Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

I’m finally writing about Kuala Lumpur which means I’m finally finishing the southeast Asia trip from 2015… better late than never! So let’s wrap up Malaysia and Asia in style with KL. Well… maybe ‘ in style’ isn’t the right phrase to use. If I’m being honest, I wouldn’t say we finished the trip with one of the best places. When I think of the countries we visited during the 9 weeks, Malaysia usually comes to mind last. Maybe it’s because it was the one we added in a rush and hadn’t planned as much for. The likes of Vietnam and Thailand were always must-dos for us but Malaysia kinda tagged along. It was a good addition, I liked Malaysia but I doubt I’ll return. Of the three places we visited there KL was probably my least favourite. Langkawi was a little bit like paradise, George Town felt different in its own cool way. KL was just a big city to me. That’s not to be critical, big cities are great and I’m sure it’s fun to live there but I didn’t come away in awe. Sorry to any KL fans/residents.

I’ve had to look through my photos to remember what happened, of course most of them are of the very impressive Petronas Towers. The Petronas Towers held the record for the tallest building in the world until 2004 and, as you might expect, they’re absolutely massive. They’re not as iconic as NYC’s skyscrapers but I liked them, I’m a fan of symmetry.

A theme of Singapore/Malaysia was multiculturalism, this was apparent again in KL. The city had all the usual influences: British/colonial, Chinese and Indian. Diversity is fantastic, it enhances any city. You couldn’t imagine any major city without it. Below you can see a mosque, a Taoist temple and a church. I’m an atheist but religions are often heavily linked to a place’s culture, even for a non-believer it’s interesting to visit places of worship. The old man in the Taoist temple kindly told us our fortunes for the coming year, that’s where I found out 2016 was going to be the year of the monkey. My year!

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I was fairly critical of KL at the start of the post, some might even say I was a bit harsh. The place itself didn’t blow me away. True. But I did tick two things off of my bucket list: I swam in an infinity pool and I saw monkeys, wild monkeys! That’s not bad going, thanks KL. The Air B&B we found had a shared communal rooftop pool with pretty decent views…

And I’ve saved the best ’til last… these little rascals below. I’d been on the hunt for monkeys for the whole 9 weeks with little success and then when hope was almost lost… Batu Caves came to my rescue. The caves have been made into temples, they were still constructing one when I visited – I carried a tile up the stairs! I was rewarded for my good deed, as once I was up there I was completely spoilt. There were monkeys all over the place. I was able to get so close to them, they definitely weren’t afraid of people – some people were afraid of them though. They could be a quite aggressive, especially if food was around. I kept away from food and snapped away, I could’ve watched them for ages. The trip to KL was worth it for this alone. The next step – letting a monkey climb on me. I’d better book another trip to Asia!

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