Final days in KL...

My stay in Malaysia is coming to a close. I wanted to extend my trip, but everything was booked on Singapore Airlines through the 6th of January. I decided it was too risky to fly standby for 3 flights, so am going back to the States as planned on the 29th.

I'm cramming in as much shopping, sight-seeing and eating as I can before I leave KL. Today I went to the National Orchid Garden with my Auntie and Uncle. It was beautiful--I saw orchids I've never seen before. Got to see the new "Singapore Girl" orchid, created to commemorate the icon of Singapore Airlines.
After lunch, popped by for a visit with my cousin Emily and her husband Mark. Nice to meet so many of my mom's relatives in one trip! Amazing to have family half way across the globe all this time and to finally get to meet them!
Auntie Kwee Leng, cousin Emily and me at a small coffee shop or kopitiam:

This one is a bit blurry as we were having lighting issues. From l to r: Emily's husband Mark, Emily, me, Auntie Kwee Leng and Uncle Harun:

On the way back to the car we stopped to get some friend bananas or goreng pisang. I was a bit skeptical, as there was a bunch sitting out, already made in Asian fashion. They looked like they had been sitting there for awhile and might be cold. When I got back to the car and popped one into my mouth I was pleasantly surprised. Delicate, sweet Malaysian fried banana = YUM!

Construction in KL never stops!

Daytime view of the iconic Petronas Twin Towers:

Got through a small portion of the Islamic Arts Museum, which is quite near the National Mosque. They had models of mosques all over the world, which were very cool. I didn't realize that the Taj Mahal is actually a mausoleum and a 'monument to love'--built by the Shah Jahan in memory of his wife Mumtaz Mahal. I managed to sneak a few pictures of the models before getting yelled at by the guard. Whenever I see a sign saying "No photos" it just makes me want to take photos more! Then if I get caught, I just say "Sorry" while smiling meekly. If all else fails, just pretend like you don't speak English! "Como? No comprendo. Lo siento, no hablo ingles." Haha, you'll never stop me, museum guards!

Model of Mecca:

Map of the Islamic World:

Kalysan (Kalan) Mosque in Bukhara, Uzbekistan (15th century AD)

Another mosque (not sure which one):

Didn't get to see that much of the museum other than the mosque models and some mini Korans (why is everything so cute in miniature?) before getting shooed out by the unsmiling guards, 10 minutes before closing.

Pretty lantern in museum courtyard:

My uncle Harun usually resists having his photo taken but I managed to grab this one of him, thanks to the mirrored elevator or "lift" in the museum. I'm becoming quite the sneaky photographer.

Museum lobby:


Beautiful tile mosaic on pillar outside museum:

Bird of prey:

After a short rest at home, I went out with my cousin and her boyfriend to shop (of course!) for a silk caftan (housedress) for my grandma. Success! Can't decide if I like this sarong though. Hmmmm...
Ha, no idea what's going on with my right hand. Guess I'm trying to make shadow puppets or something.

After a successful shopping trip, we searched for chow. Not sure that the place we ate dinner needed the sign below. It was mostly drunk older Chinese businessmen and expats trying to pick up locals, with loud Western pop blaring in the background and the "Boxing Day" football (that's soccer to you American readers) matches on tv.
Merry Christmas everyone!

Christmas, Malaysian style, la

The holidays are really something else in KL. My Auntie Grace and Uncle Kiek took me to an Xmas Line Dancing Party. All I can say is...Wow. It was one of the most unique things I've ever seen. Tons of Chinese people, wearing red and fluorescent green clothes and Santa hats, speaking Cantonese and line dancing to Christmas, country and random American songs.

Walking around downtown KL, there's tons of snowman decorations, people wearing Santa hats, fake snow blowing, Christmas trees, carolers, etc. I even saw a Malaysian "snowball" fight--people spraying aerosol cans of fake snow at each other, all while wearing Santa hats with flashing lights, reindeer horns and blaring air horns at each other. In the States, Christmas is now just shorthand for crass commercialism, but here everyone just seems so excited and happy for Christmas. They really into the spirit of things, in a very earnest and endearing way.

While having a midnight drink (my favorite, teh tarik) with my cousin and her boyfriend, we were serenaded by Filipino girls caroling. They were raising money for a "charity", although I'm doubtful as to whether said charity exists. But who can get mad at four girls far from home singing "West Virginia, Country Roads" while playing guitar, wearing the ubiquitous Santa hats and smiling sweetly? After donating a few ringgits to their "charity" we requested a Christmas song in Tagalog and they happily obliged.

Slow connection now, so pics and videos to follow later. Merry Christmas from Kuala Lumpur!

