Part Two: The Travel Diary of South-east Asia
The Travel Diary of South-east Asia
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14th of January 2019 - Singapore > Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Got up around 9am both relieved and excited with a dash of fear that I’m sure will bubble and boil as time goes on. I was mainly relieved to be getting out of this bloody hostel. It hadn’t been awful but it had left a lot to be desired. I headed down to the common room and poured over my Lonely Planet South-east Asia travel guide, grasping the basic phrases of ‘hello’ ‘thank you’ and ‘goodbye’ in Malay and checking out some of the highlights in Kuala Lumpur. I decided then that that would become my routine for each new place.
I guess one thing I’d come to appreciate about InnCrowd backpackers hostel was the free breakfast. For £14 pound a night in a really expensive city it wasn’t really fair for me to complain as I wolfed down the staple hostel breakfast of poached eggs on toast with a few cups of average coffee. I just hoped to actually make some friends at Sunshine Bedz hostel which I’d booked last night. I also hoped the free breakfast would be a common theme in Hostels, as so far I’d been living well off of two square meals a day and a hell of a lot of orange juice. I finished my little bit of my research, planned how to get to my bus (25 minute walk in scorching heat, yay) and settled down for 10 minutes to finish the last few pages of Ham on Rye by Charles Bukowski.
It’s funny how whatever you’re reading or watching can give texture to the world around you. Despite being set in America and semi-autobiographical about Bukowski’s life, it still seemed to inform how I felt about Singapore, just through its complete contrast. The character of this book suffered from boils, was beaten by his dad, lived in squalor and the whole feel of Ham on Rye was one of depressing, visceral dirt. Whereas I thought about Singapore and it couldn’t be more different. The clean trains, rich buildings, maintained gardens and polite people gave me this vision of a well run, but sanitised city. I guess I just never got the chance to truly explore it more. Maybe just to see a little of its local culture and escape from the well trodden and inescapable route of the tourist and traveller might have informed my opinion better. Still, I wrote an inscription for Ham on Rye saying, ‘For anyone who wishes to escape the cleanliness of Singapore and bathe in the squalid dirt of Bukowski’ and left it on the shelf, closing the door on my first hostel for the last time.
I struggled in the heat to find my coach, trying to navigate my screenshots with sweat dripping in my eyes. I finally came to the mall and thought it must be a mistake. There was no coach station in sight, only a tiny 4 floor shopping centre which was crowded with commodities vying for attention. And the products were strange. Cheap plastic keyrings - a whole shop of them - tacky asian cat drawings, clothes shops containing items that I was surprised were able to be hung up without ripping, and the coach company shop? Nowhere to be seen, of course. I asked two friendly people and they had no idea, but after my 4th walk round this weird but wonderful mall I found it tucked in between a phone and tie shop. I got my ticket with the instruction to wait outside the front of the mall and still had 40 minutes to kill, so I enjoyed the bizarre nature of my surroundings a little while longer. Maybe I was being harsh to describe it in the way I did, but you know when you head to a market stall and you just know the stuff is dodgy or a bit shit? It just seemed like every shop was like that. Undeniably though it was a local place. This was definitely not made for people like me, and I enjoyed sitting there for 20 minutes or so watching people and drinking a litre of water in the gradually endearing atmosphere. I headed outside, smoked 2 cigarettes and there it was, a big yellow bus that looked like the vehicle personification of the mall. I checked up the queue of people and noticed only one other white traveller at the back. The driver himself could not speak English but looked at my ticket and pointed in the rough direction of my seat. At this moment, I’m enjoying the countryside whizzing by as we gain on the border to Malaysia with Tom Petty in my ear, will check in tomorrow morning and report the rest of today.
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So of course, as we approached the border control, with no idea on the right way to go or what to do, the two white people made quick friends. His name was Dan and he was also from England, the much more beautiful coastal area of Cornwall in fact (he didn’t know where Gosport was either), and we practically held each other's hands and made it through the checkpoint with a free 3 month visa to join our coach, this time taking a couple of empty seats together. For the rest of the journey we got on really well. Dan ran a fast food stand that went to various festivals and functions across the country, and had been travelling every year from January to March due to it being the off-season in his work. He’d also never been to Malaysia, and we both wanted to go to the same places. And to top it all off, his hostel was 5 doors down from mine on the same road!
