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Our journey back to Kuala Lumpur from Georgetown was a bit more enjoyable. Mainly due to a hilarious lady we met from North Carolina. She was travelling around a few Asian countries while she taught English in China. We had some great conversation about the lifestyle in China and her job teaching private students. She had left her 30 year teaching career in America behind for a dramatic change. It, like always, was great to talk to someone who can chat honestly about their experiences. The best thing was her no fuss attitude and classic American accent.
We also found time to enjoy the view out of the train window this time, instead of sleeping or watching Harry Potter. Though the towns weren't anything like the historic Georgetown or the sparkling sky scrappers of Kuala Lumpur, it was the natural landscape that shone through. We passed thick humid jungle covering hills and mountains and through organised banana tree farms. At one point the train drove through the middle of a huge lake. Sadly we couldn't visit the Borneo island due to monsoon weather, but we can imagine it's stunning natural beauty from the small pocket we witnessed our of the train window.
We had two full days to explore Kuala Lumpur before our flight out. We planned to stop in a different location than our last hostel. Instead of Indian heritage we were surrounded by huge shopping malls and very expensive hotels. It was enjoyable being able to explore the old and new sides of this complex city.
One of the major sites of the capital is the Petronus Towers. These identical towers used to be one of the tallest buildings in the world. It has sadly lost that title but it still holds the title of having the tallest skybridge that links the towers together. We couldn't afford the overpriced fare to climb up the towers, but we were able to enjoy the architectural beauty of them as they lit up the night sky. The area of the towers is a commuters paradise, surrounded by glass skyscrapers and expensive bars keeping us riff raff out! But its expected for a city financed by oil and bank companies.
Of course we explored the shopping malls, we seem to do that in every city, but these malls were something else. Beating the Bangkok Malls, with multiple floors covered in every shop you could think of, even Dorothy Perkins! The odd thing was how many malls there seemed to be and how empty each one was. We wondered if many they had built a few too many maybe? One big bonus was the NANDOS! Of course we had to dinner their, we hadn't seen a Nandos in months, we were suffering without all that Peri-Peri. Plus is was cheaper than home and you got table service.
We gave Chinatown a second chance with its market, but sadly it didn't inspire us in anyway. We are sure that some tourists would love exploring all the imitation goods, but it just wasn't the items we were looking for. However, after some research we happened upon a cultural handicraft goods market near Chinatown. Some of the goods were questionably handicraft, but we loved looking at all the different items from Chinese good luck charms, incense and pashminars, even though we couldn't afford most of it. We topped the trip off with a nice slab of Chocolate Cake, that was too rich for Matthew and it filled up Nicole till the evening.
With all the modern shopping malls and Chinese buildings, it was time to visit Meraka Square. It had been highlighted on our tourist map and on websites we visited, so we assumed it must be something important. We walked over a river to the Indian side of town, the shop houses had disappeared and were replaced with beautiful mosques and Islamic buildings with "Aladdin" windows as Matt called them. The square had a large open grass area, used for cricket, surrounded by these majestic buildings with the Petronus Towers in the distance. It was a great place to end our journey of Kuala Lumpur and Malaysia. It's a shame we haven't had more time to explore this country further, or set foot on the natural paradise of Borneo but at least we saw a a small 10 day snapshot.
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