A ho hum day and why I'm going to Bangladesh

Today has been rather uneventful but pleasant. Due to the "all-nighter" i pulled the previous night, compliments of that night bus ride, I slept for quite awhile last night: crashed around 11 pm, didn't get up until 10 this morning. When does my hotel stop serving breakfast? 10. Whoops. It was no problem though: I walked a block and got a much better breakfast for about 75 cents: roti canai and an iced tea. the tea cost as much as the two servings of the roti (which was a whopping 20 cents/serving) I got.

After that, I headed to KL Sentral to buy a train ticket to Butterworth, which is right across the water from Penang, my departure point from Malaysia. Now you would think there would be more than one train/day between Malaysia's two biggest cities. Well you would be thinking wrong. Not only that, but the one train leaves KL at 9 PM. Logically I wouldn't choose that, and would take the bus instead. Well logic goes out the window sometimes. See, I have this fault: when I get an idea in my head to do something, I HAVE to do it, regardless of how illogical it might turn out to be. This is a perfect example, as was the kuala besut-KL bus ride. There is only one "good" reason for me to take this train. Scratch that, two reasons. #1: it is very cheap: 5-6 bucks (yet it only saves me about 4 bucks, so not a huge gain). #2: I have never taken a train in Malaysia before, so it is a good way for me to check out the train system. Plus I enjoyed all my train rides in Thailand (a whopping 2 in my life), so I am sure I will get at least a little pleasure from this ride. Well that's what I keep telling myself.

Following that, I stopped by the Malaysia post office (much cleaner and nicer than the one I went to in Bangkok), then headed to the Islamic Art Museum, on the edge of the Lake Gardens. I was there back in 2002, and both times I've been there, the place has been dead. I realize it was mid-day on a Wednesday this time, but still, rather sad. It is a really nice museum too, I wish more people would visit it. Oh well. Part of the reason I went back is the first time I went, I was with a g/friend who had no interest in Islamic culture and was mad at me for taking a rather long way to get to the musuem, including falling down a small grass hill. Fun times.. Anyway, I spent about 2.5 hours there today and really enjoyed the two special exhibits. One was on the spice trade (do you know the difference between an herb and spice? I do now, woo woo!), and another on a dude named Lafayette and his photos of Indian and Malay royalty in the late 19th/early 20th century.

After that, I wandered around the Lake Gardens, a rather pleasant park on the edge of central KL. Highly recommend a stroll through them. And by the time I got back to the Golden Triangle (my hood here in KL) it was 5:45. How time flies when you're having fun...

So why am I going to Bangladesh: this dude's blog (the first part at least) is why.