41. Malaysia @ Kuala Lumpur

We arrived to Kuala Lumpur too early in the morning.



It was around 5am in the  morning, when our train from Georgetown/Buttersworth arrived to KL (Kuala Lumpur) central station.


The station is part of a big shopping mall and we waited for the first metro to leave to Chinatown, where we had booked a hotel.


We got really familiar with all three commercial songs they had on the big screen while sitting on the floor for nearly 2 hours.


Kuala Lumpur is the capital, the biggest city and the city with most people, about 7 million inhabitants, in Malaysia and the area is among the fastest growing metropolitan regions of Malaysia.


Our hotel was situated on the most bustling street of KL and the Chinatown's every day and night street market was on our front yard.


It was nice because we didn't have to go far for some nice street food but on the other hand it was a bit frustrating to try to get back to the hotel in the evening as there was so many stalls that we could hardly find our hotel's door!


Anyway, more pluses than minuses.


We spent a few nights in KL and covered it quite well.


They had a christmas coming in the shopping mall even that over 60 percent of the population are Muslim and only 10 percent Christian.


Santa was having a break so Markus took the stage. For some reason all the children started to cry and ran away screaming that they now hate christmas.


We went to see Batu caves, about 13 kilometres outside KL. It's easy to get there by train as the station is just next to the caves. That monkey looking dude is Hanuman, the monkey god in Hindu religion.


Batu caves is one of the most popular Hindu shrines outside India.


There was many statues of Hindu gods.


Sometimes they had plenty  of hands and heads.


Carina found herself in the middle of ancient locals.


And we also found something that reminded us about the Gulliver's travels.


All of these things were inside a huge cave.


At the base of the hill are two cave temples, Art Gallery Cave and Museum Cave, both of which are full of Hindu statues and paintings. This complex was renovated and opened as the Cave Villa in 2008. 

A 42.7-metre (140 ft) high statue of Lord Murugan, who is the Hindu god of war. The statue was unveiled in January 2006, having taken 3 years to construct. It is the tallest Lord Murugan statue in the world. We haven't seen the second tallest Murugan but will let you know if we come across.


Rising almost 100 m above the ground, the Batu Caves temple complex consists of three main caves and a few smaller ones. The biggest, referred to as Cathedral Cave or Temple Cave, has a very high ceiling and features ornate Hindu shrines. To reach it, visitors must climb a steep flight of 272 steps.


There's plenty of monkeys around the temples.


And they will steal your stuff if they get the chance.


We made it to the top easily but it was a hot day.


There's another statue greeting the people that climbs the steps.


Exercise was not allowed so we tried not to look exhausted after the rise of 272 steps.


Locals had their fun in the top cave by watching a cock fight...


And just hanging around at the temple's premises.


In the top cave you could also get in to a deep courtyard.


Here's a Hindu god dancing the Las Ketchup dance and a girl from Avatar is standing by.


We also visited the National Mosque of Malaysia in KL.


It has a capacity of  15 000 people.


The mosque was built in 1965.


They had some nice little fountains near the mosque.


We went to see the famous Petronas Towers, where


we participated a tour that took us to the connecting bridge on 41st and 42nd floor and


all the way up to 86th floor.


Petronas Towers has 33 000 pieces of stainless steel and 55 000 pieces of glass panels forming the Tower's wall cladding.


The pinnacles on top of the towers houses aircraft warning lights.


Somebody was fixing the bridge while we were on it.


The view from the top was amazing.


Markus looks almost official with the 1st tower behind him.


We also almost went to the TV Tower.



It was more expensive than the Petronas Towers so we skipped it.

Instead we saw some city monkeys in the park next to the TV Tower and


had many lovely walks around the town.


The Kuala Lumpur Railway Staition building was really cool.


The Keretapi Tanah Melayu, an administration building, was just on the other side of the road. Also really cool.


The central Kuala Lumpur is a cool mixture of old and new buildings...


This one is  "the Sultan Abdul Samad building" situated in front of the Independence Square.


The building houses the offices of the Ministry of Information, Communication and Culture and formerly housed the superior courts of Malaysia.


We also saw the world.


This fellow wanted to take a picture of Carina. He also wanted one with Carina. And another one, and another one... We left him craving for more after couple pictures. Creep!


One fun thing to do was our own sightseeing with the monorail that kind of goes around the KL central area.


We only paid one way ticket as we stayed in the train to the end station and back.


Haha, bad us.


We visited a gorgeous mosque.


The Jamek Mosque was built in 1907.


It looked much nicer than the National Mosque.


A nice and polite man explained patiently to tourists about Islam.


The Little red Riding Hood didn't see the big bad wolf in the mosque.

After the mosque we went to Burger King. It was funny how fast food restaurants became our hideaway from all the hustle and bustle and bullshit.

After good times in KL it was time to change country. We flew to Phuket where we were about to Meet Markus' mom for Christmas.

No comments:

Post a Comment