The Jetpacker

Today’s guest post is from our friend Steve.  Over the next two weeks, he’ll be visiting Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, and reporting on his adventures.

I arrived at Kuala Lumpur International Airport a few hours before midnight, and had read that the KLIA Ekspres train and the airport taxi would both cost around the same. I opted for the more direct taxi. However, there was a mix-up with the hotel name.

Word to the wise: make sure they (and you) know exactly which hotel you’re going to.

Instead of taking me to the Hotel Equatorial Kuala Lumpur, I got a ticket for the Equatorial Bangi, over 30 km away. It was only then that I learned firsthand that cabbies here are not to be trusted. In addition to the RM 54 (more than $16) I was charged to go to the wrong place, the driver charged me an additional RM 74 ($22!) to head back to Kuala Lumpur, but not before trying to convince me to switch to his “budget” hotel.

After a 90 minute trip, I wanted nothing more to do with him.  Luckily, when I arrived at my actual hotel, the staff couldn’t have been more gracious. They were courteous and good at their jobs, even as I shuffled in looking like a hobo. I packed it in for the night and thought about plans for tomorrow.

* * *

I had my first taste of Malaysia the next morning at breakfast, which came included in my package. While there were standard Western fares like pancakes, omelets, and various bread products, the East was also well-represented with congee, curries, and the like.

There were also a few foods I wasn’t expecting, like corn with capsicum (basically, straight spiciness), green guava juice, and beef bacon and salami. Makes sense, as there’s no pork to be found anywhere.

Sensing I had woken up too late to get Petronas Tower tickets, I went for apparently the next-best thing:  the Kuala Lumpur Tower (Menara Kuala Lumpur) just down the road. Standing at over 420 meters (around 1400 feet,) it is the 5th largest communications tower in the world, and 18th tallest freestanding tower in the world.

Naturally, this should have screamed “tourist trap,” but I took the bait anyway. You get a choice of “Cultural” and “Adventure” experiences.  Adventure involves an F1 simulator and a pony ride, which just seemed really odd to do by myself, so I went with Cultural.

The first stop was the Malaysian Cultural Village exhibit, which was one of the most depressing tourist traps I’ve ever seen. It starts with a beautiful sign and landscape, and then… nothing. You walk a solid 50 feet of blank concrete before getting to the main area. They could have done something, anything with it, but no.

The main area featured houses from each area of Malaysia, which, frankly, looked almost exactly the same. “These houses are on 3-meter stilts, but over here it’s 5!” Yippee.

The one interesting thing going on was a few people in traditional garb teaching people to throw spinning tops. I gave it a go, but after wiping out some pieces of wood 20 feet away, I decided to let the professionals handle it. Incidentally, the top spinners were the only people there not trying to sell me something.

Whether it was batik, tacky jewelry, or pictures of myself, everything had a price, and it was inflated. I figured I’d press on and see more of the Cultural Village, only to find that I had somehow seen it all. I was so flabbergasted, I walked through twice to make sure I had seen everything, and I had.

I was beginning to think the pony ride might have been a good idea.

After the Village, I took the elevator up to the Observation Deck. Since there are apparently no floors between the ground floor and the Deck, the elevator zoomed straight to the top, leaving everyone’s ears popping.

The view was breathtaking! A full 360-degree aerial look at the city showed some surprising truths. One, this may be one of the greenest major cities in the world. Forests and parks are everywhere, which contrasts nicely with my current hometown of Seoul. Also, KL-ers really like their skyscrapers.

The biggest surprise, though, was the rapid development. To compare, I took a picture of the guide that had the major buildings labeled. I then took a real picture, and tried to spot all the new buildings. I counted 4, and I wasn’t even looking that hard.

My final stop on the tour was also part of the “Cultural” package, and was titled “Forest in the City.” Now, THIS was worth it.

A guided trip through lush vegetation so thick, you forget you’re in the middle of the city. Our guide, Zul (no Ghostbuster jokes, please) was funny, patient, and incredibly informative. You could see he cared deeply about preservation of Malaysia’s rainforests.

If you’re only staying a few days and can’t make it out to one of the national parks, this is a great 30-40 minute consolation. The only negative was that I took the tour in the middle of the day, so there were no animals to be seen. If you can make it in the morning, there are apparently a few types of tropical bird and primate that live in the area.

If you have the time, you can also explore the trails by yourself. The tour only covered the smallest trail, and it had steps and rails, but it was still a pretty solid workout. All in all, a pretty satisfying first half of the day. I decided to rest up a little and eat back at the hotel. I had planned on going to the Saturday night market, but I caught a cold that waylaid me for the rest of the night.

