Long Bus Ride
Location: Kuala Lumpur
Local Time: Saturday, Jan 28, 2006 - 9:55am
My journey started the night before last, so about 36 hours ago. I had dinner with Seth in Thong Sala, Ko Pha Ngan, Thailand. I caught the overnight ferry from Thong Sala to Surat Thani. Basically, a double decker boat with half height roofs and padding on the floor where you could lay down.
Still, all in all, that was alright. I had a lovely sleep as we made our way back to the mainland.
We got there about 5am, and I piled into the back of a pickup to go to the travel agency where I waited for 2 hours before my minibus left for Haad Yai, which is a central bus terminal several hours drive away. While waiting I got to see American Pie, Band Camp. You might as well skip that movie.
In Haad Yai, I transfered to a VIP bus. The difference between a VIP bus and a mini? The mini makes more stops. Both are basically long vans converted to have 3 rows of 3 seats behind the driver. The distance between the back rest of one seat and the seat ahead is about the length from my thigh bone, from the hip joint to the knee joint. Unfortunately I have padding on the outside of each of those joints.
The VIP bus took us to the Thai/Malaysian border. There I passed through Thai customs and got back on the bus to be taken about 1 km to the Malaysian customs. Anyway, I filled in a form, which warned me drug smuggling into Malaysia carries the death penalty, gave it to the nice lady and she stamped my passport.
Bang! I can legally stay in Malaysia for 3 months. Welcome to Malaysia she says.
Next, onto a NEW VIP bus which carried me to Butterworth. There I was told my connecting bus would arrive in 5 hours to take me to Kuala Lumpur. Okay. I walked around a bit, grabbed some food, had a nap on the bench.
Things started hopping around the travel agencies around 10pm with lots of people showing up and more buses. When I got there at 6, there had been no buses at all.
At 11, I found out my bus wasn't coming. Some indeterminate thing had happened to prevent it's arrival, and now I had to wait some indeterminate amount of time for another, as yet undecided, bus.
Well, it was 2am before I got out of there. It worked out well though. I hit KL at 6:30am. The bus terminal area was already hopping, so I just skipped a hotel for the night and started walking. I've been walking around KL (Kuala Lumpur) now for almost 4 hours. I've been to see the Petronas Towers. They are tall. Some of you (more cultured folk) may remember that the Petronas Towers appeared in the movie Entrapment, staring Sean Connery and Katherine Zeta-Jones. That is where the bank was they had to rob, and the area where they were high up in the sky going from one tower to another is called the Sky Bridge, I think.
So far, Kuala Lumpur is a beautiful city, cleaner than Vancouver, though not as clean as Singapore.
Local Time: Saturday, Jan 28, 2006 - 9:55am
My journey started the night before last, so about 36 hours ago. I had dinner with Seth in Thong Sala, Ko Pha Ngan, Thailand. I caught the overnight ferry from Thong Sala to Surat Thani. Basically, a double decker boat with half height roofs and padding on the floor where you could lay down.
Still, all in all, that was alright. I had a lovely sleep as we made our way back to the mainland.
We got there about 5am, and I piled into the back of a pickup to go to the travel agency where I waited for 2 hours before my minibus left for Haad Yai, which is a central bus terminal several hours drive away. While waiting I got to see American Pie, Band Camp. You might as well skip that movie.
In Haad Yai, I transfered to a VIP bus. The difference between a VIP bus and a mini? The mini makes more stops. Both are basically long vans converted to have 3 rows of 3 seats behind the driver. The distance between the back rest of one seat and the seat ahead is about the length from my thigh bone, from the hip joint to the knee joint. Unfortunately I have padding on the outside of each of those joints.
The VIP bus took us to the Thai/Malaysian border. There I passed through Thai customs and got back on the bus to be taken about 1 km to the Malaysian customs. Anyway, I filled in a form, which warned me drug smuggling into Malaysia carries the death penalty, gave it to the nice lady and she stamped my passport.
Bang! I can legally stay in Malaysia for 3 months. Welcome to Malaysia she says.
Next, onto a NEW VIP bus which carried me to Butterworth. There I was told my connecting bus would arrive in 5 hours to take me to Kuala Lumpur. Okay. I walked around a bit, grabbed some food, had a nap on the bench.
Things started hopping around the travel agencies around 10pm with lots of people showing up and more buses. When I got there at 6, there had been no buses at all.
At 11, I found out my bus wasn't coming. Some indeterminate thing had happened to prevent it's arrival, and now I had to wait some indeterminate amount of time for another, as yet undecided, bus.
Well, it was 2am before I got out of there. It worked out well though. I hit KL at 6:30am. The bus terminal area was already hopping, so I just skipped a hotel for the night and started walking. I've been walking around KL (Kuala Lumpur) now for almost 4 hours. I've been to see the Petronas Towers. They are tall. Some of you (more cultured folk) may remember that the Petronas Towers appeared in the movie Entrapment, staring Sean Connery and Katherine Zeta-Jones. That is where the bank was they had to rob, and the area where they were high up in the sky going from one tower to another is called the Sky Bridge, I think.
So far, Kuala Lumpur is a beautiful city, cleaner than Vancouver, though not as clean as Singapore.
posted by Jaye | 7:22 AM
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