I'm writing to you from the Cameron Highlands, located in the center of
Malaysia. Up here the air is cool and crisp, a nice change from the hot
humid weather of the tropics. It was a rather slow bus trip up deathly
narrow two lane road. The road was narrow, curvey, and people pass on
blind turns. On our way we ran into a tree that had just fallen and
blocked the road. Now imagine about 200 people looking at a tree and not
knowing how to clear the road. After some time some people pulled out
their machetties and started hacking away at the tree. About 30 minutes
later, half the tree was removed from the road, and a free lane opened
up. Now imagine everyone fighting over who gets to use the one free
lane....yea, chaos.
The past few days I have been in the capital Kuala Lumpur (KL). While in
KL I stayed in the heart of China Town. Like most asian cities, you can
buy just about anything in China Town. Need a watch, cd, vcd, or dvd?
Got plenty of those. Yesterday I had my first taste of the "King of
Fruit" (Durian). For those of you who don't know, durian is the smelly
spiky fruit you can buy at your local asian market. I was a little
scared at first, but the fruit is actually quite good. Also, I think the
smell is overrated, but thats just my $0.02.
The other major highlight of KL was the Petronas Towers (The formerly two
highest buildings in the world). These two towers are absolutely huge.
The funny highlight is that in between the two towers there is a shopping
mall. Because the area was full of tourists you would see people taking
pictures of the inside shopping mall. I guess we all have our own
memorable landmarks.
In the next few days I'll be visiting the tea plantations here in Cameron
Highlands and then head up to Thailand for some sun and beach!
View Mosque at Kuantan, Malaysia
View Street of Kuantan, Malaysia
View my Bungalow at Chearting Beach
Mosque in Kuala Lumpur
Colonial building in KL
Same building, different angle
Possibly the world's largest flagpole (KL)
Petronas Towers
Batu Caves in KL, image 1
Batu Caves in KL, image 2
Batu Caves in KL, image 3
Batu Caves in KL, image 4
Malaysia National Independence Monument
Lake Gardens (panaramic)
Fallen tree blocking road
Cameron Highlands, image 1
Cameron Highlands, image 2
I am writing to you from the fishing village of Mersing, Malaysia. After
leaving Singapore I headed to Tioman island on the east coast of
Malaysia. Tioman is normaly very busy during the summer months, but
during Monsoon (nov - march) season it is almost deserted. Therefore,
there were very few travelers on the island. Life was good. Good food,
good weather, and good accomodations. Try having a beach hut for about
$3 dollars a night. The highlight of Tioman were all the monkeys on the
island. They are everywhere. I even went to a beach called monkey
beach. Yup, monkeys on the beach. After spending my time treking around
the island and reading a book, I decided it was time to carry on. In the
next few days I'll head up the coast a bit to Kuantan and Cherating.
After that I'll head back to the west coast and stay a while in the
capital Kuala Lumpur.
Juara Beach (panaramic)
View Tioman Beach Image 1
View Tioman Beach Image 2
View Tioman Beach Image 3
View My Bungalow on Tioman Island
View Image of Mersing, Malaysia
This is my first email on my two month journey through south east asia.
After about 48 hours I have finally made it to Singapore. Before
reaching Singapore I spent about 12 hours in Soel, South Korea. Instead
of utilizing my complementary 5 star hotel, I decided to spend the night
at Dadaemond market. This market specializes in selling stuff in the
middle of the night. Additionally, this market specializes in pure
chaos. The market is set up as a bunch of malls and street vendors. The
malls are not like your typical shopping center. Instead you get about a
2 foot wide isle and about 500-1000 different shops in a mall. Each shop
is more like a clothing stand. Forget about trying something on, this is
completely out of the question. Much of the merchandise is for wholesale
only too. I think there are probably close to 10,000 different stands at
this market. Cars are going everywhere, scooters zooming around, and
people running around constantly. Oh, and I fogot to mention that techno
music is blasting everywhere.
After spending nearly 5 hours at this market (The buses don't run
11pm-4am) I caught the first bus back to the airport and went back to my
hotel. After a brief 3 hours of sleep I got back on a plane and headed
to Singapore.
Here are a few pictures from Singapore. Just click on the link to open up a new window with the picture in it.
View Singapore image 1
View Singapore image 2
View Singapore image 3
View Singapore image 4