After another scintillating bus journey in which one kid threw up and another shit their pants, we arrived at our 20th destination of the trip - a very soggy Kuala Lumpur. KL (as it's commonly known) is the capital of Malaysia and home to 1.5 million.

The rain eased off and we went for a wander around the city's Chinatown in which we're staying. This is Petaling Street - the heart of Chinatown and infamous for its pirated clothes and accessories along with bootleg DVD's and CD's hehe. There's no shortage of it down here.

We found a restaurant here somewhere to get a belated lunch. I had some authentic Malaysian food - noodles and whatnot; Kristina had a burger. I was jealous, and she knew it.

And then we found this thing - the Sri Mahamariamman Temple, apparently the oldest and richest Hindu temple in KL. That's a pretty impressive front door, so we wandered in for a nosey.

Straight away we were confused to find a number of ethnic gentlemen wandering around in what looked like bath towels, as though they'd all just taken a shower. Fascinating.

This chick has four arms. Her little friend on her right is an elephant (also with four arms), and her two-armed friend on her left looks like she had a dodgy vindaloo for dinner.

This guy appears to be exposing himself to these carvings. I think it's fair to say we know and understand absolutely nothing about Hindu.

From there we carried on and found more crap at the Central Market, though in fairness this has a large number of stalls selling some pretty cool randomness (this hat wasn't one of them).

We've noticed a lot of cars in Malaysia that have these McDonalds Drive-Thru stickers on their windscreens, which I think entitles them to some sort of something for free for being a regular customer. Apparently this public bus goes through the Drive Thru a lot too hahaha!

KL has a lot of tall buildings scattered about its centre, which we haven't seen a lot of on this trip. So far it's reminding me a lot of Singapore in fact.

Speaking of tall buildings, off in the distance there are the iconic Petronas Towers - the tallest twin towers in the world. We'll be checking them out tomorrow.

And this is the Sultan Abdul Samad Building (houses the offices of the Ministry of Information, Communications, and Culture of Malaysia if anyone cares), which overlooks...

...Merdeka Square - once upon a time a cricket ground in the middle of the city hehe. Merdeka Square (or Dataran Merdeka in the local tongue) literally means Independence Square. It was here the Union Flag was lowered and the Malayan flag hoisted for the first time at midnight on August 31, 1957, when current-day Malaysia gained independence from British colonial rule.

Shortly thereafter the heavens opened again (as they're forecast to do for the final two weeks of this trip given it's the monsoon season in these parts), so we called it a day.

Today we ventured into the so-called Golden Triangle - Kuala Lumpur's business, shopping, and entertainment district.

Our first port of call was this: the Kuala Lumpur Tower standing at 421m tall - the second-tallest freestanding tower in the world.

The KL Tower is used for communication purposes, and features a 276m-high viewing deck open to the (paying) public offering 360-degree views over Kuala Lumpur. This is looking over the forest of high-rises that is the Golden Triangle.

This is a 360-degree panorama taken from the tower. The Petronas Towers (which I'll talk about below) are right in the centre, reaching 452m into the sky with a storm brewing behind them.

Kuala Lumpur as a whole is a city of high-rises. This lot were miles off in the distance on the edge of the city. Despite this, it's one of the greenest cities in Southeast Asia.

A bit of suburbia closer to the city centre.

How the other half live.

While we were up there this massive storm system rolled in, so we milled about while it dumped its load over the city and took the usual touristy shots of the Petronas Towers.

Eventually the storm passed, so we headed down for a closer look. The Petronas Twin Towers are the headquarters of the national petroleum company. Construction started in 1992 and was completed in 1998. At a total height (including the rooftop antenna spire) of 452 metres, they were the tallest buildings in the world until 2004. However, they are still the tallest twin towers in the world. The towers each have 88 floors, and the sky bridge there connects floors 41. The sky bridge sits 170m above the ground and isn't actually attached to the main structure of the towers. Instead it is designed to slide in and out of the towers to prevent it from breaking as the towers sway during high winds. Normally the sky bridge is open to visitors but is currently closed due to renovations or something.

