Malayasia: Batu Caves

These guys will steal your bag if you aren’t careful!

My flash was having an annoying affect.

Malayasia: National Rememberance Monument of Freedom

Malayasia: Central Market/Cultural Bazaar, Arch(wood craft), Freedom Square

Kuala Lumpur at night…

…or is it…

Surprise! It’s a model.

Arch is a company that makes some pretty cool woodcraft items.

Malayasia: Kuala Lumpur Bird Park

He tried talking to my Galaxy Tab while I was taking a picture of him.

My new best buddy! (see video below)

This is a Royal Pigeon.

The metallic sheen on this birds feathers was amazing

And of course, what park wouldn’t be complete without a local rodent.

The video is still uploading as of this time of writing.  Give it a few more minutes to process :)

This is a video of my new KL buddy:

And here we have a local disturbance in progress.

Oh, don’t mind these.  Just a couple of peacocks passing by.

(link coming soon)

Malayasia: National Islamic Museum

Malayasia: Traditional Village House & National Museum

Pics from Malayasia….almost there

I’ve not forgotten to put them up…just managing nearly 600 pics/vids takes time…..ugh.  Hang tight, will try to get them up later today.

A Sunday in Singapore

Everytime I hear about Singapore, I hear how “clean” it is.  How many fines there are for everything (like chewing gum.  You can’t buy it any where!).  So you kinda have this expectation when you go there.  There are quite a few signs in the subway station that say don’t eat/drink on the subway/platforms and yet I saw a lady do just that.  Being an obvious foreigner, I try to be mindful of such things and them simply observe the reality that appears.

Burning trash (paper only?) On the street.  I saw a few of these around. And not in “rough”areas either.

No city is perfect.  This was taken from a window in the hostel we stayed at.  Sure not street facing but then again, Singapore is starting to get a little”rough around the edges”.  Sure it had all these fancy, funky buildings but those are few compared to the rest of the place.

Saw this tree with a very weird thing growing on it.  If anyone knows what it is, feel free to speak up.  No, it didn’t quiver when I walked by.  Wouldn’t that be a story eh? “Blogger eaten by a Singaporean tree fungus….”

So let’s take a little stroll thought a Chinese mythological park shall we?  Haw Par Villa.

I’m not even going to try to explain this one….

This is the gate to the 10 levels of Hell.  Ohhh….they are special.  So much so that they deserve their own album.  You are really in for a treat once I am able to make the album.

Asia had some weird myths……just freaky stuff….

Aren’t you glad you subscribed to this blog now?  But wait….there’s more!

Yes….that’s an old woman breastfeeding…..as I said….weird.

Ok, some of the more serious stuff.  This place is filled with really awesome depictions of famous events.

One thing about being here is the country is multicultural.  It casually mixes East Indians, Chinese and Malays.  We spent a lot of time in the Little Indias of the areas we were in.  I wasn’t giving up a chance for butter chicken everyday!  :)  You really don’t understand how crowded some places are till you visit them.  This is a pic of “Little” India in KL to demonstrate.

It was like walking through and endless sea of Indians, and I’m not exaggerating!

The good thing, I got one last meal of butter chicken and gaelic naan in before we left for the airport hotel.

Because we are leaving on an 8am flight, we need a hotel close by the airport.  So we wake up Tuesday morning, and try to get to our final hotel.

Now, the hotel is near the airport.  I check and there are two trains.  One is direct to the airport (same one we took when we arrived) and one that makes 4 stops.  Since one of those stops seems near the hotel, i figure well take that and grab a cab.  We got told that there is no public transportation near there.  So, to the airport and then a bus to the hotel then.

First, we arrive on the first floor of the airport.  I ask where information is….5th floor.  I get there, ask where the buses are….1st floor. Fuuuuuuuu……seriously.

But wait….the bus driver didn’t know where our hotel is! “I’m new here”.  Despite reassurances from the airport staff that the bus driver will know where it was.  Ugh, so we wait till all other passengers are on and try again.  I show him the map on my Galaxy Tab which just seems to confuse him.  I try to name some other things on the map and another hotel rings a bell.  Ugh, finally.

But wait….there’s more(I feel I should be asking you for multiple payments of money by now….).  As the bus driver goes along, shifting gears and such, he’s also counting cash!  WTH?!  And why is he not wearing his glasses when we first got on?  Sigh, we eventually get to our hotel without careening off into a Malaysian ditch.

Sadly, the “YouniQ” (unique) hotel is on a kinda deserted area.  Only one little restaurant open, with a dismal selection of food, and a convenience store that’s more convenience than store.  After a bit of spicey chicken fried rice, we head back to our room and set the alarm for 445am, so we can make the 5am breakfast and get on a 6am shuttle to the airport.

Well, if you guys are lucky, I might have more crazy things our PCs….if you are unlucky, you’ll just get a bunch of pics that didn’t get posted here yet :D

Friday in KL

Today we spent as a fluff day.  Just kinda relaxing and checking out the area around our hotel.  This is our third hotel white here and probably the best one we will have.  First this is a $300 room we got for $50 on Agoda.  We have been booking all of our non-pre-planned stays through this app.  In fact, it is cheaper to actually do so than by asking at the counter of the hotel to stay an extra night!

This room was rather large :)

It also had a decent view too.

Next stop, Singapore!

Mixed bag of elation

We have been pretty spoiled with the inter-city busses in Korea.  I mean how m much more relaxed can you get than this?

This pic was taken in 2007 when my wife cane to Korea by herself and I came for a visit. Still, the busses have reclining seats and a swing out leg support as well. How do you beat that?

When I saw “Massage bus” sticker on the bus wee were about to get onto for Singapore I was both curious and happy. These seats have massagers built in!

They are also very comfy…

…and bright.

I was going to be supper happy when I saw this:

It seems they either don’t work or the bus driver hadn’t turned them on….not getting power to charge my tablet :(

In any case, it will be a nice 5hr bus ride.