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Food, Shopping & Breathtaking Nature, A Fine Introduction To Malaysia And Borneo

Asia may only be a few hours on an aeroplane from Sri Lanka & India but it feels like they could be worlds apart. Our first introduction to Asia was a guide book classic, we landed right into the hub of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, home to shopping, food and some more shopping. As soon as we landed into KL the standard of everything was above anything we had seen so far on our travels, the train into the city centre was quick, quite and efficient! all be it somewhat a little expensive. This is everything that we are not used to and with our flight landing a little after 12pm, it did make it that little less stressful and hassle free which was nice. After some sleep and with us only having 24h in the city we headed out early to try and get a vibe of this modern city. With our hostel based in China town in the midst of it all, this made a perfect base to get out and start exploring.

We of course started our day in true Gary and Rebecca form, heading straight to the nearest hawker stall to get stuck into some delicious food. Now with neither of us ever using chopsticks before and after serval demonstrations from the chef on how to hold them, we was able to eat our beef noodles, please note however this did take us an hour to eat just one bowl, as its a lot harder than it looks when put into practice. After a full belly we headed to the world famous market, its decorated with pretty red lanterns and umbrellas and is also home to every type of knock off clothing, shoe and accessory anyone could ever wish for. One thing that is pretty obvious in Malaysia is that they LOVE to shop and with every street lined with air con shopping malls it would of been rude not to of jumped on the bandwagon. So in true tourist fashion and with a lot of our cloths now dirty, stained and ripped we headed to the shops. A couple of hours later i managed to buy pretty much a whole new wardrobe, Its ok Gary wasn’t left out he also treated himself to 3 new rather nice shirts (at the same cost of my whole new wardrobe ill just add) and with it all coming to under £50 we was chuffed to bits with our new wardrobe. After throughly enjoying the free aricon we headed back to the streets and continued to walk around aimlessly enjoying and absorbing this completely different and new country.

Before we knew it we had been out exploring for over 8 hours and with our legs a little tired and our bellies of course rumbling we headed to yet another Hawlker stall, if you’ve not been to Asia, some of the best and most delicious food can be found on these tiny street stalls. Each one serving a variety of the most amazing food that will certainly make you fall in love with this country, well it has us anyway. We tucked into a skewered platter containing various different types of seafood and meat, some of which we were completely unknown as to what it was but thats all part of the fun.

Our whirl wind 24 hours in KL lead us packing our bags again and heading onto another plane straight to Borneo!!

A mere 1h 45 minutes later we arrived into the capital Kuching, where we was going to be based for for the next week or so. This modern suphicated city couldn’t be more different to what we think of when you envisage Boreno. Its seems that even the likes of Boreno hasn’t escaped the 21st century creeping in, with its shopping malls galore and fast food chains everywhere its not quite how we pictured it to be. If you dig a little deeper into Kuching though you can see theres a great mix of old and new with its small cobbled streets and Chinese temples almost engulfed by modern hotel buildings for its neighbours, you can easily overlook its subtle history.

Shopping malls aside though the town itself is quite pleasant, snaked with a river running threw the heart of it, it makes for pleasant strolls come sunset. It also serves as a great base to explore the surrounding country side, and just 45 minutes later your transported away from the concrete jungle and into one of the many national parks and forests.

We made the most of our location and visited the beautiful Kubah National park, set within 22 sq m, it had a lovely mixed dipterocarp (many mixes of plants and trees found in the forrest) and has a huge variety of frogs, a whopping 98 species (we didn’t see any). the day was mainly spent trekking through to a lovely secluded waterfall where gary persisted to do Peter Andre impressions in the water. we mangeged to see a pretty multicoloured Centipede and some rather funky mushrooms which was nice, no primates unfortunately but it still made for a great day out and getting us used to trekking in this type of humidity and landscape.

Our first port of call with Nature was to Semenggoh nature reserve, a short 1 hour bus ride away we was nestled in 6.8 sq m of forest that is home to 27 semi wild Orang-utans. This is one of the best places in the world to see these amazing orange friends in their natural environment and with no cages or wire keeping them in the park, the one that are here are happy to stay. Out of the 27 that now live here, 13 of the orang-utans were rescued from captivity or orphaned and 14 are Semengoggoh born offspring proving that their very happy there. This is nature though and there are never any guarantees as to wether or not we was going to see just 1 of these amazing creatures. Luck was on our side as we managed to see and get strangely close to three of them!! One 9 year old male and a 45 year old mum and her baby. We had an amazing time watching the young male show off doing the splits on the rope way, swinging from tree to tree and casually placing leaves on his head to stop the pouring rain, all whilst he had one eye on us to see wether we was watching him or not. The mum and baby lied causally on the roof of the shelter whist the rangers placed fruits and a bottle for them to feed on.

