Adventures in living overseas – the wedding
02 Mar 2012 1 Comment
in travel Tags: Living overseas
One of the teachers at my school got engaged at the beginning of the year. Now, for Western women, getting married is usually on the list of “things I’d like to do” with “like” having varying degrees of intensity. For women here like sort of becomes required or “how could you not?” A single woman lives with her mother (who has carte blanche on decision making for her) until Mum dies and then she goes to live with a brother. I like my brother, but if I had to live with him? If he could tell me whether or not I could travel, even as far as the next city to go shopping? One of us would be dead inside a year. And my brother isn’t bossy.
Anyway, back to the wedding. Martha was not only getting married, but getting married to a super rich guy from Dubai. The wedding promised to be the event of the year and I was informed that I had to go.
Another aside. To get invited to a wedding here you only have to be tangentially associated with the bride or groom. Last year some friends went to the weddings of another teacher’s siblings. Invitations are open to whoever sees it and there is no RSVPing. I was also told not long after arriving that a wedding of 800 guests was almost too small. In that case, the bride’s family was from Oman and couldn’t travel in (don’t know why. Oman is literally across the street and not as big as Ohio.)
The big day arrived and due to me being a spectacularly bad girly girl, I had to plunge into my closet in the hopes of turning up something that didn’t scream kindergarten teacher. I dug out a skirt I bought last year and never had the occasion to wear. I tried it with several tops until I found one that looked decent, but ended up with the shoes I wear all the time because I was having enough trouble tripping over my own hem to want to add unfamiliar high heels to the mix. I washed my hair and let it dry fluffy and slathered on make up.
My friends picked me up at 8:30. This is a fairly normal starting time and the reason I don’t go to weddings more often. The reason the start so late is that the men’s party is outside and for most of the year it’s too dang hot to start earlier.
Yet another aside. Last year, shortly after arrival I witnessed a men’s wedding party. Dozens of tables placed outside with white clothes and crystal. Food carried around by servers so that each table essentially becomes its own buffet. And the cane dance. I’m willing to bet that the cane dance is all about fertility. Plus it’s funny to watch.
We arrived at the wedding hall by 8:45 because Al Ain is approximately the size of a postage stamp. The reception was supposed to start at 8:30 and we’d assumed that being there shortly there after we’d be early. Nope. The parking lot was packed. We had to park across the street in a runoff lot. The receiving line did not contain the bride or groom, but was a whole bunch of women in sparkly dresses and the Bedouin veils that look like metal mustaches. Must have been twenty of them. They were friendly enough and shooed us into the main room where the real bling started.
Women wearing veils encrusted with crystals. Women wearing form fitting dresses encrusted with crystals. Women dripping in diamonds and gold. Women wearing their hair twisted up around tiaras. And they weren’t even the bride!
The room easily could have contained two basketball courts with bleachers and it was a sea of tables. Ten seats / table x by a sea of tables seating women encrusted in crystals and dripping diamonds and gold = where are my sunglasses?
Then it became a waiting game combined with a baby shower. We also got to play the “you’re on my hem” game. Servers came around and plied us with excellent ginger tea, Arabic coffee, green tea, chai, some other tea and juices. For some reason the chocolate never made it over to us, but we got lots of fancy dates. I should have picked up the chocolate dipped date with the gold covered pecan because I’m sure I’m not getting my RDA of gold, but I didn’t see it in time.
Sadly, the food wasn’t all that good. Most of it was cold. Okay, maybe all of it. The chicken was dry. The lamb was greasy. I wouldn’t go near the biryani because I couldn’t identify the animal on top of it and I could see that it was cold by the way it wasn’t steaming and the fact that the server was handling the plate with her bare hands.
So the food wasn’t inspiring, the show was amazing. I finally know why the malls are loaded with those ridiculous, over the top dresses. And seeing my coworkers in fancy make up? Seeing their hair!
The bride arrived about 11:30. There was a mass rustling as women yanked on their abayas over their party dresses and then the bride came in on the arm of her brother. Normally, the bride comes in alone. I don’t know if this is her family’s tradition or if the shoes were just too tall for them to risk her walking on them alone, but on the arm of her brother she arrived. She walked the width of the room, very slowly. She paraded around and around on the stage, very slowly. She was ensconced in the bridal couch, very slowly. Cut me a break. It was closing in on midnight and I’d been up since 5. A couple of minutes later someone from school came over to say that we were all going to go up as a group to congratulate the bride so we arranged ourselves at the bottom of the stage and waited for some signal that I never saw to head up. There really is no such thing as a line here. We all just sort of mobbed around until we worked our way up to the bride, said our congratulations and then had to figure out how to escape upstream without stepping on the wrong hem and bringing down the entire group. The bride sat on a white couch, in a sea of tulle and crystals. Her face was caked with so much whitening make up that I could barely tell it was her. She didn’t say anything. I doubt she could breathe well enough to speak in that tight dress.
