Examining my Indian-ness

Hey peepz,

So, I returned back from a 2 week trip to India about three to four weeks ago, but have only now made it to the point in my blog where I can logically write about it. But before I do, a preface:

Since moving to Malaysia, I've been asked the question "Where are you from?" a lot. This was a really fun game to play while I went to school at McGill University because I'd always get an answer that went something like this:

"Well, I was born in France but then I moved to Australia and went to school there but I'm half Japanese and then I decided to come to Montreal for university and now I'm here" (fyi, that's a real description of someone that I know). So, I, in comparison, felt like my story was pretty boring when my answer to that question was "Well, I was born in Toronto and I lived in Toronto all my life, and then I moved to Montreal for university".

It was pretty lame but there was never any confusion or strangeness surrounding the fact that I am an Indian who was not born in India, nor has ever lived in India. It was pretty clear and straightforward that I am culturally and genetically India, but like many immigrant families, I was born and brought up in the land of the Moose, beavers, hockey, and winter. But, for some reason that is unknown to me, my acquaintances in Malaysia really struggle to understand the concept of immigration.

I have a few funny stories about the conversations on this topic. For example, someone once asked me how my family was in India and I told them that my family is in Canada. So they asked me if I was born in India and then moved to Canada. Of course, I said no. Then they asked me if my parents were from India. Again, I said no - they were from Singapore and Hong Kong. That brought about much confusion so I put the person out of their misery and told them that all my grandparents were born in India, making me Indian. And their response?

That Time I was in a Malaysian Show Choir

So, I don't know how many of you know, but since moving to KL, Malaysia, I have been part of a show choir called The Young KL Singers (YKLS). I joined this group of singers when I first moved to Malaysia. It was actually one of the first things I did after moving. If I recall correctly, I even knew which choir I wanted to join before I moved to KL. I know it seems like I'm really committed to my singing (and hence, I must be an incredible performer) but the opposite is actually true.

"but after her lover!"

I'm okay - and I hadn't sung in a while until YKLS. In University, I was part of a 'no-audition required' accapella group for 1 year... and for only half the year... but... while I was in high school, I was a committed member of the Middle School and Upper School choirs at Havergal College. Music has always been something I've enjoyed. One of the biggest rushes I get (and which actually makes me so joyous that it can bring tears to my eyes at moments) is playing or singing in harmony with someone else. This is exactly why I was such an active member of the Jr. and Sr. Band and a member of the Jazz band during high school. Truth be told, I like choir  because my voice could be improved by the sound of everyone else's' voices. hehehe.

So, once I knew I was moving to Malaysia, I decided I needed to start looking into things that made me happy because I knew the transition wouldn't be easy and that I'd want something to bring happiness into my life.

For the first few months, attending the YKLS rehearsals were a reprieve from the daily struggles of life (remember when I used to complain about everything in KL? Like crossing the road, and my land lord, and figuring out my cell phone plan). Things were hard and I was going through a major cultural adjustment. Singing with YKLS was one of the happiest things I did with my week! And, I was really lucky to get to sing with some incredible people with INCREDIBLE voices. The choir members of YKLS are young professionals who all work normal day jobs but enjoy singing for fun and secretly or not-so-secretly sing at night (just like me).

Finding Europen Influence in Malaysia

Yep. In the form of Portuguese people. And even though its taken me over 2 months to write about it, let me just make the excuse that I was collecting my thoughts.

About 2 months ago, I took a trip to the one town I'd been craving to go to for over half a year called Melaka - which is the Portuguese area of Malaysia just 2 hours away from KL (its also known as the town that everyone takes school trips to when they were in elementary school). It may sound a little strange to you that Malaysia has a Portuguese region... but many many many years ago when Malaysia was colonized by the British, some how, the Portuguese made it there too, leaving in their wake, a tradition of pork, churches, forts and beautiful architecture (Photos taken by the lovely Rajibul).

A trip for my heart :)

My friends, faithful blog readers, and people of the world. I have been away from my blog for much too long! ONE month! I always told myself I'd never become that person who forgets about their blog for 1 month.

Well, never say never I guess... But the neglect of my blog does not go without consequence. I have felt so guilty for not writing and now I'm just doing what I can to make myself feel better. I DO have some excuses though that you will hopefully accept.

1. I went back to Canada *surprise!!* for 3.5 weeks and didn't find anything remotely as interesting as what I am about to blog about, to blog about.

2. My choir has gone into INTENSE FULL THROTTLE MODE because the Young KL Singers are performing our big show of the year in about 3 weeks and so I rehearse three times a week - yes, THREE TIMES A WEEK and hence my life outside of work is being chomped away.

3. I am in the process of applying to grad school and the thought and stress of applying to grad school consumes my mind every second of every day because those deadlines are soon. I'm also heartbroken because focusing on important life stuff (such as grad school) means I get less time to travel, theoretically..... but I've been travelling anyway. So: Doing grad school apps + travelling at the same time don't do so well on my nerves.

