Chaotic Kuala Lumpur

 Kuala Lumpur is a very exciting city! The most iconic symbol of the city would be the Petronas Towers, which are quite phenomenal. Jayda and I took an overnight bus from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur, supposed to be about a 5 to 6 hour drive. We were meant to get in around 6 am as we left at midnight. Around 4:30 am we both looked out the window and saw the glowing towers in the night sky. First, we were blown away by how big and bright they were. Second, we realized that its 4:30 am and no trains or busses start up again until 6 am! Like the true backpackers we are, we just went with the punches. The overnight bus was actually quite comfy and relaxing, it was just the extremely early arrival that took us off guard.

We hung outside of a 7/11 until we couldn’t bear any more. We got swindled by a taxi driver, but finally arrived to our budget hotel, TUNE, clean but no air conditioning in the rooms. We survived and slept in the lobby until allowed to check in around 11 am. It was a very chaotic arrival, but made it more of an adventure. We went out for the remainder of the day to see the sites.

Petronas Towers

Kuala Lumpur is extremely hot and humid! We opted to walk around at first to get our bearings, which was quite fun due to the lack of infrastructure for the pedestrians.  The streets are almost un-walkable as there are unpaved and unfinished sidewalks whilst you play frogger just to cross the street. Luckily, the public transportation is quite phenomenal with many undergrounds, trains, and a monorail that will get you almost anywhere you need to go. After a few hours of sweating out of every orifice, we opted for the underground. Kuala Lumpur is SO CHEAP, we spent about RM 5 a day on the underground, which is about USD 1.50. We also ate dinner one night for only USD 1.25, yes it was only noodles and a sparkling water, but still! Cheap is good.

monorail & the street

Chinatown is a must in Kuala Lumpur. I find it ironic that all these big cities have “Chinatowns” and I keep going to them, but each one is different. Some are a bit dull, but this one is fun. There are a bunch of stalls of fake designer goods. There also was a few tattoo stalls, which I think anyone would be crazy to get a tattoo done in KLs Chinatown! The fake goods looked pretty good, could fool me!  

shops in Chinatown

ceremony in the Batu Caves

Probably the most historical and cultural thing to do in and near KL would be to head to the Batu Caves, they are only a 20 minute train ride outside of town. They are amazing huge limestone caves within the hills/mountains surrounding the city. Many different cave insects and species call the Batu Caves home. It is also a religious pilgrimage site for Hindus. We climbed the 284+ steps to the top (pretty exhausting in the heat) and made our way to the temple within the caves. There were people inside actually having a ceremony or service, which was neat to see, but I felt like I was invading.

inside the Batu Caves

As the Petronas Towers are the most iconic feature of the city, one should go to the top of the Menara Tower to view it at night. We went up for sunset. It was neat to see the city from up so high. It was a bit of a bummer that the smog and clouds blocked out the sunset, but we still got to see the city lights below. It also was incredible that there was no glass in the way of our view. It was an open air viewing deck. You can go to the top of the Petronas Towers as well, but we decided to do the Menara Tower so we could see the Petronas Towers and it was cheaper and open air. I think that is a better deal!

view from the top of the Menara Tower

We were fortunate enough to get a message from our friend Petra, letting us know that her husband and her had a stopover for 2 days in KL on their way back to England. It was so nice meeting up with them and meeting their new adorable baby girl, who I must say is quite the world traveler already for only being 4 months old! They were staying at A LOT nicer hotel, so we met them there to have high tea and get out of the heat. We also went to the Times Square Mall, where there is an indoor theme park!!! Super Crazy! We went to go watch, but no one went on the big roller coaster while we were there, such a shame. Still worth a visit just to see it.

roller coaster in the Times Square Mall

On our last full day in KL, we went to Lake Titiwangsa. It was in our book and sounded a lot better than it was in actuality. We pretty much walked 20 minutes each way in the heat to get to a dirty lake. It was the day’s exercise! We spent 5 days in KL, which I would say is more than enough to get a feel for it and see the sites from a backpacker’s point of view. I would say 3 full days would be enough to fit it in, but was pleasantly surprised that we overstayed as we got to see our friends whilst they were in transit.

Lake Titiwangsa !

