27 Jan 2003 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

[Eric's journal]  Today we walked to the Golden Triangle.  It is the area with the high-rises, nicer hotels, malls and restaurants.  Many of the malls were very nice.  We wandered through the Manchester United store, Nike store, and watched part of the Super Bowl in Chilis.  We looked up a lot of info on the Maldives in a huge bookstore.  We wandered around the Petronus Towers, they don't seem that tall but I think it has to do with the architecture: it is staggered in many sections and I think the towers make up a large chunk of the height.  We found out you need to get your pass to go up to the walkway on the 42d floor.  Since we couldn't do that, we wandered over to the Telecoms Tower, the fourth tallest in the world.  It is built on a 90m hill in a forest preserve.  The observation deck is at 300m and has a stunning 360 degree view.  They also have a good audio guide explaining what you are seeing.  They also have a 15 minute video in the lobby covering the building of the tower.  It is interesting how many of the buildings here intentionally have Islamic features designed into them.  All this makes the Telecoms building a much better choice to go up than the Petronus Towers.  You also get a tremendous view of the Towers from the Telecoms Tower.


[Emma's journal]  Our last day in KL.  Today we headed out to the Golden Triangle which is the newer part of KL.  You could tell straightaway.  It looked a lot like Singapore with the mirrored high rises and malls but somehow had more character.  Maybe it was the Manchester United shop!  We also visited the Petronus Towers.  They didn't seem like they were the tallest buildings in the world.  We though that maybe is was because they were tapered in as they got taller.  We could not go up to the bridge that joins them as you needed to get a pass at 0830- way too early for us.  ( Actually we didn't find that out until it was too late.)  It would have been interesting to see what, if any, security measures they had implemented since 11 September 2001.  I wonder in they do not worry since they are in a Muslim country.

That was another interesting thing about KL, although the Muslim women wear headscarves, there were not many who wore the more traditional dress.  A lot had on western clothes, including sleeveless and short-sleeved shirts.  They also walk hand-in-hand with their husbands/boyfriends- something I haven't even seen in London or Edward Street.