Cameron Highlands, Malaysia 07/16/08-07/18/08

The Cameron Highlands are hilly areas in the higher elevations of central Malaysia. There are many hiking trails there, as well as tea plantations, and strawberry farms, many of which offer tours. On the ride to Tanah Rata, the main town and the place where I stayed, I passed by a tea field. It was very pretty, but having already gone through tea fields in more scenic parts of India, I wasn't really interested in exploring them any further here.

Tanah Rata had good Indian food, but as far as hiking trails and water falls, I was sorely disappointed. Before going hiking I went to the information booth in town to get the latest information on the trails and see which would be the best to take. This was pointless because, although the information booth was open, it was deserted. I went there again after my day of hiking and there was still no one there.

Stuck in Kuala Lumpur

When traveling by bus from Melaka to Tanah Rata, I had to change buses in Kuala Lumpur. Since I could not be sure when the first bus would arrive, I could not reserve a seat on the second bus.

When I got to the Pudaraya bus terminal in KL at 12:30, I immediately tried to book a ticket to Tanah Rata. The next bus was scheduled to leave at 1:00pm. That would have been perfect, except the bus was full. I had to wait for the 3:30 bus. Crap.

I checked my bag at the bus station and wandered across Chinatown, hopped on a train, and went to Kuala Lumpur City Center (the mall attached to the Petronus towers) for lunch. I had bad Indian food and a crepe. I took my time and headed back to the bus station.

I hopped on the bus, which was 25 minutes late leaving.

Arrival

When I got to Tanah Rata, I checked into my hotel--KRS Pines. I had hoped for quiet. It was quiet except that every sound both inside and outside were transmitted directly into my room--exactly what I was trying to avoid. Oh, well. It wasn't that bad. Other than that, the place was fine.

After checking in, I went out to eat. It was already 8:30, but there were several places open. This is definitely a area that caters to tourists. I ate at an Indian place which was pretty good. I ate a lot of Indian food in Tanah Rata.

Hiking

The next day I got up and left to go hiking at 10:30. After failing to get any information at the tourist information office, I decided to take trail #9 to Robinson Falls. It was was just OK--a bit disappointing. It would have been better if you could actually see the falls through the trees and brush.

I continued on #9 to trail #8. This trail basically started straight up, rough and slippery. The whole trail was very steep with no views to compensate for it. Up and up and up and down and down and down and up and up and up and down and down and up and up. I was getting worried about how long it would take to get back. (I had food, water, a cell phone, and an emergency blanket.) I did not want to turn around because the trail I came up was not one I would want to go down again.

I ran into a young British guy coming the other direction and he said it was about two hours back. Crap. I had already been hiking two hours and I wanted out. Nonetheless, I felt much better for having seen him. It made me feel more secure to see someone coming from where I was going and getting a sense of how bad it would be.

A few minutes later, at the peak, I ran into an older traveler. He seemed to know the area. I asked him which was the best way down, and he told me to take trail #3 to trail #6, which I eventually did. It was good that I ran into him--the maps did not show #6 (or rather, they did show it, but they showed the old #6 which was miles away.) The guy stopped for lunch there and I stopped and ate a muffin and chatted a bit. He was originally from America but seems to have been on the road for years.

It was still a long trek back with much up and down, but not as much as trail #8. I saw Parit falls on the way back to town. It was a joke. A brown drop that was nothing to look at.

With the exception of one spot in the boggy bottom of a valley near the end of my hiking, the trails were easy to follow.

All and all, a very disappointing day of hiking. I decided that I would leave for Penang the next day.

I went back to the information desk when I got back to town. It was still empty.

An Even Worse Walk

After lunch, I went back to my hotel and rested a bit. I saw the young woman who works there and asked her about suggested hikes. The one she pointed out was to another mountain. I did not want another one of those hikes. I decided that I would just walk down the road to a scenic viewpoint shown on the map in Lonely Planet.

I started walking to the viewpoint that was supposedly a mile out of town. I walked and walked along the highway and never found it. I don't know if I went the wrong direction or if it was just not what I expected to be and I missed it. I did not see the tea fields that I expected. When I turned around it started raining. I was drenched and my right shoe developed a hole in the bottom. A metal bar was sticking out and clicking on the asphalt as I walked. The shoe was acting like a pump--every step pumped water into my shoe. I felt like a fool walking along that highway.

