Malaysian Holiday Report J
November 18th 2002 to December 2nd 2002

Week One – Kuala Lumpur

Hiya All, 

Just a little note to say that I've been, saw and survived the holiday !!  For those of ya that might not have known, I have had 2 weeks in Malaysia and it was very relaxing :)

Spent the first week at the Century Plaza Novatel Hotel at Kuala Lumpur (KL to the locals) which is one giant shopping centre !  They seem to specialise in shopping mauls (not malls as they maul your wallet) there and without trying too hard I managed to spend some $2000 or about 4000 ringit on cloths, electrical, software and DVD movies and tours.  Temp in KL was between 30 and 35 deg C the whole week with sunny humid mornings and tropical rain in the afternoons.  By tropical I mean if you put your head out you would be soaked to the skin in 20 seconds !  The hotel had a pool on the third floor and I an tell you that by the last day there, I was swimming about 70 odd laps.  Just don't tell anyone it was only a short course size pool :)

More noticeable purchase was a portable DVD player which fits nicely into a laptop bag and will be great for travelling about.  Has plugs that easily fit into motel TV's and the likes.  Cost 899 ringit (After a little haggle down from 1000) which is about $410 aussie.  Took about 1000 ringit with me which I picked up at the Travellex Counter at the Aussie airport, but found that I got better exchange rates just taking cash advances through ATM which were in abundance over there.  Typically 1.9 ringit to the dollar at Travellex while the exchange conversion using VISA card in an ATM or carded purchases were closer to 2.15 ringits to the dollar plus a $4 fee.  Learnt pretty quick to withdraw 1000 at a time and the $4 fee for cash withdrawals becomes way less than the savings made on the exchange rate differences.  Only problem is that Malaysia seems to be know for credit card fraud, so I'll give a few days for the last of the transactions to come through, then request the bank to cancel the card and issue a new one I think.  Unlike Aussie EFTPOS machines, your whole card number is printed on the receipts and in the case of store purchases, that means the have all your card number on their copy


Electrical gear seemed to be about 20% cheaper I suppose, about 10% cheaper than Aussie Duty Free.  Clothing was way cheap, typically 5 to 10 ringit for cheap T-shirts, 15 to 20 ringit for good quality T-shirts and I think I paid about 45 ringit for some dress pants.  DVD movies and watches are the infamous items to buy there and everyone has them for sale.  DVD prices ranged from 8 ringit each to 15 ringit and most were buy 5 and get one free.  Came home with an "Undisclosed" number of movies, both new ones not released yet and some oldies :o)  Also availed myself to MP3 and software CD's at about 12 ringit each (currently have 225 Disco Hits blaring on the new portable DVD player through the stereo here and I think the neighbours know I'm home now :)


Anyway, back to the story..  The first weeks was a shoppers nightmare, with more stores and shopping centres than even the avid shopper could visit in a 24/7 week.  Shops are open from 10am to 10pm in the cities. Took a KL City tour the first day which introduced us to the hectic traffic and driving methods of the Malaysian Capital City.  They are really quite mad and decided that day that I would not be hiring a vehicle to drive !  Spent about 4 hours in traffic with a few stops about the city to look at the Kings Palace, Twin Towers Building (Now claimed as the tallest in the world), Local jail where Barlow and Chambers were hung which is now closed and a few other typical city sights.  The Malaysian people seem to genuinely like Aussies and we found them to be very friendly and helpful, even the ones that come out at dawn with offers of "Beautiful cheap girl to take to your hotel room Sir?" 

We also did the tourist trap and visited the "China Town Markets" one night which is a section of KL with stalls and food stands lining a couple of blocks.  After warning from a few people I did not buy anything to eat there, but enjoyed a walk down the rows of stalls.  I don't think anyone could survive that walk without buying something !  They practically drag you into their stalls to look at their wares :)  They got me for me for the "Genuine Imitation Rolex Watch"  there..

KL also has a park something like a Disney land called Sunaway Lagoon.  Did a day tour there at cost of about 160 ringit.  Price includes Park Entry and the bus ride there and back.  You end up with about 5 to 6 hours at the park.  Once you are in the park all rides are included as well as the wave pools and water parks attractions.  Was quite a good day although the food there was mediocre at best.  Rides were average theme park types (roller coasters and stationary things that tried to get you to throw up your lunch :) and the wave pools were pretty popular with the locals.  They need to visit the wave pools on the Gold Coast to see what a wave pool should be like though.  I called them ripple pools :o)

Week Two - Pinang.