After we went back to our table, there was some more rustling as the bride was draped in a white veil for the arrival of her husband and his family. Pictures were taken of the happy couple, him looking serious, her draped in a veil, her brother on the other side. At one point, after the photos were taken, I think it was the brides mother, went up to her and she lifted her veil and draped it over this woman like the two of them were in a private tent. A mixed sex group, I can only assume they were family of the bride or groom (though not both), started dancing on the stage. This probably doesn’t sound too shocking to you, but you didn’t just spend 2 hours in a room full of women. The way society is set up here, I can go days without encountering a male over the age of 7. The males I do encounter fall into 2 categories, men selling me food and the rare father of a student. When I say days I mean, if I have enough milk, I can easily go a week without even seeing an adult man. So to see a mixed sex group dancing together (and doing some kind of tribal dance I’d not seen before) was amazing.
At that point we decided to swipe some flowers and call it a night. It’s perfectly acceptable to plunder the flower arrangements and the fruit tables on the way out, but the nannies had gotten to the fruit ahead of us.
Came home, washed face, collapsed into bed, woke up 5 hours later without the aid of an alarm, cursed my body clock, tried to go back to sleep, gave up wrote this. Now, I think I’m going to indulge in a little forbidden meat with eggs and milk for breakfast and contemplate taking a nap.
Adventures in driving, and shopping – the accident
05 Feb 2012 1 Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: driving life, Living overseas
7:00 My friend and fellow carpooler, Susan announced on the way to school that she too sick to work today and would call her cab driver to take her to the hospital. I said, oh no, I’ll take you. The kids wouldn’t arrive for an hour and a half and I could easily get ot the hospital and back in that time.
7:10 Going around a round about the car in the lane one over decided to cut in front of me, bashing into me hard enough to turn my car 90 degrees. He hit his brakes and pulled off to the side ahead. A good Samaritan stopped, made sure we were okay and then pulled his car ahead to talk to the other driver. I looked over my shoulder at the traffic building up behind me, decided that I shouldn’t move the car because the law says you are to stay at the scene of the accident – right where you were – until the traffic police arrived. I looked forward to see if the other driver or the good Samaritan were contacting the police and they were gone. Gone! Bastards! Leaving the scene of an accident! And me! So I got out my rental agreement, found the police number and called to tell them I’d had an accident and the other driver had gone. They told me to wait and someone would be right there, as soon as they figured out where “there” was.
7:30-8:30 I spoke to at least three different officers and told them where I was at least twice each. I happened to be at the only roundabout in Al Ain that isn’t named and the hospital I was across the street from apparently wasn’t a good enough landmark. Three other people stopped to ask if we needed help and I had the last one call the police again to tell them where we were. Eventually, the officer called and told us to meet him further up the road. He asked if we’d gotten the plate number of the other driver. Uh, no, because where he stopped we couldn’t see it and both of us were so rattled that it didn’t occur to us that he wasn’t stopping for the duration. The traffic cop inspected my license and registration and told me to meet him at the accident office at the traffic complex.
8:30-9:00 We went to the accident office and were told to wait until the officer arrived. By this point both of us had to use a bathroom so we asked where it was. Go to the building across the plaza. Beside.” Susan and I sallied forth, across the plaza to the side of the building. The bathroom opened directly outside, had no toilet paper and no light source other than the vents in the door. Mother Nature was insistent so we got tissues out of our purses and managed in the dark. Sadly, this is not the first time I’ve had to deal with a totally dark bathroom. Probably not the last either. Relieved, we went back to the office and took a seat. The traffic officer came in, did something on the computer and told us we had to go to the investigation office so they could look at the car. Out the parking lot, around the roundabout and back up the other side of the same road to the door just before the next roundabout.