It was a very serial experience and also quite depressing that these guys were only here because of what we (mankind) have done to them, either man logging their natural home or because someone has kept them as a pet or been poached. Being this close to an Orang-utang shouldn’t make you feel guilty but it did and with the realisation that this is only going to get worse in the future didn’t sit well with us. We walked away with torn emotions after having had an amazing time, watching and simply being around these guys and it was a truly special moment for us. But when you think about it these guys are the lucky ones to have a safe home and to be able to successfully breed in the wild which is amazing, but as to the future for all wild Orang-utans this will remains hugely unknown which is a worrying and sad thought.

#food #shopping #malaysia #kuala lumpa #flights #nomad #backpacking #travel #traveller #world #culture #orang utans #wildlife #national park #trekking #kuching #borneo

GOING..GOING....GET YOUR KUALA LUMPA LEGGINGS

Last chance to get yourself a pair of our best selling, super popular Kuala Lumpa leggings! We only have size 2 left in stock, that's a UK size 10-14 thanks to the Whoy 4 way stretch. Only £25 and you can get yours here: http://www.whoy.com/shop/leggings/Kuala-Lumpa-Leggings

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Lord Murugan and The Batu Caves

The Batu Caves Hindu temple in Kuala Lumpa during holy festival of Thaipusam

Postcard from Sutr, "The postcard is from my sister who was travelling with her boyfriend and his mother, who are from Sweden. She lives there now. The postcard describes the usual rigmarole of enmeshed family life in Malaysia. You forget how normal it all seems and how jarring their behaviours are on your return. "

Friday, 18 May 2007.

"Hello all in Sydney,

Lisa (Chris' mum), Chris & I came to Penang yesterday from KL by bus 5 hours. On the first day/night Chris and I arrived Uncle Bobby and Aunty GhekBee picked us up from the airport (KL) & fed us with a mountain of food. "chia chia chia!".... They took Chris and I on our first day to Batu Caves. We were all blessed and had red powder (see front) pressed onto our foreheads. Some Indian guy in the carpark gave Chris the the thumbs up. Uncle Fong gave us free dental check ups AIYAH!! We tried to pay but they refused. *sigh* Will meet them for dinner when we go back to KL.

-♥P&C"

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13 kilometeres north of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia lies a 400 million year old limestone hill where lies a series of caves and cave temples complex. Batu Caves takes the name from the Sugain Baut (Batu River). The caves were used as shelters by the indigenous Temuan people. A pattern emerging with these postcard sites is that these sites often become famous after being recorded by colonial authorities.

Pillai was an Indian trader who founded the Sri Mahamariaman Temple in Kuala Lumpa, was inspired by the Batu cave's entrance and decided to create a temple of dedication to Lord Muruga there.

The story of Lord Muruga is described in Skanda Purana. Lord Murugan is a popular deity amongst Hindu Tamils and is also known as the God of War or Skanda. He was a young, handsome, fire-eating and spear-throwing deity. Lord Murugan is considered to be the manifestation of handsomeness, robust youthfulness, masculinity, fragrance and unmatched valour - all symbolising the abode of happiness. Muruga has no beginning or end. he was not born nor can die. He has been described as being analogus to the sun, always shining brightly somewhere in the world, even when part of the world is cast in darkness.

He lived on forested hills and of course fond of pursuits typical to that of a handsome war god - hunting, fighting and had an appetite for blood sacrifice. According to legend, Murga rose from Lord Shiva's Third Eye to protect gods who were subjected to extreme torture and cruelty by the demon Surapadma. The gods appealed to Lord Siva who brought forth Murga, an element of Himself, and yet distinct from himself, who would alone be able to slay Surapadman and his clan. Many of the shrines in the Batu Caves relate the story of Lord Murugan's victory over the demon Soorapadman.

The Batu Caves consists of three main caves, the largest, the Cathedral/Temple Cave has high ceilings and features ornate Hindu Shrines. For visitors and those making the pilgrimage they must first climb a flight of 272 steps. It was in the Temple Cave, Pillai installed a consecrated statue of Sri Subramania Swamy. The tallest statue of Murugan, is located outside the Batu Caves. The statue, rising to an ominous height of 42.7 m and stands beaming in the sunlight covered in 300 litres of gold paint brought in from Thailand.

The Batu Caves becomes the focal point of the annual Thaipusam festival and attracts approximately 1.5 million Hindu devottees worldwide. The processsion is an 8 hour religious ceremony begining at Sri Mahamariamman Temple in KL and leading to the Batu Caves. Milk is offered to Lord Murga by devottees either by hand or in clay pots.

The limestone hills is also home to numberous macaque monkeys which visitors sometimes feed. They have posed a biting hazard to tourists and have become quite territorial. Below the Temple Cave lies a two kilometre network of untouched cavens known as the Dark Cave. Over thousands of years, stalagmites rise from the floor and stalactites drip from the ceilings to form intricate flow stones, cave pearls and scallops. The caves are home to some unique species including the Liphistiidae spiders and Eonycteris and Rousettus fruit bats.

Reference: murugan.org/ayyar_1.htm www.lotussculpture.com/muruganwargod.htm en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batu_Caves

#Postkarten project #malaysia #Batu Caves #Kuala Lumpa #Murugan