Leaving Thailand was somewhat a relief. The country is beautiful and its fun, however, it has been very much a case of Same Same but different through SE Asia (Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand) to the Malay border. Beautiful countries with lavishly decorated cultural artifacts and religious icons, night markets, day markets, street vendors and general madness all seem to have been intoxicated by the lure of the fast buck generated by the tourist trade.Malaysia from the border onwards is a breath of fresh air. The mix of religion and ethnicity is perhaps the most elaborate and the dynamics on a first glance make Malaysia a really vibrant place. We took a bus from Thailand into Penang- there was the initial negotiation with a Thai tout which resulted in us walking out and around the corner to a much friendlier agency who quoted us 70 Bhat less per ticket immediately… and the bus was lovely! Our bus from Ko Lanta had been ok but really screwed up our travel plans as it was 2 hours late- meaning we missed the train. Stroke of luck really.
Arriving in Penang we got dropped in the backpacker area and had a look at some hostel type places. It seemed like they might be breeding fleas and bed bugs so we decided to have a little more of a look around. Twenty RM more per night and we were in fairly luxurious surroundings, TV, AC and on the main food road! So off we went for some Indian! What a great introduction…. The food was superb, having eaten so many Thai Curry's and Noodles throughout, the Malay food- Indian no less, put the rest to shame. The heady mix of spices and flavours gave me what I had been really looking forward for a while- great cheap food!
Penang itself is a funny town; a mix of old colonial houses and new mega apartment blocks. We didn't really have the chance to look at the whole island, but did manage to walk up the coast road- heading North from the centre to find some restaurants which served up great steamed fish, fried prawns in coconut and garlic and more. Overlooking the sea of course. If you go.. highly recommended they are.
With great infrastructure we thought it would be best to hire a car to Ipoh and the Cameron Highlands, however, the price of car we wanted was of course gone so we had to take a bus once more. With twenty minutes to go before the last bus of day it we managed to catch possibly the slowest taxi driver in the world to take us there but he did and we got onto a very plush bus (three seats per row). Arriving in Ipoh was amusing, we had no idea where we were and were ravenous. The first thing we did was sit down and have a bite to eat – ordered Satay from a bike boy and took it easy. We then got our bearings and went hostel/hotel hunting.
The next day we hired a car and Jen drove up to Cameron Highlands; to strawberry fields and more. It rained. A lot. We ate fresh strawberries, wandered through the rainforest, and were generally not impressed by the development of the towns- huge apartment blocks and hotels going up two a penny it seems with no thought for environmental consequences what so ever. Side effects are smelly rivers and costa del rain architecture. We stayed in shared room which was in a Nissen Hut type building and overlooked the hills – was lovely. The walk through the rainforest was breathtaking and relatively strenuous, only so as some of us are perhaps a little less fit than we used to be J
Heading back from the Highlands we met Lam Poh Wah who is a legend in our family. It was really nice to be shown around Ipoh on a late night drive and shown my house from when I was three.. somewhat smaller than I recall though! Moving onwards we took another bus on the next day down to KL which I really liked. I will have to return and explore further:-) Jen and I wandered over to the Petronas Towers and looked around the extensive shopping centre before heading to the tourist ticket office to go up the tower. The ticket office where you make bookings informed us that the tickets were all gone but we could have some for the next day- sadly not an option. The manager then suggested we wait a while and so we did. Eventually, not too much later we were given some tickets to go on the last lift up, brilliant! The view was great, is an impressive building- courtesy of Petronas of course it's all free.
Onward ho then to Borneo!
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