Welcome to Malaysia!!! The Festival of Thaipusaum.
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Date: 14th January
Well, after our short stay at Singapore and the lack of sleep over the last 3 days, we decided to stay in Kuala Lumpur for the night.
So far, the plan is to leave tomorrow morning and head to "Cameron Highlands", whihc are supposed to be beautiful and lie about 3-4hours north of here. They're also very ENGLISH! So, it'll be like going home for a couple of days!
Kuala Lumpur itself seems like most Asian cities. It's sprawling, has lots of high rise buildings and hundreds of cheap food outlets (inc. KFC and MacDonalds of course. A real travesty.) and the people are very friendly and helpful. As far as cities go, it's no bad. And it has the "Petronas Towers", the tallest towers in the world.
Date: 18th January
After KL, we split for the Cameron Highlands. Too many people, too much smog in the big city for us and the mountains beckoned.
That didn't stop us doing some lovely treks through the forests though, and once you'd gotten away from the building sites that now sprawl around the town, the jungle was gorgeous, if not a little steep! I mean, do you really HAVE to climb solidly for an hour and a half, up a slope that is more like a ladder than a hill. It's just plain silly!
After 2 days walking up and down mountain trails, constantly getting lost as new paths appeared and old paths had been overgrown, we decided we'd done enough exercise and went for a tea at the tea factory.
The mountain slopes were cleared long ago and replaced by tea bushes, which look like a patchwork of greenery, very bizarre at first sight. The leaves are still hand-picked by locals, and then treated and packed at the factory, where after you've taken a very brief tour, you can get a fresh cup of tea.
However, after taking a taxi there, we suddenly realised during the first cup of char that there was no bus back, no taxis available and no phone to call for one. So we had no choice but to walk, again, up more paths and roads to get back to civilisation. Anna was not happy and the tea was spoiled by the knowledge that we'd have to walk yet further after our 4 hour hike earlier that day. DOH!
The food here is fnatstic though. There are 3 main cultures; the Malays, the chinese and the Indians, meaning fantastic curries! And what better way to eat them, but with fingers, off a banana leaf. No washing up? What a way to live!
We were very lucky, in fact, to find a bed for the night as theis plae is now full of pilgrims and tourists come to watch the pilgrims.
Happily there isn't any blood, but we did feel a little squeamish around the devotees! We should have some cool photos for you soon, but check the link out above if you're interested.
The rest of the Hindus, basically wander around the several stunning temples having a good time, eating curries (which are provided free by several stalls, all day and tastes great. There is a strict diet thing for the festival, to purify one's body, so all the food is veggie. One for Graeme then.) and enjoying the whole weekend. In fact around 600,000 of them are still out partying in the temples right now. And thats just on this tiny island! Another 1 million are in KL celebrating there.
So after wandering the stalls and temples for hours, seeing the devotees go into trances, fall over with tiredness and also dance around like fools to some great bangra, the sun got to us and we had to leave for a little shade and respite from the thousands of people there.
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Text by: Carlos
We met a lovely Slovenian girl and a Canadian guy on the bus and we've all just had a gorgeous curry at a local restaurant, for about 50 pence each. And I'm stuffed! You have to love chap, good food!
Text by: Carlos
They're actually very beautiful, when you can see them. For the most part of our 2 nights there, the tops were covered in clouds and rain, so we'll never know!Pulau Penang
After the highlands, we took the tortuous bus down the mountain trails and back to the city, Georgetown on Pulau Penang. Its a fun kind of place, not too big, but full of the usual temples and life you find over here. And what's more we got here just in time for the biggest festival and public holiday of the year... The Hindu festival of Thaipusaum.
The whole festival revolves around the birth of one of the higher gods "Lord Muraga", so I guess it's a little like Christmas!
The weirdest thing seems to be that you can atone for your sins and wrong-doings by causing yourself lots of pain. So, some of the guys stick around 30 big metal hooks through the chest and backs (and some smaller ones through the face), a big pole through the cheeks and possible another through the tongue. Then they walk for miles around all the temples with ropes attached to them, whilst another dude yanks them back by the ropes. NICE.
I did quite fancy having a go on the reins after a while, though I don't think Anna would've been too pleased if I had!
What am I doing here??
Who am I??
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