But let me briefly tell you all what I've been up to in Canada..... okay. CANADA WAS WONDERFUL! For the first few days I was back, the temperature was actually hovering around the low twenties. I felt the need to wear a scarf, pants, sweaters. It was glorious and I was LOVIN' it! (Although its a bummer that I had to come back to KL right before all the trees changed colours... someone please, take pics of my tree in front of my house and send me updates on its colour change progression. I'm serious.)

You haven't experienced Asia Until You've experienced NAM! Part 2

So I left you guys (hopefully at the edge of your seat) at Thailand and promised you tails of Vietnam which I failed to deliver on.... until now!

Let me just jump right into it. So Bilal and I said good riddance to James (jk jk we actually left him in the middle of the night) to catch our 6 am flight to Hanoi, Vietnam! Thailand and Vietnam are separated by Laos and Cambodia but are not far from each other at all so it was a nice little 2 hour plane ride.

Now, I was so freaking amped up to get to Hanoi! I had heard the best things at Vietnam. I had heard that there was French influence everywhere since Vietnam was originally colonised by the French. I was told that I could get fresh baguettes on the streets and in the hostels, 20 cent "microbrewery beer" on the sides of the road, heavenly pho, and vintage Vietnam war propaganda posters. This place sounded like quite the cultural mecca. Secretly, I was also hoping that Hanoi would be the cheese oasis of Asia given the French influence....(spoiler: I was wrong).

So let me tell you my feelings about the real Hanoi...... it really IS THAT COOL and I LOVED THE PLACE!!!!!! Bilal and I were staying in a really, really tall town house in the old quarter of Hanoi. All of the architecture is like that - everything is built UPWARDS and built with French architectural influence. 

Our tall, tall hostel

The Blog Post You've All Been Waiting For (I hope.) PART 1

I would like to think that this blog post is most anticipated. If you are my friend and have been talking to me on a regular basis (don't worry, one statement does not infer the other...) you'll know that I finally felt like I was living my ASIAN DREAM because I took two weeks to travel around Thailand and Vietnam!

Not only did I get to travel around these two AMAZING countries but I was lucky enough to get to travel with my very good friend Bilal! (Shout out to Bilal!) Finally - I could SHARE some of my Asian experience with someone from home. This means 20 years from now I can discuss Asia with someone from home (rather then discuss Asia to myself, in my head, on my own when all my Malaysia friends - whom I DID get to share this experience with - are living all around the world). 

Anyway so let me tell you about my trip. You may want to get comfy, get yourself a snack, because this is going to be a looooonnnnggg read (And only part 1 of 2)... and I apologize in advance. 

First Stop: Bangkok, Thailand. 

Happy reunion on Khao San Road :)

What it's like to live in a fire place

Maybe some of you at home (in Canada) have been reading about the toxic haze slowly creeping into Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. Just so y'all know... it's affecting me over here. What is the reason for this hazey grossness you ask? Sumatra is burning. Apparently some people believe that setting everything on fire is the cheap (and ideal?) method for clearing the crop fields so that they can grow crops again next year. The only (MAJOR) problem is that the smoke from the numerous forest fires is carried by the wind over to Singapore, up to KL and it's heading even further north, consuming and destroying all mucous membranes in it's path. I guess this is one of the problems with living on the side of the world that is still developing. Some countries just can't afford/use the technology/have the technology to do things in a clean way that doesn't make the air into one giant cigarette. 

Kuala Lumpur: a confluence of muddy waters

It's been six months (?!?!?!?!) since I moved to Asia and 5 months since I moved into my apartment and really started living in Kuala Lumpur. I got into the habit of leaving KL every 2 weeks sometimes due to bordem and cabin fever,  sometimes due to my desire to travel Asia in this short 1 year. But there were weeks where I felt like I was spending too much time outside of KL and not really embracing the city. In the beginning I didn't really care because to me, KL was a crazy, overwhelming city without a grid system and it really just confused me for various reasons (the lack of logic re: everything, the roads, the transport system) and so I didn't mind leaving so often.

Malaysia in May: Stories of Landlords, Cousins and Amy Winehouse

Hey guuuuuys! I'm back! I hope you missed me. I've been super-duper busy with everything going on in my life: My choir, my new (and amazing) yoga classes twice a week, my travels, all the new projects that I've been given at work, and of course, all the "socializing" that I have been doing. Actually, the only reason why I have some time to sit down and write again is because my body has basically forced me to sssssssllllloooooowwwwww things down by picking up a lovely pair of viruses. Yes, a pair. Two. So please, send me some healthy vibes so I can get back to my regular (but maybe a little bit more toned down) lifestyle.

As always, I have lots to update you on. Since the elections, I travelled to Langkawi for my company's annual Team Retreat, I was treated to a visit from Devesh, and I renegotiated my lease with my landlord (which was probably one of the biggest challenges I have faced since moving to Malaysia). And the best thing that's happened to me since we last saw each other is that Henna came back to KL for summer holidays and began working with me at Mindvalley as an intern AND Sumira also decided to come visit home (for an all-too-short 10 days). It's a full house (plus one more - I totally crashed it, being the baby that I am, so that I didnt have to be a super woman and take care of my sickly self).