Kuala Lumpur all of a sudden enclosed us in its grip. Encased by the high rises, I looked out and saw a bustling vibrant city full of people. We were dropped in the middle of nowhere, but I had an unlocked phone and Dan pointed across to a shop called 7/11 and talked about how much it had saved his life in Thailand for things like this, so we headed over and I got a sim with unlimited internet for the equivalent of about 5 or 6 pound. What on earth are we paying for back home! I typed in our road and after a quick 5 minute subway journey, where I noticed a carbon copy of the layout of the Singapore MRT, we arrived at a street which needed 10 eyes to take everything in. Everywhere I looked there were hostels placed above shops and restaurants and street karaoke things in full swing. Travellers gave courteous nods as we walked past and my nose indulged in the luscious smells of various street food stalls. We were both hungry so we agreed to meet outside my hostel after we’d checked in to get food.
And the hostel? Well it couldn’t have gone much better. Straight away I buzzed the door and checked in and Patrick the owner introduced me to everyone in the common room and invited me to the pub quiz that night. It just so happened I’d lucked out too and pretty much every other guest spoke English. My room was great, with a lovely bed and a drawer underneath for all my valuables. I got talking to all the guys in my room, a guy from Essex also named Dan, a beautiful dutch woman called Arabella and her friend Milan. I said I’d see them in an hour or so and headed out to meet Dan.
I went straight away for a falafel and hummus wrap from a street food guy. It was fucking incredible. There was a mix of vegetables and whatever it was marinating in was filled with spice and just tasted mua! (you know that elaborate kissing sound you make as you put your fingertips to your mouth? It’s hard to try to type). Best part? It cost a quid. A QUID! I gave him a tip that was worth what I’d just eaten because I felt guilty. I told Dan about the pre-drinks at my hostel and the quiz and he was keen to join. He’d not had the same luck as I had in his hostel it seemed.
Patrick was a little unsure but ultimately decided it was ok and chaos ensued. We had a couple of beers at the hostel then went to an Irish bar a few roads away where a huge plethora of bars seemed to be. I got put in a team with the rest of my room, and hazy memories were made in the company of a gradually swirling bar and my new best friends for the night. Arabella and Milan had been travelling for over a year, Dan 4 months and they were an asset to our team, ‘Slippery Nipple’. I helped in the football round and before I knew it I’d drunk 5 pints fairly quickly, had pure vodka being free poured down my throat by Patrick, and was puking up in the middle of the road immediately outside the bar.
I swallowed it up and we all carried on until honestly I have no recollection. I just remember being on my own walking home looking up at the stars, as prostitutes harassed me at every turn. It seems the red light district was in between the bars and home. Drunken desire almost overtook me as I eventually stopped stargazing, but then I saw an adams apple and decided that wouldn’t be for me. I smiled politely and said no thank you, and walked the last hundred yards to the vaguely familiar bustling street I was to call home for the next 3 nights with a huge smile on my face. Why hadn’t I left the nest sooner?
15th of January 2019 - Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Hungover as fuck, me and Dan managed to get up and get to the KL tower for 11. It was walkable from our hostels but I had to have about 6 bottles of water in half an hour. The view there was unbelievable. There is a tower in every major city across South-east asia and I’ll be going to every one. That feeling of looking out with a birds eye view of a city never gets old, and it never will.
Then we hopped on a train to the Batu caves, which were astonishing. I’d read you couldn’t see Kuala Lumpur without seeing them and the guide was once again right. Various street hagglers tried to sell us good luck charms in their broken English. One such encounter went thus:
Man: ah I see you are special, you need charm
Me: terima kasih, but no, I don’t want it
Man: you need charm for good luck I give you ancestors spirit
Me: I have no need, selemat, tinggal!
Man: you must take ancesters spirit, I give for free because you are special!
Me: Ok Ok put it on, terima kesih.
Man: now you give me 20 Ringgit
I just laughed. I had to admire their spirit, and I felt like a coloniser or some shit, walking around with my white privilege and not handing 4 quid to someone who’s literally impoverished. I gave him 20 ringgit and another guy 10 ringgit. My budget wouldn’t last long if I went on like this. The caves themselves were full of mischievous monkeys and I got a good pic of a mother carrying her tiny kid on the mammoth staircase that we had to walk up. The sights were captivating. After we descended I sat on my own as Dan got food and looked up at those iconic multi-coloured steps I’d just struggled up and down and wondered about their inception. Religious I imagine? I’d have to look them up when I got back to the hostel, I felt extremely ignorant. Dan suggested heading back getting a bit of rest and having some dinner later on as he chewed on a dodgy looking bit of chicken. I agreed.
