I arrive in KL around half five in the evening. The largest backpacker area is in China Town so I get the sky train to Pensar Seni (Central Market) and set out to look for a hostel that's recommended in the LP. I'm on the right street but end up heading the wrong direction but luckily I bump into an Aussie and Kiwi couple and they're staying at the place where I want to go.
They are flying out that evening to Paris and are using KL as a lay over also but are really unimpressed with the city calling it boring. As ever I hate to jump to conclusions about a place as soon as I hear someone else's opinion, but in this case I would have to agree.
I won't go as far as assuming anything about Malaysia as a whole as I'm in no position to comment but KL is really rather boring. There's no atmosphere and elegance about the place, it just feels like a bit of a hollow shell of a city. I completely believe that it can be the people you meet that make a place so perhaps I didn't meet the right people but that was my experience.
Everyone I did meet seemed tired of it, unimpressed or was waiting to move on.
The mosques were uninventive, the streets crowded, markets typical. I was really making an effort to find things I liked about this city but it wasn't being made easy.
With three days till I flew to Bali, I decided to take things easy. Start my days lazy reading for a few hours and then taking a wander till I was tired. Came back to rest then go out again for some dinner.
On the first day I wander around the market and find a small art gallery where I meet * (his name escapes me so I'll call him *). * is a young malaysian guy who wishes to be anywhere else than malaysia. Not shy, he soon tells me his life story, starting with the problems he's faced living in KL. Having studied in America and Europe his spoken English is unlike others Malayans. His grammar is correct and this has caused him segregation from the local people he knows. All his life he has been bullied for not being Malaysian and wishes to life abroad in Paris or London. A student of fashion, he yearns to work in photography but instead is stuck with his dreams unrealised in a country where he feels he does not fit. Wherever you go in the world there will always be prejudices about the most stupid things. Its such a shame however when its so bad that people no longer want to call their own country home.
On the second day I decided to try and find the national museum but in the maze that is it wasn't as easy as I anticipated. Hoping to find information on Malaysian culture I was greeted instead firstly by a frightening looking giant snake at the entrance then the history of how the world began and a really scary moving display of cavemen that just shouldn't be allowed.
On the third day I took decided to check out the Batu Caves just north of KL city. I finally got there by local bus after a 45 minute journey.
The caves themselves were impressive great big gloomy gothic looking structures with threatening dangling spikes hanging down above you.
Monkeys ran around squabbling among themselves sounding like abu from aladdin getting into a scrap with the carpet, taking no notice of the visitors wandering around them taking their pictures.
I stood observing them for a while realising just how intelligent these creatures were while I watched one pick up a bottle, unscrew the lid and drink the water inside.
Leaving KL that evening reflecting on my visit I was glad that I'd been but even more excited to be leaving for the Indonesian gem that is Bali.
I do have one regret though- I made friends with a middle-aged french man that I shared a dorm with and spoke to many times in passing, but I never knew his name, and I guess I never will.
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