KP in KL

(You asked for more pictures. I've got you covered on this one!)

In an effort to capture the essence of Malaysia as much as possible in the short few weeks Barry van Helsing and Ewy Lewis and the News, (as they’ve asked to be called) are here, they decided to take a trip to Malacca this past weekend and asked Paul and I to join them. Malacca is a town two hours south of KL that used to be the biggest port city in the region. Now it’s mostly a historical tourist attraction with lots of museums and old buildings to tour.

This sounded like a fun little history lesson for me, but I questioned whether or not the guys would like that. When asking if they knew it was basically just a bunch of old stuff I was quickly informed that they are “quite the culture vultures” and were all over this trip seeing that they are “very adept at fitting into a plethora of multicultural societies”. So we took a blue taxi to be sure we had working a/c and adequate leg room for the four of us for the two hour ride south. Our taxi driver, Mr. Saiful, was a fairly small man looking very cool with his mini rat tail haircut and a giant black dome, sorcerer-like ring on his right ring finger. Of course we were fully prepared with cameras in hand, plenty of water, and essential nutrients: chocolate chip cookies.

We passed miles of palm tree covered hills while listening to Paul, Barry, and Ewan crack jokes for most of the ride, and I learned a few things. 1. The large gas tanks in the trunks of all the cars are actually for natural gas. I didn’t even know it was possible for cars to run off natural gas. 2. Palm tree oil is actually used in one type of gas which explains all the palm tree plantations. and 3. Muslim people actually do not use toilet paper ever because wiping isn’t clean. Instead they take a mini shower every single time they use the restroom. This would explain the lack of toilet paper in the restrooms, the presence of water hoses in every restroom, the inevitable abundance of water on the floors, toilet seat, and walls in public restrooms, and the reason for the drains and step down in our bathrooms in the apartment! I think I slept better last night having a logical explanation for those drains.

For those of you needing a picture of exactly what these two Scottish jokesters and Paul look like in front of the camera to give you a better picture of our trip, Barry was happy to oblige you.


Ewan claimed he doesn’t do pictures, but his true colors came out later in the afternoon,

and Paul pretty much has to be forced to even look at the camera. If my shutter speed is fast enough to get a shot of a half smile from him, I’m lucky. This one's a keeper.

We arrived at Malacca with the weather overcast luckily, so melting from the heat might only happen halfway through instead of half a minute into the trip. The town looked old and run down with vacant buildings scattered on the streets and people were eating their lunches under the lean-to’s built next to the vacant buildings.

Traffic was jammed bumper to bumper and side mirror to side mirror with tourist getting into the town so close that I could clearly see the small bobble head Chinese tiger waving at me from the dash of the car next to us. Still the dirt bike riders managed to finagle their way through the cars, barely skimming ours. When we finally got to the town square, Mr. Saiful parked the car right in the center of town without a designated parking place and we agreed to meet back in two hours.
We clearly had no idea where we were going or what to do first, so we followed the crowd into what we learned was the literature museum, but turned out having all sorts of interesting artifacts like guns, knives, antique furniture, and lots of history about the colonization of Malacca and the British forces taking over after WWII. This particularly peaked Barry’s interest because his grandfather had been stationed in Malacca. So after being patriotically pumped up, the rest of the afternoon was accented with outbursts of “Rule Britania!” with his fist on his chest and “let’s take this place back!” After making it all the way through the many British flags and models of British soldiers, they decided the three of them would fight to take the place back while I cooked for them to keep them energized. What a plan.

We walked around the square and were passed by many rickshaw/tuk tuk like modes of transportation that were made from a full bicycle on one side, and a half bicycle on the other, that had radios tied to the back blaring music by Elvis Presley and the like with an umbrella on top and mercedez benz hood ornaments on their cash boxes that doubled as dashboards.

We made it up the hill in the center of town to St. Paul’s catholic church, where only the shell of the building had withstood time, and was now filled with large gravestones.

