Federal Territory Day

1st Feb

It appears that we are in Kuala Lumpur on Federal Territory Day, when they celebrate their independence from colonial rule - hence lots of national flags. We spent some time exploring the old centre, where there is a tower built to commemorate the coronation of George VI, much smaller than the ones built to celebrate being a tiger economy. We found that in the old part, where you can use the 5ft ways, it was not too bad walking around, but on the main roads it was hot, noisy, dusty and difficult to navigate for pedestrians. For car drivers it was incredibly busy. In the end we cut our expedition short and took the monorail (air-conditioned) back to the hotel for afternoon tea.

Yesterday, Sunday, we went for a walk in the park - the Lake Gardens, which are the KL Botanical Garden. Getting there involved an introduction to KL pedestrian "facilities", half-metre wide strips alongside dual-carriageway off-ramps, then a metre wide strip which included a bus stop. Once over a bridge, down some steep steps, under the tunnel and through the gate it quickly got very peaceful with a few joggers, lots of gardeners and, as we got closer to the car park, Malaysian families out for a picnic - huge camping mats, lots of food, occasional camping stoves, barbecues and wedding parties. We also saw some wildlife including a mouse deer (caged) and a splendid kingfisher (flying free) which we followed for quite a long way.

In the evening we got the concierge's directions to walk to a local restaurant mentioned in our guidebook - Vishal Food and Catering, with an attractive single $ symbol for pricing. It involved a walk through the KL Sentral shopping mall and then along much less salubrious shop-house streets where we found it opposite the Hanuman Temple. It turned out to be a Tamil banana-leaf establishment. However, being "experienced travellers" (Eleanor took us to one in India), we knew what to expect. The food was delicious, they provided forks, and despite the up-selling of a couple of extra dishes and some mango lassis it came to less than 40 Ringgits (£8). We staggered back home feeling very replete, and (so far) have experienced no digestive repercussions.