Happy Hari Raya, Hope everyone is well back home, sorry its taken us a while to update! Well we are in Malaysia and have been here just over a week, We left Krabi town Tuesday 9th of Octobe in a mini van that had enough room for 12 people, but guess what they decided to put 13 people in the van?? And guess where that extra person was sitting? That right on my F$#*ing knee. When your 6ft tall in a mini van the last thing you need for a 10 hour bus trip is someone crammed in next to you, not to worry we got there in the end after 10 hours in the bus we arrived at our next destination Penang. A small island just off the coast of Malaysia. We were staying in the Capital which was called Georgetown, Georgetown is a very historical, Multicultural city and consists of many Asian influences such as little India and Chinatown. Inpressive colonial architecture and countless trishaws around the town. We were dropped off by the bus in the middle of Georgetown with not a clue as to where our hostel was, so when a Chinese looking man prob in his late 60's stopped in his Trishaw ( two seats being driven by a man peddling a bike) and offered us a lift we bundled our heavy backpacks, my guitar and ourselves on, Oh boy bad idea!! The poor guy was struggling very badly, never spoke any English and when we showed him the bit of paper with our address on it he looked at us blank and shouted OK OK YOUR GOOD YOUR GOOD.. After pedalling about half an hour we told him to stop, took our bags and walked off without paying him. Poor guy, but he shouldn't have took us if he never knew where to go. Eventually we stumbled upon our hostel, very nice and clean which is always good. We have been very lucky with our accommodation so far. It appears that if you just pay a little extra, ie $4 or $5 you get so much more. So after checking in we went out to get some tea. Before arriving in Penang we had heard rave reviews about the food, and we came to find that its true! Nothing short of amazing for eating. So many restaurants, cafes and street vendors to choose from. We opted for Chinatown on our first night. Nice food big portions and dirt cheap, Cheaper than Thailand for eating which we thought was impossible... Wednesday 10th October. We were dandering along the Street in the morning looking for somewhere to eat breakfast and noticed this place "Jims rock and Reggae bar", looked ok so went in. What an experience that was, Jim a Black Indian owned it, what an ex centric but friendly guy! He's written a film and reckons he can get Brad and Angelina to star in it, Says he knows Jude Laws sister who owns a film company. Think Jim was dreaming slightly but very entertaining at the same time and we loved his script, hopefully it will be a hit one day! Anyway after breakfast it was time to do some sightseeing. We went on a walk around bits of Penang to view some of the history and amazing architecture. Some interesting and lovely things to see. Stopped off at an Indian street vendor and bought some samosa, they were a totall dream....MMMmmmm. That night we headed to Little India for some Indian food, obviously!! We found this little place with seats outside sat down and ordered. I ordered chicken Tandoori and Jamie ordered a Curry, they brought it out along with another about another 5 dishes. "you try you try this" we were a bit like, we never ordered it but ok. The whole meal was quality. Lots of bread, sauces, finger food, curry's and meat. We were both freaking out when we got the bill thinking it was gonna be loads, it came to 5 quid that was with 2 beers aswell. Penangs Food rocks big time... We were planning on leaving for KL ( Kuala Lumpur) on Friday or Sat so on Thursady morning we went to a travel agent to enquire about buses. When we asked for a bus to KL over the weekend the lady gave us a funny look and said "Hari Raya this weekend all bus full"...WHAT!! Well Hari Raya is the Muslim equivalent to our Christmas and New year. All the Muslims head off to celebrate so the only space to KL was that afternoon at 4pm so we booked it and were heading to KL a few days early. Thankgod we enquired on the Thursday!! So the rest of the day we went around the shops etc and ended up buying me a pair of crocs, possibly the comfiest shoes ever! Yeah Jamie was right! We headed back to the hostel got our stuff then stopped off at our favourite Indian street vendor for 12 more samosa to help keep our hunger at bay on our what turned out to be a long haul journey! Whatever Thai or Malay people tell you for travelling times its never right, generally add at least an hour or so on to any semi long distance trip.They told us that from Penang to KL was 3 and a half hours possibly 4 if traffic was bad, the bus seemed to move along nicely the whole way but for some strange reason it took us 5 and a half hours and if my memory serves me correctly a similar incident happend from Surrithani to Krabi. (We were promised an air-con bus with no stops and plenty of room, we had two small seats no leg room and the bus stopped everywhere including a school - Oh and it took 2 hours more than they said) Although thankfully the bus to KL was VIP which mean we had loads of leg room and it was very comfortable.....KL here we come!