Backpacking Paradise: malaysian layover

While waiting at the airport to board my plane to Kuala Lumpur, I fell asleep with my ipod on, Devendra Banhart lulling me to sleep. A lovely Australian couple, whom I had gone through security with, shook me awake and told me we were boarding-without them, I would have been forced to wait another day and night in the airport. Finally, at 11:00pm, I arrived in Kuala Lumpur. While collecting my baggage a Japanese guy of the Fast and the Furious Tokyo Drift variety asked me if I wanted to bus to town with him. We journeyed together to the bus stop and hopped on the hour bus ride to Pudu Raya. He told me that he had been in India for four months and that in that time he had shit blood (overshare for a blog, I know, but this was an overshare for me as well) and at this point constantly wanted to quarrel with Indian people whenever he heard them speak. Things to look forward to...We got off the bus, found the bar that Jon had told me to meet him at, and parted ways. I stood, with my huge pack, two-day old clothes and slicked back hair, debating whether to enter the bar in this manner when I felt a tap on my back. It was Gabe. A long-haired Jon came out of the bar shortly after. So good to finally see them!

The next day, we slept until we had had enough and hopped on a bus to the island of Penang. We remained there for almost a week. On Penang, we were awakened every morning by the chanting of the monks with sunrise. We spent our days exploring waterfalls and caves, swimming in the ocean and lounging. We saw monkeys in the wild and magic shows on the beach. It was our "holiday before our holiday." It was nice to have some time to unwind and catch up on the sleep that had escaped me the last few days. By the time we left we had a breakfast joint where we could order "the usual" and would be brought an omelette and steamed rice. We bonded with travelers from Sweden, Canada and the UK who were staying at Baba's Guest House with us. And we met a well-traveled, 11-lingual (?), firedancing, painting, scuba diving, any other skill you can acquire in a lifetime, Malaysian man who we called The Lion. He gave us travel tips and stories for days. We spent our afternoons with him and our evenings dining at our favorite food market with our newfound friends over Tiger beer, fresh squeezed fruit juice and chocolate-peanutbutter-banana pancakes. On our final night, we rented wave runners and hit the market for dinner.

Before we knew it, we had our packs on our backs and were navigating our way to the bus stop through the bustling streets, avoiding all of the "special deals" for us. "Sunglass for you miss, special deal for you!" From there, we took a bus, hailed a cab to the bus station and by 10:00pm, we were on a bus back to Kuala Lumpur, lounging in the Lazy Boy style recliners. We got in at 3:00am and made our way to Wheeler's Guest House, the boys' guesthouse of choice in KL. In our short time in there, we saw the Petronas Towers, a few movies and the Batu Caves. On our final night, we had to switch rooms. When I went to exchange keys for the new room, the ladyboy at reception told me "you guys will really like this room. It's much bigger so there is more room to jump around." We were thankful for the upgrade-we had been robbed of this freedom in our other room. The next day, I was off to Calcutta, India and the boys headed to Menaka to await the processing of their visas.

Jon and Gabe with The Lion