Tis' the Season

It's the holiday season and Christmas is right around the corner! It is the festive, yet hectic barrage of parties, teacher gifts, Christmas cards, shopping, wrapping and baking that leads up to Dec. 25th, but for us we toss in a birthday and pepper in our new life in East Asia to add a bit more complexity to the mix. The amount of rushing around never seems to change, just the location.

We kicked things off with a Thanksgiving celebration hosted by an American family, to an international crowd, serving up two fried turkeys and all the traditional trimmings (or at least all that we could find the ingredients for.) It was a relaxing and fun evening with our new expatriate family and if you can believe it, I was so busy eating and chatting that I didn't take one photo.

Instead of setting up the tripod for our Christmas card photo this year, we decided to get a mini session with a local photographer in the KLCC park which is right near our condo. Thankfully, it was a beautiful morning, but it was crazy humid. We were in the park when I took this screen shot and the sun had just come up.

Thanks to the 100% humidity (doesn't that mean it should be raining?), the temps were skyrocketing and there was not a cloud in the sky.  You can see it in my hair, as it kept growing throughout the 90 min.

It was a fun photo shoot and we were able to get some great, new family photos! 

Ashleigh and I had an enjoyable afternoon at the Girl Scout Mother/Daughter Tea.  It is a rare treat to be able to hang out with Little Miss Personality one-on-one, and we had such a good time. 

This tree is in the lobby of our condo.

Anna's 12th birthday was December 14th and we celebrated with a mall scavenger hunt and ten sweet friends. 


On our way to the mall.

The girls had a blast searching out answers to the twenty-five clues David had masterfully come up with.  There were two teams and about 90 minutes of time. It was great fun watching the teamwork and getting to see the personalities of Anna's new friends.

After the hunt we headed home for presents, cake, and a new twist to the birthday song.  We have been used to the Australian addition of "hip-hip hooray..." after the standard song, but here the kids chanted in unison and loudly the following:

Cha, cha, cha
Kum ba ya
Pizza Hut
Noodles!

Don't ask.

I still can't wrap my head around the fact that 2015 will be our last year before we have a teenager! 

Malaysia is a predominantly Muslim country, so we were surprised by the amount of large-scale Christmas decorations there are around town. All of the malls are heavily decorated, as well as the grocery stores, office buildings, storefronts, coffee shops, etc.



 

You can't see it in this photo, but there is even a small Ferris wheel down there.

Christmas music, religious music included, is pumped through the speakers loudly and clearly.  I was pleasantly surprised, ok more like shocked, to hear songs like "Hark the Herald" and "Angels we Have Heard on High" while I was grocery and mall shopping.



As much as I am yearning for cozy socks, warm comfort food, crackling fires, a chill in the air, and extended family, we are celebrating in our own sandal wearing, sweat dripping, cool beverage drinking, swimming pool kind of way.  We have been able to celebrate with new friends.

  

 

We have our Christmas tree, our stockings, and even our elf, Jingleheimer, was able to find us. 

 

 

We will celebrate the birth of Christ, try and keep as many traditions as we can, and maybe add a new one or two.  In three days the rush will be over. Until then, I best get going. I still have shopping and baking and wrapping to finish.  Merry Christmas everyone!

Lord Murunga and the Macaques

Our first venture to a local tourist attraction was the Batu Caves, which is tauted as one of the top 10 attractions in KL. It is a massive limestone outcrop that has become a Hindu shrine.

At the base of the entrance beautifully handmade flower garlands are sold for those who want to present them as offerings. Sometimes un-informed tourists purchase them and wear them as leis. Not the intended use, but they are pretty non-the-less.

The most prominent feature is the forty-three meter gilded statue of Lord Murugan. He looks as though he is standing guard over the entrance and the 272 stairs that lead to the Temple Cave.

 

Apparently the giant gold guard isn't enough to keep away the masses of macaques (monkeys) that dangle from scaffolding, scale the limestone walls, climb up and down the stairs/railings, and steal food and drinks out of unsuspecting tourists' hands and bags.

 

Notice the baby hanging underneath the monkey on all fours.

Those cheeky monkeys are aggressive and we watched one snatch food out of someone's handbag then fight to see who was going to eat the prize. We only had to be there for a matter of minutes before Ashleigh decided she wanted nothing to do with the monkeys and we had to weave our way up the stairs in order to avoid being anywhere near one. 

  

 

The stairs are steep, the air is hot, and unfortunately, it's not well maintained. It was hard to ignore the monkeys, the pigeons and their droppings, and the mounds of trash. 

 

Once you reach the top of the stairs, the cave opens up and there are wires, lights, mini temples, and stalls selling trinkets, t-shirts and drinks. Not really the holy shrine we were envisioning.

The cave itself is really quite amazing and beautiful. At the top of the next set of stairs is another shrine and a skylight opening in the cave. Much nicer without the artificial lights and hawker stalls.

  

 

There are other attractions like the Dark Cave, which is a more traditional cave experience, but crawling through a dark wet cave didn't interest us. I'm pretty sure there is another place to hold a defanged cobra, but we passed on that too.