We walked down to the canal that ran through the town and down the street that would become a busy china town district at night. There was a narrow sidewalk only on one side of the street, so foot traffic was coming and going in a chaotic mess, and cars, mopeds, and trucks were trying to push their way through the crowds of people.

We came across some guy lip-singing for a music video that was being filmed, and if you’ve never seen someone mouthing the words very passionately while there is no music to be heard, it’s pretty funny looking. Hawker stalls were sprinkled along the street.

There’s a particular dessert that is very common wrapped in banana leaves which I probably should have tried after I took the picture, but I had to run to catch up with the guys who were already across the intersection planning their next point of interest. I think Paul spent most of the day looking behind him because I kept stopping for pictures everywhere and the three of them were subconsciously determined to keep up a good pace. My short legs didn’t help the situation.

Then back in the town center we came across two very large pythons that you could have you picture taken with for 10 ringit. The three guys were too chicken.

Ewan was stopped by two Malaysian girls who wanted their picture with him, and low and behold, Ewan who doesn’t do pictures started posing for the photos like it was America’s next top model. The girls claimed they were students and the picture was for their assignment, but I’m pretty sure the girls blushing in the picture proves otherwise.

Back in the car, Mr. Saiful suggested we see the crocodile habitat, so we went. This place ended up being the worst theme park you’ve ever seen in your life, and as a result we were the only people in the place. We passed the haunted house hut and coconut selling guy to find a few dozen crocidles who might as well have been dead, because they were all motionless. There was no Malaysian version of Steve Erwin trying to stick his head in the croc’s mouth, which was really what the four of us had in mind. We attempted a pit stop at the restrooms on the way out before getting back on the road for the two hour drive home, only to realize those were the worst restrooms I’ve ever seen in my life. I won’t go into details. Mr. Saiful asked how the crocodile habitat was, and to very accurately describe it so perfectly, Barry’s response was, “Mr. Saiful, that was rubbish!” So on the road Mr. Saiful put in a Celine Dion video which automatically put Barry and Ewan to sleep. Paul and I sat in silence.

When we returned, Ewan and Barry planned on taking Paul and I to High Tea Sunday afternoon to show us what real High Tea was. Being newbie’s to the whole idea of drinking hot tea in scorching weather as opposed to iced sweet tea, we got the whole explanation on how as a generalization it’s for the hoity toity basically, and you eat little finger foods and desserts while you have your hot tea. I was then told that you have to dress like Jackie O. and a hat and gloves are common. Ewan would be in his tux, and Barry and Paul in suites. Most of the women wear hats apparently, which I do not have. Oh, and the hot pink dress I have that’s the closest to Jackie O. in my closet, would probably not be an appropriate color for high tea. Hmmm. Who knew tea drinking was such a formal event? After hours of trying to come up with a solution for the appropriate attire to wear to drink tea, I came to grips with the fact that I would have to wear my hot pink dress and just look like the life of the party instead of blending in with all those tea drinkers who looked like they had come from a funeral. I had it all planned out, made sure Paul had his suit and white shirt cleaned and ironed, and was mentally preparing myself for this high tea drinking with apparently high fashion people. It all seemed a bit overdone if you asked me, but I was going to be a good sport about it all and play dress up while we have tea and scones or crumpets or biscotti’s or whatever else they serve.

I should have known better that to succumb to the stories these boys put together so thoughtfully. A few hours before we were set to leave for High Tea, Paul sent an email saying it was all a joke and I could wear whatever I want. So, I did just that. I wore exactly what I wanted which was almost the nicest dress I own with the biggest bow you’ve ever seen around the waist, complete with pearl and crystal earrings and heals. While they might have expected me in shorts, I tried my very hardest to give them the closest thing to Jackie O I could. With Barry and Ewan in shorts and jeans, and Paul making an effort to dress with his bright orange fishing shirt and boots, I will gladly accept the award for best dressed. So we sipped our Moroccan Mint tea and ate egg sandwiches and biscuits with clotted cream and I tried to capture the true essence of High Tea.