9:00 He meant gate. we went through the gate, parked and went inside where we waited a few minutes. The guy at the counter noticed that the accident had been that morning and asked why we came so soon. Um, because the officer told us to? We were on the way to the hospital so Susan could see a doctor about her cold. I just wanted to go teach my students the magic of the letter B. I would not be at a police station, sick and frazzled if I had been given a choice. Then he walked out with us and looked at the car. By that I mean, he looked said,” oh yeah, you were in an accident. This looks like rubber. I don’t think there’s any damage. Did you get the plate number?” That again. He told us we must think like police women and always get the plate number. I told him I was a kindergarten teacher and could control 23 5 year olds with a dark look and that was the extent of my superpowers. He laughed. Then he took us back inside, explained the situation to some other guy who stamped my accident report and sent us back to the
9:30-10:30 Back to the accident office where we waited a few minutes. The desk officer called us up and asked what parking lot we were in. Naturally I had parked in the wrong lot. I had to go down the road to the roundabout go right and right again and then park so he could take pictures of the damage. Moving the car should be easy, right? There were two exits and one entrance and all the spaces were marked in Arabic. We sat dumbfounded until someone coming out gestured for us to follow as he went back to his car and pulled out of a space that wasn’t marked in any language. Then we went back inside and waited. Eventually desk officer gestures for us to follow. At the door another officer is escorting in a big guy in a white candoora and shiny silver handcuffs. I pulled Susan out of the way and we let them pass. Always let the officer escorting the big handcuffed man go first. Outside the desk officer takes pictures of our car, pictures of another guy’s car and escorts all of us back in the office and tells us to wait. While we did so, Susan and I made lemonade out of the situation and discussed that fact that both the officers we dealt with were cute and considered their attributes. (Their general attributes. The uniforms weren’t that tight.)
10:45ish The desk officer calls me up and in the course of conversation I say something about needing a paper for the rental company. This is not the first time this has been mentioned. We told the officer at (or near anyway) the scene. We told the desk officer when we arrived. We told the investigation officer. I’m surprised we didn’t tell the cleaning guy and random other accident victims. The desk officer exchanges a look with the guy next to him. I say, “Is this a problem?” Apparently I need some kind of paper from the rental company since they are the owners of the car. I joked with the officer about not wanting to do it because at that point I was still in a pretty good mood and being my usual easy going, cheerful self. Then off we go to the rental office.
11:00 They can’t give me the paper I need because the manager is out of the office. They will courier it to me, but before I go they want to inspect the car to make sure it’s safe.
11:00-Noon There have been several trips in and out and discussions about the deductible on my insurance and something about owing on a ticket (because as the victim of a hit and run, I should be given a ticket.) By that time the manager was on his way back and Susan was flagging fast. Ten minutes after the manager walked in we had the loaner and the assurance that not only would they get the car fixed, but they would finish filing the paperwork with the traffic police and so sorry you had to wait that long.
Noon Utterly starved and frazzled we headed for Al Ain Mall to hit the food court. I immediately got lost and we were forced to take the scenic route.
1:00-1:45 We finally arrive at the hospital. I deposited Susan at the ENT clinic and went to the GP clinic where I was told my the nurse who took my blood pressure that my pulse was fast and my blood pressure was elevated. No, really? I wonder why? You s’pose it has something to do with that car accident I JUST told you about? I said none of this. The doctor told me he could do nothing for me and I needed to go downstairs to the orthopedic clinic, but he was sure I’d be able to see a doctor right away. Ah, no. All the morning doctors were finishing their shifts and taking no new patients. The one doctor on afternoon duty was due in at 2 but he already had five cases waiting so it would be at least an hour. I asked the nurse, how would it be if I just went home, took an OTC painkiller and a hot bath and if it was worse in the morning I would come back? She told me to come in at 8:15. I went back to the ENT clinic to wait for Susan.
2:00-2:30 We went to get Susan’s meds at the hospital pharmacy. It took a while. My good humor had deserted me in the ortho clinic with my adrenaline.
2:30 Headed home I turned wrong again and because of the way the road are set up here, I couldn’t just turn around. Since we had to go right past the really good grocery store, I asked Susan if she wanted to stop. Food had revived her some and the prospect of being stuck in her apartment for 2 days (as she had gotten a sick note for that long) gave her a little energy. In the store I passed an Emirati man who said hello. Not surprising. He asked what I was doing. I said grocery shopping and walked away because I could already see where this was headed. He followed me to another aisle where he asked me if I lived in the UAE. Really, how do you answer that question after you’ve told someone you’re grocery shopping? I said yes and moved away. He followed me again and asked if I was here with my family. I lied and said yes. He asked if I was with my husband. I lied again and said yes. He said, “Give me your number.” I said, no. And he walked away.
