Nilesh's Posterous

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

13/12/2008 - 17/12/2009 : Reached Kuala Lumpur from Bangkok at the LCCT terminal, the low cost budget airlines terminal in Kuala Lumpur -- its really budget.. we get off the stairs from the airplane and walk to the terminal in the light rain. After immigration and all, we took the airport shuttle bus to the city for RM9. For the first two days, I had booked a hotel in the Bukit Bintang Area and the next two days in the Chinatown area so that mom, sis and sid could experience both very different parts of town.

The first hotel was one block away from Jalan Alor, a main food hawker street in Kuala Lumpur. The entire street is closed at night and many food sellers set up their tables and chairs by the roadside for people to eat at their eateries. All different kinds of food from Malaysia and south east asia but a slight bias on seafood. We stopped by one of the street stalls and had dinner there and later on went on to walk around Bukit Bintang to check out the scene at night in the main shopping district.

The next day, weather was pretty bad. It was raining and pouring intermittently, but we still decided to go out and see the sights. We took the KL monorail and the commuter trains to go and see the KL twin towers, some shopping malls and Kuala Lumpur's Little India. The KL twin towers were impressive, great architecture and nice shopping mall within. After Twin Towers, we went to Jalan Sultan Ismail area (Little India) to have lunch and do some shopping.

So, we spent two nights already at the Bukit Bintang Hotel and the next two nights, I had already booked hotels in Chinatown. We had to check out from one and check in to another hotel today, but doing so might make us lose the whole day. So, we decided to check out early morning, ask the hotel to keep our bags and go and do some sight seeing.

We decided to go to the Batu Caves today - famous religious cave at the top of a hill where you have some temples. We took a taxi and went there. Batu Caves was very nice and spiritual. We climbed up the 272 stairs to the top to see the caves and the temples and carvings within. As we climbed up, many monkeys were coming up to people to beg for food. One even jumped on ashveena and stole a packet of biscuits from her bag. They have a very good sense of smell.

After the temple, the taxi driver dropped us at MegaMall where we had lunch and they had a kid wonderland there where Sid had a great time. We went back to the old hotel, took our bags and checked in to the new hotel in Chinatown. Mom and me, went to take a walk around chinatown and we were passing by the Mariamen kovil just in time when they were doing the daily prayers. So we stopped by to receive the blessings and then continued on our chinatown visit. The night market on Petaling Street was starting to form and vendors were starting to bring in their wares. In about 1 hour, the streets were packed with vendors selling anything from fake Dior Bags to fake puma shoes. We browsed along the road checking our some stalls and doing some hard bargaining.

Raining Cats and Dogs again the next day. We did not do too much. We went out to take the train and do stuff, but was too rainy to want to be out much. We had lunch at an Indian Banana Leaf vegetarian restaurant and then came back to the hotel to nap/relax and get ready for the departure the next day. My mom, sister and Nephew are leaving tomorrow. Their flight is around 8:30a.m. So we got to reach the airport by 6:00a.m or so. I boooked a taxi which came to pick us up at 5:00a.m. Dropped them at the airport, then took the KL Express back to the city center and went back to the hotel to sleep till check out time. I had previously asked for late checkout and they gave me till 2:00p.m. Had nice good sleep in a nice hotel before my solo backpacking travel starts :)

Pic 1 : Cold Drink Seller
Pic 2 : Roasted Chestnut Seller
Pic 3 : Roasted Duck and Chicken Rice Food Hawker
Pic 4 : Kuala Lumpur Twin Towers
Pic 5 : Dining outside on the streets on Jalan Alor
Pic 6 : Chinese Temple in Chinatown
Pic 7 : Batu Caves Monkeys
Pic 8 : Muruga inside Batu caves
Pic 9 : Ashveena and Sid in front of xmas tree
Pic 10 : Chendol Desert
Pic 11 : Ashveena Drinking tea from plastic bag
Pic 12 : Satay Vendor
Pic 13 : Giant Muruga in front of Batu Caves
Pic 14 : Taxis and Bikes
Pic 15: Chinese Store Facade
Pic 16 : Claypot Chicken Rice

Bangkok

9/12/2008 - 13/12/2008 : So, after the last blog entry, I just did not have the time or internet access to continue writing up the trip.. but now that I am back home, I'll try to recap it and put some notes and pics for the remaining days.
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Day 2, Bangkok : We don't have much time in bangkok (3 days) and I know my mom and sister want to do most of their shopping here. We had to try to do a little bit of the touristy things and then leave the other day for shopping mostly. So today, decided to go and see some of bangkok's famous wats (temples).

We took the Bangkok Skytrain to the end of the line, where we boarded a boat taxi (Chao Phraya Express) to go to the Wat Pho, home of the largest reclining buddha in the world. Boat Taxi as with other means of public transportation has a section reserved for monks on the boat, rather than handicapped and pregnant women as in the western world. We jumped off the boat at our stop and walked our way to Wat Pho.

