Malaysia: Truly Asia

Or something. Malaysia is indeed pretty awesome, though.

Perhaps because it was the first place where I stepped off the plane and felt warm, but I knew the second I arrived in Malaysia in the early morning of January 20 that I loved it. Though the feeling was tempered when we finally returned, two and a half weeks later, I still feel a great deal of fondness for that country.

First, a few words about traveling: you guyses, it is EXHAUSTING to take a two-and-a-half week vacation and pack it with as much stuff to do as we did. KL, Bangkok, Phuket, Bangkok, Siem Reap, KL again - not to mention the tiring and stressful travel to get to and from all of these places - it just sort of takes a lot out of you. So when we did get to our last destination, I was pretty well vacationed out, and ready to take it easy in Kuala Lumpur.

Fortunately, the weather was more than willing to cooperate with those plans of mine. Hot, humid, threatening rain in the afternoon - it was like a Houston summer, only in February (which sometimes happens in Houston, too). It was, however, perfect weather for hanging out in airconditioned monorails, malls, temples (both Hindu and Buddhist), mosques, and museums. The nice thing about the Malaysian capital (and its largest city) is how very compact the central city is. The suburbs sprawl out all across the Klang (it's a river AND an onomatopoeia!), but the central city is not only very walkable, but well-connected by a monorail and a light rail. Our hotel in Chinatown served as a great jumping off point for not only Lunar New Year's festivities, but also for light city exploration.(Though this turned out to be a double-edged sword: centrally located in Chinatown during the New Year means also centrally located to what sounds like a Mongol invasion when they set off the firecrackers every night)

What struck me the most about KL, though, was the staggering diversity of it. Living in Korea for a year, which is a traditional nation (ethnic/state boundaries are generally coterminous), has kind of warped my expectations of what to see in other countries. China, Thailand, and Cambodia really only reinforced this. In each of these countries, the state is generally associated with one ethnic group - China with Han Chinese, Thailand with Thais, and Cambodia with Khmers - and any minority populations tend to either be very small or shunted off to the hinterlands. This is true even of the big cities. In Kuala Lumpur, however, you have ethnic Malays, Chinese, and Indians of all shapes, sizes and colors walking around the streets. Add to that the legions of tourists and business travelers passing through the city and it makes for some very interesting walks.

My particular favorite scene was one I found myself in on the first afternoon in KL. I was standing on a street corner in an area that looks like a less-crowded version of Mayor Bloomberg's Times Square in NYC. Standing next to me was a woman in a full burqa, and the both of us were watching a street performer sing a cover of Bob Marley's "No Woman, No Cry". It was one of those very surreal moments that seems so far out of the realm of possibility; yet here you are, and there she is, and there he is singing Bob Marley. Odd.

Another fairly remarkable thing about the city: it exists, holding sizable populations of Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus (with other minorities) side-by-side in relatively little conflict with one another. Partly I think this is because of the history of the place - these religions and ethnicities have been in peninsular Malaysia for centuries - and partly I think it is because of the heady wealth flowing into KL over the last thirty years that seems to have done pretty well for the entirety of the city, rather than just the already-wealthy.

An interesting parallel to this city could be seen in Sarajevo. For centuries, Bosniak Muslims, Serbian Orthodox Christians and the generally Roman Catholic Croat population lived together in what was arguably the most cosmopolitan city on the European Continent. Then, during the collapse of Yugoslavia and the rise of Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic, Serbian Nationalism was stirred up in response to the breakaway republic of Croatia and the attempts of Bosnia-Herzegovina to leave the union, leading to a horrifically bloody war (complete with genocide in the east and the stunningly awful siege of Sarajevo).

Malaysia in the latter half of the 20th century, in contrast, saw incredible growth in its economy thanks to increased oil reserves and other natural resource extraction - not exactly ideal conditions to incite nationalist zealotry. So the country has done fairly well for itself, and indeed has become a fairly important conflict moderator in the region. As well, its approach to religion has been a fairly liberal (in the classical sense) one - the strictures associated in the West with Islam seem far more flexible in Malaysia. Yes, some women wear burqas. But standing with their daughters who are dressed in a more western style, one wonders whose choice it was to wear the burqa.

I was fascinated by KL, and I was exhausted by it. I think I'd like to go back some day with more energy to really see the city, but the thought of any more travel just at the moment (aside from going back to Houston and then spending some time in DC and then moving to China) just makes me want to crawl under my desk and hide in terror.