Last Day in Siem Reap...

was actually a few days ago, but am only able to sit down and write about it now. On Wednesday I decided I had seen enough temples and went out to explore the "real" Siem Reap a bit.

I had breakfast at a hawker stand nearby where I was staying. Was drawn in by the dessert, which consisted of lots of coconut things, condensed milk and shaved ice. Southeast Asians love them some condensed milk!

I then moved down to the other end of the stand and had some noodles, fried spring rolls and scallions. Yum!

Just a few steps down the road I saw some men moving huge blocks of ice in a truck. They stick metal hooks into holes into the blocks of ice, to move it around.

Further down the road and down a side street I came across a temple, much simpler than the grand ones that I had seen for the past two days.
Just down the street I heard some kids playing and went over to have a look. These boys playing volleyball were pretty good! Made me remember my high school varsity volleyball days.

Burning trash is one way to get rid of it! At least they're not building lots of landfills.

Huge bicycle & motorbike parking lot:

Some sweet schoolgirls I ran into:

All of the houses and many business in Siem Reap have these little temples or wats outside. There is also a fair amount of construction going on and laundry drying outside, all of which are captured in the photo below.

Another small "house temple"

I asked these charming little boys if I could take their picture. Instead of the standard Cambodian child "Give my one dollar" response, they responded by running away, chasing each other and laughing.

People make liberal use of the horn in Cambodia. From what I've surmised, horn usage can mean "Watch out, I'm going to pass you on the left" or "Hey! You're too close to me!" or "I'm going to go straight now" or "I'm going to weave in and out of lanes erratically and drive on the wrong side of the road" or "Hello" or any combination of the above. Cambodian ladies manage to make riding on the back of a fume-spewing scooter a noble and elegant act, by sitting side-saddle.

Old school and new school transport.

After my walk around town, it was time for some quick shopping in the Old Market. I employed what I hoped were impressive negotiation tactics and scored a few souvenirs. Then it was back to Wats Up to gather my things and off to the airport. Thank you Freshie Girlie Room! You were a nice home for a few days. (Photo won't rotate now la. Will try to fix later la)

The American giant and nice friendly Wats Up guy:

Cows on the way to the Siem Reap airport

Thank you sign, you explain so little and so much at the same time. It's all so clear now why there were so many children begging and selling pirated books outside the temples. I'm glad to see that the "Passenger Charge" is reaching those who need it most.

Thank you Cambodia, you were rich in contradictions and beauty, a feast for the eyes and the soul. I'll never forget you.

Sunrise over Angkor Wat

It started with this:
And become this:

Welcome to the Kingdom of Cambodia

I'm starting to realize that every Air Asia flight has at least one delay. I put in my "hand phone" number with my reservation, so they send me a text message for each flight to let me know the delay. It's funny--the text message always arrives at least 24 hours before the flight. You'd think if they know about the "delay" ahead of time, they could just prevent it! I'm wondering if they severely overbook every single flight and then bump a bunch of people to another time. Either that or they are just really efficient at letting you know how inefficient they are! Not good when on a tight schedule la.

In any case, I arrived at the Phnom Penh airport in one piece and then had to deal with getting a visa. I didn't realize this until I got to the visa counter, but they use American dollars in Cambodia. And of course I hadn't brought any with me, assuming that there would be an ATM in the airport where I could get real (pronounce "ree-Al") or I could just charge it. You'd think so, right?



Oh yeah and I forgot to bring extra passport photos. (And I thought I was a seasoned traveller!)So they wanted to charge me an extra dollar to make a photocopy of my photo in my passport. I told the guy I'd give him 3 ringgits, since I didn't have dollars. The official exchange rate is actually 3.5 ringgits to the dollar, but he didn't seem to care. Yep, that visa dude is now 3 ringgits richer thanks to good ol' me.

And of course you can't charge your Cambodian visa to your Visa. The guy said if I wanted to pay in Malaysian currency, it would be 100 ringitts, which would be a nice $10 profit for him. I was having none of that nonsense. After a protracted discussion and further confusion (one of the visa counter ladies had erroneously told an Aussie chick that she could pay with her credit card--maybe the visa counter lady was confused by the sign, too), they let me and the Aussie chick's boyfriend through customs to get cash from the ATM. (The Aussie dude showed me his 50 dollar bill and asked me who Grant was. My response: "Some General." Ah, yes, I'm an American history guru.) Dollares in hand, it was back to the counter to pony up my 20 bucks for a tourist visa. Customs was a trip as well. Flat screen tvs displayed messages like "Child abuse ruins a child's life. If you abuse a child, it will ruin your life, too." I very badly wanted to snap a photo, but was afraid they'd sic the Khmer military police goons on me. Finally through customs, where they had a scary camera that I was afraid was video taping me all 1984/Big Brother style, but was just for the photos. Cambodians apparently like to have lots of photos of people visiting their country. (My friend Bonnie said she needed to submit photos for her utilities application, mobile phone, etc.)

