Bangkok Thailand and Kuala Lumpur

Well we finished up our summer internships last Wednesday. Let the celebration begin. We went the Esplanade, the performing arts center of Singapore, to see Dim Sum Dollies. A female comedian musical trio. It was a great performance and reflected lots of Singapore's Culture. Some of the humor we did not get at times but it was still hilarious!

The next morning we parted for Bangkok, Thailand. We took Thai Asia Air and arrived in Bangkok after an hour or so. Suites where the first thing on our agenda. We all got measured and fitted for a variety of suites. I choose a midnight blue suite with a suttle pinstripe for myself and my dad. We'll have matching suites. The prices where fairly reasonable at 112.00 US Dollars. We even got free beer and other drinks while getting fitted. I had my fair share of beers and felt really good after leaving the tailor shop. Good Story to tell when I get home! LOL

Traffic in Bangkok was horrible. The system isn't really regulated with toll roads in the downtown areas, so it is quite congested with traffic flow. Motorbikes weave in and out. It can take several hours just to go a few kilometers.

Thailand is on the Baht which is about 40 Baht to one US Dollar.

We then hit the road to Pattaya which is about 2 hours South East of Bangkok at the coast. We ate a quick dinner and then went to a Cabaret Show. This featured traditional Thai dances. The performers look like women, however they are actually men who have undergone surgery to make them female. It was quiet disturbing, yet interesting to see how good the surgery was.

We then checked into the Day-Night Hotel which appeared to be a hospital at one time. Quite Depressing! We then headed out to Walking Street to enjoy the night life. We found some Muay Thai Kick Boxing and enjoyed the show. Pattaya is known as the Sex Capital of the world due the abundance of Strip Shows, Sex Shows, and prostitution. For the parents relax, we didn't attend any of these, however we where asked and shown menus of places several times on the streets.

The next day we slept in before heading to the Thai Culture and Elephant shows. The culture show featured traditional Thai Dancers(female ones), Kick Boxing, Elephants and several other features. The Elephant show had elephants performing a variety of activities that included bowling, darts, painting, races, and others. Following the show I was picked up by the trunk of an elephant and held on to its tusks. It was an amazing experience to be picked up by such a powerful animal. I also got to hold a chimpanzee and take a picture with a tiger!

The World's Largest Restaurant during the 90s was the feature for our dinner. The restaurant was built on water and featured cement boats for the places to eat. It could seat 5000 people and has a working staff of 1000.

We then took our roadtrip back to Bangkok and checked into our Hotel called the Palazzo. When we first entered our room we smelt a very strong sewage odor. We couldn't figure it out until the next morning. This is when we saw was was adjacent to our hotel: A sewage treatment plant!

We went to a few shopping centers around the Bangkok Area. Petpong was a market sandwiched between the redlight districts. We found several deals at the area including small lighted lamps and a Buddha statue.

Sam and I got separated from the others during our shopping experience. We started looking through our stuff and found we didn't have the card with directions on getting to the hotel. The only thing we had was a pen with the name of the hotel on it. We stopped at many places asking for a phone book, but they either didn't have one or couldn't understand what we where asking for. We then saw a small police hutch and the officer spoke very little English. We communicated that we where lost and needed an address for our hotel. Luckily they had the internet. GOOGLE to the rescue! We found the address! The next thing was finding a taxi cab driver who could understand us. We jumped in the next taxi and he couldn't understand us. He took us to the nearest officer and he could read English and explained to the driver where to take us. Atleast we where hoping we where on the right track! The driver was really cool and attempted to teach us counting in Thai. He was a really nice older gentleman and we tipped him well for getting us home! What an adventure!

The next morning we went on a river boat tour around Bangkok. We saw the Royal Palace, Governmental Buildings, and the reclining Buddha Temple.

We then flew to KL or Kuala Lumpur the capital of Malaysia. We where picked up by a sweet bus. We had a full size chartered bus for the 11 of us. The seats reclined back and even had foot rests! We where now traveling in the lap of luxury.

