by the way is incredibly efficient and clean, you're not allowed to eat or drink anything on the trains. The plan is to cover all points and areas of Singapore with the MRT virtually making it pointless and unnecessary to own a car, indeed they try and entice people away from cars to public transport by putting in toll roads, a 100% tax on all new car ownership and making it extremely hard to get a license to own a car over 10 years old. I have to say I saw very few old un-efficient polluting cars on the road.

In terms of food and restaurants, Tracy got to try dim sum a couple of times, once in Chinatown and once in Geylang. The Chinatown restaurant being superior in terms of food quality and also in terms of cost. Another day we tried one of the local specialties, chilli crab in the Geylang area, it is literally a big crab that is cooked in chilli, it was OK I thought but not something I am in a rush to try again. We also had a Korean BBQ one evening (again in the Geylang area), where you pick your food and cook it on a BBQ plate, they also provided a big hotpot to boil food into. I thought it was good value for money but a heck of a lot of work, I am not used to going to a restaurant were I pay to cook my own food.

Overall I really liked Singapore, it is somewhere that Tracy and I could consider living in the future I think, it has a lot going for professionals such as ourselves. It has lots of employment in the financial sector, it has a very efficient, modern and cheap (at least compared to the underground) train system. It has good weather all year round, oh and did I mention that income tax is a lot lower than most other western countries, certainly a big plus point I think.

So that brings me to the end of another blog session and it also brings Tracy and I to the end of our time in South East Asia. It has been over four months spent in SE Asia or about 130 days in total and I for one have really enjoyed it, there are too many highlights to mention, I just hope the next 100+ days that will be spent in the Oceania/Australasia continent will offer us as much fun and varied lifetime memories to take with us as SE Asia has.

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Photos

The Petronas towers
It took a while to find somewhere to take this shot!

No we're not back in England
This is St Mary's Cathedral by Merdeka Square

China town
Tracy's attempt at being arty on the new camera!

View from Padang
The central business district behind the old cricket club

Patrick where he should be
Well we couldn't afford the plane fare

Chijmes complex
Old convent now a lovely courtyard full of restaurants