Time for a break…

Well, a break from touring the hot, dry and pretty desolate northern part of SE Asia anyway… And what better place to do that than a "city break" in the two massive developed cities (with aircon!) of Kuala Lumpur and Singapore? And so it was that after 20 minutes of sightseeing in Vientiane in the morning, I swapped the country feel for the big smoke of KL. And what a change it was! Not the biggest city in the world by any means, but if all you have been seeing for weeks before is two story bamboo huts, it appears so much like Gotham City I was half expecting to see the Bat signal in the sky. First impression is visually fantastic - arriving at night, it is as if seeing a space ship rise out of the horizon, the ubiquitous Petronas Towers glow in the distance all the way from the airport, some 70km out of town. As they grew bigger, the city eventually appears and for the next 5 days the towers featured in almost all my photo moments.

There is, however, more to the KL than the towers. Firstly, it was quite a noticeable change to be in a Muslim country after a month surrounded by Buddhism. Fashion, food and etiquette change - but at the same time, much is retained -street food, smiley people, cheap markets, dirty roads and pushy sales people still hover at every turn. Along with the new culture came an opportunity to peak into a world that is very distant growing up in the "west" - from art and museums to mosques, I learnt a great deal from this short introduction and Im sure I will seek out more in the future. Seeing incredible exhibitions at the Islamic Art Museum for instance was superb - punctuated by an exhibition by Steve McCurry, the world renowned photographer who has been documenting Islamic daily life for decades. If it wasn't the museum that highlighted the culture, then a brief stop at the National Mosque certainly did. Attired in a delightful full length purple gown, I had a friendly chat with a funny, experienced and extremely opinionated Muslim volunteer at the Mosque. In just 15 minutes we covered religion (Islam, Buddhism and Christianity…), differences in eastern and western philosophies, the friendliness of travelling as a Muslim in Europe and Africa, the world cup and a few other bits!

In case some of you were worried, the visit wasn't entirely cultural. Through some planning and coincidence I had the chance to meet up with an "old" (!) friend from London. Always great to see familiar faces in faraway places, so I really enjoyed catching up on things back in sunny London for a few hours - thanks for the beers Pia! And finally, the weekend was wrapped up with another great opportunity - to watch the F1 GP at Sepang. It has been while since my last encounter - almost long enough to forget just how loud those machines really are. Incredible engineering and a great race made for another fun day out and at a fraction of the cost of our trip to Belgium in 2008. That is despite being literally eaten alive by all manner of little critters on the grass bank: jumping spiders, caterpillars, crickets, ants - it was like an insect zoo ;-) Fortunately the day was good, so I wont recall for too long the epic 4 hour journey back to the city after the race… which, on the upside, did give me the chance to chat at length with Malay guy called Jason (wearing a Man United shirt) about life, love and everything else in KL.

And with good memories and bed bug bites from the worst hostel in history, it was on to the train (first class) to Singapore - the anomaly of SE Asia. No matter where you arrive from, Singapore is a shock to the system. I didn't get ripped off eating at the train station; I didn't even get a dodgy tummy from eating at "Jolly Jamals curry trolley"; I didn't get ripped off for a taxi to Chinatown; I didn't step in any dog doo while walking around… It is as clean as they say it is, its safe, has an incredible skyline, good food, a compatible mixture of Chinese, Indian, Malay, expat, etc. cultures. The only thing it most certainly does not have, is anything cheap! Sure, you can feed on street food, but should you wish to wash that down with a glass of ice cold beer, expect to fork out. I bought just one round for 4 people at a bar, and it cost me S$60 (about £30!).

So a city described by my taxi driver as "a fine city", while laughing heartily at his intended pun, has much to offer - and is certainly the best and softest place to begin if you plan to travel in the region. However, the highlight (and somewhat the purpose of being there) was to catch up with Rob. You know it's a funny world when you plan to be in Singapore and at the same time, your brother flies right across the world to the same place for business! That's twice we've caught up in 3 months, certainly a record… which, as always, was great to reminisce about things, get some advice, talk about South Africa in November, etc. Thanks for the beers Rob, will get you back one day when I have a job! Another upside of this, was crashing in his 4 star hotel - swimming pool, gym, butlers all included. Sometimes, a bit of luxury doesn't hurt a backpacker ;-) Eventually however, the time runs out, the four star fun ends and the tribulations of real travel return - so from here its straight back into the thick of things in Hanoi, where I expect no less than chaos.