Impresive temple with many sattelite smaller temples on the surroundings of the temple.  The main temple had a giant reclining golden buddha.. impressive display. The reclining Buddha has many carvings on its feet made of cut out mother of pearls. Many other great temples and buddha displays withtin Wat Pho. Very spiritual and impressive size of the temples. Mom and sis prayed and made offerings at a couple of the buddhist displays.

After Wat Pho, we decided to walk to the Grand Palace (Wat Phra Kaew) to see the Emerald Buddha. As explained in the lonely planet guidebook, some touts did approach us and told us that the temple was closed and they'll take us to a better temple to see the black buddha. We ignored them and continued our way to the grand palace. The grand palace is very strict for admissions - absolutely no shorts, no sandals, no tshirts etc.. allowed. One has to be well dressed and one has to be pay around 450Baht to enter. We decided to skip it and rather go have lunch instead.

We decided to go to Pahurat, Bangkok's little India for lunch. We took a tuk-tuk there and on the way, stopped by another wat, Wat Rajaburana which had great outer decorations. After visiting the temple, we found a punjabi place in Little India which had vegetarian food. Had lunch there and then visited the surrounding street fairs to do some shopping.

While visiting around there, we found a huge statue of Ganesh on the streets of Pahurat. Apparently, many thai people pray to Ganesh. Seems like Hinduism is present in many facets of thai society. I was talking to a local and she was telling me that they worship Ganesh as Vinayaka and those that pray to Vinayaka don't eat beef (same as in Hindu) and fast and do rituals on same days as Hindus. Throughout bangkok, we saw many displays of Hindu culture and gods - such as statues of Brahma, Vishnu, Hanuman etc.. for public worship. We had initially planned to go to another temple - Wat Arun, the temple of dawn, but sis and mom had enough of already of temples. We took the boat taxi and skytrain back to the hotel. I looked after Sid while mom and ashveena went for some more shopping at the Pratunam market, another market known for its many goods and wholesale prices.

The next day was solely was shopping. Went to Pratunam market and mom and sis spent the entire day shopping. After shopping, me and Ashveena went to get massages at one of the so many masage parlors all over the city. I think we paid like 300Baht (less than $10) for 2 hours thai massage. The next day was our departure to Kuala Lumpur around noon. Did not have much time to do anything much. We took a taxi to the airport and had lunch there itself, before taking our Air Asia flight to Kuala Lumpur.

Pic 1 : Largest Reclining Buddha in the world at Wat Pho
Pic 2 : Stuphas at Wat Pho
Pic 3 : One of the buddhas in the sattelite temples
Pic 4 : Mom and Sis praying at Wat Pho
Pic 5 : Ashveena and Sid in Tuk Tuk
Pic 6 : Grilled Ripe Bananas
Pic 7 : From the Boat Taxi at Sunset
Pic 8 : River Houses on the bank of the Chao Phraya River
Pic 9 : Mom, Sis and Sid in front of Giant Ganesh in the middle of town for public worship
Pic 10 : Wat Arun, the Temple of Dawn
Pic 11 : Bangkok's colorful Taxis
Pic 12 : Street Vendors
Pic 13 : Bangkok Street

Last Day in Singapore, First day in Bangkok..

So, today is already our last day in Singapore. Our flight departs in the afternoon for Bangkok, but we have to check out at noon. Rather than waiting for noon, we checked out around 10:00 and asked the hotel to keep our bags and we took a taxi for last bit of touring. Went to the Bugis market and strolled around checking out the various stalls and foods. After that, went to the famous Mustapha Center - a multi storey multi purpose mall that sells basically everything. Navigated through the maze of the shopping center in the little time that we had. I managed to try on a few things in the mega tiny changing rooms and bought something. We had a south indian vegetarian set meal close to Mustapha and then took a taxi back to the hotel to pick our luggage, then take the MRT to the airport.

We flew Tiger Airways (http://www.tigerairways.com) out of Singapore. I had bought the tickets a couple of months and I got them for SGD $ 0.01.. Yes you read right.. 1 cent singapore, but then with taxes and surchages, it came to $40 SGD, but still a great deal. Changi Airport is very nice and all terminals are accessible by the skytrain in the airport Except for the Budget Terminal. I guess being budget, these airlines can't afford the prices to afford skytrain charges or other fancy stuff. So, we had to go to the basement of terminal 2 by skytrain, then wait for a bus to go to the budget terminal. We checked in there after waiting in a long line and then walked our way to the plane, up the stairs of the old school plane stairs (just like the old days) rather than the automated longnecks.

Flight was good and we reached Bangkok on time in the dark. Did immigration formalities easily and got out and changed some dollars to thai baht and then started looking for Taxis inside the airport itself rather than go out and face the many touts and private taxis waiting. They have the Aiport of Thailand (AOT) official limosine service that one can book from inside. I asked one side and they quoted me 1300 Baht and then asked another counter of same company and it was 950Baht to Sukumvit Soi 15. Took the latter and we got a nice BMW suv to take us to our hotel.