The new airport is the 3rd best in Asia. It is located about 60 miles from KL due to the development of the new Governmental City of Putrajaya. This city was started only 10 years ago and the governmental offices have relocated approximately 40% to the new area. The city has a master plan that limits commercialization and other development. The city is similar to the Washington DC Area. Each building features architecture from around the world. The buildings are quite impressive.

We then headed to our Hotel located in a quite area of KL. We went out for clubbing near the Twin Tours of KL. We went to a Thai Cowboy Club and The Rum Jungle Disco. I wasn't feeling too well due to the smoke so I sat away from the crowd and just hung out for the night.

Following the Clubbing Experience we decided to walk to the Twin Tours to see the view at night. The Tours where massive and you couldn't see the top of the buildings from the bottom due to the pinnacle shape.

The next day we went to the Malaysian Royal Palace. The palace has guards similar to those at England's Buckingham Palace. Redsuited soldiers on horses ordorn the sides of the gates. The palace use to belong to wealthiest Chinese Family in KL, when the family passed away instead of accepting the inheritance the family donated it to the Government. This building will be converted to a hotel in the next 10 years and relocated in Putrajaya.

We then took a picture with the Twin towers in the back. The day was great because the haze was gone. Indonesia has been experiencing large forest fires and the smoke has been creating thick haze around the KL area. Luckily it rained the day before knocking some of the haze away.

We then saw a War Monument dedicated to those who died during the Communist War.

A large Buddhist temple that was built into a mountain cave was the next stop. The cavern was a beautiful natural formation. 272 steps must be climbed to reach the entry of the cave! Monkeys are all around the temple waiting for food! I got some great pics of this one monkey eating peanuts!

We had some good ole American Fast Food for Lunch at Burger King and then headed to the Highlands.

You can only go so far up the mountain on a bus due to the steepness of the terrain. We then had to take the Cable Cars for 15KM. This Cable car was the longest and fastest cable car in Asia. The Highland resort area featured a Casino, Theme Parks, Video Game Arcades, and several other items of entertainment. I decided Id go to the Casino and try my luck at Black Jack. I started with 200 Ringit about 53 US Dollars, enough for 4 hands of Black Jack. I was doing horrible and went down to 50 Ringit just enough for one more hand. I decided to change tables and walk around the casino. I found an area that had 4 tables and decided this would be a good area. I sat down with my 50 Ringit Bet and let it go. Black Jack!! It was a good start. I slowly built my money up and walked away from the table with 700 Ringitt Total. WHOOP! 190 US Dollars!! It was a challenge! The weird thing about the table was that people would start betting on your cards too. Players would add money to your pot and then you would all split what you put in. I was really confused because no one spoke English around me. The Dealer could tell I was getting confused so he made the players separately stack the money so I could tell I was getting a fair deal. It was a great run and probably my best one so far!

We headed back down from the highlands! Money in Hand! WHOOP! We then went back down for dinner at the hotel. A western meal treated us with steaks, chicken, or fish, along with soup, salad, and garlic bread. It was a great treat.

Paige, Alicia, and I didn't feel up to clubbing like the rest of the group so we decided we would seek out a massage. Unfortunately everything was closed or a little too shaddy for us. We decided to go to China town right across the street from our hotel. The market here was a little bit different than the China Town in Singapore. We walked around the street which was densely loaded with shops selling wallets, watches, and DVDs. We found a DVD store which seemed to be pretty good. We all purchased some DCDs and some CDS. We found some Country Music CDS which really shocked us. We pretty much staid until the market closed around 12:30.

The next day was our Road Trip day. Instead of flying from KL to Singapore we took our private coach on a road trip. The country side is lined with Palm Tree farms. Palm is used in oils and cosmetics.

We stopped in the historical city of Malaka. This is where history starts in Malaysia. The Chinese where first to settle here and mix with the local Malays. The area was also taken over by the British and Dutch Settlements. The city features lots of historical artifacts. Malaka is really laid back town with a small town atmopshere. Tricshaws elaborately decorated line the streets waiting to give tourists rides. We saw the Junker streets selling antiques and other items. We also go to see the ruins of the old Dutch church.

After Malaka we headed back home to good ole Singapore. The drive alone was a little over 7 hours from KL to Singapore.