3:00 Finally headed home I related to Susan my encounter with the Emirati man and she said, “You’ve been hit and run twice in one day by Emiratis.”
Adventures in eating – the pork tenderloin
07 Jan 2012 2 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: cooking, Food
Early in December, some friends and I went shopping to Dubai Mall which has two really good forbidden meat stores (stores that sell pork and other Muslim forbidden treats like Cherry Poptarts. I don’t know why or if the Cherry Poptarts are forbidden, but the only place I can find them is in the pork section of the Waitrose Supermarket at the Dubai Mall.) I had recently shipped my Crockpot over so I was looking forward to making pork and sauerkraut for New Year’s dinner.
Oh, my dear departed Crockpot, how I loved thee. I’d had the thing for like twenty years and then I shipped it across the ocean. I set it up (to cook some delicious pork chops I’d bought on the same trip) and it never heated up. I tried different outlets. I tried a different converters. I tried filling it with water and leaving it sit for a whole day unwatched. No dice. So I resigned the Crockpot to the trashman and baked the chops in the oven.
New Year’s Day came and I opened my pork tenderloin which had been safely frozen (in addition to being vacuum sealed) for the past month and I thought, ‘that’s not right.’
My tenderloin smelled distinctly smoked. I cut into it and I studied it and decided that it felt distinctly firm for raw meat. So I tasted it.
Yup, smoked, cooked, done. I hadn’t stuck a fork in it, but the knife I used worked well enough.
Now, the plan was to cook this less than 1lb pork tenderloin, have my traditional pork and sauerkraut dinner and freeze portions for later consumption. I had even walked to the market across the desert for potatoes to mash. (Not as strenuous as it sounds. It’s only about a half a block. Don’t go all Lawrence of Arabia on me.) Since the meat was already done, I didn’t have time to fiddle with mashing the potatoes. so on New Year’s Day I had sliced pork, sauerkraut and a baked potato, leaving me with a lot of pork that I couldn’t refreeze.
So the next day I had pork cubed up in my scrambled eggs with a banana and an orange for breakfast and a pork sandwich with cheese and mustard for lunch and pork with sauerkraut and a baked potato for dinner.
And the next day I had pork cubed up in my scrambled eggs with fruit for breakfast again, but I didn’t want to eat smoked pork for lunch so I had bratwurst, potato chips and a banana for lunch. I was going to variety, don’t you know. For dinner I had popcorn as I was to lazy to cook anything.
The next morning I couldn’t face scrambled eggs again so I fried the end of my bacon and fried the eggs in the grease. For lunch I made mac and cheese and put cubed pork into it with a bit of onion. Of course, when I bought the mac and cheese, I didn’t realize I was getting the family size so now I have oodles of mac and cheese with pork and onion in the fridge. At dinner time I decided to dismember a pomegranate and I ended up with pomegranate juice all over the living room. One of the best things I ever did was buy a hot pink carpet. If pomegranate juice stains a hot pink carpet, does anyone see it? Unlike the tree falling in the forest, I have a conclusive answer to this question. Nope. Then again, you also can’t see the seeds when they fall on the floor either, but that’s an entirely different problem.
Yesterday morning, faced with the stubby end of my pork tenderloin that I wanted so badly a month ago and now wish to never see again, I fried two eggs, sliced the end of the pork, crammed both into a roll with some cheese and ate that for breakfast with another banana and the rest of the pomegranate seeds. Not sure how soon I want to see another banana either.
I still have half a package of hot dogs and 2 brats in the freezer and three servings of mac and cheese in the fridge and I think I’m starting to grow a snout.
Malls! Malls! Malls!
01 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
in travel Tags: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, malaysians, petronas, petronas towers
There were, within one block of my hotel, four malls. Pavillion Mall is very upscale. I was sort of surprised they didn’t do a credit check on you at the door. Stahill Gallery, attached to the hotel, was even more upscale though much smaller. Fahrenheit 88 and the one close to the train station that didn’t appear to have a name were just sort of standard, American style malls. If you were willing to walk a couple of blocks or ride the monorail one stop the Times Square Mall was a 10 story monstrosity with an amusement park though the top two floors were pretty much deserted. The roller coaster in the Times Square amusement park amazed me. A few blocks in the other direction were the Petronas Towers, which contained, surprise, a huge mall. Two actually, one at the base of each tower. All the malls were jammed to the hilt with shoppers and the halls were most certainly decked. You couldn’t get a table to eat between 11am and 3pm, or after 5:30. I’m not sure there was ever a table free in any of the food courts I saw.
