Kalied in KL – The Experience

Kalied in KL – The Experience

KL has been fun in a completely and utterly different way than HK was (sorry for keep using acronyms – I am not being hip, just a lazy typist, and Hong Kong is hard for me to get right on a keyboard first time) .

It has all the things a ‘modern major capital city’ should have but it does not have the soul of other cities like Barcelona or HK. In fact it is very difficult to find anything in the city with any culture or history on the tourist trail and we were not here long enough to delve deeper. That said it appears the Malaysian government are happy with this as they are promoting the modernisation and building of big buildings as its theme.

However here are the good bits

Chocolate Pudding

Great food – the food here is just fantastic we tried both a reasonably priced restaurant and got down with the locals in Chinatown . The reasonably priced restaurant served us fantastic dishes, the most memorable was whitebait served with deep fried orange and lemon peel which was just an amazing taste and some sesame chicken wings which made your mouth water.

We discovered dessert’s bar in the shopping centre near the Hotel while waiting for our trip up the Petronas Tower and had the most yummy chocolate brownie ice cream concoction. I was silent throughout its devouring other than the occasional Mmmm. This franchise needs to go worldwide it is a fantastic concept.

Sadly Taken!

The Hotel Bar – one of the reasons we chose this hotel was the Sky Bar on the 33rd floor. So after a quick mooch about the city on our first night we decided to go and have a butchers. It is pretty darn cool. It overlooks the Towers and the Park and also houses the Hotel pool. The problem is there are only about 10 booths by the windows overlooking the view which are all booked up in advance and reserved for those drinking Bollinger or Moet. We had our first cocktail and then John decided to slip the waiter £10 and guess what; within 5 minutes we had a prime location in one of the booths. Flushed with our success we decided to work our way down the cocktail menu and admire the view.

The booths are next the pool and you have a gangplank which is about 50cm across to navigate your way to the toilet or out. After our fifth cocktail we decided to call it a night or I could see one of us taking an involuntary dip in the pool on the way back to the room. I think we behaved mostly like adults that evening.

The Stalker – We got the hop on bus round the city to get us round the tourist trail and we first stopped at the KL Tower which is KL’s equivalent of the Telecom tower in London (in fact it serves the same purpose here – who’da thought!! At the top this woman asked John to take a picture of her with her camera. That’s where it started.

We came down and got on the next bus to head to our next destination and made for the open air deck. Two minutes later who should wander on the bus and then come and join us – crazy tourist woman who it turns out was born in Rotterdam, lived in Thailand yet spoke with a thick American accent . She stalked us for the next two sights hanging around like a bad smell and we couldn’t shake her. In the end John was plain rude when we got off in Chinatown and said “we are off to get some lunch, enjoy the rest of your trip love” and we made a quick exit down a side street.

KL Wifi – I am returning to one of my themes. I told how I get excited about free wifi. Well just imagine how crazy mad giddy I might get if I found the whole of a city had free wifi? Well it has there is a thing called WirelessKL which means you get access in virtually all shops and restaurants in the city, I even had wifi access while on the tour bus as they are part of the scheme. Its just the way to do it. I am guessing the businesses all pay a small amount each month and the whole city benefits by having an almost pervasive FREE wireless access infrastructure across any city. Simple concept yet inspired and it made me very happy.

Air con I love you – Never ever in my whole life have I appreciated aircon as much as have in KL. The heat and humidity are just energy sapping and after about 20 minutes in the open air you are searching for a building to run into and cool down.

The Hotel

I cannot say enough about this Hotel, Traders is just the best. Staff, facilities, location, just everything. I want to wrap it up and take it in my suitcase for the rest of my travels. Things that have made me very excited

In the Bag!

The little things – I have a confession to make, I am a bit of a kleptomaniac when it comes to hotel toiletries and things. I have a large basket full of them at home with a range of shower caps, shoe shine, ear buds and sewing kits in it from hotels around the world – all of which I will never use. Traders gave us a whole smorgasbord of goodies which even includes a Chupa Chups lolly placed delicately on the towels in the bathroom. Why in the bathroom heaven only knows but it made my day to find it. Needless to say they will be in my suitcase when we leave.

The Customer service –I said it was good at check in and it has continued to be so. In fact that goes for the whole experience in KL they do customer service very well and without that oleaginous stuff the Americans do. Perhaps I should write to AirFrance and suggest they send their staff here for some reprogramming. On that very subject I had an e-mail from AirFrance yesterday apologising for the knackered plane and giving me a free 2000 air miles on my loyalty card. I thought that was nice of them and I probably now qualify for a free slight from Manchester to Bolton.

The washy bum toilet  – I have seen these things on the telly but never experienced.  Well I have now!!

Automated bum washer

Thanks to the British Empire – While I am ashamed of our historical ruling of foreign countries it does have its benefits. I have managed to visit two countries now and not had to concern myself with looking the wrong way crossing the roads or pissing about with adapter plugs to get everything charged. I tip my hat to dear old Queen Victoria for that.

Off to Bali next a Malaysia Air flight to look forward to and the KLIA experience.

Tags: Air France, KL