Overall, I loved Kuala Lumpur, it was absolutely chaotic in a great way. Motorbikes swerving in and out everywhere, people bustling in and out of the subways and trains, huge architectural feats, yet just a few minutes away are the Batu Caves. KL is great and the organized chaos is a ton of fun to be a part of.  

stairs up to the Batu Caves

Singapore, the Modern Gateway City

the famous MerLion

Singapore, first impressions: extremely clean & diverse. The first thing I noticed was the cleanliness. We landed, picked up our backpacks and headed to the MRT station to take the train to the city where we were staying. The station was immaculate, the train we got on was air conditioned and also clean. Second thing I noticed was the diversity. Many different people from all over South East Asia, China, India and Europe. The most used language here (that I am currently finding) is English, I am assuming as that is the common language amongst all the residents. The first full day here we did so much, thanks to our lovely host; Annina. We were fortunate enough to have friends who live in Singapore to show us around. Just in one day alone we walked to the MerLion, went to the Marina Bay Sands shopping Centre, Chinatown, Little India, the Gardens by the Bay, and the Satay by the Bay Hawker market. It was great.

in front of the Buddhist Temple in Chinatown

In Chinatown we went to a hawker: a room with seats in the middle and a ton of little kitchens surrounding it so you could choose what you wanted. It was cooked fresh to order and then you would sit down to eat it. It’s super cheap and delicious. Hawkers are very Singaporean (and can be found throughout Malaysia, Singapore, & Brunei) and are on every corner. In Chinatown, we also went to the Gold Tooth Buddhist Temple. This was pretty awesome. I’ve been to a lot of Buddhist temples, however in this one, people were actually inside praying during a service. They were chanting and praying, it was quite special that they allowed the tourists walk through admiring the beautiful temple while they were there. I quite enjoyed that moment as you could really see their devotions. After that pleasant experience, we went next door to the Hindu Temple, no one was inside there for prayer, but we still went inside for a look. It was nice, but the Buddhist Temple was more impressive.

We ended our evening getting hawker food to go from Satay on the Bay so we could go sit in the Bay Gardens to watch the light show on the big trees. This amazed me. There was hardly anyone at this mini tourist attraction. So far, this large man made park/garden areas along the bay was my favorite. It is a huge, free, gorgeous outdoor park, yet it seemed that hardly anyone took advantage of it. The trees that had the light show were ginormous, man made, but beautiful. We met our friend Stefan (Annina’s husband) after he got off work and enjoyed our hawker feast. Satay chicken and beef (as a vegetarian I didn’t get to eat this, but thoroughly enjoyed the smell!) pohpia (sort of a vegetable, egg, with peanut and chili sauce wrap), seafood crispy noodle, fried rice, Hong Kong noodles and topped it all off with wine and beer. It was so great to see friends and sit outside and relax to some amazing food and watch the light show in the trees. We felt like we had the place to ourselves.

the gardens by the bay

view from the ground on the gardens by the bay and the MBS at night

We spent 4 full days in total in Singapore. We added a few more sights on the last few days. Two fun places we went to were the two most iconic hotels: Marina Bay Sands and the Raffles Hotel. The Raffles Hotel contrasted to the modern MBS. It was very Colonial British, when we walked up to it I could just picture it surrounded in the lush jungle many years ago. The original “Singapore Sling” was created at the Long Bar here. We went up to have a drink, but for $28 Singapore Dollars, we thought we would save our money for the MBS later that evening. Again, I could never afford to stay at Raffles, but it is quite iconic and a great piece of history for the city, it is definitely worth a visit!

the iconic Raffles Hotel

We were very lucky on this trip, as we were also able to meet up with one of my husbands’ old house mates as well, who has also decided to move to Singapore. We met her on top of the Marina Bay Sands at the Club Lounge. It was on a Wednesday, which is ladies night in Singapore, so once we got up to the top I received a free voucher for a drink. Which was great as one glass of wine would set you back $28 Singapore Dollars! (About $22-$23 USD depending on the exchange rate). It was gorgeous at the top of the hotel, the view overlooked the city and we got a sneak peak of their amazing infinity pool. Our friends we were visiting have a roof top infinity pool on the top floor of their apartments, so luckily we lounged there most days so I didn’t feel too jealous of the hotel guests. As most people cannot afford to stay at the MBS(as the locals call it), it is neat to go up to the bar for one drink to see the pool and the view. As Singaporean residents seem to work hard all day, the city really comes alive in the night; so heading up in the evening would be a more lively experience.