Okay. Where do I stat?

Langkawi. Once a year, my company takes advantage of the fact that we can get to a beautiful beach in approximately one hour by airplane and moves all 120 of us to a place where we can chill out, swim, party, build sandcastles....and work :-P. This year, the team got moved to Langkawi which is an island off the northern west coast of Malaysia which is known for its beautiful beaches, jungles, waterfalls, mountains, and tax free alcohol :) When you look at pictures of this place, it is totally spectacular. When we finally reached there on Thursday afternoon, Langkawi did not disappoint. We stayed at the Berjaya hotel where we had a beautiful view of the ocean from our rooms.

Malaysian Elections - A Canadian's Perspective

It's May 5th and 4:00 pm and I'm sitting at my Aunt's house waiting to hear what the results of the Federal election in Malaysia will be (which we be known in a few short hours).

It has been a pretty intense process for me to take in everything election/politics related over the last month here in Kuala Lumpur as I am used to living in a country where your political alliance is a vey private matter and a private decision. It is not a topic of discussion during parties (at least among my friends), nor appropriate conversation for a nice sit down dinner, or part of the useless banter/small talk with your taxi driver. It is here. This year is a year unlike any others when it comes to politics in Malaysia. The Malaysia government can call an election when ever they desire within the 4 years that they are in power. This year, the ruling party (called BN) waited till the end of their 4 years to call the election and refused to tell the public exactly which day the elections would be placed on.

Signs that an election was coming started with strangely flags scattered along the roads about 3 months back. At one point, I asked if there was a festival going on! Then BN started handing out ...well...handouts and things to certain racial groups in Malaysia about 2 months ago (around the time that I went to Ipoh) and this eventually resulted in a build up of political discussion and a hugeeeeeeeeee build up political flags.

This year, there is very little certainty regarding who will win the election. For the last 50 years, the country has been under the control of BN. There has been no change for FIFTY YEARS and in the last few years the party has even stopped trying to hide the corruption going on within the government. After 50 years the population seems like it is ready for change and it seems that there is A LOT of talk in support of the Opposition party.

Let's talk about some ways that the Canadian elections differ from the Malaysia elections.

1. There is political signage EVERYWHERE.... and it seriously appeared over night on every sign post, on every street where ever space is available (not just on people's front lawns). I don't really know what BN thinks is going to happen if they put up more and more flags but...whatever.

A day in the life of....

Hey guys.

I've wanted to put up this post for some time now. I just took a bunch of pics as I went through my weekly routine to show you what it looks like where I live and do my work. The last pics that I put up of my apartment were pretty depressing so I wanted to share what my room has transformed into since I moved in about 4 months ago. As you can see, I am settling in :) 

My bed with my bolster pillow that I love... everyone's really into bolsters in Asia... imma bring one home. 

The Bangkok Experience: Shopping, Eating & Soaking...

Okey dokey.... It's been WAY to long since my last blog post. I hope yall missed me :). I've started uncontrollably adding smiley faces to everything I type due to working with customers all the time, and constantly leaving them little :) :) :) even after firmly telling them off. So..... if there is an excessive number of smiley faces in this post, I'm sorry. I can't tell. I don't even think it's weird any more.

In the last 3 weeks, I travelled to two places! First, to the Perhentian Islands, located on the East Coast of Malaysia, with a bunch of AIESECers for a mini vacay. We left KL on an overnight bus on Thursday and came back on an overnight bus on Sunday (which was an "adventure"/scene out of my worst nightmare), after which I went home, napped for 2 hours, showered, and went straight into work. I AM HARD CORE FRIENDS. So. hard. core.

More recently (about two weeks ago now), I went on a lovely 5 day trip to visit my roommate from first year, the lovely Chollawan, who is currently living in Bangkok. And, this is what I'm going to write about in today's edition of my bloggity blog blog.

First, I have to say that Bangkok is an incredible! There is so much culture, so much to do and see, such good food and SO.MUCH.SHOPPING. In the 4 full days I spent in Bangkok, Chollawan took me all around the city to get the full Thai experience.

So Bangkok is located in kinda mid-way up Thailand (and Thailand borders Malaysia to its south). Bangkok is in a really safe area of Thailand but right by the Malay-Thai border is a civil war going on in Thailand were many people die every day. Even though it is not even something I think about in my daily life while living in Malaysia, or even all that often while in Bangkok, this is constantly being talked about on the news in Thailand. It's weird that a civil war is occurring so close to me and since I don't follow any Asian media channels regularly, the war does not even cross my mind on most days (FYI there is also a war going on in Malaysia in Borneo with the Phillipeans...).

AIESEC. 7 countries, 2 holidays, 1 day

On Easter weekend, the AIESEC Global network really showed me what it could do. In the past (during my McGill dayzzzz), I have been really jealous when my fellow AIESECers went on exchange/internship, met a group of people from all around the world, became besties with them and celebrated all their holidays and went sight-seeing and traveling together. I'm really happy to say that I am one of those people now, complete with the insane number of events, beautiful pictures, and travel stories...

