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Jul - Sep 2002: This is a continuation of my China trip, but includes travels to other countries in Asia.

Southeast Asia, month 1

Jennifer Radcliffe
2005-11-12 10:17:24

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a nice hotel room with a shared bath and a pool costs about 40,000 rupiah. Things are very cheap here, but it's hard to know the "real" prices for things. There is a dual pricing system in place - one for locals and one for tourists. When asking what something should cost, people give you all kinds of different answers. In this way, I miss the straightforwardness of more developed countries, where everything is universally expensive! It's the principle of the thing - at least then I know I'm paying the same as the locals. But I guess I shouldn't complain about prices in a country where a bottle of cold Coke only costs 17 cents!

I'm already planning my next trip to Indonesia - my host family invited me to return around the time of Happy New Year, as they called it, when they have a big celebration. I can't wait! I would like to visit Sumatra, Bali and Lombok as well next time!

The music in Indonesia is what won me over first. :) It is so inspiring, and has a way of touching the soul!

Malaysia

Kuala Lumpur is a nice city - clean, comfortable, modern, convenient. It's also very Muslim - most women here dress very conservatively and wear headscarves, and they look at me funny when I wear shorts! It's interesting to see the mixture of modern, shiny highrises with the intricate, geometric Islamic architecture. There are actually Islamic skyscrapers here! Who knew?? And the train station looks more like a grand mosque-cum-castle than an everyday transport hub. I took several pictures of it before someone told me it was a train station.

Today I took a bus to the nearby Batu Caves, about 15km outside of KL. The caves are special because they have Hindu temples inside of them, and on festival days they are a major attraction for the local Indian population. There are steps which you must ...