7 April

The next morning we arrived at KL at 06h30 with a fleet of backpackers, the chase was on to see who would find accommodation first fitting the criteria of as cheap as you can get with as clean as possible for the price. After some time finding the KLM (Kuala Lumpur Metro) we traveled to Bukit Bintang station in the golden triangle to stay in Pondok Lodge.

After dropping our bags we headed for BB Plaza to find a Dell agent who could assist. A funny thing is that in Asia no one starts work early in the morning - most shops only open at 9 or 10 in the morning leaving you to wander the streets looking at locked shops. Every laptop shop we visited had the same story, "we not help, phone Dell" At last someone referred us to Imbi Plaza where after several attempts we found a shop where the manager was willing to help, we used his phone to call Dell, and as Murphy would have it I explained my situation to the operator (having tested it again the morning before leaving to fix it), who suggested I try again to switch on the laptop. Yes it did go on, I was not feeling very bright in front of all the computer staff but hey what can you do. From here she explained we needed to do a bios test on the system only about an hour or so, it turned out to be from 11h00 until 17h00 to do the tests. I asked the manager whether I could leave the computer there and return later to collect it once all the tests had been completed, he said yes and locked it to a table and we left.

We still required one elusive item namely the rain jacket which we had not been able to find in Singapore, feeling very confident we set out to find it, only to be sent from shop to shop, shopping mall to shopping mall literally. In KL they have shopping malls in skyscrapers only 6 or 7 stories high but vast numbers of them. Also whenever we asked someone if they knew where we could find a rain jacket, they would either say "…..shopping centre, only 20 minutes walk" or "on the 3rd floor" - believe me they were never right!! We walked and walked until our feet hurt and after 2 1/2 hours searching we gave up for the day and headed to China Town by bus. Here we walked through dirty smelly streets and eventually found the JJ Petaling Market where everything can be purchased although specialties include perfumes, leather belts, games, movies and clothing. Two of the aforementioned caught our attention and we ended up leaving with two perfumes and a Hugo Boss belt. From here we headed back to the Imbi Plaza building to fetch the computer only to pass by a stall selling peculiar triangle shaped food, we settled down with two coconut rice, fish and chilly meals wrapped in coconut leaves molded into a triangle shape, very very nice for only 1 Ringet or R2.5 each.

We collected the laptop and made our way to the Petronas Towers, all the way bargaining with taxis but not willing to pay the RM 10 they wanted, luckily it was only a 3 km walk. After taking some photos but not able to go up to the 40th floor as all tickets had been sold out we headed for the nearest bus station. Hear we waited for 20 minutes only to join a swarm of people wanting to board the bus, we and two other foreigners could however not board as you needed the correct change RM 1 pp, I only had a RM 10 and no one could assist. From here we walked further on our way to the train station only to pass the tourist centre where we made a booking for a bus to Taman Negara leaving in two days time. The day had gotten the best of us, we jumped on the metro,got home and collapsed in bed.