A cultural hodgepodge

After two weeks on Bali and the neighboring little island of Gili Trawangan, my parents, Ryan and I headed to the Kuching area for a few days, which is on the Malaysian side of Borneo, and then West to Kuala Lumpur. Malaysia was a mix of cultures unlike anything we have ever seen in our trip so far. After spending a large amount of our time in Japan and China where the population is largely homogeneous (at least to our untrained eyes), the diversity in Kuching and Kuala Lumpur was very obvious to us. The people, food, shops, and feel of these cities are largely a mix of Malay, Chinese and Indian, but there are also smaller influences from Indonesia and the rest of Southeast Asia all around.

Malaysia was also the first country we have spent time in where the majority of the population are Muslim (not counting Indonesia here, the world´s largest Muslim country by population, because we were mainly in Bali, which is primarily Hindu) and it was interesting to notice a lot of the little things: signs outside of restaurants state whether the food is halal; the main TV news channel was Al Jazeera (which, by the way, didn´t seem much different in terms of content than BBC News or CNN International); in most hotels there is an arrow on the ceiling that points in the direction of Mecca; and in airports and other public buildings there is always a prayer room.

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One of the many cat sculptures at a round-about in Kuching. Kucing means cat in Malay, and this city is obsessed with them! Unfortunately (ok, lets be honest, fortunately) we did NOT visit the massive cat museum while we were in town. I guess we'll have to come back another time...

Kayaking trip in the Borneo jungle

Ordering coffee and tea in Malaysia is an art...when you order a standard coffee or tea, it's served with sweetened condensed milk (too sweet for me!). You can also order coffee and tea with evaporated milk, or with a wheatgrass shot at the bottom in case you want to cancel out all of the negative effects of the caffeine and sugar all in one drink--that's the drink I'm pointing to!

My mom with our extremely nice and informative kayaking guide

Ryan hanging in a jungle hut, checking-out the Sape, a traditional Borneo instrument.

The Petronas Towers of Kuala Lumpur

A Ray Rice knock-off jersey in Chinatown....random!

Big thanks to our friend Steve for letting us stay at your place for a few days (and for hooking us up with Treme season 2!). We met Steve on the Lares Trek in Peru back in May...and now he just so happens to teach in Kuala Lumpur.