Week 2 was spent in Pinang which is an Island off the Malaysian coast (Still a part of Malaysia though) at the Casuarina Beach Resort in Batu Ferenghi (Sounds like the Star Trekkers Suburb :)  We flew from KL to Pinang but its also possible to drive there.  The island is connected to the mainland at a city called Butterworth by both car ferry and a 14 kilometre long 4 lane bridge (Claimed to be the 3rd longest bridge in the world), but peak hour traffic and it seems like 30 kilometres :o)

The resort is a little lower in quality than the 4 star Novatel in KL but hey, its only a bed and a shower that you need on holidays and it was fine in those regards.  This was more like a resort in its self with several restaurants, cafes and bars within the complex.  On arrival here we finally noticed Europeans :) and heaps more Asians. Average age of about 50 in the guests here as we found that this motel was a favourite of retired people.  Reasonably cheap and very relaxing.  The staff here were much more friendly and attentive than those in KL and it actually became a little annoying to be continually asked if everything was going fine :)

Struck up a friendship with an English couple in their 40's who visit the place every year for a 2 weeks before heading off somewhere else in the "Far East" for a week (Thailand this trip).  Compared notes on places to see and things to do.  They said that they love the exchange rate (6 or 7 ringits to the pound) and the atmosphere which is why they keep coming back.  They are a little more used to bad drivers than I and had hired a car for a few days to tour the island.  The guy owns his own tropical fish business in England.  Must be money in those !

From this base in Pinang we did a couple of tours, walked the local markets, more shopping centres and tried to burn some skin off in the sun :)
The first tour was a 1 day trip to another island called Coral Island.  Costing about 125 ringits the tour included transfers, boat trip and lunch box meal. The tour starts with a pick and delivery to the ferry port in Goergetown (main city in Pinang Island) where we boarded a modern high speed ferry.  The trip took about 90 minutes when we were then deposited on the main jetty at Coral Island.  The Coral Island jetty is in a bay area where they give you flippers, goggles and a snorkel and off you go.  We were advised to bring bread to feed the fish, but did not.  The guide said that the fish would bite if we did not feed them to which we laughed and agreed.  Funnily enough, they did bite us quite often till some more tourists arrived and started feeding them.  There were literally 1000's of fish which seemed to be not to worried about swimming with humans.  


I got a little carried away and on one of my dives, ended up swimming backwards underwater into a lump of coral, which was very painful on my sunburnt shoulder blades!  When I surfaced I checked and was bleeding so decided it would be better to get out of the water.  Within 5 minutes there were about 6 reef sharks swimming through the tourists which cased a bit of alarm to the tourists, but not the guides !  Turned out about an hour later, the guides  dumped a bag of fish blood into the water which attracted more of the reef sharks, which they then proceeded to feed dead fish to by hand..  All part of the show in the end :)  Needless to say, with the red raw exposed shoulder blades, I did not venture to deep into the water again that day :o)

Our second tour was a 2 day trip to the Cameron Highlands.  Cost was 485 ringits each which included a car, driver/guide, 21 individual tours and a nights accom and breaky up in the highlands.  Would have to say that this trip was the highlight of the holiday.  Taking a tour without a bus and 30 other tourists is definitely the way to do it.  The driver basically said to say so when every we wanted to ask a question or see something closer that we were passing. 

The tour included a stop at the local indigenous peoples (called aborigines there too), chiefs hut.  Its a bamboo house constructed on the side of the road about half way up to the top of the highlands. The chief is a personal friend of our driver, and after he put some pants on, showed us his blowpipe and darts, some of which were poison tipped, and shot a few darts for us.  He then invited us inside, gave me his pet rat to nurse while chatting through the guide.  He noticed I smoked so rolled me a smoke made from wild tobacco which he harvests and dries himself.  He is 80 odd years old with 21 children.  His grandfather (I think it was) was chief when a Scotsman named Cameron first walked up and they named the area Cameron Highlands after him.  The chief seemed impressed that my Christian name was the same :)

 
He had a couple of the kids and his wife there and was happy to receive the smokes and some local booze made from coconuts that we had purchased a little further down the road.  Also ended up buying him a kilo of salmon from a passing fish van which he seemed ecstatic about :o)  Apparently, the local indigenous people wont take money from the government and rely on the hunt for food.  