The rest of the day passed without much incidence. I headed back to the hostel, talked to other Dan about all kinds of stuff for ages. I felt like I’d made a new friend until he said he was moving on in the opposite direction tomorrow. I headed out, got pineapple fried rice and tofu curry and barely touched it. I was fucked and yesterday had finally caught up. Me and Dan made plans for tomorrow and I came back here. Bedtime.
16th of January 2019 - Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
When I said about Singapore’s Botanical gardens being unparalleled I was definitely right. Kuala Lumpur’s are not even in the same ballpark. Me and Dan got up in the sticky morning heat and took a walk around some of the gardens and aside from a few hundred yards up in a treetop path being great there wasn't much that inclined us to carry on, so we quickly gave up.
We instead headed to the very opposite of nature - a sprawling manmade skyscraper that google told us had a rooftop pool at the top. What we didn’t account for though was arriving at the lobby for them to tell us that there was a power cut and the lifts wouldn’t be working for an unknowable amount of time. We took the stairs and it was a tortuous 600 steps to receive our reward of an empty rooftop. I’ve gotta say it was worth it. I lazed about in the pool with the sun taking peeks through the muggy air and the gaps of towering skyscrapers that surrounded us as the afternoon lazily rolled by. It blew my mind every time I thought about our surroundings, it was my first rooftop pool.
Me and Dan got to talking. I began to tell him of my plan to head up into Thailand. Dan had been to Thailand before and absolutely adored it so inevitably he decided to join me. We set out our plan to pass through Cameron Highlands for a day then go on to Penang before taking a long and arduous mix of flight, bus and ferry to get to Koh Pha Ngan for the infamous full moon party. We booked the coach for early the next morning and headed back to our hostels. It felt good to have a companion for my next country and a new friend. In Singapore the anxiety of loneliness had been eating me away and I finally felt remedied. However, I wonder as I write this whether it might be a dangerous new form of a safety blanket.
We reconvened for the Petronas Towers, and they were great too. I have to say the KL tower was a better view, but the Patronas have a historical aspect that the KL can’t match, and it was great to walk from one to another on the bridge and see a nighttime view at the top.
After this it was back to the thriving hostel area where we were temporary residents. 4 tinnies from 7/11 cracked open on the sidewalk and people watching - I could waste away evenings like that for the rest of my life no matter where I am in the world. Some amazing street performers were taking requests for songs and a timid looking man with dark hair tied back shuffled out of the crowd to ask for one. Cue a beautiful reverby lick from the guitarist and this man transforming. The deep power of music will never be understood and is all the more beautiful for it. The man’s face was screwed up in the pain of the lyrics he sang. With each utterance he leaned back until he was gazing up at the sky and bellowing cosmically, aligning himself with some existential grace to save him from the pain of what was inside him being projected out through the melody. Every note was right. He sang out of tune he sang in tune but every note was right. It shook me, to the point where I couldn’t really see anyone but him tearing out this part of himself for everyone to see. Eventually he stopped and every hair on my neck began to stop tingling. I was in the mood now.
I went and paid the band some money (I think it might have just been everything in my wallet) then went and bought more beers for me and Dan and came back. I asked if he wanted to try and go into some clubs and soon we headed around the place looking for dancing.
We came to a doorway in the middle of a phone shop and a small cafe and heard a faint thump of bass. After a tentative discussion where we worried about it being some seedy backroom establishment, we said fuck it and headed up the stairs and were greeted by colour. Red walls, fancy dress, sequin jacketted live band and fluorescent drinks. Someone met us and walked us to a table at the back with a massive smile on her face. A genuine smile too, not these ones they have to make at ignorant tourists, genuine happiness. I lit a cigarette then finally noticed what surrounded us was a truly local scene. We were the only white people there and noone really gave a fuck whether we were there or weren’t - it was unbelievably refreshing. I looked around and saw immense happiness as the tables danced and swapped and danced again, flirting and laughing the whole time. Being from the UK and comparing it to our vacuous, sticky-floored, house-based, seedily-lighted clubs at home got me on a bit of a downer but it was impossible to stay that way in an atmosphere like that. I drank more, I smoked more, I laughed more, then I left on a wave of euphoria. And Kuala Lumpur, on a wave of euphoria is just the way I wanted to leave you...
For part three click here
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