Us Round The World
…….our travels across the globe

We left Thailand at the end of February taking a ferry from Ko Lipe and bus to Hat Yai where caught the overnight train to Kuala Lumpur. The train was very smart and clean but for about an hour and a half we were stranded with no driver and no idea as to where the driver was. This seemed to annoy a few of the German passengers on our carriage who obviously weren’t used to such inefficiency in rail travel! After we finally departed it wasn’t long until we hit the border with Malaysia. We had to vacate the train with all of our belongings and go through Thai and Malaysian border controls, soon discovering that the Malaysians win for the friendliest border control of our whole journey so far… (and actually just generally being the friendliest people in the world!) Back on the train we headed to the restaurant car for some yummy Malaysian food and then settled in for an early night as we were arriving into KL at 5am. Luckily the train was VERY slow and we actually got in at 7am so we had a nice unexpected lie in. KL Sentral station was great – really modern and within 5 minutes of being there we had two members of the public ask us if we were ok, if we needed directions and welcoming us to KL and Malaysia – well you certainly don’t get when arriving into Euston at 7am that’s for sure!

We locked our bags away and went exploring KL using the fantastic LRT system (sorry I know I’m a geek but it’s been ages since we used a good urban transport system!). The city was lovely, really really clean and modern but with a real mix of Asian cultures. It’s also very very hot and sticky and there is thunder and lightning 312 days a year which meant we had to get used to the storms!

We had decided to get ourselves an apartment for a few nights as I needed to catch up with some MSc work and David also had work to do and also we actually missed cooking as we’d not stayed anywhere with a kitchen for 3 months and so wanted the luxury of our own kitchen. We found a great place on the edge of the city and we settled in for catching up on work… until I was ill again! It was just flu this time and not a food poisoning related illness but still meant I spent 4 days in bed. We extended our stay for a couple of days so we could see more of the city and spent time eating lots of excellent and cheap Indian food, riding the LRT and going to the cinema and shops. After KL we headed for Melaka as it was a highly recommended historic town to visit. It was a fairly odd place and after about an hour there I think we had seen everything – you have to worry about a place when its river boat tour’s most interesting fact was that the piece of land to the left is the site of the old cinema that was open from 1962 to 1994! However the detour to Melaka was certainly worth it if not just for the crazy hostel we stayed at. A live music duo played in the bar at night and the male singer sang an Audioslave song. We told him he sounded like the Malaysian Chris Cornell (he did as well!) and he was so impressed as that’s who he models himself on that he dedicated three Audioslave/Soundgarden songs to us in their final set. It was quite funny as we don’t think he had ever played to anyone who knew who Chris Cornell was before – as he usually sings on cruise ships where he only gets requests for the Beatles and Robbie Williams!

Singapore…

The next day we headed off to Singapore where we decided to spend our last week in Asia (and catch up on that work!) before we got our flight to Australia. Like KL, Singapore was very clean and incredibly safe. The safest place we have ever been. I am sure the death sentence for almost everything aides this. We were reading that two men received the death sentence for discharging a firearm in an internet cafe holdup. Even the intention of murder receives the death sentence. Which did not calm me as I unwittingly committed a crime on entering Singapore! We were walking through border control looking at all the signs that read ‘The sentence for drug trafficking is the death sentence’, when suddenly I realised I had chewing gum in my bag. Chewing gum is strictly banned in Singapore and all the signs read you are not allowed to enter Singapore with it. Oh dear, but we were in the border control cue before I realised and a sudden sense of panic fell on me as I struggled to think what to do with the banned substance. Should i confess and take the punishment or conceal the banned substance. I took the chance and put the chewing gum at the bottom of the back and squeezed through security with a nervous smile on me, and David Laughing at me. Luckily I made it through after a 10 minute ordeal. Then we read the sign more carefully and it said dental chewing gum was actually allowed, which the gum was. Oh well, all that panic for nothing.

However, the massive shock to us was the price of alcohol and we must have looked pretty cheap bartering over the price of a glass of wine at the bars on Clarke Quay! We did have the obligatory Singapore Sling in Raffles though as it has to be done and was a good ending to our time in Asia and marked the end of our overland journey.

We spent our last day at the airport as it had been recommended to me to spend some time there and we weren’t disappointed with the rooftop swimming pool, cinema, guitar hero and DJ hero mixing room, shops, cafes and the really cool Harry’s bar where you can sit on the terrace and drink beer or Singapore slings while you wait for your flight.
So, it was really sad to leave Asia but we looked forward to the next part of our trip going to Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands of Fiji, Western Samoa and Hawaii.

The first three months of our trip were excellent and it’s really difficult to say which were our favourite moments though the places that would go back to right now are the Thai islands and Cambodia and the trans-siberian is highly recommended! We also decided that we might possibly come back to Asia after doing the USA and Central America part of our trip in September as there are still so many things we want to see. So our itinerary might change slightly – watch this space!