home-made dinner | Chaos roaming the world

We had obviously needed a day to simply crash so we extended our stay in Thap Sakae for another night to see at least a bit of the surrounding attractions. After a yummy breakfast (Flo had bought me Nutella and Thomas bakes his own bread!), we slowly got into our motorcycle gear. Despite it being 10.30am, you could feel that it would be a scorcher of a day.

Iconic, isn’t it?

The Ban Krut temple is only about 25km away but the ride was long enough to get quite hot. The first thing to notice on the temple hill is a giant buddha statue. It looks out over the land in the calm fashion of all buddhas. Around it, there are smaller statues to which you can apply leaf gold and thus do your bit for the temple (and for improving you standing regarding this life and the next). This practise results in a very patchy look of the statues though.

Walking up the hill, we first passed two big warriors or guardians, one of each side of the road. A big, well frequented staircase, then, leads up to the top of the hill with the temple on it.

Dragon stairway

As always, removing your shoes is expected but apart from this fact, Flo and I are lacking the knowledge of rules for proper behaviour in a Thai temple. For example, I wasn’t sure if it’s okay to take photos at all. Though I asked a staff member, I was sure I wasn’t understood when I got a “yes” answer…so really I wasn’t any wiser afterwards. So I quietly took some picture, not disturbing any people who were there for prayer and not zooming in on the devotional statues too much.

Soon, we were too hot again and went back our “flat” with just a short lunch stop on the road. The pool beckoned so we jumped in to cool down before using the afternoon for some administration and reading up on the next countries. Apparently, landmines are still an issue in Cambodia so no going off the roads at all…

Sweet concoction – but yummy.

Dui and Thomas invited us to a home-cooked dinner. Dui makes this vegetable dish out of Thai zucchini with some scrambled eggs with a sauce and it is so y.u.m.m.y! NOM! In capital letters! Then, we actually drove into town again to have the rich tea one last time. Unfortunately, we didn’t take a single picture of Thomas and Dui… 🙁

: Iconic, isn’t it?

: I think that is some important monk guy here in Thailand

: These guys are a thing here – Ogre I think.

: Not many people, but always in the way 😛

: Dragon stairway

: At the gates

: this seems to be the cheese – we unfortunately have no idea.

: Nope, your eye does not deceive you, the doors are … crooked.

: More gold … we need more gold!

: One of two beaches in Ban Krut. This is the northern one.

: Interesting to see stained glass in a non-christian context

: I think they are having an argument …

: Detail of the roofs

: white flowers in bloom at the temple stairs

: They were made from glazed porcelain. Pretty cool.

: So good – and veggie!

: Sweet concoction – but yummy.

Not much is left of the namesake mud that gave the city its little complementing name, nor of the tin upon which the early success was founded. There was plenty to discover of the people that came here for that reason and many others, though. From European colonial era buildings to the Indian and Chinese quarters – Kuala Lumpur really feels like the melting pot it has been for so long.

Sultan Abdul Samad Building, one of the landmarks

We wanted to use the last day in KL to do some more proper sight seeing. So we headed out a bit before lunch to go for a long walk in the city. For a city with millions of inhabitants and teeming with glittering high-rises, KL is surprisingly walk-able. We took a taxi to Merdeka Square to start our walk. The square is surrounded by colonial era buildings with some modern museums thrown into the gaps and feels like a huge contrast to all the skyscrapers all around.

From here, it was a short walk to our lunch spot, an all vegetarian restaurant in Little India. All the food was amazing, but we had it especially for the plain naan bread. Fluffy, smoky and perfect to lap up that butter paneer sauce. An observation I made was that there was a surprising variety in what a main dish consists of. Until now, most Indian restaurants we have been still stuck to the western formula of rice – sauce – maybe bread. Whereas here, I got a tray with something between a naan and a pizza in the middle and 4 pots of sauces around it plus a cup with either a soup or a sauce. Without anyone around to mimic, it can be surprisingly hard to find out how you are supposed to eat your food 😉

Red lanterns mark the whole quarter

With a short walk we crossed half a continent and went from Little India to Chinatown. There are a couple of roofed streets providing much needed shade in the searing afternoon heat. We used that for a stroll over the street markets here, amusing ourselves with knock off handbags and the politely pushy hawkers.

A three dollar cab ride later, we were right at the foot of today’s main attraction: The KL Tower, or Menara Kuala Lumpur. Since we did not get up the Petronas Towers we went all in here and got tickets for the highest (open air) platform for RM210. This one is higher anyway with its 421m on a 90m hill.

We spotted a Hard Rock Cafe nearby from up top and thought it be a cool way to end the foray with a drink there. Unfortunately it was A: further than it looked from up top and B: we realized too late that we had run out of cash. At least we could pay our overpriced but nice drinks by credit card.

It took us almost an hour to find the nearest ATM in the next mall to be able to pay the taxi home – just in time for Nina’s family call to Germany.

The day was rounded off by another lovely home cooked dinner and wine, compliments of Sonja.