Days 70-73: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

The train from Singapore to KL starts off very oddly. The train station is Malaysian property, just like an embassy, so you go through Malaysian customs then and there. Then you get on the train and travel through Singapore for 30 minutes until you reach the border, where you disembark, go through Singaporean customs, then start off on your journey once again. The transition from Singapore to Malaysia is quite abrupt; fancy suburbs are exchanged for miles upon miles of palm trees (palm oil plantations) and occasional shacks. The train ride takes about seven hours and is quite comfortable, at least in our first class train with AC.

The best parts of KL are the night markets, filled with vendors selling food and knock off goods. The city is quite large and switches from run-down buildings that are ready to collapse to the Petronas Towers in the blink of an eye. The people are as diverse as the buildings, with a seeming even mixture of ethnic Chinese, Indian, and Malay peoples. Apparently the British brought in the first two groups less than a hundred years ago, but despite some earlier racial tensions, things seem very well integrated now. The muslim heritage is very strong, and many of the women walking down the street wear head scarves, and some cover their faces too. We’ve seen many more tourists here than I expected too. I knew very little about Malaysia before arriving, and still have a long way to go.

We’ve walked through the beautiful Lake Gardens, Chinatown, Colonial District (yes, another one), and the Golden Triangle (business district). KL’s downtown is relatively small (if not highly walkable), but the city stretches out for miles. The Petronas Towers were closed the day we tried to go up, but even from some of the hilltops you can see the city stretching out quite a ways. There are quite a few interesting museums here; due to time constraints we only made it to the Islamic Arts Museum, which had a good collection of pieces from all across the Islamic world.