When I got to the hotel, I was soaked.

Departure

The bus ride out of the highlands from Tanah Rata to Penang was not as scenic as the ride coming from KL. Ugly buildings or stripped ground spoiled the scenery in a lot of places. I don't see the big attraction of the Cameron Highlands. While sitting on the bus, I lamented that Malaysia had been kind of disappointing so far.

Melaka, Malaysia 07/14/08-07/16/08

I left Kuala Lumpur and headed to Melaka. Several Malaysians that I met in KL indicated that that was a place to go. The guidebooks seemed to agree. After going there, I don't see the attraction. Yes, the city is historically significant, but if you are not a Malaysian history buff, I wouldn't bother going. Don't get me wrong, it is a pleasant city. It just isn't that interesting to me. Since I visited, the city was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site along with Penang, Malaysia. Having seen its colonial neighborhoods, I was a bit surprised by this.

Arrival

In Kuala Lumpur, I got up packed, did a little shopping before checking out, grabbed a McDonald's burger (sad, isn't it?) and then went to the Pudaraya bus station a few blocks from my hotel in Chinatown. This bus station is pretty large and busy building. The teaming masses make it seem a little chaotic, but it is fairly organized--definitely not like the total chaos of many Central American bus stations.

I got on the bus, no problem, but almost got off a half hour early. Of the 20 or 30 people on the bus, I was the only one taking it all the way to Melaka city, which really surprised. Fortunately, the bus driver, who did not speak English, got my attention and said, "Melaka Sentral?" to which I said, "Yes", and he waved me back on the bus (which I had just stepped off while following everyone else. I saw no sign at the station, so I assumed it was Melaka. I never did find out what station that was.

When I got to Melaka, I took local bus 17 as described in Lonely Planet and got off within a couple of blocks of the hotels I wanted to look at. Traveler's Lodge was full. Uh oh. I didn't think things would be busy. I grabbed the last room available at Samudra Inn. It was a double with air con, but shared bath. Oh, well, only RM 40 (about US$12.50). I was worried it would be too noisy--there is TV down the hall--but no noise penetrated my room except for traffic, which was not even that bad. My room had a balcony overlooking the street. When I had the guesthouse do my laundry, it was dried on a line on the balcony from which I could pluck it when it was dry.

After getting in the hotel, I walked around town, hoping to find a late (4:30) lunch, but everything seemed closed or deserted. I ended up eating a curry puff from a place in a mall.

My aimless walk around town left me very disappointed. I did see the town square, surrounded by historical buildings. The theme is definitely red.

Seeing the Sights

The next day, I decided to take another walk around town a little less aimlessly. With guidebook in hand, I hit the points of interest. After yesterday, I was not expecting much, but it turned out to be OK. The weather was overcast and threatening to rain, which was actually very nice because I did not have sun in my face and sweat pouring off of me like yesterday.

I had lunch at the Newton hawker center--a big open air food court. The place was practically deserted.

I went to the ruins of the fort and the church. They were fine, but nothing extraordinary. I walked through the old street in Chinatown which Lonely Planet said had well-preserved buildings. I would not have noted anything about it if I had walked down it accidentally.

I walked quite a way around the city, and eventually made it to the old Chinese cemetery, which is on a big hill. That was actually one of the nicer things that I saw today. There were nice view from the top. (Tomb with a view?) Unfortunately, I got turned around when I left the cemetery. I was headed the opposite way that I wanted to be going and ended up going all the way around the cemetery--a few kilometers.

I decided to go to the waterfront. It is amazing how they treat the ocean like it isn't there. It isn't mentioned in tourism information, there is nothing looking out on the water, no waterfront restaurants, nothing except for the mosque, which I will talk about later. They seem to make a big deal about the "river" (which seems more like a drainage canal) but not the ocean.

Mysterious Island

I decided to take the causeway to the island just offshore. There is a big mosque there. When I got to the entry of the causeway, I saw a fence across the road. There were two lanes each direction on the causeway, but the fence was only open for one lane. There was a sign that said "Danger", but a few cars were going in. I saw a few people on the side of the causeway. I went in.

Just past the fence, there was some marshy land to the right. As I looked over, something hopped about in the water. My first thought was that they were big frogs. When I saw them, I realized that they were actually fish. They hopped around quickly on their fins and poked their eyes above water. Their dorsal fins were drooping down to one side. Weird.