The chiefs family walk from the hut to the forest, strip off (The animals can smell clothing) and go hunting all night.  They will return in the morning with squirrel, iguana, snake or if they are real lucky, wild bore.  They also have a cat and dog which is always pregnant as they find young ones a delicacy ! He had a couple of monkeys hanging about too but I was not game to ask what they were for :)

We also visited the Gua Tempurong Caves which were opened up by a New South Wales explorer (whose name I can't remember at the moment !)  The caves were used by the communists and then the Japanese during the English Government and the Japanese occupation.  

There are literally kilometres of passages and large caverns with White Snakes (Supposed to not be poisonous but I did not test that), large spiders, scorpions and bats.  We did about an hours worth of climbing up and down steps in the short tour and only ended up travelling some 700 meters ! There is also a river that runs through the caves and the extended tour includes travelling along the river from entry to exit points.
Another highlight of the tour was a visit to a cactus nursery.  I was not that interested in it but our driver knew one of the farmers that had a farm next door and when the farmer heard from our guide he had a couple of Aussies with him, he asked if he could chat so I spent an hour or so with the produce farmer, walking over his plot and tasting the fruits and veges off the plants.  Very interesting :)  

The farmer asked how big farms were here and when I told him that some were that big the farmers used planes and helicopters to get about the properties, he could no believe that.  They seem to think Australia is a wonderland of wealth and all want to move here, especially with what they hear of the social security system here !

The last few days were spent on the beach at the resort finishing the few books I'd bought to read and making the most of the Malaysian sun. 

The Trip Home.


The trip home was hard.  8am rise on Sunday with breakfast delivered to the room. We had to be packed and checked out of the room by 1pm.  A little snooze at the resort pool bar and pickup at 3pm for the 45 minute drive to Pinang airport for check in to fly to KL.  Once in KL a 90 minutes wait (duty free shopping here :) and then board the flight to Sydney at 9pm.  We arrived in Sydney Monday at 8am after a flight on Malaysian airlines that I don't want to talk about.  Well OK I will, we were allocated Bulk Head seats (If you don't know, they are seats which face up to one of the toilet or food prep areas on larger planes.  It means that there are no seats in front of you and they leave extra space for people to walk past.  For a 9 or 10 hour flight having the extra leg room was like an early Christmas present :)  I could not believe my luck !  The problem was that a family had 2 seats and we the other 2 in the 4 seat bank.  The family asked the stewardess if they could be moved together (they were 2 in our row and 2 in the row behind).  The stewardess made us move back into the second row. Put the family together and which cramped us in behind.  To top it off, 10 minutes later the stewardess moved the father and a carry on child (No fare kid as its young enough to be nursed) to another part of the plane that had a vacant seat next to it so he would not have to nurse!!  Then, to really drive my "pissed off meter" up, the mother laid back her 12 year old sons seat back onto mine which cramped me even more for the 9 hour flight.  I think the stewardess must have got the feeling I was pissed off as she then ignored us the rest of the trip.  Needless to say, I will be writing about how much this pissed us off to Malaysian Airlines head office.  Robert (The fellow I went on the trip with), pressed the call button for service and it was answered 20 minutes later by an attendant from a different section of the plane!  There, had a whinge and feel a bit better :o)


As I was saying, arrived at Sydney International at 8am and then worried about customs.  Had to fly into Sydney as the travel company was unable to secure seats direct from KL to Adelaide for us. With the purchases I was worried about the $400 limit for goods being brought into Aus by residents.  Declared the stuff at customs "Red Lane".  Had a chat with the customs officer and it turns out that he had some discretion on such things and he said that what I had would be OK.  I said that I had no need to declare which he corrected me on.  He said that if I had been searched and had not declared what I had, then I would have been fined the duty, regardless of how little there was and perhaps faced fines and or jail !  The moral is, declare it if you have it :)

My brother Anthony met us outside customs and took us back to his unit where a much needed refreshing shower was taken :)  It had been 24 hours awake by this time with another 6 hours to kill until the Virgin Blue flight from Sydney to Adelaide.  Anthony took us to Bondi Beach where we had an Aussie brunch Bacon and eggs and juice and coffee, at a cafe overlooking Bondi beach.  Anthony then did a little tour of Sydney harbour so Robbie could take pics of the bridge and opera house (He had never seen either).  We were then dropped back at the airport for the flight to Adelaide and then back home :)

Links to Heaps of Photos :)
First Batch of Pics are ready :o) Video will be here by the weekend !

Salamat Detang :o)