On Easter Weekend, two very different religious holidays were taking place.... First of all, let me just talk about how Malaysia doesn't give ANY holiday for Easter unless you go to an international school. Ya ya ya okay it is a Muslim country but since you give holiday for Diwali, Chinese New Year and Hari Raya, why not include the Christians too? Anyway..... AIESECers being AIESECers decided to celebrate Easter and Holi on the same day anyways :)

My lovely Polish friends were adamant that we had to paint eggs, eat eggs, ham, easter soup in order to properly celebrate. So we did! Where my friend Zuza managed to find acrylic paints, food colour and paint brushes? I have absolute no idea. All I can say is that the Polish are PRO at painting Easter eggs... and me?... not so much.

Inter-Cultural Interactions

Dearest Blog readers!

Hello! How are you all doing over there in Canada? India? Singapore? Specifically the cities of Toronto and Drummondville (?) I'm acting weird right? Ya, I know! It's because I know who you all are now!...Kind of. My friend Martin, from Uruguay (who arrived in KL just 2 weeks before me) has helped me to put Google Analytics on my blog! It's super cool - now I can track what cities you are in, what browser you use and how long you spend on my blog. The only thing is that I just don't know WHO you are (and this is why you need to comment. A simple 'hi!' would suffice. I'm really not asking for much guys). So basically, a whole new creepy internet world of tracking has been opened up to me. And, now that I am working in an online marketing environment, the stats that Google Analytics provides actually kind of means something to me now. In 2 years of having this blog, I've reached over 15,000 hits (it sounds pretty impressive...but really its not :-P) and I'm able to tell that I could never make it as a personal growth author :-P.

Speaking about personal growth, look at my Team's new piccy!

Love Week at Mindvalley, My Trip to Ipoh, and other revelations.

I’m feeling like I’ve become more and more settled in Kuala Lumpur and this has caused me to think about some things...

One day, I was walking to work, happily ignoring the calls and whistles and ‘hellos’ and ‘good mornings’ that are often called out to me on the way to work – I don't get called at because I’m dressed like a *slooot* but, because I am dressed in a way that makes me so obviously foreign. 

The typical professional woman working in Kuala Lumpur is dressed in a long, flowing gown/mumu type thing or loose clothing and a head scarf.... (this is a Muslim nation after all). Meanwhile, I’m wearing a skirt that hits slightly above the knee, or skinny jeans which are a little more shape-hugging than the aforementioned outfit. Therefore, I stand out, along with many other foreign (and not so foreign) girls working at Mindvalley.

So as I was walking to work, I realized that I had taken to walking around with a scowl on my face in order to ward off the people who thought it would be kinda cool to say “hellooooo”. In my heart, I was kinda sad with myself because I’m usually the person walking around Montreal with a smile on my face for no apparent reason (ironically, this leads to the same effect as the scowl in Malaysia – where people avoid me because they think I’m a little looney... seriously. One time, my chiropractor was like: I’m about to manipulate your spine and you are smiling. What is wrong with you?) but here I was, starting my day with a frown!

This led me to think about all the things I’ve had to change about myself, in ways that I do not like, in order to adapt to living here. For example, I’ve had to give up recycling because no recycling facility exists! It kills me just a little bit inside, every time I have to throw a cardboard box into the garbage because there is no recycling at my building or at my work place :’( Right now, a pang of guilt goes through my body, but I can slowly feel this level of guilt diminishing...NOT GOOD.

The third thing I’ve had to change is my politeness factor. It has been greatly reduced. Being Canadian, I’m just inherently over-polite. I am the totally classic case where when someone bumps into me on the sidewalk, I say sorry to them. Now in KL, by adding extra words like “please” and “thank you” to a request, I seriously confuse the people who work at places like my cell phone company (Maxis) or the local Mamak.

Case in point – the tea tarek that the Mamak gave me had too much sugar and I needed to ask them to remake it with less sugar. So I said: Hi there, thanks, I ordered this teh tarek but if you don’t mind, could you make it with less sugar? It’s a little too sweet for me to drink. Thanks.

In response, I get a super confused look from the server because I’ve used so many works that they don’t know what I’m asking for. But, then I said to the waiter: Too sweet . Less sugar. Change. – they know EXACTLY what to do! Basically, being polite takes a lot of words and people here speak with the fewest words possible. Therefore, being polite slows down communication considerably so you just gotta say what you WANT, straight up. I was also sent this video by a friend about Malaysian English. Maybe it will give you some insight into what I face every day when it comes to speaking with my cab driver or when it comes to bargaining at a stall so that I can pass as a local. Let me just say that I’m not doing so well right now......

Now, I want to tell you about something lovely! Last week (well, 2 weeks ago now) at Mindvalley was our version of Valentine’s day. Mindvalley’s way of celebrating love was by creating a week where we did nice things for people for no apparent reason. Everyone pulled a name out of a hat and that became their human that they would do nice things for. As secret angels, we were asked to leave cute things on our human’s desks or find different ways to show them love for an entire work week.

