Greetings from Kuala Lumpor. Arrived here as scheduled yesterday evening and leave for Borneo tomorrow(unless I change my mind at the airport, which I'm actually 25% considering...) KL is OK, but not blowing me away. Kinda seems like a SE Asian version of Minneapolis. Lots of friendly people, but surprisingly little to do or see for a city this size (1.5 million). I'm sure there is a super-cool underbelly that I haven't found, but it seems to be hiding pretty well. Very different from Bangkok which has a billion sites and an energy that just oozes out in all directions (for better or for worse.) Aside from some small pockets (like Chinatown, where my hotel is...) it seems like all there are here are Bank headquarter buildings. Though it does have the Petronas Towers which I went and which are awesome. I thought they'd be cool, but they were cooler than I imagined. I actually went twice: once in the morning to get my "first-come, first served" ticket for going up to the skybridge, and once again at 6pm to actually go up to the skybridge (which was also even cooler that I thought it would be...). Aside for that, hoo-hum. A few misc observations:
- Guess what the language is here: English! Who knew? I didn't. (BTW, why the hell doesn't the Lonely Planet guide discuss how easy/hard it will be to get by in various countries speaking English? Kinda useful to know...) Ok, so the "first" language is Malay, but pretty much everyone speaks English, both because it was an English colony for some time and because it is a pretty international place and English is the common tongue. I was talking to a local (in English!) and he said that people who move to KL will live here for years without learning any Malay because it is so easy to get by with just English. Nice for me...
- Apparently it is not a social taboo to pick ones nose in public in Malaysia. This trend seems to hold true for restaurant workers too, which is more than a little bit troubling.
- Apparently it is also not a social taboo to look at porn in an internet cafe. The user at computer #1 appears to have several dozen explicit webcams open, while the user at #3 prefers a site called "gayromeo.com." (for the record, i am not on computer #1 or #3...)
- Horrible generalization: Thai people (men, women, and ladyboys) seem to be overall much more attractive that Malaysians for whatever reason. The people here really do seem nice though. They do seem more serious though. I have gotten very use to constant joking/kidding that is a standard Thai conversational tool. Doesn't seem to a factor here.
- Speaking of Thai conversations: my English has seemed to morphed in to version of English that Thai people speak. For example if someone asks, "What did you do today?" instead of saying "I hiked to a waterfall, but got caught in a rainstorm and got a billion leeches on my feet" I now say, "I hike to waterfall. Much rain. Many many leeches. Not good." This has happened slowly and unintentionally. I've noticed that it has carried into my conversations with Katie ("I go to Borneo soon. Maybe no have internet. I call soon as I can.") and even the voice in my head ("Very tired, but must get up for free breakfast buffet now. No need pay for breakfast. Can sleep later, OK?"). So you can probably blame at least some of my typos on that.
Thanks for reading...
-erik
2 comments:
1. The sleeping chamber is an awesome idea.
2. I think your writing is actually improving. It has a certain economy of language.
The towers do look awesome. Nice photo. And, thanks for the laughs...after a long week at the office, it was fun to read your latest post and laugh out loud at how your "Thenglish" has evolved.
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