The next day, I decided to just walk and see what I’d run into. Turns out, I fell smack-dab into Times Square, one of KL’s numerous shopping malls.

Times Square is notable not only for a dozen floors of clothing and electronics, but also Malaysia’s largest indoor theme park, Cosmo’s World.

The Cosmo mascot is one of those wonderful anthropomorphic things that can only exist in a theme park, but kids love getting their picture with him… her… it?

Anyway, the park is dominated by a huge, looping roller coaster that winds its way through the 5th-8th floors of the mall. It snakes its way so close to various signs and banisters I was convinced it would have plowed through one of them by now.

The starkest picture, however, was of how empty it seemed to be. On a summer Sunday afternoon, a place like this would be packed to the gills in America. Here, they’d start each ride with only 2 or 3 riders, because that’s all there would be.

In the mall, I stopped in to the food court and was amazed at the selection. Every corner of Malaysia was represented, from Malay to Indian to, um, Italian. After some halal lemon chicken at the North Chinese Muslim section, I stopped off at the Internet café to catch up on world events.

I missed Dennis Hopper and Gary Coleman dying, and another perfect game in the MLB. Jeez. After a long day of walking and eating, I headed home to rest my aching feet and plan my next move. Tomorrow: Steve gets arty, and actually buys something.

Today, I learned that the Malaysian reputation for kindness is well-deserved. I had just finished breakfast and walked out of the hotel when a middle-aged woman and her daughter stopped me and welcomed me to Malaysia. Just like that.

It wasn’t a trick to try to get me to buy something, or to steal my wallet, or anything like that. There’s an innate curiosity from the locals about visitors; everyone wants to know where you’re from, and why you’d come to their fair city. Even though it was a brief conversation, it instantly brightened my day.

My first stop of the day was the Kompleks Kraf, the Malaysian Craft Complex. Here, you can learn how to make pottery, take a tour covering Malaysian art, weaving, and music (only RM3 – great way to spend an hour!) and even try your hand at batik, the art of using ink and wax to create stunning designs on fabric.

I first met with John, a batik artist from the Borneo side of the country, who welcomed me into his studio and showed me some of his work, which was incredible. I knew I had a lot to live up to. I went with a lizard design, and the instructor first had me trace the picture onto a piece of fabric. Then, I traced the picture again, but this time in wax. Now, I could start painting with the ink and water.

It was ingenious how the wax stopped all colors from bleeding through it, helping differentiate sections. I was soon joined by two young English women on holiday, Marie and Beth. We chatted and painted, safely away from the passing thunderstorm, until our masterpieces were finished.

Well, Marie and Beth had masterpieces, mine looked like a fifth-grader’s work. After we were done, the instructor dried them and wrapped them up. For only RM20 (about $6 American and change), we had a wonderful memory, spent a few hours having some great fun, avoided a thunderstorm, and made some new friends.

After we left the Craft Complex, we headed to the Pavilion Mall. It was Marie’s birthday, and she wanted some chocolate cake.

The Pavilion is known in KL as the high-end mall, and with good reason. Everywhere you turned there was another designer label with impossibly thin models. We snubbed our noses at the perfect physical specimens looking dead-eyed from the posters and headed towards the Godiva store, where we all surrendered to chocolatey awesomeness. Take that, you skinny jerks!

Afterwards, we made plans to meet up again next week in Singapore, and went our separate ways. I was about to head back to the hotel, when two words caught my eye – Pub. Quiz.

Those who know me know I’m a sucker for any sort of trivia contest (I once appeared on Jeopardy!), especially when the prize is a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. I ordered a burger (quite good – turns out the chef was an award-winner in Ireland) and a Strongbow, and hunkered down at Healy Mac’s Pub.

I started chatting with the gentleman next to me, Liam, who turned out to be the owner. Soon joined by John, a Scotsman, and a couple from Liverpool, we were ready to take on the world. In the end, we fell short of the win, but the lively conversation and laughs more than made up for it.

The overriding theme of the day was kindness. Whether it was John the artist, Liam, Beth and Marie, or the women outside the hotel, everyone was smiling, enjoying themselves and wanted to learn about me as much as I wanted to about them.  I took a taxi home (cabbie tried to charge RM20 for a few blocks – nice try, jerk) and I drifted off to sleep, ready for whatever the next day brought.

Check back later this week for the conclusion of Steve’s time in Kuala Lumpur and his arrival in Singapore.