I pulled the name of the biggest, facial-hairiest guy in our office who is basically our resident hacker. His name is Gareth and I knew nothing about him except for that he was a techie who sat in the corner of the office and made sure all the servers for our websites were up and running.

But, as the days went on, I learned so much about Gareth from everyone else at Mindvalley, which I probably would have never learnt about him had I not pulled his name out of the hat. Gareth is a tech CELEBRITY in Malaysia. They call him Shaoling Tiger and he has over six thousand followers on twitter. Gareth is British, but not really, because he knows more about Malaysian and Chinese food and where to get the best stuff to eat, over any other Malaysian. Gareth is actually currently living in Malaysia because he fell in love with a girl from here and married her! Basically – this Gareth was one PRETTY INTERESTING CHARACTER.

So, I did things for Gareth like made him this tumblr: http://ilovegareth.tumblr.com. I spread flowers and hearts all over his desk (I have a strong feeling that he didn’t appreciate have teenie little hearts everywhere but OH WELL IT WAS A NICE GESTURE), I bought him a razor and provided a beard menu and demanded that he shave his beard in a cool way. And at the end of love week, I got nominated as one of the most creative secret angels for my tumblr :)

The person that had me was a pretty great secret angel too. He/she left me cute gifts every day – one of them was a SELF-PORTRAIT taken from my facebook profile picture... now that is skillz. I was treated to cheese cake (the yummiest) and at the end of the week, an adorable teddy bear who now sits on my desk. Thanks secret angel!

Now that was love week at Mindvalley!

Let’s talk about my short 2 day trip to Ipoh with Michelle Ngai (that’s right, she makes a repeat appearance!) Michelle is currently working in Alor Star which is about 2.5 Hrs north of Ipoh while I have been working in Kuala Lumpur, 2.5 hrs south of Ipoh. So we decided to go to Ipoh which is known for its limestone cave formations and its really soft noodles and nutritious beansprouts! Now, most people never think to take a trip to Ipoh. It’s a pretty small town and there is no beach, but Michelle had heard that there is the opportunity to go spelunking in Ipoh so we said HAY. Let’s do it!

We met up at the Ipoh bus station on Friday night. My bus came in a little earlier so I sat down, stuck in some headphones and tried to chill out.

I gotta say  - I was a little nervous being there by myself late at night...not knowing how much longer Michelle would be and also not knowing where the hotel was that we were staying at that night. But – Michelle finally arrived and we found our hotel with ease. The receptionist was friendly, but she had no idea what we were asking for when we tried to find out how far away the limestone caves were and if we could get a taxi for the next morning. (We were being too polite!) Finally we said – Taxi. 8:30 am. Bye.

And so that night we debated over which level of spelunking we wanted to take on. There were 4 levels, levels 3 and 4 involved climbing through small holes, swimming in cave rivers and sliding down walls. We were pretty sure we wanted to do level 3, mostly because we had only brought flip flops with us... People on tripadvisor suggested sturdy slippers so I thought we were going to be okay.

We finally got to the caves the next morning and found out we would be joining a group of 60 girls from a local university who were part of an “extreme sports” club. Michelle and I looked at these girls in their intense water pants, rubber shoes, water proof bags, ALL carrying flashlights and we thought.... erm..... 

They must be over-prepared. We’ll be okay.  At the last minute, we thought we might switch to level 4 since the group was much smaller but after asking a few people about whether our footwear was appropriate, we decided against it. And THANK GOD. Because we were so not prepared for what we were about to experience.

First of all.... it’s impossible to walk or swim in rivers while wearing slippers because they will float away. And, if you don’t have a flash light, you will not find them in the complete darkness. Luckily, we had the FRIENDLIEST 60 girls with us who were so kind as to swim out to help us find our flip flops and make sure we had enough light to find our way, and to help us with the strange walls we had to slide down and hold our hands to keep us steady as we climbed through holes, and walked and swam around the rocky cave rivers in the dark. Their kindness and their interest in these two random Canadian girls really touched my heart and I felt really lucky to have joined them!

The caves were incredible. I felt like I was on the set of an Indiana Jones movie the entire time. I felt like I was going through some strange ride at Disney land but, no, this was a real limestone cave with real stalactites and stalagmites and rivers and bat poop that I was swimming in. It is incredible how large the caves are and how clear and clean the water is within the caves! It was a really cool experience getting to swim around the limestone and see a cave from the inside! 2.5 hrs later we emerged into daylight with new friends and a sigh of relief that we didn’t do the 3.5 hr trip because I think I would have most definitely lost both flip flops and twisted an ankle or SOMETHING.

We got back to our hotel, napped, and then went out for dinner with Michelle’s PhD collaborator and got a lovely night tour of the quaint town of Ipoh. The next day, we were meeting up with my Dad’s friend from university named Cecilia. She wanted to take Michelle and I to breakfast so at 9 30 am we piled in her car and went for dim sum! I met her husband, Vern, and her grandson, Sam. We got to the restaurant and I asked Cecilia –

S: So how long has it been since you’ve seen my Dad?

And she said C: “I’ve never met him”.  Inside my head I was like... :-O. What?

