In Continuum.

Malaysian Trip Part II: First Impressions

It was in the dark when i arrived in Kuala Lumpur,so i wasnt sure how the city was like.At 4am,every city is the same.Little cars filling the streets,sparses population roaming the pavements,and deep shadows around the corners everywhere.But the morning of Kuala Lumpur was drastically different,and bursting with life.

I woke up in a completely dark room at 830am on Saturday morning.The rooms at Dragon Inn didnt have windows,so there wasnt any differences between a room at 8am as to say,a room at 2am.Completely dark for the both of them,and i remember opening my eyes thinking that they were actually closed.It was that dark,and i found it really hard to climb out of bed.But i did anyway,and the day started with the smell of chestnut filling the lobby of the 'hotel'.An observation about escalator doors in Malaysia is that they close way too fast.They seem to expect one person to exit the doors everytime,and will close right after the ass of the first person crosses the exit.I got stuck in between the doors three times within the first six hours of the first day,and that's a rather high probability if you ask of me.And they move ridiculously slow,as if they were hydro-powered or something.

The streets were bustling with life.Cars horning at each other,smoke drifting through the air from the tip of cigarettes and the venders on the side of the road.Noise everywhere,people chattering and shouting over the voices of one another,calling out to each other and cursing in unknown languages.The four of us stood in the middle of the crowd with our hands on our bags,being constantly paranoid that somebody was going to come up and grab our bags,and then make a dash.Because really,in the eyes of every passerby,all of them seem to have something in their heads,working our ways and schemes to rob you.There was an indian man on the LRT the other day,who kept eyeing JiaYing and her camera,which she was holding in her hands.I changed placed with her,and swiftly alighted at KLCC.He got off too,and still kept his eyes on the camera.So you see,everybody had a plot in their heads,and we were a bunch of very paranoid people throughout the trip.

But like the saying goes,you cant be too careful.We kept our things to ourselves,and thankfully nothing happened to neither of us.Besides,with the guide of WW's cousin it was a breeze through the city.The city of Kuala Lumpur reminded me of an interesting mix of Singapore and Taiwan.It had the feel of Singapore,in the sense that it was very multi-racial.But at the same time the way the streets were built,the buildings structured and stuff,was a lot like Taiwan.Only here,it is much dirtier,with more sinister looking people and of course,worse traffic.It was like the two cities blended together in a giant blender,but with a layer of dust added to the top of the mixture.

So the first impression wasnt all that great.And it was as hot as Singapore,which is a bad thing since i have a theory about hot places.You see,if you are cold you can wear more clothes to keep warm,right?But if you are hot,even if you strip down to nothing,you will still feel hot.That is why i hate hot countries,but it's not like i could do anything about the weather.We merely took refuge in the gigantic shopping malls,and we did a bit of shopping there.I am glad that the bunch of that bothered to take their time off to check out some shoes with me,but the ones they picked didnt have my size,sadly.But oh well,it was a great thing of them to accompany me on my shopping trips,and i was grateful enough to treat them to a barbeque dinner.But that is besides the point,now isn't it?

The problem with Malaysian shopping malls is the structure and design of it.It reminded me of the room in the Harry Potter books?With the bunch of staircases moving here and there and never in a very orderly fashion.So on this floor you see an escalator going up,but that does mean the design is going to be the same on the next floor.Also,a staircase here will not lead to a stairecase next floor.You have to walk a distance before hitting the next set of them.It was crazy,and i got lost just trying to find my way around the crowd and the noise.It was a mind bending experience for me,but at least we found each other due to the beauty of technology.

Green Box is the God of karaoke.K-Box is trash compared to that.I mean,im not a frequent visitor of karaokes,but at least i know they almost always have trashy videos,and almost always have little to no good English songs.In Green Box,they even had Death Cab for Cutie,John Mayer,Radiohead,Yeah Yeah Yeahs...Wow.Besides,it was cheap too.I was telling the bunch of them,that if we took a budget airline to Kuala Lumpur,then sing for three hours and fly back,it'd still be cheaper than singing in Singapore.Go learn something from Green Box,K-Trash.

Times Square was a great shopping mall.But at the end of the day our legs were so sore that we just wanted to sit somewhere.Like i said,girls have stamina when it comes to shopping.They never stop,and they just go on and on and on.Despite the eyebags and despite the pain in the feet.They go on shopping,and that left the cousin and i in Borders,staring into deep space and later falling asleep.

But still,it was an eye-opener for me take the monorail and the LRT in Malaysia.You really start to appreciate the transport system in Singapore,which is top notch i must say.I mean,the monorail trains were pathetically small for one,and it felt like a bunch of sardines packed into the same can.It was invited molestors literally,to take a grab at some innocent ass and get away with it.The LRT was marginally better and bigger,but it was rather shabby as well.Like Singapore,people rushed to get into the train while people tried to get out.But like the lift doors,the train doors were eager to close too.So you can imagine the rush that was involved.It was rather bad,i must say.

We ended the day in a tired tone.But still,over midnight we did play a game of truth or dare.Well,it wasnt so much about the dare since there wasnt much to do as a dare save for knocking on the doors of our fellow residence.So it was down to the game,putting a card on your forehead.You dont know your own card,but you know the other three cards.We each try to convince each other to change another card,which might result in a bigger or a smaller card than the initial one.When everybody is satisfied with the card on their forehead,we all flash our cards and see who has the biggest and the smallest.The guy with the biggest card will ask the guy with the smallest,some intimate questions,which of courses included the normal sexuality question,virginity and stuff.Jerry the cousin was a good sport,but JY was obviously reserved with her secrets.I understand of course,since i know not everybody is as open as i am with my thoughts and experiences.

So i must say the day ended on a high note.Sure it was tiring and i bought little stuff.But at least at the end of it all we ended up laughing in the room deep into the night.Like said,it is always the company of the travel that counts,and never anything else.