After a relatively short four hour journey through some beautiful scenery, we arrived in Malaysia’s capital city Kuala Lumpur (affectionately known as KL by the locals). Thanks to the recommendation of a couple from the Cameron Highlands, we checked into the ‘Haven Guesthouse’ on Bukit Bintang (as it turned out, the main shopping street in the city). The guesthouse has not been open long and has been designed in the style of a longhouse (tribal home famous in Sarawak, Borneo) with timber partitioned rooms. Once we had got ourselves comfortable and with the aid of Evan from the guesthouse, we located the nearest hospital and headed out to get Debs foot looked at. The Tung Shin hospital was only about 500m from the guesthouse and so couldn’t have been more convenient. Unfortunately, as it was Saturday the surgeons were all on half day and wouldn’t return until Monday morning, so we spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the nearby area. Later that evening we had a look around a couple of the nearby shopping malls, found a restaurant for dinner and then went back to the guesthouse for the night.
With the hospital put on hold until Monday, we got a taxi to take us to the National Monument and Asean Sculpture Park, both of which were pleasant but not worth too much time. Debs did however display a fine command of gymnastic skill, when she commando rolled down the steps to the park, coming to rest some 20ft away from where I last saw her! Slightly more carefully, we walked through the park to the KL Butterfly Park which houses more than 6000 butterflies consisting of 120 different species. The most spectacular of all, was the huge Raja Brooke butterfly (the national butterfly of Malaysia).
From the butterfly park we went to the Orchid and Hibiscus garden (the hibiscus is known locally as Bunga Raya and is the national flower) and then took a taxi to Pasar Seni (central market), passing the huge state mosque along the way. Pasar Seni used to be the city’s wet market and now holds a collection of overpriced tourist craft shops in what is admittedly a very nice 1930’s Art Deco style building. In its defence, we did find some very nice Batik pictures and some equally interesting abstract elephant prints (no prizes for guessing who bought them); it also contains a very good food hall.
With our stomachs full of chicken teppanyaki and our wallets somewhat less full, we continued our tour of the city by visiting the Masjid Jamek (the city’s oldest surviving mosque). The mosque looks very nice from the outside, but when compared to the staggering scale and beauty of the ones we have seen throughout Turkey, Iran and Pakistan, it falls rather short. Debs did get the joy of having to don a shapeless robe again, when we ventured inside for a closer look. Starting to get quite tired, we made a brief journey to Merdeka square, passing a strange pitcher plant fountain on the way. Merdeka square is where the Union Jack was lowered on 31st August 1957 marking Malaysia’s independence and now holds, what is, at 100m high, reputedly the world’s tallest flagpole. It is also where we hailed a taxi and headed back to the relative cool of the Haven Guesthouse.
With the weekend over, it was time to go back to the hospital and get Debs’ foot looked at by a surgeon. The rest of the day went past in a bit of a blur; the surgeon said it was a cyst on the tendon that he would prefer to remove and that he could do it that day! So having seen the surgeon at 10:30am, she was admitted at 1:00pm, operated on at 2:00pm, recuperating by 3:00pm and discharged at 5:30pm minus a lump (she has still got it in a jar though!). Still a bit groggy but able to walk, we headed back to the guesthouse with the instruction to take it easy and return in one week.
We had planned on staying in KL for only a few days and then going to Borneo, but Debs had to take priority so we extended our stay in the city, not that it was any particular hardship. Eugene and Evan from the Haven are great and the guesthouse has a huge selection of DVDs to watch. With so many big shopping malls and good food courts nearby, there was no real difficulty in finding something to keep us, or more correctly me occupied! During the next week we treated ourselves to new bags (Debs’ fourth bag, my second), had a look at the Petronas Towers (both at night and during the day), and visited Petaling Street (a tourist market in Chinatown full of cheap tat and knock off goods).
On my birthday we made a somewhat ill advised trip to the Batu Caves. Debs was not really ready to climb 272 steps, even if there was the promise of monkeys and a Hindu shrine! To be perfectly honest I wouldn’t recommend the trip to anyone, there isn’t much to hold your attention and we got ripped off by a taxi driver on the way back (this time he put the meter on and then proceeded to take the most circuitous route back known to man). Fortunately we made up for it with a really nice meal at the Outback Steakhouse (not very Malaysian, but you have to have steak on your birthday!).
Before we knew it, a week had passed and it was time to go back to the hospital and have Debs foot checked over. The stitches were removed and she had to have it aspirated, but everything else appeared to be ok so there was nothing stopping us from moving on. Heading back to the hostel we sorted out our bags with the intention of leaving the big ones in KL until we returned from Borneo (Air Asia’s 15kg baggage limit is a real pain!). We then went to the nearby Berjaya Times Square Mall to watch Spiderman 3 at the IMAX theatre. Berjaya Times Square is quite a place, as not only does it contain lots of shops and two cinemas, it also has a theme park (Cosmo’s world) within its walls, complete with a looping rollercoaster!
With our time in KL over, it was time to say goodbye to everyone at the Haven and head to the airport bound for Sabah in Borneo, where I hoped to climb Mt Kinabalu (at 4095.2m the highest peak in SE Asia). Kuala Lumpur is a great city and our stay was made even better by Eugene and Evan at the Haven Guesthouse. We can’t recommend the place enough, going so far as to say it is one of the nicest places we have ever stayed.