And then I reasoned “Ohh, you mean you haven’t met him since you graduated from University?” and Cecilia said “no, I’ve never met him before.”

S:“So HOW DO YOU KNOW EACH OTHER?”

C: “He added me on Facebook”. 

Inside my head now I was like -____________ -. My dad is one of those ppl that randomly adds people on facebook. And now this lady is nice enough to take me out to breakfast. So I inquired further:

S: What? But how did he find you on facebook?

This is when I learned that my dad was the president of the “international club” at his university in the Philippians, and Cecilia joined this group a few years later. Today, they have a facebook group that they are all a part of where they organize their reunions and share stories and photos. (SO THIS is what my dad’s generation does on facebook....).

Anyway – Cecilia and Vern were the LOVELIEST people. They took Michelle and I to breakfast, and then all around the lovely, laid back town of Ipoh. We went to the weekly Sunday antique market where Cecilia and Vern knew EVERYONE THERE. They helped us bargain and I found the nicest bag which I paid 10 RM for ($3.33 USD), and a BALL ROOM TYPE DRESS for 7 RM! (This is $2.33). I was so excited!!!

Such great finds at this market – old antiques, the newest and oldest electronics I’ve ever seen. Wanna know where your old stereo system went to die? We’ll it’s in Ipoh being sold at the flea market. The oldest fans I have ever seen, cell phone chargers of every kind – you need it, you name it, they GOT IT! So we had a really fun afternoon antiquing in Ipoh (Michelle also managed to find the nicest antique watch in the entire market. Unfortunately the price was a little too high L but it did prove that she has good taste!) 

After this, Cecilia and Vern took us for Ipoh’s famous chicken and beansprouts. The beansprouts in Ipoh are famous for being THICK and healthy because the limestone water has lots of good minerals that get into the sprouts.

We had the yummiest meal and then went to go see some more limestone caves, a beautiful national park with BEAUTIFUL limestone formations and then finally went to their home where we relaxed until Michelle and I got on our separate buses and parted ways.

Again – I felt so lucky to have met such a wonderful family. The people who live in Malaysia are just proving themselves, over and over again, to be incredibly hospitable, friendly and generous. You rarely see this level of hospitality towards total strangers in North America!

Now... some weird stuff did happen on this trip. Like – the receptionist started texting me. I had to give my phone number when I checked in but then, it strangely turned into this:

Then I thought that would be the end of it after I checked out but the next day when I was already back in KL....

We also got into a minor (ok major) argument with our taxi driver due to a GREAT DEAL OF MISCOMMUNICATION so that was very interesting and you can ask me about that story and I can elaborate ONE ON ONE.

But overall, it was a GREAT weekend trip and I had a wonderful time!

Okay long blog post but I felt like I was really behind and I had so much to tell you! Bye bye!!

Chinese New Year in Kuala Lumpur!

Dearest Friends,

I am so happy to be writing to you as it has been such a LONG time since I last sent you an update, and I have lots of stories to share!!

But I must tell you that this past week and the week before, I have been missing home a little bit. It was family day long-weekend and Reading Week at Western so my brother was at home with my parents doing fun things with them like watching movies, eating cookies that Marissa made, driving around in an Audi because Jalesh got the car rear-ended...good job Jalesh... and I was so missing! On top of that, can you believe that I am actually missing the snow, ESPECIALLY when y’all take pretty pictures of snow covering things/snow falling in pretty places (like Montreal) and then instagram them. You may look at my instagram feed and get a little jealsies, but I’m feeling the same way looking at yours!

Anyway, this week I wanted to tell you about what it’s like to experience Chinese New Year in the land of the Chinese people...(ok it’s not China but there are nuff Chinese people here too). First of all, I don’t know if I mentioned this but it is the year of the snake which is MY YEAR! So it’s really cool that it is my year the year that I am in ASIA!

So as I told you before, Kuala Lumpur was totally painted red. There were red Chinese lanterns hanging from every mall and every other house, and red lights up all around the city. Even whilst in Penang, there were rid lights and lanterns EVERYWHERE. Boxes of mandarin oranges and yummy shortbread cookies appeared in our office kitchen every day and everyone was abuzz with Chinese New Year plans.

I, too, had plans for Chinese New Year, but much simpler plans than everyone else. Since we got an EXTRA long weekend (Sat, Sun, Mon & Tues), non-Chinese people travel to some lovely Asian island while Chinese people travel back to their home towns. The thing is, because everyone is traveling, it’s not the cheapest time for booking flights and many hostels and hotels are fully booked. This was okay for me though, because I wanted to stay in KL and experience Chinese New Year from the perspective of a family celebrating! My co-worker, Lin, invited me to her family’s Chinese New Year open house, where all of her family gets together to eat, drink and gamble!

I think you can guess whose house this is....

