One thing I love about travelling is meeting other travellers from all over the world, from all walks of life, and that everyone is super friendly in sharing their background and travel stories. Currently in my dorm I've met someone from Chile (who use to live in Edmonton!-shoutout because meeting someone who knows where I'm from is ridiculously rare), another from London and one from an island close to London, and finally one from Switerzerland. I was bless to be able to join some of them in doing some exploring yesterday and it's always nice to have company when you are on your own. They've all have been travelling longer than I have so it's nice to hear their travelling tips, make a bucket list of where they've been to that I want to go, and build a connection that may evolve into a friendship for keeps.

We decided on checking out Batu Caves and the journey there could've have taken longer. It's about an hour ish away from central KL depending where you are staying, but thankfully the KTM Komuter (underground subway) goes directly there (it's the last stop). However, from where we're staying, we needed to get to KL Sentral via monorail (train) which was easily accessible as it's around the corner from our hostel to transfer onto the KTM. Here's a note about the monorail, there are always delays and it's not very effcient as you never know when it will stop running and you've guessed right, this happened to us so we had to figure out a plan B. Good thing is that Malaysia is very tourist friendly and they actually offer a free 'GO KL' (green line) bus to KL Sentral as well as other main stops, which we were able to catch nearby (sort of like hop on/hop off buses elsewhere). Though, an alternative can also be taking the taxi which can be luxuriously cheap-but only if you take a taxi by meter or am willing to bargain with a taxi driver that doesn't use their meter. Reason being is that taxi drivers know they don't earn as much by meter vs. quoting you a ridiculously high price-so be assertive and say no if the driver won't budge! Another bonus to travelling with others is splitting costs, so this drives a cheap taxi price down even further when you split it with three others like we did.

We made a stop at Chinatown for lunch and went to Chinatown Food Paradise that had good reviews. Here you will find a various food stalls selling different types of Chinese food and there's even vegetarian options. It's sort of like a semi indoor foodcourt. I settled on dumplings because it's my go to staple no matter which country I'm in and what better place than having it in the heart of Chinese food heaven? Also, we saw a vacant table and took it without realizing that it was vacant because the table was affliated to a juice stall, but regardless their drinks we're less than $2 CAD and freshly thirst quenching so it wasn't a big deal.


So finally, we arrived at Batu Caves and the commute was so worth it! The exterior of the caves are so picture worthy and there are also a lot of hindu-esque designs, structures, and items around the area. I assume because Islam and Hinduism is so imbedded into the Malay culture here that believers tend to deck out whatever they can with symbols from these religions. After going up 272 steps (which wasn't bad  at all), we got to the entrance of the caves and it was so amazing. God's creation is just so beautiful and intricately astounding. The interior also had displays of Hinduism, but I was just so drawn to the natural makeup of this place. You definitely got to see it in person to believe it, pictures don't do it justice! I think this place has been a highlight so far of my time in Malaysia.

On the way down, you have to make sure you're not monkeying around-literally. There are monkey moms, monkey families, monkey babies (sooooo cute!) all ready to snatch any plastic bag you have because they are so accustom to people feeding them or giving them food that when they see plastic bags they don't stop bothering you until they get what they want-they aren't afraid of humans!! I saw a lady who had a water bottle in her plastic bag being bothered by one of these monkeys and she almost broke out in tears. It was funny to observers, but she eventually dropped her plastic bag and when the monkey realized it wasn't food inside, it quickly left. One of my roomies told the lady to keep the plastic bag and water bottle in her bag, but shortly after we saw her holding it in her hand again-some people just never learn.


 That evening we headed to Sky Bar in the Trader's Hotel downtown KL as not only was it Ladies Night (meaning free cocktails!), but we heard you also get a free view of the Petronas Towers. If we had booked ahead of time, we would've been able to snatch a bomb window seat view of the towers right across from where we were. Despite this, it was still stunning and there's even a swimming pool in the middle of this classy bar. Food was western style snacks and obviously higher priced than local food, but when you convert it it's still fairly affordable as an atmosphere like this in North America would probably cost you a fortune.
I feel so spoiled by the lifestyle here, I think I only spent like $20 US for all of this yesterday including commute.

P.S. Photos to come later-I need to find a computer!