So if anybody wondered if I was missing Christmas, I don’t think the Malaysians would have stood for it.
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Batu Caves
01 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
in travel Tags: batu caves, hindu architecture, hindu temple, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
My friends insisted I go to Batu Caves. It’s amazing. Stupendous. Astounding. Well, it wasn’t a mall. Batu Caves were discovered (according to my guidebook) 120 years ago and the Hindus decided to make a shrine of them. When you get off the train, you follow the crowd to a gate lined with people selling stuff. The gate, which is large enough to accommodate a car, is closed, but there is a man door open in it. Nothing to write home about. Stone, wrought iron, not snazzily decorated. Kinda disappointing considering that we’re talking about a Hindu temple. Inside is a huge statue of the monkey good which starts to make up for the lack of deco on the gate. Then there’s a little temple where you are invited to take off your shoes so you can go inside. As the temple has no walls and there was no way I was walking barefoot in a tropical tourist attraction, I chose to observe from a distance. A bit further along you get into the truly fabulous Hindu architecture. There’s even a koi pond and some lovely little bridges.
And then you get to the temple. Or rather to the steps at the bottom of the temple.
Ever since I was in Korea, steps have made me breathless. Not sure if it’s leftover asthma which I got from living there or my hypochondriacal memory of it. Caves have always made me claustrophobic. I’ve gotten over a fear of manmade tunnels, but caves? I don’t care how long they’ve been there or how many people walk in and out perfectly safely everyday, those suckers are just waiting for me to step inside so they can collapse on my head. (I got panicky watching The Molly Maguires starring Sean Connery.) Between the two, standing at the bottom of the immense number of stairs leading up to the cave made me a little dizzy and I had visions of being carried down all those steps by some poor Malaysian Hindu when I freaked out and collapsed.
So instead I went shopping. I found a very nice blouse at the first store I stopped in which I knew would solve a couple of holes in my school wardrobe, but I chose to wander around to see what else was there before buying. There was a lot of stuff there. Guys splitting open coconuts before your eyes. Rainbow wigs. Bubble guns. Unidentifiable fried foods (what is it with the unidentifiable fried foods. Can you just fry anything and that makes it good?)
Eventually, I circled back to the first store and started checking out my desired purchase to see if it would fit. The clerk said I could try it on and led me to a – I kid you not – broom closet, complete with a broken mirror and a sloping ceiling. The shirt fit, but as I was taking it off, I banged into the fluorescent light, which blinked out leaving me half dressed in a pitch dark broom closet with a sloping ceiling and a broken mirror. I tried tapping the light back to life to no avail and ended up getting dressed in the dark. Fortunately, it occurred to me to feel for seams so I didn’t put my shirt on inside out.
On the way out I encountered the monkeys. The travel book had promised monkeys, but I forgot until I saw one. At that point I remembered that it said not to get too close as they bite.
Travel is so enriching.
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Adventures in trying to get places
01 Jan 2012 2 Comments
in travel Tags: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, train network, train system
Kuala Lumpur has a terrible train system, which puts it ahead of places with none, but not by much. I like to use trains and subways when possible while traveling because the train station is going to be exactly where I left it, something I can’t count on with a taxi. Ever need a taxi and couldn’t get one? My point exactly. Plus, you get to see the natives in their environment. You’re on vacation, they’re trying to get to work, school, home, wherever. So I like trains.
I can’t say I liked these trains though. Kuala Lumpur’s train network is actually a couple of different companies so you have to buy a new ticket every time you switch trains. Sometimes you have to move to another station, which may be blocks away.
