Malaysia and Singapore

The night train to Butterworth in Malaysia was mostly comfortable but we didn’t get a lot of time to enjoy our beds as the train was running late and didn’t collect us until nearly 3am, we then had to get back out of bed for the border crossing at 9am. It was one of the smoothest border crossings yet, a stamp out of Thailand and a stamp into Malaysia all within the same office and back on the train to find, most disappointedly, that the beds had magically turned back into seats and so the rest of the journey was a more normal train sleep, drooling against the window! From Butterworth we took a ferry across to Penang Island to spend the night in Georgetown. As a former colony it has some nice buildings, a nice park area at the waterside and a few bars to keep us entertained. With only one night here we didn’t get to see it all but we got a taste of Penang which was good as it’s another place I know my parents visited nearly 40 years ago!

The following day involved boat and bus to reach Kuala Lumpur, the exciting big city of Malaysia and home of the beautiful Petronas Towers. Arriving in the evening we headed straight out for a walk through the city, past the KL Tower and arriving ultimately at the beautiful twin towers. I was taken aback by their beauty, I’ve seen many fabulous buildings which stop you in your tracks (or not) and this one is definitely a highlight and a sight to behold, the lights shining out, the elegance, the way they command your attention and hold it. I couldn’t just take a photo and walk away; I had to allow my eyes to saviour it. The city is so clean and accessible, it was lovely to walk around at night time, I really enjoyed listening to the live music and taking in the lights and the atmosphere, Kuala Lumpur scored a lot of points that night.

After enjoying the towers so much in the dark I was keen for a daytime visit not to end as a disappointment, and I am pleased to say there was no disappointment in store for me. As stunning as they are lit up at night, the towers are equally eye-catching in the daylight, so much glass and silver metal draws the eye right in and once again I am captivated by the presence of something very attractive! Such a beautiful building! Walking around them also holds various pleasures, from the small lake to the fountains to the flashes of air conditioning blasting you as you walk past the doorways of the very expensive shops housed within. It’s like a small burst of heaven when you walk past an air conditioned doorway, a small but very enjoyable blast of freezing air to break up the monotony of constantly sweating! We’ve been sweating for a long time now, the last time I remember not sweating was China, there was actually a point in China when I had a fleece on!! That seems a long time ago now.

The rest of my Kuala Lumpur experience involved wondering around the city, and what a lovely city it is. It’s such a clean place, seems very orderly, there is of course a China Town and lots of Chinese food on offer all around the city, the Malaysian food is either well hidden, not advertised as Malaysian or it’s just a combination of Asian foods, I can’t quite decide.  We also spent a night in the nearby shopping centres theme park with all sorts of fun stomach-churning rides to play on, it was a lot of fun.

From KL we headed to Malacca for a couple of days of exciting discovery, and discover we did, mostly though we discovered that this seems to be a very odd place and I’m not entirely sure why so many tourists come to visit this town! There are fort remnants, and canons and a variety of churches and temples and of course a China Town but most of these we discovered on the first few hours of being in the town. As our time there expanded we then discovered that the pavements are a little secret known only to the lucky few, in the middle of China Town there’s a garden devoted to some brass animals and a brass statue of Mr Malacca (also Mr Asia, Mr World and Mr Universe, though who competes in that that didn’t compete in Mr World I do not know!!) and then there were the cyclos or rickshaws with their over-the-top flowers and flashing lights turning a normal mode of transport into something really quite different!  The best part for me was a beautiful church up on a hill, St Paul’s, which is the roofless remains of a church lending itself as a fantastic outdoor performance area.  There was some dancing on while we were there and what a great place to enjoy some visual arts, under the stars.  With some time to spare we took a wander along the sea front to take in the sights of the nearby boats afloat in the Malacca Straits, there weren’t loads to watch but I still like to see the huge barges being pulled by tugs and any container ships that might be at sea at the time.

The following day we took a bus to Singapore and that was the end of our time in Malaysia, a country which hasn’t lived up to expectations in my mind. I have enjoyed my time here and Kuala Lumpur was an easy winner as my favourite part but overall I am leaving Malaysia a little bit disappointed by my inability to match it with a fantasy.

Singapore is well known for all its rules and cleanliness but I think this time around (I visited Singapore briefly in 1999) I found it to be a little more relaxed and Kuala Lumpur had raised the bar with cleanliness leaving Singapore behind in second place. The highlight of Singapore was the coincidental occurrence of the Grand Prix which was taking place during our visit, this immediately gave the city an extra buzz and the atmosphere was easily passed on to the rest of the city. A stroll along the busy shopping area of Orchard Street proved to us the wealth of the city, we were passed by Lamborghinis, Porches, all sorts of fancy cars in among all the fancy hotels and posh shops there’s a lot of money floating around. Between the shops were formula one cars on display, podiums to have your photo taken on and temporary shops selling merchandise.

On the night of the final race two of us took a walk into the city centre, it’s about a 45 minute walk and along the way we became aware of a kind of buzzing noise, of course it was the sound of racing cars in the distance. As we neared the race circuit the noise got louder and louder and it was quite eerie walking a city at night with the background soundtrack. Eventually we reached the closed roads of the race course, we could stand just metres from the road and while we couldn’t see the cars the sound of them tearing past was immense, and very exciting, it soon became our mission to see the cars! The whole place is well sealed but we managed to find a building with a fairly climbable wall, a metre up and hello! There go the cars! It was too much for us, we both actually squealed with delight every time one went past! We lasted in our spot for a couple of minutes before security moved us along, but by then we didn’t mind we were elated with our success. Eventually we found a pedestrian bridge right next to a bridge the cars race across and we sat there for the rest of the race watching them flash past us, we then had a perfect view of the end fireworks. Sitting on the bridge, listening to the cars zooming past with the backdrop of a beautiful city, followed by a walk along the riverside, what a gorgeous night, I thoroughly enjoyed my evening out in Singapore.

The next day was just as exciting, we walking into the city again and headed around the riverside towards the marina. There are some really lovely buildings here painting a cityscape befitting of such a rich capital. Fortunately the route we walked was similar to that of the Grand Prix and so it was natural for us to walk the empty streets of the race-course while they dismantle the masses of concrete and iron in place. It was really quite special to have this opportunity to see the marks on the walls where wheels have connected, to see the skid marks and crash marks where a car had smashed into a wall and to stand in the place where Michael Schumacher had taken out another car and come to a skidding halt. Pieces of rubber remain strewn around the place and only a handful of tourists have taken to the race-course like we have, making it a pleasant dander around. These things generally wouldn’t be all that interesting to me, but it all added up to a far more enjoyable Singapore adventure than I had bargained for, I thoroughly excited myself and can declare quite truthfully that without the Grand Prix Singapore would not have scored nearly as high on the smile test. I leave here with a far more positive view of the place and can’t help thinking of it with a gentle buzz in my heart.