Next entry: Kota Kinabalu, Sabah
With the hospital put on hold until Monday, we got a taxi to take us to the National Monument and Asean Sculpture Park, both of which were pleasant but not worth too much time. Debs did however display a fine command of gymnastic skill, when she commando rolled down the steps to the park, coming to rest some 20ft away from where I last saw her! Slightly more carefully, we walked through the park to the KL Butterfly Park which houses more than 6000 butterflies consisting of 120 different species. The most spectacular of all, was the huge Raja Brooke butterfly (the national butterfly of Malaysia).
From the butterfly park we went to the Orchid and Hibiscus garden (the hibiscus is known locally as Bunga Raya and is the national flower) and then took a taxi to Pasar Seni (central market), passing the huge state mosque along the way. Pasar Seni used to be the city’s wet market and now holds a collection of overpriced tourist craft shops in what is admittedly a very nice 1930’s Art Deco style building. In its defence, we did find some very nice Batik pictures and some equally interesting abstract elephant prints (no prizes for guessing who bought them); it also contains a very good food hall.
With our stomachs full of chicken teppanyaki and our wallets somewhat less full, we continued our tour of the city by visiting the Masjid Jamek (the city’s oldest surviving mosque). The mosque looks very nice from the outside, but when compared to the staggering scale and beauty of the ones we have seen throughout Turkey, Iran and Pakistan, it falls rather short. Debs did get the joy of having to don a shapeless robe again, when we ventured inside for a closer look. Starting to get quite tired, we made a brief journey to Merdeka square, passing a strange pitcher plant fountain on the way. Merdeka square is where the Union Jack was lowered on 31st August 1957 marking Malaysia’s independence and now holds, what is, at 100m high, reputedly the world’s tallest flagpole. It is also where we hailed a taxi and headed back to the relative cool of the Haven Guesthouse.
With the weekend over, it was time to go back to the hospital and get Debs’ foot looked at by a surgeon. The rest of the day went past in a bit of a blur; the surgeon said it was a cyst on the tendon that he would prefer to remove and that he could do it that day! So having seen the surgeon at 10:30am, she was admitted at 1:00pm, operated on at 2:00pm, recuperating by 3:00pm and discharged at 5:30pm minus a lump (she has still got it in a jar though!). Still a bit groggy but able to walk, we headed back to the guesthouse with the instruction to take it easy and return in one week.
We had planned on staying in KL for only a few days and then going to Borneo, but Debs had to take priority so we extended our stay in the city, not that it was any particular hardship. Eugene and Evan from the Haven are great and the guesthouse has a huge selection of DVDs to watch. With so many big shopping malls and good food courts nearby, there was no real difficulty in finding something to keep us, or more correctly me occupied! During the next week we treated ourselves to new bags (Debs’ fourth bag, my second), had a look at the Petronas Towers (both at night and during the day), and visited Petaling Street (a tourist market in Chinatown full of cheap tat and knock off goods).
On my birthday we made a somewhat ill advised trip to the Batu Caves. Debs was not really ready to climb 272 steps, even if there was the promise of monkeys and a Hindu shrine! To be perfectly honest I wouldn’t recommend the trip to anyone, there isn’t much to hold your attention and we got ripped off by a taxi driver on the way back (this time he put the meter on and then proceeded to take the most circuitous route back known to man). Fortunately we made up for it with a really nice meal at the Outback Steakhouse (not very Malaysian, but you have to have steak on your birthday!).
Before we knew it, a week had passed and it was time to go back to the hospital and have Debs foot checked over. The stitches were removed and she had to have it aspirated, but everything else appeared to be ok so there was nothing stopping us from moving on. Heading back to the hostel we sorted out our bags with the intention of leaving the big ones in KL until we returned from Borneo (Air Asia’s 15kg baggage limit is a real pain!). We then went to the nearby Berjaya Times Square Mall to watch Spiderman 3 at the IMAX theatre. Berjaya Times Square is quite a place, as not only does it contain lots of shops and two cinemas, it also has a theme park (Cosmo’s world) within its walls, complete with a looping rollercoaster!
With our time in KL over, it was time to say goodbye to everyone at the Haven and head to the airport bound for Sabah in Borneo, where I hoped to climb Mt Kinabalu (at 4095.2m the highest peak in SE Asia). Kuala Lumpur is a great city and our stay was made even better by Eugene and Evan at the Haven Guesthouse. We can’t recommend the place enough, going so far as to say it is one of the nicest places we have ever stayed.
Next entry: Kota Kinabalu, Sabah
2 comments:
Hi Matt/Debs,
really enjoyed reading about your adventures in KL, Cameron highlands, etc. I lived in KL in the 70s and 80s so it brought back a lot of pleasant memories. You mentioned pictures but I did not see any posted. Perhaps elsewhere? Also, did you mean Bukit Bintang in KL? Sounds like a really nice hotel you stayed at and I plan on checking it out.
Mary
Hi Mary
Yes i did mean Bukit Bintang thanks for pointing it out. I hadnt got around to posting the pictures but they should be up now. Hope you enjoy the rest of the blog. Definately check out 'The Haven' i have added a link to their web page on my blog.
Take care
Matt
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