The taxi pulled up right in front of a restaurant and Bonnie was standing right there! So funny. I checked into my hotel just down the street and got my ticket to Siem Reap sorted out. We then met up with some friends of hers at Alley Cat, a Mexican restaurant in--you guessed it, an alley. I tried to order the Thai curry as I wanted something somewhat local, but changed my order to chicken tacos, since the guy taking my order looked so sceptical. (Apparently Alley Cat is a Mexican joint.) We had a few more beers and chatted for a bit, then it was sleepy time.

Woke up around 5ish this morning for some reason and watched Bloomberg tv and read for a bit. (I finished "The Nasty Bits" and am now on to "Kitchen Confidential.") Was just going downstairs when I ran into Bonnie in the lobby. She was coming to get me to see if I wanted to have breakfast. So funny that we kept running into each other that way. Maybe we're long lost twins. Ha. Breakfast was yummy chicken with "yellow noodles" with a very light and tasty broth. I am really loving the noodle breakfasts here in Asia.

A tuk tuk ride to the airport and Bangkok Airways flight later and I was in Siem Reap! Bonnie told me a lot of people coming to Cambodia skip Phnom Penh (or PP or P2, as the locals call it) and just go to Siem Reap. It's high season right now, so the Bonnie-recommended Golden Banana was booked up. They sent me to Wats Up, which had a few available rooms. The "Monky Room" (sic) was available and had beautiful bed sheets, but I didn't want to be on the first floor. So "Freshie Girl Room" (2nd floor) is my home for the next few days. They give you the option of paying for AC or just using the fan by simply removing the AC remote. Pretty smart idea. Can be cheap or comfortable, your choice la.

I then checked out the Banteay Srey temple, which is pretty far from town. The tuk tuk ride out to the temple was scenic & very rural. It actually reminded me of rural Costa Rica, when I was there in 1996. (I'm sure it's changed since then.) We stopped to get some gas, which were crazy Kool-Aid colors.



Some other funny sightings on the drive to the temple:

Skinny Cow (click to see larger version)


The Banteay Srey temple was absolutely beautiful.

Unfortunately Blogger is taking forever to upload photos, so I'll have to add more another day.

The tuk tuk driver took me to another temple and then my camera battery died from all the photos I'd been taking all day. I was pretty exhausted and famished at that point, so had some good fish curry and rice and fresh pineapple juice before heading back to town. Not bad for $6.50 (although pricey by Cambodian standards).

That's all for now, sleepy time so I can take in more temples and sights tomorrow!

In Kuala Lumpur la

So I've spent the past few days in KL hanging out with my cousin Lynet. Got in late Friday night and she picked me up from the airport. KL is great and I'm mastering the use of "la." Lynet explained that you have to use it correctly. On it's own la doesn't really mean anything, but it's simply used to place emphasis, as in "Their nasi lemak is the best la. Look at the long queue la." Speaking of which, my cousin and her boyfriend took me to eat the best nasi lemak last night at Antarabangsa, which means International. They have been there for more than 20 years are pretty well known! They have a board with thank yous from people from all over the world.

Nasi lemak is a local Malay breakfast. Nasi is rice and lemak is coconut--the coconut rice comes with different things. The basic one comes with egg (either hard boiled or fried), sambal (sweet chili paste), ikan bilis (fried anchovies). You either eat it there on the banana leaf, or get it wrapped up in a banana leaf triangle packet to go.

Photos to come when I have a faster connection.

I've basically been eating eating eating and shopping shopping shopping, which I'm coming to think are the two Malay (and especially KL) pastimes. Also hearing more about my family history from my Auntie Kwee Ling--complicated Chinese family la!

I'm off this afternoon to meet up with my friend Bonnie in Phnom Penh and then off to check out the temples in Angkor Wat. Cambodia here I come!

Intense foot massage

I've been wanting to get reflexology since I arrived in Malaysia. I got a 30 minute foot massage last night for only 30 ringgits(about US$10)! I'm not sure if it was actually reflexology, but the lady was putting everything she had into it. It was a mixture of pleasure and pain and a few times I had to ask her to do it a bit softer. I will definitely try it again--hopefully pain isn't a normal part of the foot massage experience here!