Spanning 17 acres below the towers is the KLCC Park, with jogging and walking paths, a fountain with incorporated light show, wading pools, and a children's playground.

I like to cover my fat gut with a white shirt too.

Me getting my art on.

From the towers we wandered deeper into the Golden Triangle. Spot the monorail there - more on that in a second.

This billboard across the intersection appears to show global humanitarian missions that Malaysia is currently or was recently involved in. Christchurch makes the list on the bottom-left there due to the earthquakes. So Malaysia, cheers for that :)

So that monorail. After a lot of walking today in very humid conditions we figured it would be a good idea to catch that back to our hotel rather than walk. As it turns out, walking would have been faster hehe. It was rush-hour, but these things come fairly regularly and didn't appear to be too chaotic. So, we bought our tickets and followed the sign to the platform in the direction of where we needed to go. However, that sign was wrong, and we caught a monorail in the wrong direction hahaha! So we got out at the next station, crossed to the opposite platform and waited, and waited, and waited some more. Something had obviously gone wrong - broken down train or whatever, and none came for about 20 minutes by which stage the platform was bulging and the crush was on! Good times. If this was Paris there'd be fights breaking out.

Bit of a quiet day today, partly because of the persistent showers coming from this freakishly dark sky, and partly because after 60-something days on the road we're both starting to feel a little exhausted (and looking forward to some quiet time in New Zealand in a couple weeks).

We spent the day wandering about the 92-hectare Lake Gardens, located in the heart of the city. On the way there we stopped into Masjid Negara, the National Mosque of Malaysia. It is one of Southeast Asia's largest mosques, and we clearly weren't welcome hehe. Kristina made a good point: how do they know whether you're Muslim ;)

Kristina's new favourite animal (after this happened last week).

The Lake Gardens were KL's first large-scale recreational park, established in 1888. It contains large sculpted and manicured gardens and a host of attractions, for example the largest covered bird park in the world (but at bloody $16 to go in we didn't bother). There is also a butterfly park, a deer park, an orchid garden, a couple lakes, and so on.

After cowering under umbrellas as the first major shower passed overhead, we found ourselves in the orchid garden and the neighbouring hibiscus garden. Did you know the orchid family is the largest family of flowering plants with around 20,000 species? Did you care? I didn't, but it's another one for the general knowledge bank.

We milled about until it started pissing with rain again and we all took cover, including the lizards. As I write this I'm sucking back a Leffe (the world's greatest beer) in the Reggae Bar in Chinatown, and Kristina is next door getting a haircut (more like a mop chop). Like I said, quiet day :) In ten days we'll be in New Zealand, getting some much needed R and R.

Air conditioning - how did these countries ever get by without it?!

We only had one destination in mind for the day, which involved a bit of walking and a couple trains to get there. That turned into a few trains and a lot of wasted time when we managed to get on the wrong bloody train and ended up out in the podunks. Check this out - a "ladies only" train coach hahaha! Apparently there are ladies-only taxis as well, for the discerning Muslim woman who has no time for men and their wicked ways.

Eventually (two hours later) we made it to our only destination of the day, and much to Kristina's horror it was full of monkeys. This one was enjoying some coconut.

This one didn't want to share his (massive) coconut with anybody.

This one tried to eat this can.

And this one has mental retardation.

Monkeys aside, this is what we came to see: the Batu Caves. This is one of the most popular Hindu shrines outside of India. The big gold dude covered in scaffolding is Lord Murugan, and this just happens to be the highest Murugan statue in the world at 43m. The 272 steps there lead up to the entrance of the caves.

In line with the confusion that Hindu has already caused me over the last couple days, here is some chick with several heads and an excessive number of arms riding a peacock.

See this is what I'm talking about - what the fuck is that?! A cow's body with a woman's head, a peacock's tail, wings, and a plump pair of breasts. I don't mean to offend any Hindus to who might be watching but this is just getting silly.

Anyway, we powered up the 272 steps to check out these caves.

What's the name of that condition where sufferers spontaneously fall asleep at random times of the day? Well this woman looks like she has it. Though in fairness, 272 steps is a lot of steps.