So on Monday around noon, we walked over to Lin’s house and shortly after, Lion dancers showed up at Lin’s front gates. Her family lit dozens and dozens of fire crackers and the Lion dance group played drums and cymbals as they lions danced through Lin’s house, blessing it with wishes for prosperity (just fyi, I am not an expert in Chinese traditional practices/culture... and most things are done for prosperity so this MOSTLY a guess....). The Lion dance was a loud and elaborate spectacle and really interesting to watch because each lion is controlled by two individuals who have to be extremely coordinated to make the lion dance. The lion also goes around ‘eating’ things like heads of lettuce and pineapples so I literally have no idea how the dancers managed to hold them inside the lion with them while manipulating the lion its self.

ROAAAAR

wraw. 

After the lion dance, we enjoyed a massive meal with Lin’s family and friends. One of the things that they do before they eat is bring out a huge plate with noodle-type-things and raw seafood. Then, everyone is instructed to put their chopsticks into the huge plate, all at the same time, and try to lift and mix the noodles as high as possible. The higher you lift the noodles, and the more messy you make it, (you guessed it) the more prosperous you will be.

Noodles & Prosperity!

After stuffing ourselves with Nasi Lemak, fried chicken and tiramisu just DRIPPING in rum, we tried to gamble with Lin’s friends. Notice how I said ‘tried’. The game was blackjack, and at our table, the minimum bet was 5 RM (this is $1.66). So I happily put in my 5 RM and within 2 seconds, the money was taken from me because someone else WON something. I didn’t even look at my cards. I had noo idea what had just happened. I was UBER confused and decided that gambling was NAAAATTTT my thing. After this, I decided it would be wise to watch (why I didn’t think of doing this before I played, I do not know). I soon figured out that they were playing blackjack with about 15 additional rules such as if you can hit 7 times and still be under 21, you win 3 times your bet. If you draw a 15, you have to double your bet, kill your cards and pick up 2 more sets of two, increasing your chances of getting 21.

intense FOCUS.

NOW DO YOU SEE WHY I WAS SO CONFUSED? After learning the rules.... I still didn’t play but helped by co-worker win some $$ and overall, it was lots of fun.

After some gambling, I thanked Lin and her mother for a wonderful day and headed out to see one of the largest Chinese Buddhist temples in KL called the Thean Huo Temple, to see everything that happens on Chinese New Year and to see all the pretty red lanterns.

This temple was beautiful! There were thousands of red lanterns, tons of stalls with shiny golden pinwheels and lots of people praying and collecting their fortunes at the temple. 

Thean Huo Temple - Bangsar, KL

I also got my fortune! What you do is grab a bunch of plastic sticks. You pull them into the air and then drop them into a metal cylinder. All the sticks will sink to the bottom but one will stay above the rest. This stick as a number on it so you match the number to the numbered fortunes, and that there, is your fortune! What was my fortune?? THAT’S A SECRET.

I absolutely loved seeing people dressed in red and white, lighting their incense, praying to their ancestors and deceased relatives and getting their fortunes. It was like my Religions of East Asia class coming to life!

All in all, it was a lovely Chinese New Year. I got to experience it from the perspective of a family that celebrates and parties, from the religious perspective, and from the perspective of someone who doesn’t celebrate and lies in her bed at night listening to firecrackers go off for 14 days straight :-P.

But seriously – love that my Asian adventure is finally giving me some cultural experiences! The saddest thing though, is that all my pictures are TRAPPED on my camera until further notice because I didn’t bring the TRANSFER WIRE WITH ME. But I am soon taking a trip to Singapore, at which point I will obtain the technology I need and you will be inundated with my photos.

More about this past week’s trip to Ipoh later!  MUCH LOVE!

My trip to the town/city of PENANG!

When you tell people from Kuala Lumpur that you are taking a trip to Penang, they all say “awwww Penang? I love penang! I want to move to penang, penang has the best food!” and when you talk to people from Penang, many of them will tell you that they are originally from KL, went out to Penang for a trip, and never left!

Basically, people in KL love Penang, people in Penang LOVE Penang, and I really enjoyed my time there too! Penang is an island off the west coast of Malaysia and is about a 4.5 hr bus ride from Kuala Lumpur. If you ask people what there is to do over there, they will tell you that you that you go to Penang to EAT because Penang people really care about their food. I even downloaded an app on my phone called “Penang street food” which points you to the best places nearby, based on what you want to eat. Apparently Penang has the BEST cha kway teoy (shirp, friend noodles), Indian food, prawn mee (prawn noodles in soup), plus a number of dishes with names that I do not understand the meaning of.

Quickly, here’s a lesson on the naming of Mamak food in Malaysia:

Nasi = Rice

Goreng = Fried

Mi = Noodles

Cha = shrimp

Ayam = chicken

Roti = bread

Now let me test you:

What is Nasi Goreng ?

What is Mi goreng?

For Bonus points: Maggi Goreng?

If you answered: Fried Rice, Fried noodles and those maggi noodles that you get in a package but fried in a real dish, you would be correct! Add some ayam and you got a full meal... kinda... One thing I discovered with Tharyn yesterday (I mean he probably already thought of this but I’m just going to say that we had a brain wave) was that the reason why everything is fried is because of the lack of concept of ‘BAKED’ because of the lack of OVENS! We thought up this while thinking about how easy it is to make quiches but how difficult it is when you don’t have an oven L (Just so you know it took me about 2 weeks to finally understand that every time I ordered Nasi goreng, I was just ordering plain old fried rice... and not some other new and interesting dish).

