Malaysian Marathon

After Singapore, Beau and I ventured on what I have non-affectionately nicknamed the Malaysian Marathon... so named because we spent from 10:30pm Friday to 7:30am Monday in transit. No hostels. No showers. Limited sleep.

It started at 10:30pm Friday night with our overnight bus ride from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur. The bus was a custom designed "sleeper bus". There were only 21 seats and they were all comfortable, spacious and reclinable... they also had earphones and individual TV consoles. I slept like a baby and only woke up when we crossed the Singapore and Malaysian borders. We had to get off the bus, wait in line at Immigration, get our passports stamped and then hop back on the bus. All in all it was pretty quick and efficient.

I woke up at 4:30am on Saturday when the bus arrived in Kuala Lumpur. We were told it was Puduraya Bus Station, but it certainly felt like it was in the middle of nowhere. We wanted to stay near the bus station to inquire into further buses to our next destination, but nothing was open. That is, except the 24hr McDonalds. Ahhh, American capitalism! Not only was it open, it was huge, it had Western-style bathrooms, free Wi-Fi AND a huge HD TV screen on every floor playing World Cup highlights! We bought our McD breakfasts and asked the cashier about the bus station. Here was the conversation:

Me: We are looking for the bus station.
Cashier: Puduraya?
Me: Yes. Where is it?
Cashier: It is over there.
Me: Where?
Cashier: Over there. (points to where we were dropped off)
Me: Okay. When does it open?
Cashier: About four months.

Apparently the bus station was closed for maintenance and was only being used for drop-offs. So we went to the train station, bought overnight train tickets from Kuala Lumpur to Butterworth, close to the Malaysian-Thai border, dropped off our backpacks into storage and we were off to see the city! My initial assumptions of Kuala Lumpur was that it was smog-infested, busy, and dirty. That's what everyone had told me. I was pleasantly surprised to find it relatively clean with efficient and inexpensive public transportation and plenty to do and see. That being said, it was also INSANELY hot and humid which made walking around difficult and exhausting.


We started with Chinatown. Our first stop was the Central Market, which was air-conditioned and full of fixed-price souvenirs. We were looking to haggle, so we walked over to Petaling Street and its open air market. It was still early in the morning but the place was already coming alive. There were food vendors selling fresh fruit and Chinese dishes. There were souvenir vendors selling everything from local trinkets to fresh handmade floral necklaces (see photo) to knock off designer gear. We wandered the street and stopped to grab lunch at the food stalls before continuing on our way.






We followed the river and passed by Jamek Mosque, KL's oldest mosque. That led into Little India and it's own version of the open air market. More looking and haggling.












We caught the subway to the Kuala Lumpur City Centre (KLCC) to see the famous Petronas Towers (seen in the movie ENTRAPMENT). By this time it was early afternoon, sunny and insanely hot. We were exhausted and had managed to check off everything we really wanted to see in the city and still had endless hours until our train departure. We killed time by going to the movie theater inside one of the Towers - A/C and the A-TEAM were a great way to spend the afternoon!




For dinner, we found a restaurant that had fusion Malaysian-Indian food. The restaurant was set up like a buffet and we had our server dish out his recommendations. We ended up with some items I had read about in the Malaysian guide books, like their traditional rice dish, Nasi Campur, and also easily recognizable Indian food like naan and lamb curry. It was all delicious! Our bellies full, we headed back to the train station and found a quiet spot to rest before catching our night train. Definitely not as comfy as the bus and air-conditioned to the point of frigidness.

We arrived in Butterworth around 6am Sunday morning and immediately started inquiring into our next location - Surat Thani, Thailand and it's ferries to our ultimate destination, the island of Ko Samui. We walked to the nearby bus station and found out there were no large buses that went that far, but would we like to hire a mini bus to take us there instead? We would not. We bought a train ticket that left at 2:20pm, wandered around for a bit more to stretch our legs than anything else, and ended up at a tiny restaurant full of bus employees that served yummy local food. We killed the rest of our time napping on the floor, and felt a little better when we saw many other foreign backpackers doing the exact same thing :)



Our train left at 2pm and this time, it was a Sleeper Car. That meant that our seats converted into bunk beds! Of course, when I immediately asked for the transformation, I was given a funny look and the response "Too early. We change later". Later ended up being around 8pm when we finally crossed the Malaysian-Thai border. At this point, we hit our first major snag in our journey. Everything I had read about getting into Thailand said that you could receive a 30 day free visa upon arrival. However, when we passed through Immigration and received our stamp, the expiry date said July 4th... 15 days from entry. When we asked about this, we were told that the law had just recently changed and now any ground entries (i.e. by train or bus) were only granted 15 day visas. My flight is scheduled for July 12th. Hmmm. Time do so some research and see if there is a way to extend the visa or do a one-day visa run and leave/re-enter to receive a new 15 day visa. But that would have to wait since we were still on the train and a long way away from being in a position to check. So we got back on the train, FINALLY got our beds set up (which was lots of fun, I must admit) and slept until our train arrived into Surat Thani at about 1am Monday morning.



At this point, we banded together with two backpackers from Scotland, Joanna and Richard (loved their accents!) and shared a taxi into town, thinking that certainly a ferry town would have SOMETHING open - a 24hr. Internet Cafe, a bar? Nope. Just a 7-Eleven. The driver told us that the travel agencies open at 8am but the first ferry to Ko Samui left at 5am and offered to drive us the 72km to the pier. So we did that. We arrived at the pier, bought our tickets, said goodbye to Joanna and Richard who were headed to Ko Phagnan and boarded our ferry to Ko Samui and a week of bungalows, beaches and relaxation!