Malacca Tour and Cocktail Party

Today we started fairly early on our daytrip to Malacca on the coast. It is a very old town and the settlers first came there when they arrived in Malaysia. It was about 2 1/2 hrs by bus from Kuala Lumpur. The town has a lot of history and has a mixture of all the countries that have once occupied Malaysia - Portugal, Holland, England and Japan. Malaysia got it independence 1957. On the way we stopped at a Portuguese settlement and also at a rest stop with interesting fruits.

The Chinese also have a big influence here and all religions are practised in harmony. You can even find a chinese temple with Buddhism, Taoism and Confusionism in the same "compund" right next to a mosque and then a hindu temple - all on the same street. It was a very hot day and we did quite a lot of walking. We climbed a big hill where there was a church ruin on top. During this walk we came across he python snakes where I got acquainted with an albino python (see the picture!). I was the only one who dared and I had to pay 10MYR (about $3) for the pleasure! We had lunch at a large chinese restaurant and the food was soso.

We did not return to the hotel until 6.45pm and that just gave us 45 minutes to shower and change since 7.30 was the start of the Cocktail Party at the poolside at JW Marriott. The Swedish ambassador and his wife were both present and talked to us. The food was great and the volume of 200 Swedish women is deafening! 

Tomorrow we are having lectures in the morning. Mostly about Swedish involvment in South East Asia.

Fifth Day in Kuala Lumpur

Today I had to go to a meeting with the SWEA International Board and talk about my involvment with the electronic newsletter. When I got back, we headed out to check out a place called Hutang Village, which was like a Chinese food court. We decided not to eat there, because we didn't think it looked all that clean and I have to be careful, since I am immunosuppressed. Instead we went back to the Pavillion and a Spanish restaurant. After lunch, Spanish tortilla, which was not very good, we once again made our way to China Town to buy fake bags for another Swede, who did not have time to shop. I bought a red watch.

In the evening I was invited with the SWEA VIPs to the resident of the Swedish ambassador to Malaysia. It was a lovely house, but unfortunately Sweden is closing even this embassy in a few months. (They have already closed New York and LA and maybe even more - I don't know). The ambassador and his wife welcomed us all and then the ambassador disappeared because this was just ladies night. The wife is a member of SWEA as well. We were served a very tasy buffet and the tables were set outside. It was quite warm but they did have some fans blowing, which helped. We were a lively crowd and the sound level was up really high. Us Swedish women are known to be quite loud when we get together, but oh, it is so much fun!

Tomorrow we are going on an all day tour to Malacca.

Fourth Day in Kuala Lumpur

Today we had decided to go shopping. Our first destination was SOGO, a shopping mall. We were actually quite disappointed by that place. They were having a great sale, but we couldn't find anything to buy.

We have now also discovered that we should use old taxis rather than newer ones. The price difference ranges from 6.70MYR to 25MYR for the same distance! If they ask for too much we just refuse to pay that price and we get the price down. After SOGO we returned to the hotel area and went for lunch. 2 stories below the shopping mall, that is only minutes away from the hotel, we found the largest food court I have ever seen! There were restaurants galore as well as shops. We ended up at a Japaneese restaurant and had mixed tempura and green tea. We also stopped by a great bake shop and bought some pastries for our afternoon coffee at the hotel.

After lunch we headed out for China Town and some shopping. Here we did find some handbags - fake of course, but still nice.

The Swedes are trickeling in from all over the world and it is great to see old friends. This organization we belong to, SWEA, is incredible. Even people you have never seen before seem like old friends and some you might have been e-mailing with for months and you finally get to meet in person. For dinner a bunch of us went to a Malay restaurant called Top Hat. We talked a little "business" but mainly it was just a great evening out. Tomorrow the actual conference days start with registration and I have a meeting with the SWEA International board in the morning.

Third Day in Kuala Lumpur

We started our day with a return trip to Central Market to complain about Christina's new watch that had stopped after 6 hours. Before we took off for the market we decided to book a City Tour for the afternoon. At the travel desk we met 3 more Swedes and they were also going on the same trip. Christina's watch got a new battery and is still working.

After the market we went to the Italian coffe shop for a bite to eat before our sight seeing trip. We were picked up at the hotel and it was only us 5 Swedes on the tour, which was great. First stop was at the Royal Palace. It turns out that they have 9 "kings" in Malaysia and they take turns every 5 years to be king!

