Arriving at the towers around quarter to eight I felt confident we would be served. Looking up at the towers as we approached I felt myself getting slightly giddy; I've never been one for vertigo but I felt a twinge for some reason. As we got into the complex we managed to find the escalators to the tourist section, cloistered away around a corner to keep tourists away from the businesspeople moving through the site. When we reached the bottom we realised 7.45am was far too late, apparently some losers had been camped out since 6am!
As the mass of people pushed there way around it became apparent that we weren't going to be getting onto the tour today. The system stupidly works by giving 500 tickets out and asking people how many they want, once 500 is reached, poof!, no more tickets. Feeling dejected we inquired about getting tickets for another day and were told to come back at: 11.00am, 11.30am, and 12.00pm. Deciding to err on the side of caution we decided on 10.45am, and whilst we waited, food!
The Petronas Towers is host to over 80 floors of office space and to serve all these people they have built a shopping mall (a Malaysian past-time) in between the two towers. I soon discovered prices similar to the UK and baulked; the high prices of the UK are going to take some getting used to when coming home :(. Despite the prices we soon found a gem hidden amongst the other 'overpriced' gems: Rotiboy.
Rotiboy is a bun shop, something which may seem a bit bland to devote an entire shop to but they are everywhere apparently. Due to our early arrival we could only sample the Classic (butter & sugar bun) as everything else was being cooked. For simple bread, butter, and sugar I was really surprised! The bun wasn't quite savoury or sweet but somewhere in between, the baked coffee-flavoured crust gave a nice sweet crunch with a soft, salty, butter-soaked centre. I was starting to fall in love with eastern baking.
Following on from the failure at the Towers we looked round the shopping centre and were planning on going into some museum attached to the towers but sadly it was aimed at an age group a little too young for us, time has a way of glossing over some of these things when looking back on them.
As we were now in the middle of KL and no ride home, Lena's dad had dropped us off on his way to work, we decided it was time to take in some of these shopping malls KL was so famous for. Using our map as a guide we headed off towards 'The Pavilion' shopping mall. The problem was that maps make distances look deceptively short, coupled with the fact that it was KL in the middle of the day. In my mind we may as well have been walking in the Sahara. Not the best introduction to KL on foot, I still maintain that driving is the way forward...
Pavilion felt a lot like shopping malls in the UK; 80% clothes. Sadly these weren't your TK Max's or Primarks, and seeing as I'm not exactly svelte they wouldn't really have anything I could fit into anyway. Even so it was nice to be inside, accompanied by some italian gelato did put the icing on the cake though. As it became apparent that very little money would be exchanging hands we moved onto the bermuda triangle of shopping, in the sense that your money will never be seen again once you enter it. There were a group of 3 smaller shopping centres clustered together that offered cheaper products, one of which proved to be technological mecca!
The first two shopping centres were a maze of floors and small stores selling all manner of items, and with a lack of windows it slowed the passage of time and got me very disoriented; much like alcohol! Oddly the first two malls were interconnected by only one exit and appeared, at least to me, to be identical. Now I'm a man who likes to shop but I felt I was reaching my limit, the combination of shopping and extreme heat just made me feel so tired but all of that was washed away when we hit the techocentre (not its real name).
(Lena explains: Sungei Wang and Bukit Bintang Mall are the two connected malls the white one is talking about, not very interesting to him as it was mainly cheap shopping for me. He found Eden when I finally agreed to leave and take him to Low Yat Plaza, where we spent the rest of the day.)
(Lena explains: Sungei Wang and Bukit Bintang Mall are the two connected malls the white one is talking about, not very interesting to him as it was mainly cheap shopping for me. He found Eden when I finally agreed to leave and take him to Low Yat Plaza, where we spent the rest of the day.)
Trying to get to the techo rave cave was difficult as apparently it wasn't deemed worthy as a place to put onto tourist maps and we had to rely on Lena's navigational skills. I'm not going to lie, I did think the place was closed or Lena may have imagined it, as it was 4 years ago :). Oh how I was wrong! 7, count 'em, 7 floors of tech with everything you could want in order to sustain your technological thirst, I found my energy coming anew as my body filled with the rejuvenating energy of the gadget lord; in other words, I was excitable. For hours we scoured the place to find all manner of gadgets and tech, it was so vast I instantly came to the conclusion that I was going to have to come back here again for a full day of searching. The hours inside the place rumbled by with my trusty companion Lena bartering like a champ! Despite her being less enthused than me she didn't show it, haggling with everyone she could, exploiting the language barrier I couldn't overcome.
As our time in the shopping malls came to an end we met Lena's dad (yes we spent a full work day in shopping malls - love the student life!) for dinner where we dined on JUMBO prawns with noodles (Soo Kee's Son's Sang Har Mee on Jalan Imbi - RECOMMEND!) and beef & scallions with noodles; both of which the place was famous for. The ginormous prawns were delicious, and I'm starting to get good at peeling them, although I will never become accustomed to eating the brains.
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