Anyway, Penang is all about the Mamak food. There is just a seriously huge amount of food everywhere you go and everywhere you turn. But the food is not perpetually there... The road literally transforms from day to night. The main road has nothing but hardware stores and airline/travel stalls and Chinese temples and Mosques.  But as soon as the sun begins to set, BAM. THE FOOD STALLS COME UP, tables are set up everywhere along the street and people are just chowing down. It really was a transformation that I have yet to experience anywhere else. You also have a number of open air hawker centers where tons of people sit and order food from the stalls surrounding them. The food comes fast, friend and super yummy! And the food was YUMMO – I think my favourite was the peppered prawns or the Satay that we ordered.

Zehra and I stayed right by a street called Love Lane, in an area called “George Town”. George Town, and particularly Love Lane, is a UNESCO world heritage site because it is the area where the British first colonized Malaysia (I think....at least this is what Zehra and I determined thanks to Wikipedia) and so the architecture in this area is just lovely – quaint little buildings painted in pastel colours. All around is iron street art, made to depict the British history of the area. Zehra and I did a lot of exploring.

In George Town with new Sunglasses!

We walked around George Town, around Little India, around the mosques and temples that are known for being so diverse and in such close proximity, and the  “clubbing district area” where we ended up going into a hawker center called the Red Dragon where we found tons of people sitting around tables, drinking, and watching a petite Asian woman dance around on an elaborate stage while singing asian music. We THINK it was a performance for Chinese new year but we can’t be sure because then, the Asian woman got up on a table, started singing gangnam style, and then proceeded to chug beers while doing flexibility exercises. It was easily one of the weirdest (yet entertaining) things I have ever seen in my life. Unfortunately I did not bring my camera with me so you’ll just have to believe me.

What was also really fun about this trip is that we got to meet up with Michelle Ngai, since she is currently doing research  about 2.5 hrs away for her PhD in Ipoh. We explored the Chinese temples together and observed as they got ready for Chinese New Year by hanging all their lanterns and things! It was like 2 Million degrees outside so we basically hopped from one shady spot to the next and drank ICED teh tarek in between.

Chinese Temple

Outside our Hostel

Outside the Penang Mosque

On our 2^nd last day in Penang, zehra and I made an executive decision to leave our cute little area and take a bus out to a supposedly GREAT hawker stall. But when we got there, we found that it was closed L LUCKILY we had directors from someone in our hostel to go looking for the best prawn mi place “close by”. So we walked and asked people and walked and asked people but there was no sign of the best prawn mi place ever. Finally I went into a restaurant where a jolly family gave me directions. BUT WE STILL COULDNT FIND THE PLACE after walking for 5-10 more mins. So we thought we would take the bus home but, little did we realize, we had taken the bus down a one-way street so the bus stop in the opposite direction was no where to be seen.

I went back to the jolly family who was unsure of the bus stop location but told us to take a taxi... and if we couldn’t find a taxi, come back to the restaurant because they would take us home. Obviously we could not find a taxi, so we went back and the jolly Asian man and his wife happily drove us back to George town... then... took us to dinner, then paid for our dinner, then introduced us to their daughter (their son, I had met at the restaurant because he owns it). So basically, Zehra and I met the most hospitable family in Malaysia. They were so sad that Zehra and I were leaving the next day as they wanted us to join them at their holiday apartment on the beach. But since we could not, they told us to get ready for 6:30 AM the following morning because they would take us to the Botanical Gardens.

And so at 6:30 AM the next day, they showed up, took us to see the beautiful Penang sunrise, bought us a traditional Malay breakfast, and took us on a walk through the gardens. Beverly (the mom) and her daughter, Angeline were actually the cutest mum and daughter ever. Angeline guided her mother as she drove through the streets of Penang and suggested some hilarious things like “why don’t you just go through this red light” ... or said “der der der der *point*” when the light turned green and Beverly hadn’t moved. They were so cute and so hilarious to observe.

With our new favourite family!

Botanical Gardens with Beverly and Angeline

Penang Sun Rise :)

A malaysian breakfast!

I felt pretty special that Beverly and Lim (her husband) had taken a liking to us. I didn’t know whether they were just really really bored, or they really liked us, or, Beverly just saw the fear in my eyes when we couldn’t find the bus nor could we catch a taxi. All in all, I felt so happy to meet this lovely family and experience the friendliness of the Malaysian people that everyone is always talking about J

Zehra and I got up to some other exciting things like going to the beach to go parasailing (although beaches are not Penang’s strong point), finding and chicken nuggets, after eating SO MUCH MAMAK FOOD, and then being caught by a local who told us off for not eating the local food anddddddddddddd ya. Also the hostel we stayed in was wonderful and highly recommended for anyone traveling to Penang. You can find them on Facebook here!

Overall, we had a lovely trip and we came home with full tummies and some great stories!