When I went to the Butterfly Park, the concierge told me I had to go to the central station (called Sentral) on the monorail and change to the Putra line, which I only had to take two stops to Masjid Jamek (and then start the Bataan Death March.) I got to Sentral, followed the crowd and found myself standing on the street. Assuming this was wrong, I went back into the station and tried staring at the map. Didn’t help. I asked the nice people perusing the map with me and was told I had to walk down the block and across the street. So I joined the crowd again down the block, across the street, through the construction, up the stairs and into the station/mall. I followed the crowd to the ticket counter and waited in a long line, but when I got to the window I was told it was the wrong one. I went across to the other side and got into the amazingly short line. When I got to that window I found out why it was so short. You didn’t buy tickets there, you had to get them from the machine. At my grimace, the woman behind the counter laughed and assured me that someone would help me. She also called over to the woman helping at the ticket machines to warn her I was coming. She needed warning. I couldn’t find the button to put the instructions in English. Then I couldn’t work out how to pick the right station. Then the machine wouldn’t take my money. Eventually the woman just took my money and got the ticket from another machine for me. At least once I got on the train, I was okay.
On the way home, I had time to study the map and I realized I could get on the Ampang line, change trains at Hung Tauh and eliminate four stations including the horrible Sentral and a half an hour of travel time (which I really looked forward to after the march to the Butterfly Park.)
One thing I did learn when I got in the wrong line the first day. There was a train that went to Batu Caves. Try as I might, I couldn’t weasel around going back to Sentral, but if I could get a train to Batu Caves instead of relying on a taxi (spelled teksi in KL) or a driver it was worth it. The trip out was nice once I figured out the cars. The middle car was women only which was novel. The trip back however, that was interesting.
Abhorring the idea of wading through Sentral again, I located a way out of it by getting off at one station and setting off a few blocks to another station so I could do the Hung Tauh interchange again. Well, easier said than done!
First, getting on the correct train proved tricky. Normally, you get off the train on one platform and get back on going the opposite direction on the opposite platform. Batu Caves happens to be the last stop. Apparently they have two trains. One going one direction, another going the other direction. When one train reaches the end of the line, it simply switches directions. I’ve never encountered this before so when I was directed down the steps to the platform I had gotten off at, I was confused. So was the Japanese family attempting to board at the same time. I asked two different people and so did they. Then we pooled information. Since every single person said this was the right train, we boarded.
And waited.
And waited.
And waited.
I’d like to say it was half an hour because it was. I happened to look at my watch when I sat down because I was calculating how likely it was that I could get back to the hotel in time for a late lunch. Eventually the train chugged off and out the window I saw a nifty little tourist attraction that would have handily eaten up that thirty minute wait had I known about it. Pooh.
After the second station, the train stopped on the tracks. We sat for about ten minutes before resuming our journey. Then after the third station, the train stopped again. This time we sat for a long time. I hadn’t conveniently checked my watch so I have no idea how long, but the woman across from me fell asleep. The trip out had taken maybe half an hour. The trip back was over an hour. Ah, the joys of public transportation!
I knew getting to the other station was something of a leap of faith, but security guard directions had gotten me this far. The directions I was given by the security guard were “follow the walkway to the mall. Ten minutes.” Out I went, through the walkway, over a river and a road to another station, but not the one I was looking for. However, there was another walkway over a street that appeared to lead to a department store. Department store, mall, same-same, especially in Asia. I was hoping that the department store would have a food court because the long train stops had eaten into my projected lunchtime and I was starting to think I was going to end up at a McDonald’s. If there was one, I couldn’t find it in the swarms of humanity. I chose retreat and headed out to the street where a number of hawkers were selling unidentifiable fried this I wasn’t willing to risk my stomach on and headed in what I hoped was the general direction of the station. My sense of direction must be getting better because I came up to the track and followed it to the station with a minimum of broken crossing lights or staring down roads trying to figure out where the street sign was and the train deposited me at the station nearest my hotel in a few minutes and well before I fainted from hunger.
One last, non-train story. I arrived at the airport the prescribed three hours before my flight and headed to the gate. At the gate, I stopped outside the unattended metal detector, look around and proceeded through. It went off causing the three security guards chatting at the desk to look up. One came over so I asked her if I needed to go through yet another scanner. She said I wasn’t allowed in the waiting area yet. (We’ll just put aside the fact that there was already a family, who by the looks of their fast food bags, had been camping there for some time.) I asked why. She said, “the plane is not even-” at this point, she paused to glance over her shoulder at the plane, which was sitting at the gate like a giant Labrador Retriever. “You can’t wait here. You have to wait in the concourse.” Where all the shopping is. I walked away snickering at her almost telling me the plane wasn’t there when I’m pretty sure the plane had been sitting there for a couple of hours already. It’s the little things.
The wait did give me the opportunity to go through the jungle in the middle of the airport. Yup, jungle. In the airport.