Caves! And what was in these caves?

Souvenirs of course hehe.

There are also a few shrines, and a Porta-Potty. Lovely. And that's about it really. Was it worth the journey out here? Yes, to torment the monkeys. The one above that was really protective of his coconut, I tried to steal it hehe. He was not happy.

After dinner we went back into the Golden Triangle area to get some night shots. This is the KL Tower shot from a rooftop bar as another storm was passing over.

The Patronas Towers (recall the tallest twin towers in the world), looking pretty impressive by night.

And KLCC Park below the towers, looking towards the Golden Triangle. This is a really beautiful area at night, but there are a lot of men around so if you're a 'ladies-only' Muslim woman it's probably not your scene.

Welcome to Melaka, which sounds very similar to "malaka" which is the Greek word for 'wanker' (travellers fun fact of the day). We arrived here late this afternoon to torrential rain, and a taxi driver who blatantly ran red lights and drove on the wrong side of the road in a car that was on the brink of collapse. Once the rain eased we went out in search of food. This is Jonker Walk, the heart of the city's Chinatown.

And this is Datuk Wira Gan Boon Leong, a locally prominent politician who once upon a time held the titles of Mr. Malaysia, Mr. Asia, and Mr. Universe in body building hehe.

We wandered the cute little backstreets in search of some grub, and that's about it really. Anyway, we've got a couple days to kill here before heading down to Singapore. This time next week we'll be on a plane bound for New Zealand :)

The view from the rooftop of our guesthouse. Yup.

All we did today was wander around Melaka, as that's pretty much all there is to do here. I don't know what that dude on the left is drinking but he looked as though he was about to face-plant at any moment. Unfortunately he didn't ;)

This is Cheng Hoon Teng - the oldest Chinese temple in Malaysia dating back to 1646. All the materials used in its building were imported from China. Great.

A man's gotta have a job. This man's job is shelling coconuts.

This is the town square (also known as the Red Square). In the background is Stadthuys, built by the Dutch occupants in 1650 as the office of the Dutch Governor and Deputy Governor. Groovy.

Christ Church is an 18th-century Protestant church, and the oldest functioning Protestant church in Malaysia. Awesome.

Nearby was a group of local dancers getting their local grove on. Cool.

Up an adjacent hill is St. Paul's Church, built in 1521 this time by the Portuguese. Excellent. I should probably mention that current-day Malaysia has belonged to various empires over the last several centuries including the Portuguese in the 1500s, the Dutch in the 16 and 1700s, and the British in the 1800s.

Looking out towards the coast, and Melaka's revolving tower which as far as I can tell serves very little purpose other than taking tourists up and down. Fantastic.

And this is A Famosa (or what's left of it), a former Portuguese fortress built upon their arrival in 1511. Mint.

We walked everywhere today but if you're not in the mood for that you can always take one of these - a "trishaw" hehe. They're all over the place and half of them are pumping out cheesy dance music.

And that is basically Melaka in a nutshell. We've still got another day to kill here tomorrow before heading down to Singapore - buggered if I know how we're going to fill it. Today was the first day in while where we've had no rain at all, but that sky is constantly threatening.

Back in town tonight we found some sort of talent show or something going on.

I thought this chick was going to eat the microphone at one stage, but she resisted.

Then this young one got up and belted out a few numbers. I may have had a voice like hers when I was her age but I doubt I had the courage to get up in front of an audience with it. Anyway, good random Melakan entertainment.

Yesterday I said we had one more day to kill in Melaka and had no idea how we were going to fill it, having seen most of what there is to see yesterday. Well we filled it by going to one of the mega malls here, feeding our faces, kicking back and abusing the WiFi, before Kristina dragged me to see the new Twilight movie hehe (a big deal for her apparently). Since we've been in Malaysia we've happened to pass by a lot of pet stores, full of rather unhappy-looking dogs who get excited at the slightest bit of human attention. We happened to randomly pass by yet another one after the movie.