Next stop was at Thean Hou Chinese Temple. Ninni and I had our fortunes told. Not very exciting, but the temple was nice. It was raining quite hard on and off so if it was raining we didn't stop. After the temple we went to a place where they showed us how they make hand painted batik. That is one of the specialties of Malaysia. After the batik place we were taken to a pewter factory - Royal Selangor which was founded in 1885 and is the world's largest pewter factory. They export to 20 different countries and much of the work is done by hand. Our final stop was at the National Monument, which is there to honor all the soldiers that have died in the wars.

After the sight seeing we went back to the hotel for a little rest and then we went to a steakhouse for dinner, followed by coffee and cake at Starbucks. Oh, between the Central Market and sight seeing we had time for a little shopping (shoes).I am eating far too much!

Second Day in Kuala Lumpur



Lunch



Today we were planning to shop. We had planned to go to China Town and got a taxi from the hotel. However, the driver convinced us to first go to a leather factory outlet store for handbags - he waited for us while we browsed the store. We didn't like any of the bags so now we were heading to a batik place and other Malaysian crafts. Even this place was  bust! We didn't buy anything there either. Our driver had now deserted us and we were stranded at nowhere and had to walk for a while to get to a bigger street and get another taxi. Now we were were heading for Central Market. This was mostly an indoor market with gizillions of little stores offering an awful lot of stuff. We had lunch here and the only purchase was a watch that Ninni bought. However, it has already stalled so we will go back tomorrow and complain.

After all this shopping, which didn't result in much, we headed for our daily fix of Starbucks accompanied  by Chocolate Tuxedo cake which was (is) delicious! After Starbucks we headed back to the hotel to rest and we had planned to tackle China Town in the evening. That did not happen and instead we went to a Mexican restaurant for Quesadillas and beer (yes, more beer for me too!). China Town will have to wait until tomorrow!

First Day in Kuala Lumpur

We had a slow start in the morning, but the sun was shining and it was very hot. We took a walk in the neighborhood and discovered that there are lots of shops and restaurants practically just around the corner from the hotel. We stopped at an Italian cafe and had freshly squeezed orange/carrot juice, iced latte and lovely tosted whole wheat panini bread with Camembert cheese. After our brunch we went to a supermarket and bought eatables and drinks to have at the hotel room.

For the afternoon we had booked a KL Park & Garden Tour. Lake Garden is the most popular park in Kuala Lumpur. It is built around two lakes on 92 hectares and consists of Orchid Garden, Hibiscus Garden, Butterfly Park and Bird Park. The bird park houses over 5000 birds where 90% are local and 10% from overseas. After the birds we were suposed to visit the Orchid and Hibiscus Garden, but quite a thunderstorm with lightning and thunder as well as rain, made us skip that part and instead went to the Butterfly Garden. We didn't see that many flying butterflies but there were some that looked exactly like dried leaves. They did have a lot of beautiful butterflies that were dead and mounted.

After resting for a while we went out for dinner to a German restaurant and had sausages with potato salad and rösti. I even had a beer :-)

Hong Kong airport

Finally arrived in Hong Kong after 14 hours in the air. Many hours, lots of food and four movies! Drinks and nuts to start, followed by a salad (I could have had caviar or salmon, but you know me - much too exotic for my palate.) The salad had fake crab meat in it so I passed on that part. For the main course I picked filet mignon and dessert ice-cream with warm chocolate sauce! The movies I picked were "The Social Network", "The Town", "Black Swan" and "Burlesque". I enjoyed all of them. The first two movies were shot in and around Boston, which of course always is fun to see and the Social Network also had a scene from the Henley Regatta and the Leander Club in Henley-on-Thames, England close to where my sister lives and where my niece got married last year. I did manage to sleep a little and since leaving Boston I have have almost read a whole book - The Keepsake by Tess Gerritsen. That is a murder mystery that is also taking place in Boston and at a museum that possibly have the Museum of Fine Art (MFA)as the main place of action (that's where Kim, my daughter works) so that is interesting as well.
My flight to Kuala Lumpur leaves in 2 hours and it will be Friday afternoon there by the time I arrive. My sister is flying in from London and she will get there before me. Starting tomorrow I should be able to start to add some picures as well.