A bit later, a tour bus stopped on the causeway and disgorged a bunch of Asian tourists with cameras, some of whom proceeded to snap pictures of the not-particularly-attractive seascape. I figured since there was a tour bus, it must be OK to go on.

I walked on, only occasionally seeing a car or motorbike go by. There were maybe two or three people on the shore of the island beyond the causeway. As I went on, I saw blocks of these big yellow apartment buildings. There must have been scores of them. They were all deserted. It was creepy. I saw a few people sweeping and doing some construction work on the road. At one point, I got a glimpse into a courtyard among the buildings and saw what looked like police doing practice for riot control. Other than that, it looked like a ghost town until I got to the mosque. I can only assume that the buildings were still under construction, although they looked complete except for garage doors and an occasional unterminated wire. It looked like some of the paint was old.

I had seen the mosque from the causeway, and it looked very nice. It was bright and colorful, looking very new. As I got closer, it looked even more impressive. It was set right on the sea. There was a fence around it. Everything within the fence was very manicured and beautiful. Everything outside the fence was very desolate and deserted. I stopped to take a picture when the late afternoon singing came from the minaret. This made the already creepy area seem even more haunted. I decided to take a short video to try to capture the feel of it.

I walked close to the mosque, onto the grounds, and took some photos. I did not feel comfortable actually going to the mosque. Being a tourist in a religious place--be it Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, or whatever--always feels odd to me. There were only a few people at the mosque. I could see through the mosque to the sea beyond.

While walking back over the causeway as I left the island, there were 4 people doing a photo shoot on the side closed to traffic. There was a woman who appeared to be in very modern-style wedding dress, a man in a formal jacket and jeans, a woman fussing over the woman in the wedding dress, and the cameraman. It was very odd.

I walked back off the island, grabbed a Slurpee at 7-11, and went home.

Fun Food

After using the net, I went to Capital Satay, which was highly recommended by Lonely Planet. I was worried that it might be closed, since it was almost 9pm. It was full. I walked around the block and came back to find that there was a table free. It was fun. I went to the bar and got skewers of various meats, tofu, stuffed veggies, little boiled eggs, etc. and put them in the pot of boiling satay sauce in the middle of the table. I ended up going back to the bar two more times. It was 70 sen per skewer and my bill was RM 23 (about $7.25), so I guess I ate about 35 skewers. (Granted, many of them did not have a whole lot on them.)

Departure

The next morning, I packed, caught the local bus to the bus station, and bought a ticket to Kuala Lumpur on the bus leaving half an hour later. The Melaka bus station is easily navigable and not at all chaotic. I booked a room in Tanah Rata, my final destination, over the phone while waiting for the bus.

The ride to KL was nothing exciting. I used the time to read more in my guide book for trip planning in Thailand and Cambodia.

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 07/03/08-07/14/08

Overall Impressions of Kuala Lumpur and Malaysia

From the moment I landed in Kuala Lumpur, I could feel the difference. It was much less hassle and seemed much more developed. This feeling would continue to grow as I saw more of the city. Compared to most of southeast Asia (Singapore excluded), Malaysia seemed more developed. Kuala Lumpur was a very easy city to get around as a visitor. It has a good, modern transit system making it easy to get from place to place. (I was told by one person that it is good for tourists but not so good for people who live there.) Another convenience for me was that it seemed that everyone spoke English. Not just in Kuala Lumpur but wherever I went in Malaysia.

Malaysia seemed like a very pleasant place but didn't seem too exciting to me. I should add that I did not go to the east coast of Malaysia which is supposedly where it is really shines. Kuala Lumpur has plenty of nightlife, but it did not seem like the kind I tend to enjoy. It seemed a bit pretentious. (When I later told someone in Penang that Kuala Lumpur seemed a little pretentious, his response was, "Aren't all big cities?")

Kuala Lumpur seemed nice and orderly and civilized, but not so much so that you couldn't find markets and street food. I would liken it to Singapore but without the stick shoved quite so far up its butt.

I met several people in Kuala Lumpur, and all of them were nice enough, but none seemed to stick. When comparing Kuala Lumpur with Jakarta, I would say that Kuala Lumpur is a much nicer city, but I had a whole lot more fun in Jakarta. It was easy to make friends in Jakarta and Bangkok, and while it was easy to meet people in Kuala Lumpur, it was not so easy to make friends. Some would say that it's a lot like San Francisco that way.