Reached hotel, checked in and went for a walk on Sukhumvit avenue. We reached a night and little did we know, Sukumvit is the heart of Bangkok's red light district. As we walked around on Sukumvit, many girls dressed in skanky dresses standing on the side of the road waving at single guys and many fat old white guys walking hand in hands with young thai girls - sad scene. I knew the scene was such, but did not know the hotel was so close to it. I picked the hotel to be very close to the BTS (skytrain) Asoke Station. Well, anyways, its always good to experience a bit of all kinds of sceneries. So, we walked about from Soi 15 to Soi2 then back to our hotel. Mom, sis and Sid went to sleep and I ventured out again and walked the opposite way from soi 15 to soi 27 or so and had some pad thai on one of street food sellers. Met a french backpacker and had some good late night dinner conversation over the pad thai.

Pic 1 : View from our hotel room in singapore
Pic 2 : Mum Drinking coconut from street vendor
Pic 3 : Laksa that I had for breakfast
Pic 4 : Rickhaw Drivers waiting for customers at Bugis
Pic 5 : Dragon Fruit
Pic 6 : Bangkok Street Food (where I had dinner)

Singapore : Sentosa Island, Underwater World and Little India

So, after we got back from the rickshaw ride in Clark Quay, I was still not yet sleepy. So I browsed a bit on the internet to plan the second part of my trip. Then at around 3:00a.m, I had a craving for some Chinese food. So, I decided to walk to Chinatown. Chinatown is not too far from where we were staying, maybe some 2 kms. Weather was great - perfect for an early morning walk ! Walk there was great and empty, barely anybody in the streets until I reached Chinatown itself and there, many people eating at the various open hawker stalls. I sat down at one of the stalls (I think I was the only non-chinese looking) and ordered some chicken rice. Chicken Rice in the early mornings is the best ever !! As soon, as I finished, heavy rain started pouring.. like torrential rains. Waited for some 30 mins for it to finish, but it continued heavily. So, now, I had to be in line in hailing for a taxi. Many people waiting and I managed to find one as well, after a long waiting time and getting completely dripped. Reached hotel and had a great night's sleep.

Woke up to a still gloomy and rainy morning. We decided to go to Sentosa Island today. Before going, as we were not sure if they'd get vegetarian food, we crossed the street over and got some vegetarian food from across the street and we headed off to MRT to Harborfront station. From there, we had 3 options to go to Sentosa - monorail, bus or cable car. We decided to do the touristy cable car ride. Paid $24 for each of us for a round trip. As it was still quite rainy and grey, even with the glass bottomed cable car, we did get magnificent views.

Reached Sentosa and we took one of the free shuttle lines to the Underwater World where we had lunch and then went in to see the fishies. Good variety of fish, hands on aquariums, where you can touch the rays, starfish, fishes etc.. Then the star of it all is the revolving underwater tunnel where we could see a 360view of the fishes in the aquarium.

After underwater world, we took a rainy walk in sentosa, checked out Siloso artificial beach (pretty nice), then took the tram to the MerLion (Singapore's national symbol - half lion, half fish) garden. Lots of fountains and sculptures in the Merlion garden. Enjoyed the walk and then before we left, me and Ashveena, went for the Cineblast movie - I've done a similar one in Disneyworld, but different story at this one - in this one, we were supposed to be a piece of log journey's though canyons, rivers, sawmills etc.. with the lots of motions, shocks and jerks from the chair as the log goes through its numerous stages.

Took the cable car back to MRT station and we deided to go to Little India directly from there to have dinner before we go to the hotel. Little India is very very different from the other places we've been in Singapore. As soon we got off the station, we could see thrash on the streets (we barely or never saw any other dirty streets elsewhere in singapore), lots of people sitting on the streets and eating and drinking (most probably bangladeshi workers), fruit and vegetable sellers all over, flower sellers with jasmine fragrance, saree and churidar shops, music sellers broascasting over loudspeakers  tamil or telegu religious songs, ladies in saries and churidars grocery shopping, Indian Restaurants. We walked around a little bit to experience the sounds, sights and smells and then found a restaurant serving Vegetarian food - Appollo Leaf. They had non-veg too.. thankfully :) We had our meal there and they served us on a real banana leaf. It was very nice. We taxied our way back to the hotel. I was still not too sleepy. So I went out again for a long night walk and came back around 2:00.am to have some good rest for our flight tomorrow.

Pic 1 : Ashveena with Sid in front of Merlion
Pic 2 : Sid Talking to Rat in the Merlion Garden
Pic 3 : Standing in the rotating Aquarium Tunnel
Pic 4 :  Sea Anemone
Pic 5 : Sea Horse
Pic 6 : Nilesh and Sid Standing in MRT
Pic 7 : Our Dinner - North Indian Set meal on banana leaf