New Day, New Country

Leaving Thailand:  It’s a travel day.  I leave Phuket today.  I am going to Kuala Lumpur (KL, for short), Malaysia.  Air Asia makes winging your way around this part of the world easy and relatively cheap.  It’s cheaper if you can buy a ticket online, but I can’t, at least with Air Asia.  I have tried several times, but they will not take my credit card information.  I asked at the airport and the airline says it’s the credit card company.  I email my credit card company and they send a canned response that says it is the airline.  It doesn’t really matter, though.  At every airport, the airlines all have ticket counters where you can walk up and buy a ticket up to the time of departure.  It seemed to me that the prices were only about 15 dollars more expensive.  It is mighty convenient, but if you did it in the US you would pay premium fares.  Let me say it out loud:  US airlines are the least progressive on the planet and spend most of their time thinking up new ways to charge for their tickets and other services.  Here’s another example.  I might attend a conference in Montreal in the fall.  So I went on line (while in Patong) and priced a ticket:  over $700.  I then sent an email to my travel agent in Virginia:  same price.  By comparison, I will cross an international boundary flying from Phuket to Kuala Lumpur and pay about $100 (for advance purchase, it is less).  How do the US airlines get away with it?  My backup plan (if I actually choose to go) is to fly to Burlington, Vermont, and rent a car for the Canadian portion of the trip.  Maybe on a slow day soon, I will write more about budget airlines.

I can’t say that Phuket was one of my favorite places, but it has come to feel like home over the past five days.  I now have a favorite restaurant, a favorite coffee shop, a favorite ice cream parlor, and a favorite deck chair by the pool.  Oh, I shouldn’t have admitted that!  Just remember, this is a resort island, so accommodation prices are low.  I would certainly return here, but I think tourism is gobbling up the island, which is the very resource that attracts visitors.  Some restrictions on development are badly needed.  Returning to the airport by taxi (a 50 minute drive), I became even more away of how sprawl has crept along each and every road.  The airport, though, is right on the beach; it is very modern and welcoming.  I bought my ticket, passed through border control, and waited for my departure.  From the air you get a broader view of the Andaman Sea and realize what a tropical paradise it is. 

Arriving in Malaysia:  A little more than an hour later, we landed in KL.  As usual, there was a landing card to fill out.  Here is what it said in red caps at the bottom of the card:  BE FOREWARNED DEATH FOR DRUG TRAFFICKERS UNDER MALAYSIAN LAW.  I wondered if I should get rid the aspirin in my backpack.  I think I arrived at the Budget Airline Terminal, which is separate from the main terminal.  And, it did seem a little ‘budget.’  Thirty US dollars to get into the city by taxi.  Nix that idea.  Where’s the bus?  Finally figured out the answer to that one.  Price?  Less than US $3 to the Central Station (and it's really far away).  From the station, I paid about 30 cents (US) to take the train to the part of town where I had identified a place to stay.  Of course, everything was priced in Malaysian ringgit.  (Yes, the currency used to be the Malaysian dollar, which is what I was expecting.)

I am a card-carrying member of Hostelling International, so for this leg of the trip, I decided to go back to budget accommodations.  I checked the HI website and found a place in Kuala Lumpur, and it seemed rather centrally located (a priority for me).  It turned out to be a two-star hotel (Wira Hotel).  Instead of dormitory quarters, I got a private room and a nice one at that.  Price?  About $30 US, breakfast included and free wifi, too.

The journey to KL was fun.  In fact, it was more fun than usual because when I left the hotel in Thailand, I had neither a plane ticket nor a place to stay in Malaysia.  Whenever there are some unknowns in the equation, it makes travel exciting.  I have often said that there is nothing more exhilarating that arriving in a city where you have never been with no advance planning.  You have to figure it all out from scratch.  But, as the ‘unknown’ becomes the ‘known,’ you feel like you have learned so much and another city has been added to your collection.  By the end of this trip, I will have visited 37 of the 101 largest cities on the planet.  My hobby:  collecting places.

Geographically yours,

D.J.Z.