Arrival

I flew from Jakarta to Kuala Lumpur on Air Asia--a discount airline. As such, I landed in the Low Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT) instead of the usual international airport. It was the most hassle-free airport arrival experience that I have ever had in Asia. I zipped through immigration and got waved through customs. I didn't even have to fill out a landing card or customs form. When I got through customs, there was no one. No hordes of touts trying to get me to go to their hotels. No taxi drivers trying to get me into their scam cabs! I could not believe it. Not a single person came up to me. I asked the information desk where I could get a SIM card for my phone, got cash at an ATM, got my SIM card (a couple of dollars), got a taxi voucher into town (US$15-20), and was out of the airport in a few minutes. I could get used to that.

Even the taxi ride into town was pleasant. I had nice chat with the driver who used to work for an airline doing the KL-Tokyo-LA route, so he knew California.

While I was waiting at the baggage carousel in the airport, someone came up to me and asked if my name was Steve. I said, no, but it was close. (People often remember my name as Steve or Scott or some other name that begins with S.) I told him my name, and he recalled it. He said that we had met at Red Dragon (a club in Jakarta) twice. "Ian?" I asked. It was him. He was an acquaintance of Pavis's. He was on the same plane as me, visiting a friend in KL. We chit chatted briefly before he headed to customs. Small world.

The Neighborhoods

Kuala Lumpur has several notable neighborhoods. My logding for the first few days was in Little India. I stayed in the Coliseum hotel. It was an old building with a great facade, but as a logding, it was pretty dumpy. Definitely budget digs--shared bath, no A/C, constant traffic noise. The room was open at the top of the wall for ventilation, meaning every sound in the hall was transmitted into the room. What do you expect for less than US$10? My room did have some interesting old furnishings and a private wash basin. In spite of its shortcomings, I felt pretty happy there.

After I checked-in to the hotel, I went out in search of dinner. It was pretty cool to turn a corner and see the Petronus towers glowing in the distance or the the Kuala Lumpur tower lit up around another corner.

Little India was a pleasant enough neighborhood, if a bit noisy. Some tasty Indian food. It took me a while to find an internet cafe and a carton of milk, though. I never did find a place to have my laundry done.

A few days later, I moved to Chinatown. Chinatown was much more busy and crowded and rough around the edges. There is a street that becomes a night market when the sun goes down. My hotel, Chinatown Inn, was in the middle of that street. It took a while to get in and out of the hotel because I had to wade through the market to get anywhere.

One of the other neighborhoods of note is Bukit Bintang. This is an area of nice restaurants, clubs, and megamalls full of posh designer stores. I ended up going to a couple of clubs here. Not my cup of tea. I can't say that I enjoyed going out in Kuala Lumpur. Granted, I only went to a couple of places. One problem with going to a bar in Malaysia is that the sin tax makes liquor very expensive. Expect something like $9 for a cocktail. I was a bit pissed that the first place I went (Blue Boy--not a posh place at all) charged prices like that and then watered down my drink so much that it was essentially water. You can either charge outrageous prices or water down the drinks, but not both.

The Sights

I met up with someone and went to the Kuala Lumpur City Center (KLCC) which has a huge, expensive mall and is also where the twin towers are located. There is a pleasant park setting outside with fountains and a small pool for kids. The Petronus towers (referred to as "the twin towers" in KL) are pretty impressive. It doesn't seem like one of the tallest buildings in the world when you are next to it.

After lunch at KLCC, we headed to the KL tower--a communications tower a few blocks from the twin towers. We took the elevator to the observation deck for a bird's-eye view of Kuala Lumpur. It also offered great views of the twin towers. I have heard that the view is better here than in the twin towers, and I believe it. For one, you can see the twin towers. For another, the observation bridge on the twin towers is nowhere near the top. It is also kind of hard to get tickets to the twin towers--they are first come first served and go quickly in the morning. I never did get up the twin towers.

I spent a day walking around Kuala Lumpur's colonial sections. I walked from my hotel in Chinatown past the cool old train station with tons of spires. It looked more like a mosque than a train station. I walked past the Masjid Negara (National Mosque), but could not go in because I was not muslim. I walked past the independence square--a large open space surrounded by well-preserved colonial buildings. Then I went over to the Masjid Jamek near where I stayed in Little India. I could have gone in, but I think it might have required some extra clothes.

