Amazing night at KL

Sunday, 22 July 2012

Anders and I are getting pretty good at this packing and unpacking business. Alan had good practice the last month or so of traveling. In 30mins, we both got ourselves ready and packed. We headed to the savanna hotel next door for some breakfast before heading to the airport. It was pretty good. Anders had a ham and cheese omelet. Alan had bacon and pancakes. I had the Filipino breakfast which consisted of egg, pork that tasted like fresh Chinese beef jerky, and rice. It was yumm. We then checked out the hotel and happily hopped into our reserved cab for the airport. We all felt pretty good about leaving Philippines today since it was once again raining cats and dogs.

On the ride to the airport, I gave a call to daddy to see how he was doing. He is having a good time checking out my photos on Facebook, he especially liked our kung fu shots. We got to the airport in no time. At the airport we wandered around the gift shops, which took only a few mins. We bought Civet coffee for Anders' parents. It's supposedly the most expensive coffee in the world and only produced in Indonesia and Philippines. For 85g, we paid 800 pesos / $20. This coffee is from Mount Apo, which is 1500 meters above sea. The coffee is grown on the volcanic soil of Mount Apo, and civet eats the berries for their fleshy pulp. It cannot digest it so it processes it out. During this process it makes the coffeee less acidic, which means less bitter. Basically the coffee bean is picked up from the poo of the civet and it's worth a lot because of the rarity. We also bought some dried mangos from Cebu, which Anders claims its the best he's ever tasted. I agreed. It was chewy and not too sweet.

The Airasia flight was fine, full of indians (huge indian population in KL). We took the time blogging / reading / sleeping. For lunch we each got an instant noodle. The payment of the food was eager confusing because the flight attendant couldn't do math and charged us the wrong prices and gave us the wrong items. Anders tried ribena, which he thought tasted like solbær.

The passport controls were more strict in Malaysia compared to Philippines. We had to do electronic fingerprints. As we know Malaysia is a muslim country, certain remote areas is dry (aka no alcohol sold). To prepare ourselves, we went to the duty free to stock up (a bit) with one bottle of Bacardi gold. We also bought a medium bag of m&ms, which we finished in a matter of one hour. Locating our bags were not an easy task. The belt board didn't list out flight, but later on we realized it was because we were too late. They already off loaded everything in the matter of minutes and our three lonely bags were locate on the side of one of the belts.

Our next adventure was finding our way into the city. According to the guide book, it took the same amount of time with the bus as the taxi and the price of a taxi was 65rmb ($22) and the bus was 8rmb per person. With the bus, we would have to then get a taxi into the city, so we opted for the taxi. The transport system at the airport was based on getting coupons in advance. It was very confusing. It also costed more for 3 people versus 2 in a taxi. Eventually we opted for a bus that dropped us to our hotel, which costed 18rmb per person.

I'm not so certain that additional savings was worth it. It took forever to get into the city. The bus was very old and there were no shock absorption. Every bump we hit, we bounced up and down a few times. It's like a child's bouncy chair. Anders couldn't stand the ride, so he had to nap instead of finishing his blog entry.

We booked the five star Pacific Regency Hotel Suits across from the KL Towers. According to lonely planet, it has one of the best roof top bars in the city. We were all very excited, but also concerned how we were going to sneak one in since we were cheap an only booked a room for two. Given its a five star hotel, we didn't think it would be a problem fooling the lobby people, however to our surprise, the lobby was tiny. Our plan was that Anders and I check in with all the bags and Alan wait in the lobby for us. That worked out rather well. When we stepped into our suite, we saw it was just one king size bed. Crap! We went downstairs to request for two doubles, but they said they were completely booked that night, but they could change us the next day. We could however pay 88rmb for another bed. Darn darn darn! We parked the issue for a bit and told Alan to meet Anders at the rooftop bar. When the boys came back to the room, we discussed what to do. In the end, we've concluded the bed was huge enough for the three of us to share. So we did. Everything worked well with some minor adjustments. Alan is allergic to down, so we had to use the synthetic pillow and sheets instead of the down blanket. We got two sets extra, so we each had our own cuddle blanket. Everything worked out fine :-)

Alan had a friend from the Philippines, which had a friend in KL. She was kind enough to introduce us and asked him to take us out the first night. Alvin was a really nice guy. He met us at 7:45 at the Bangsar Village, which is a more residential / non-touristy spot. He brought us to Wondermama for dinner, which is a typical Malay restaurant with a japanese twist. The food was really delicious. We had soft shell crabs, chicken, roti toast, fries calamari, noodles, churros and even Dorian crepe. I read on the WSJ, that was a must try and given Anders and Alan never tried this stinky fruit, it was a good opportunity. Anders actually liked it, which will make my mama proud! Actually, with the ice cream and crepe mix, it was pretty good. The dinner was accompanied by also very charming conversations. It was nice to hear about alvin's experience in malaysia. He is part Malay and part Filipino. He is living here alone. He told us all about the local view of the Muslims here. For instance, during Ramadan (Muslims fasting period) its rude to eat in the afternoon in front of them and that the prayer time is very long and loud for all. It is also especially long during Ramadan period. There are actually religious police here trying to catch inappropriate behaviours by the young ones. I read about that in the guide book, but I thought they meant the police religiously look for misdemeanors...not actual religious police.

Alvin tools us for a spin around KL prior to heading out for some drinks. It was really cool to see all the major sites in the car. He had peugeot 307, which had a huge rooftop. This gave us great view of the tall skyscrapers and lights. KL love their lights.

After the wonderful drive, we headed to the Martini's 57, which was a six week old bar right next to the Petronas Towers on the 57'th floor. It was really cool to get an up close and personal view. The drinks were also fantastic. We had a really good time and went back to the hotel when the lights turned off at midnight.

Prior to cozying it up in the king size bed, we went to have a drink at the rooftop bar. We admired the view and the beautiful pool. It was a great end to a great evening.