The Kuala Lumpur Butterfly Park
31 Dec 2011 Leave a Comment
in travel Tags: Butterfly Park, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, travel
This was not supposed to be an ordeal. Before I left a friend had said she wanted to make it to the Butterfly Park but didn’t. That sealed it. I had to go. Plus, butterflies. On the map it showed that the Butterfly Park was in proximity to the Central Market (a must see) and Chinatown (a would be nice if there’s time.) I consulted with the waiter at breakfast who said the train would be the easiest way to go. I like public transportation. I figured out trains in Seoul and Paris. How hard could it be?
Well, that’s another story.
I went to the concierge asking for a train map and directions. She pulled out a tourist map and did a full spiel on what to see in KL, including how to get to the Butterfly Park, or at least to the nearest subway stop. The long way at least. I got off at the station and asked the first security guard I spotted for directions. He looked surprised that I planned to walk, but I assumed that was because he thought I was the average soul who doesn’t walk further than to closest parking spot to the mall. I should have realized he was factoring the relative humidity with the distance and the mountain he knew I would be climbing. Regardless, he gave me directions thusly. “Go around the front of the building to light turn right” said while gesturing with left hand. “You will pass Merdeka Park and you will see the police station. You will see it on left ” making a right hand gesture. I repeated the directions with the words that matched the gestures. He said yes. I set off.
Two blocks from the train station I came to a huge intersection with a broken walk signal. I figured out it was broken after I waited for a complete cycle. I consulted my map, jaywalked through traffic and set off in what looked like the right direction. And I walked. And I walked. A nice little park with a cool fountain appeared on the right so I crossed the street to have a sit down and consult my map. Lucky me, I had found Merdeka Park. Cooled and confident I was headed in roughly the right direction I set off again. And I walked. And I walked (losing confidence all the time.) Dehydrating by the moment and fearing I was going to end up so hopelessly lost that I was going to miss my flight in four days, I stopped at a little kiosk for some water and a few directions. “Keep going straight on this road. At the National Mosque turn right” (accompanied by right hand gesture). “Follow that road to the end and turn left” (accompanied by left hand gesture.) “All parks right there. Butterfly Park, Orchid Park, Deer Park. You want cold water or not cold?” I went for the not cold because it was going to be warm in about five minutes anyway and set off again.
I spotted the mosque roof through the trees. There was a road to my right lined with Easy-Up tents, no parking signs and parked cars, trucks and vans. The lure of that was took much to pass up. Plus, I had to be close to the park by now. I’d been walking about 45 minutes and it just didn’t look that far on the map. The road was jammed shoulder to shoulder and down the middle with people selling food, people selling perfume, people selling sandals, people selling prayer rugs…. About then it dawned on me that it was Friday, the Muslim equivalent of Sunday, and I was near the National Mosque. Doh. I headed up and through all the retail until I came to an intersection where I found my first sign pointing to the butterfly park. I wouldn’t call what the road did ending, and neither did the map, but it did kinda peter out in one direction.
Sensing my destination was near, I walked another ten minutes in the soupy heat to get to the butterfly park, which was hotter and soupier due to the rainforest conditions needed for the butterflies.
Totally worth it.
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After leaving the park, I decided to walk to the Central Market. You know where this is going, don’t you? I trekked down the hill, through the throngs and realized at the bottom of the road that I had no clue where to go from there. I flagged down three women who, with much consulting and discussion over who had the most English, decided to just lead me most of the way. They stopped within sight of my turn and told me I would be going through a building and over a bridge and I would be there. K. On the corner where I needed to turn there happened to be a textile museum so I stopped in there for about an hour. The exhibits were interesting. The opportunity to take my hair out of its ponytail so the sweat could dry was priceless.
Heading off again, I found a bridge and crossed it. Then I walked along for a while, peeking down side streets because the best stuff is down side streets. And then I saw it. This huge covered, closed street.
I went through a building, but not the one she told me, so I’m assuming it’s right next to the police station. The Central Market was less than it was cracked up to be. Fascinating that it’s been going since 1888 and all, but to me it was just another flea market. I did stop for lunch there. The food court hosted one place called Western Food, which served “spaghete beef meatball”, that I swear was covered in gravy. I went for the Thai food. Note to self, if the Thai restaurant doesn’t have pad Thai on the menu, you’ll be getting Chinese. I ate my Chinese Thai food, considered whether my legs would take the walk to Chinatown, decided against and headed outside to, guess what, rain.