An Exodus of Sisters

Near Masjid Jamek, I took a picture of the big fountain statue of what looked like pitcher plants. While taking photos, a guy asked if I wanted him to take my picture with the fountain. I declined, since it wasn't all that interesting. I ran into him again a few moments later as we waited for the street crossing light. He started talking to me. He asked where I was from and told me that he was from Indonesia near Ubud. He said his sister was going to Florida for her final year of college. He asked me stuff about costs in the US and the like. Then he asked if I could spend some time talking with his sister and his grandmother--to give them more information and calm his grandmother's concerns. I was suspicious. Not only am I suspicious when a stranger on the street asks me to come to his home, it sounded eerily like the story that a guy in Bangkok gave me which seemed to be totally a scam. I told the guy that I had stuff to do that day and in the end came clean that I was not comfortable with going home with someone I just met in the street. He did not push it and I went on. He seemed honest enough, but then, if it was a scam, it wouldn't work very well if he seemed suspicious.

But wait, there's more. On my way into KLCC the next day, a woman stopped me and complimented me on my earring. This seemed like a contrived reason to talk to me. Then she asked where I was from. When I told her, she asked if it was near Santa Clara. I said yes. She said her sister was moving there very soon. This was sounding familiar. She was with a couple of other women and they seemed to have just been shopping. She asked if I could spend some time with her sister today. I said I was kind of busy today. She asked about tomorrow. I came clean with her and told her that I just didn't feel comfortable going with people that come up to me in the street. She said something to the effect that not all Malaysians are scum. I told her that I would give her my number, and I would be happy to give any information that I can over the phone. Needless to say, I never got a phone call.

I am really curious to know what the deal is. In each case, I was in tourist-heavy areas. Each person seemed to start talking with me by intent, rather than by chance. Unlike most scammers, they did not set off the "Watch out for this person" alarm. (Well, neither of the ones in KL--the guy in Bangkok a few years ago totally did.) I find it hard to imagine that as soon as someone (always a sister) finds out that they are going to America, their siblings scour the streets for American tourists to get more information. I mentioned these incidents to Malaysians that I was hanging out with and they were very surprised.

Holy Hindus, Batman! (No, wait, that would be the "bat cave".)

I took a bus trip a little way outside of KL to visit the Batu Caves. These are a series of caverns containing Hindu temples. Not as impressive as the Buddhist temples in the Marble Mountains in Vietnam, but still pretty cool.

Switch to Liquid Detergent!

I was having trouble finding a good place to get my laundry done. I ended up taking it to a nearyby hostel (the Red Dragon Backpacker's Hostel) to be cleaned so I would have clothes for the weekend. It came back covered with streaks of undissolved laundry detergent. Surely, the person folding the clothes had to see it. I took it back. The young Malay guy at the desk did exactly what he should have: apologized, sympathized, and offered to rewash the clothes. Then his manager came in and got all Indian on me. He decided it was more important to start an argument and deny responsibility than to resolve the situation. The situation that had already been resolved by his underling got unresolved, and he ended up giving me my money back. If he hadn't insisted on being difficult, he would have kept the money and just rewashed half a load of laundry. I really wish self-service laundries were popular in Asia. It would be so much simpler to just spend a couple of hours doing it myself than dropping it off and waiting a day.

I Guess You Can't Be a Backpacker Without a Scruffy Beard

I went to trim my beard and fried my beard trimmer because I forgot to use the voltage converter. I looked in a lot of places and asked around, but there don't seem to be beard trimmers anywhere in Malaysia. (I might think that this was related to the whole Muslim facial hair thing, but there were plenty of razors and electric shavers.) If I had been looking for a pair of Bruno Mali shoes, a Prada bag, or some Fendi sunglasses, I could have found them in 5 minutes. Useful things are much harder.

Travel Hints from Helois

I did add one useful item to my travel arsenal: a small squeegee. One thing that has always annoyed me about Asia is the idea that bathrooms are expected to be puddles of water. The bathroom is the shower stall. Anytime you set foot in the bathroom, you come out with wet feet. By squeegeeing the bathroom floor after showering, I mostly eliminated this peeve.