Wow, where to start! We ended up taking a Taxi into the city from our hotel. Seven of us decided to go into the city: Mara, Zandie, Matt, Charlie, Steve, Andrew, and I. It was actually pretty cheap, costing only $15 US per person for an hour cab ride both ways. The driver was nice enough to drive us around a few places too, before he dropped us off. First, we stopped at the country's royal palace. I took a picture of the unmovable armed guards that were stationed there. After that, we stopped at a Chinese temple. There were stairs leading up to the main room, were people took their shoes off before lighting candles and worshiping Buda. As we were driving down the hill from the temple, we almost ran over a monitor lizard the size of a medium-large iguana! On our way to the Petronas twin towers; we also stopped by place with a good view of the city. We got into town around 4:00 and stayed until 8:00. When we got to the Petronas twin towers, we had intended to take the elevator up to the bridge that connects the two towers, but we were just a little too late. Instead, we walked around the park, which was beautiful. It surrounds the area around the twin towers and covers quite a large area. There were lots of interesting native species of plants covering the grounds. We walked around for quite a while, just taking in the sights of the city. It looks like it would be a great place to visit for a few days sometime. The US dollar seems to go a long way too. After a few hours, the girls decided to go into the mall for a while we walked around the city some more. Inside the KLCC (the building between the two towers), there is a large 6 floor shopping mall. We walked around the mall for a while too, and then stopped at the California Pizza Kitchen (of all places!) so Steve, Matt, and Andrew could have a beer. The beer was called Tiger, and is brewed somewhere in Asia.

We went back to the hotel and had a buffet dinner. There were all kinds of bizarre tropical fruits, and strange dishes. Everyone was a little reluctant to eat the food, and drink the water, but it seems to have turned out ok. The hotel was much nicer than the shops across the street from it. There were shops inside what looked like garages, with things strewn all about the stores, which didn't seem very clean. One thing I noticed most places where we went were large rain gutters. I bet, that when it rains, it really pours. It was looking like rain for a while we were in KL, but somehow we escaped the storm. A few other things I’ve noticed are that Malaysia drives on the right hand side of the road, and there are quite a few motorcycles. The drive to KL was long, (an hour) but not because of traffic, it was actually just a long way to drive. The highway winded through the jungles along the way, which consisted mainly of royal palms, which Mani, our driver, told us are used to extract palm oil. Driving also seemed to be much more aggressive than in the states, with a lot of tailgating, and motorcycles driving between cars.

While I was on Malaysia Airlines, they offered to pay for postage for postcards advertising Malaysia Airlines. I was going to send some out, but I realized that I didn’t have most people’s addresses. Friends back home, and abroad, please send me your addresses by replying to this thread.

Please read a few days back. I’ve written some entries, and then posted them later for previous dates.

My phone number here at Vickery House at the university is:
My address is:
I’ll also be getting a mobile phone soon. I’ll post the number for that son too.