Kuala Lumpur

Well here is the extent of our photos from KL: Ah, Canon. How we loved spending hours and hours navigating the suburbs by public bus to find you.

Read the rest...

OK, OK, I did sneak in a few more photos, but only about three. And I got lost taking them. Josh was waiting at the bus station as we were leaving for Singapore, while I set off to get at least one photo of the Petronas Towers (I am an architect after all. Also, Bird needed a photo with this recognizable icon. For those of you who haven't met Bird, maybe I will introduce him later on.) Anyway, I set off on my own, forgetting that you can't just walk around the corner to get a better photo of a skyscraper when other skyscrapers abound. I pretty much ended up walking all the way there, but then taking a street heading back in a different direction without realizing it. I knew where I needed to be, but I just couldn't get there! Streets here are not like that loveable Manhattan grid... I also didn't have any Ringgit (Malaysian currency) since Josh was spending the last of it, so I couldn't get a taxi... my "30 minute trip" ended up being well over an hour. Enough to get both Josh and I a bit worried! I don't know if these photos are worthy:

As for Kuala Lumpur, we do have a few comments (with no personal illustrating photographs, of course). Mostly, we liked it a lot more than we were expecting! Most travelers we've met don't have much to say about KL. Here are some reasons why:

1. We weren't overly impressed our first night, but after walking around a bit, we discovered a suprising number of beautiful or interesting buildings. Like George Town, the city was full of shophouses and covered sidewalks (the required five-foot way). Along the river were some amazing colonial buildings and a number of buildings with a decidely Mughal look. KL is also full of beautiful mosques- especially the massive newer National Mosque and the small but quaint Masjid Jamek. We attended a service at St. Mary's Anglican cathedral, which looks like it came out of an English storybook. We also liked the art deco Central Market, which was almost torn down before some concerned citizens saved the day! I also randomly recognized a Ken Yeang building as we went past in the depths of KL suburbs (bus to Canon), on whom I gave a brief presentation in a sustainable design class a few years back. Just thought it was cool to think, hey, I know that building.



2. What an international city! The movie we saw had two different subtitles, and we saw plenty of Indians, muslim women in full berka, women just in headscarves, Chinese, Sikhs... you name it. We were impressed they get along as well as they appear to.



3. Thank goodness for air conditioning. We spent an afternoon "decompressing" at the mall at the base of the Petronas Towers and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The bathrooms were clean and free, and everything was shiny. Amazing!



4. Finally, an absurd amount of our time was spent running errands- fixing the camera, our water purifier, getting documents about the camera for insurance... it's unfortunate, but after some islands and the rainforest, thank goodness for cities!