Malaysia – A Great Place to be Kicked to Death

Idiotson Crusoe

Four days in Singapore had cost us a third of our budget and partial use of my liver so we decided to get out. I had wanted to start the trip at Singapore’s cool old Keppel Road station but after a hot, frustrating day investigating we discovered a hitch. To buy a ticket in Singapore you have to pay in Singapore dollars – fair enough. If, however, you catch a bus 30 minutes to Johor Barhu in Malaysia, you pay in Malaysian ringgits. So a ticket to Kuala Lumpur is about 40 dollars or 40 ringgits, which would be fine if the conversion rate was about the same, but 1 Sing dollar buys over 3 ringgits so the price of the ticket is triple. It’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. Singapore is weird. Also, you can’t book tickets in advance so we jumped on a bus from central Singapore and tootled over the mile-long causeway that joins Singapore to mainland Asia. The bus station and the train station were clean, efficient and – most surprisingly – in the same building. Sometimes in Indonesia they had been in different provinces – the bus station in Surabaya, Java is actually in East Timor and Jakarta’s central train station is on one of Jupiter’s moons.

It was disconcerting and I was waiting for the catch, so I was almost pleased when we were told that, because you can’t pre-book tickets on Malaysian trains unless you do it 24 years prior to departure, there were no sleeper beds left and we would have to spend 18 hours in a seat. Facing backwards. Luckily, there would be a half hour stop in Kuala Lumpur station, which was probably in the Philippines. 

An early morning view of Penang from the ferry.

            Malaysia might have the best food in the world. Thai food is great but even breakfast can be eye-wateringly spicy and I’m told the food in India is fantastic but three hours after you eat it your bottom explodes and you die. So the mix of Indian, Thai, Malay and European food coupled, almost uniquely in South-East Asia, with food hygiene levels that involve more than a sponge that is washed bi-annually in a river, it’s got to be pretty good. Which is why I was a little surprised to find myself having my first meal in Malaysia in a Burger King in KL Sentral station. But we only had half an hour to change trains and I wanted to put on a little last minute bum fat before spending the night in a seat.

            Around dawn we rolled into Butterworth station and walked down a clearly labelled walkway and straight onto a ferry which left immediately on its 15 minute trip to Georgetown on the island Penang. Just like that. Travel in Malaysia is ace.

The ferry had a viewing deck and the early morning sun shining on the historic port of Georgetown was pretty enough to make me forget the crushed vertebra and dislocated pelvis the 18 hour train trip had given me.

            After an hour strolling around the picturesque old town and generally getting lost, we found a great old hotel that looked like it hadn’t been renovated – or vacuumed – in 70 years. But it was cheap and had things modern hotels don’t offer like high ceilings, a hat stand and a fan that you have to turn on with a crowbar. We dumped our bags and went out in search of food.

After four days I had to be surgically removed from this chair.

            If there is a better place on earth to hang out, eat food and drink beer than Georgetown, I haven’t been there. The food is great and cheap, the beer is cold and, unlike Thailand and Indonesia, there are no coral reefs or indigenous craft workshops to feel guilty about not seeing. In fact the only touristy sight is an historic ruined fort built by some silly white people 5 thousand years ago or something and, despite being big and imposing, there’s nothing inside but a rusty cannon and a tree so you can see it in 20 minutes and get back to your noodles.

We sat on the water’s edge at what amounted to a boozy open-air shopping plaza food court and ate plates of $2 dumplings while slurping on enormous Tiger beers and watching cruise ships and thunder storms pass from horizon to horizon. One day we rented a scooter and rode most of the way around the island, racing around smooth windy mountain roads. I felt like Valentino Rossi. Except with a passenger. And a 100cc scooter. And very little idea how to ride properly. But still, it was fun and at one point we stopped at a national park and swam at a nice beach. On the way home we even saw monkeys and big monitor lizards. Then we got drunk and ate something on a skewer. 

Oh, chimpanzee that...

            The next day a man kicked me in the shins so we went to Thailand.

            I’ve taken night time wanders through Naples and Bangkok. I’ve been hopelessly lost in Cambodian forest villages and towns in Eastern Europe where the basic unit of currency is an AK-47. Once I even went to Morwell. But until our last night in Penang I had never been physically attacked. We were walking back to our hotel after a hard day’s sitting around and found ourselves in an unlit, empty street. A wild looking Malay guy with long hair and an unbuttoned shirt paced up and down the footpath not far in front of us. Bringing all my special services training to bear, I completely failed to notice him until he was about 30 feet away.

“Shit, that guy’s dodgy. Let’s just keep walking,” said Alicia.

I had wanted to stop and ask him to be Godfather to my first child, but I decided she had a point. As we walked past he gave me a full-force Muay Thai style kick to my right shin.

I guess he wanted me to fall down so he could kick me to death, steal my wallet and touch Alicia in the pants. Either that or he had taken offence to my anklet. It was so fast and odd that I had walked about 20 feet past him before I realised.

“Oww,” I said bravely and walked quickly around a corner to a crowded street, also bravely.

He didn’t follow and it all seemed more funny that scary. I don’t think we narrowly avoided an organised ring of criminal masterminds operating a kick-and-grab credit card scam. I just think the guy was mad as an onion. And if all you have to pay for staying in a jungly paradise ringed with beaches, full of great food, cold beer and cheap hotels is a weekly kicking, then I still think it’s a good deal. It would probably discourage German tour groups too, and that can’t be a bad thing.

Alicia considering an Evel Knievel style canyon jump in the Penang hills..