Getting here accounts for roughly 24 hours of time in transit on top of a 12 or 13 hour time zone change. Let me say one thing quite clearly: I never want to take this trip in economy. That might sound stuck up but our company has a policy on trips like this to book us into business class and as much as this trip sucked it sucked a whole lot less than economy would have. My advice though, bring a pair of sweats for sleeping so you don't feel so icky sleeping in your travel clothes!! Also in business you get these cute little travel bags. The one I got had what I call travel slippers, a eye patch for sleeping, toothbrush and toothpaste, hand lotion, chapstick, a glasses cleaning cloth and face lotion. Sometimes they have a little candy in there :) I also love the multiple warm wet face clothes they give you to freshen up a bit.
So favourite things about Malaysia!!!
Unbelievable wireless rates
I pay roughly 80 CAD a month for my phone back home, that gets me 500 MB, unlimited talk and... that's it. Before I left Canada I picked up an unlock code off Ebay for 15 CAD for my S5. When I arrived in Malaysia at the airport I picked up a SIM card for RM 10 (RM 1 roughly = 0.32 CAD) and then added talk time and data for RM 30 each. Now I'm not entirely clear yet on the how the talk time works out, after every call I get a notification of how much money my call just cost and how much I have in balance. Somehow it worked out that I spent RM 30 and got RM 40 in credit. A week here and I've used less than RM 10. Data I bought 1 GB of data and got a bonus 500 MB. I have been getting texts about this other like welcome pack of 100 MB that I got for free too and there's wifi everywhere so I don't think I've even gone through the 100 MB yet. Plus social media apps don't cost me any data.
Downside, I get a lot of junk mail texts.
I can't figure out how to flip this picture and apparently I was holding my phone upside down when I took it...
Hotel Staff
I guess because the cost of living is lower here our "normal" hotel rate gets us some pretty fancy digs here. My hotel is more like a bachelor apartment, full kitchen, small living room, office, the whole nine. When my colleagues drop me off at the hotel some guy opens the car door for me and closes it then walks me to the elevator to push the button, swipe his card and push the floor number button for me. Call me spoiled! Everyone is so helpful, someone walked me to breakfast the first day because I didn't know where it was.
The Price of.... Everything
Stuff is just cheaper here. Admittedly a few times I've taken a double take when my bill says 60!! Then I remember it's RM not CAD and then I'm shocked that an entire nice sit down meal with drinks cost me 20 CAD. Walking around the mall I found the same things, not like bargain basement prices but I saw a dress regular price for 24 CAD at H&M. That's like sale price back home.
No 'Poo
Ok, not related to Malaysia but last November I switched to no poo. So not only is my hair LOVELY now but it's less maintenance :) I brought my baking soda and ACV with me to Cuba in small plastic containers but the ACV melted the container (who knew) so I was thinking about how to transport it for Malaysia. I guess I didn't think enough because I completely forgot it. I popped over to the local grocery store and they had baking soda for RM 6 and white vinegar for RM 6. I couldn't find ACV but I found apple vinegar with honey for RM 16. A bit of a splurge but touching my hair right now, I feel this was the right decision, hahaha! So the el cheapo solution was 4 CAD, the splurge solution cost me less than 8 CAD. Where can you find conventional shampoo and conditioner that isn't complete garbage for less than 8 CAD? Winner, right here *points at self*
What do you like about travelling in SE Asia?
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