I asked an employee what kind of dog this is. He didn't get the joke (or just didn't find it as funny as I did). Regardless, this is a chinchilla, and ironically these things are crepuscular which means they are active primarily during twilight hehe :) Anyway, that's it for Melaka, and that's it for Malaysia. Tomorrow we get on a five-hour bus to our final destination of the trip - Singapore!

Yesterday I said we'd be in Singapore by now. Well, we're not. While we were at the mall here in Melaka the other day we passed by a Canon store (as in the manufacturer of my beasty little DSLR camera), and I noticed they had a so-called "ultra-wide angle" zoom lens in stock. When I purchased my camera back in August for this trip, I also purchased a long-range zoom lens to go with it (EF-S 18-200mm for those who know about DSLR lenses) which is capable of both wide angles and close-up zooms - perfect for travelling since you can get away with carrying just a single lens albeit at the sacrifice of some image quality which is inherent to this category of lens. However, there have been several occasions where its widest angle just hasn't been wide enough, and the only real way around that is by creating panoramas which isn't always ideal. Spotting the ultra-wide zoom lens (EF-S 10-22mm) got me thinking about the advantage of having such a lens on hand for a trip like this, and especially considering New Zealand is coming up with its gorgeous landscapes.

To put what I'm banging on about into perspective, check out the image on the left. It was shot with an ultra-wide angle lens at its widest angle (in this case, 10mm in camera-speak). The area within the red dotted frame accurately shows what my current lens is capable of capturing at its widest angle (18mm). Quite a difference to say the least, and this is an example of where my traveller-friendly lens just doesn't cut the salami. I could capture this scene by way of a creating a panorama (i.e. taking multiple images and stitching them together), but that is both a time-consuming pain in the ass and not always a successful operation. An obvious question would be "Can't you just stand back further man?" Well not always, as illustrated by the shot on the right - once you're standing up the back of the stadium you can't go back any further.

Another couple of examples I stole from somewhere.

Plus such a wide-angle lens allows you to take some pretty whacky and creative shots. Here the dog's nose is disproportionately large, which is a result of the extreme perspective that wide-angle lenses can capture. Has anyone seen the South Park episode where some of the kids were getting high on cough syrup and made videos of animals with wide-angle lenses? Well you missed out ;) Snippet here.

Put simply, the shots I've talked above and these two here with the huge sweeping skies and the trees that appear to envelope you are in some cases extremely difficult to capture or in most cases simply impossible to capture with my lens (awesome though it is). So, given we've got New Zealand, Australia, and Central America all coming up, having to ability to fully capture some amazing scenes such as these makes buying this ultra-wide angle zoom lens seem like a no-brainer. However, as is often the case with these things, price is the sticking point, not to mention the need to carry an additional lens around everywhere. Regardless, after weighing up the pros and cons, I decided to go back to the Canon store before leaving for Singapore this morning and buy the damn lens. When I rocked up there was a slight problem though: the bastards don't open on Mondays hahaha! Upon researching the price of the lens elsewhere, this particular store seems to sell it for the lowest price, and much lower than in Singapore where the cheeky bastards sell it for almost twice the price. So all that plus the fact that Singapore is expensive (and Melaka is cheap) and we probably allocated one day too many to spend in Singapore anyway, we're having another chill-out day doing diddly-squat in Melaka. And Kristina has come down with a bad cold or something, so another good reason for a quiet day. So I'll try again tomorrow to buy this groovy lens, and then we'll be off to Singapore.

Now, to make this post at least borderline relevant to this trip, here's a story from last night. After I got done updating this page about 8pm I fell asleep, and Kristina has this cold or whatever so she was already asleep. Neither of us had had dinner yet. We woke again at about 11pm, hungry, and set out in search of food. The only place we could find still serving anything was this cook-it-yourself-bitch place next to our guesthouse. The idea is they give you these raw ingredients, a pan full of water, and a cooker. You boil the water, biff the raw ingredients in, leave it for a bit, and enjoy your soup. Sounds simple huh? Well it wasn't. No one really spoka da good Engrish so we were pretty much left to figure the deal out for ourselves hehe.