Annina and I on top of Marina Bay Sands

view from the top of MBS

On our final full day everyone we met while in Singapore as well as our friends decided to meet up on the East Coast before our overnight bus to Kuala Lumpur.  The beach on the East Coast was blue and clean, you could see all the large planes coming in to land at the airport (Jayda and Stefan loved this) as well as all the major ships off the coast. It was pretty neat. The East Coast was also known for its seafood, so we went to a hawker and ordered a TON of food. We had: black pepper crab (amazing, SO GOOD), cereal prawns, sting ray, fried rice, fried carrot cake (not a dessert, it’s a radish chopped and fried with egg, bean sprouts, chili & salted radish), pohpia (again, yum and not entirely sure if that is spelled correctly at all!), satay beef and pork, and of course it was all swished down with some Tiger beer. It was a smorgousborg of delicious, cheap food, shared with friends. It was the perfect way to end our trip in Singapore.  

the East Coast

our feast of pepper crab, stingray, satay, fried rice, popiah, and cereal prawn, topped off with Tiger Beer, yum!

I quite enjoyed Singapore as it is a very interesting and diverse city. It is very clean, so clean they don’t even allow chewing gum in the city. You can bring it in on a flight, but you cannot buy it in Singapore. They don’t want gum to be spit out making the city unclean. There is no eating or drinking in the subways, no smoking signs everywhere, and the funniest bit is that there are “no durian” signs in the subway as well; due to the extreme stench of this fruit!

I also loved the irony of Singapore. I felt safe the entire time, but didn’t see a single police officer. The city is very orderly and clean, but near our hotel there were rows and rows of prostitutes. The city has strict laws on eating and drinking in the subway, yet prostitution is legal. I found this very amusing. It definitely added to my intrigue of the city.

The city has old areas with great architecture, but it is also very modern with a huge city center for business. It is a bit of a sterile city, therefore making it a great stop over destination as you can see and do mostly everything in a couple of days. It is a huge shopping destination and also quite expensive. Due to the cleanliness, diversity, sterility, and safety, although it may be a somewhat quick tourist destination, it is a great place to live. (Apparently as I cannot say from experience as I do not live there). Our friends Annina and Stefan are extremely happy here and absolutely love it, the same goes for Emma, my husband’s old house mate. For me, as a tourist, I would imagine that I would have been bored after a few days, but I can see that living in such a safe, and diverse city, would be fun as a permanent to semi-permanent resident.

the infinity pool at our friends apartment building

There are things going on for the residents throughout the year, easy transportation to work, and you have a ton of cheap airline carriers that can take you to other destinations in South East Asia, Indonesia, and Australia in only a couple hours. I am extremely happy for my friends and am very glad I got to see a locals’ view of things. If it weren’t for their point of view, I may have thought Singapore was a bit boring as I wouldn’t have had their insight, knowledge, and great advice on what to do and see. Thanks Annina and Stefan for being great hosts and I think that we definitely will be back for a visit again!!

let the adventure begin!

my 25 lb backpack for the next 4 months

My husband and I are currently sitting in the SFO Virgin Atlantic Upper Class Lounge waiting to board our flight. Today is the first day of our adventure. I think I will celebrate by sipping on some champagne. This trip has been 4 years in the making. We were originally supposed to do this trip 2 years ago when we moved back to the States. However, due to the recession we decided against it; always a regret.

VA Lounge at SFO 

Two years later and plenty of time saving miles, points, and money we're finally off on our dream backpacking trip to South East Asia. We're fortunate enough to have had enough air miles to fly back to England in Upper Class to visit friends and family first. A HUGE thanks to my grandma who encouraged us to go on this adventure by volunteering to watch our son, Mr. Butters, while we are away. Although, I already miss him dearly, I know he is in good hands.

It's time to relax, explore, and just see what life has to bring. It was a blessing in disguise that we didn't go on our trip the first time around. We've made great friends in San Diego, rescued a wonderful "dog-son", and have made even more friends that we now get to visit while we are backpacking. I am so excited and so happy that this trip is finally about to happen. The adventure is just beginning........ stay tuned! For now, cheers !