 

 

Some of the areas had been recently repainted and were brightly colored and interesting. However, there are no written explanations so we couldn't appreciate the significance of what we were looking at.

Our afternoon was a combo of local culture and a little exercise. Looking forward to seeing some of the other KL highlights.
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Malaysia - Our New Home

I'm back! We have been on an expat rollercoaster for the past 5 months and now I have so much to catch up on; the unfinished Australian posts and our bittersweet good-byes, the two-month holiday in the U.S, and now the new adventures in Kuala Lumpur (KL), Malaysia.

We departed Australia in a bit of a rush in order to make sure we had time to visit family and friends in the US after not having been back in two years.  Then once there, our month long holiday kept getting extended as final approval to move kept getting postponed.  We had been waiting for the green light to head to KL for quite a while, but once we got it, we are on the plane two days later.  The biggest challenge was stuffing our already full suitcases with two months worth of US purchases.  Not an easy task and our eight large suitcases were each hitting the 70 pound max. (not including our four overstuffed carry-ons and equally bulging backpacks)

 

It was a long 23 hours of flight time from the US to Malaysia, which started in Savannah, GA and included stops in Washington D.C. and Qatar.  The flights were very comfortable, but the air was turbulent for much of the trip, so I didn't get a whole lot of sleep.

  

Change is hard and our move from Australia to Malaysia was especially difficult this time around.  It has been an exciting, exhausting, heartbreaking, and nerve-wracking transition. When we moved to Australia, although everything was different, it looked pretty familiar on the surface. Here in Malaysia there is no familiarity, surface or otherwise.  The look, sound, feel, tastes and smells are all far from what we were all used to. 

Anna and Ashleigh started 3rd grade and 6th grade, for the second time, two days after we arrived. (School started in January in Australia, so they were a little ahead of the game.) Since the girls had a two month holiday and this particular school had already started a month prior, we thought it best they jump in right away. They toured the school and were very excited to start.

The first day of school.  The school buses came and picked them up at the Doubletree.

When they each got off their respective buses after their first day, there were tears, followed by a heart-breaking two weeks of anxiety induced vomiting by one child and the pleading for homeschooling by the other. Needless to say the first day did not go well, and the second and third day wasn't much better. Why?  Here is my theory. For the first time the girls were at different campuses in different towns. That meant unfamiliar bus rides across very unfamiliar territory without the support of their sibling.  Anna started middle school and had to navigate different classrooms/teachers and a locker. Both had to endure the excitement from international classmates by being "the new kid."  It was all a little too much for the girls at first. I am happy to report that by week three both girls were doing well and now that they are settled they truly love their new school and have made many good friends.

 

The Hilton Doubletree in downtown KL was our home for the first five weeks.  Our first week we started out with one bedroom and two slightly larger than regular twin beds. Let us not forget about all of that luggage. After a week of being extremely cozy, a quick chat with the front desk and we had adjoining rooms and a lot more breathing room.  Ahhhh. 

After a while, it felt a little like "Eloise at the Plaza." We knew the staff by name and they new ours.  We could walk into the lounge and they would know what snack and drinks we all were going to have. There was no need to give our name and drink order at breakfast either. Many times to get out of the room, we did homework, ate, and lounged by the pool.

Eloise, is that you?

We were quite comfortable, the building is full of restaurants and shops, and it gave us time to find our new home.

After living out of the same suitcases for almost four months, we moved  into a downtown high-rise and were excited to be reacquainted with our belongings that had been shipped from Brisbane.

Moving into our condo.

The urbane lifestyle has taken some time to get used to.  Our specific building does not have balconies, so we don't have any private outdoor living space. A complete switcheroo from our outdoor/indoor space in Australia.  There is a common area with pool, BBQ, and playground.



Our new home.

We do, however, have a beautiful view of the towers. The photos make them look smaller and further in the distance then they actually are.  We look up at them!

The Petronas Twin Towers

Just like in Brisbane, we walk a lot.  Unlike Brisbane, the reason we walk is we don't have a car.  There is still a chance we may eventually lease/rent one, but for now we walk or take taxis. Travelling by taxi was scary to me at first. I wasn't thrilled about jumping in the back of someone's car and trusting them to take me to where I asked, especially since I had no idea where I should or shouldn't be going.  However, with time I have grown more confident on knowing more of the city and street names, so I think, for the most part, we are all comfortable with calling a cab. We picked our location so that David can walk to work and I can walk to multiple shopping malls, grocery stores, friends houses, etc. So far it is working out pretty well. Unfortunately, we don't live within walking distance of the schools any longer, so both girls are picked up by school buses.

Here in KL we sit very close to the equator (217 miles to be exact), which clearly wipes out any typical seasonal changes. Our seasons are wet, smog, and monsoon. To begin with its HOT all the time. KL is a tropical climate where the average temperature year round is between 70°F (22°C) and 90°F(33°C). Add to that the humidity which sits at about 80%.  Unfortunately that bumps the "feels like" temp up 10-12 degrees. Here is a quick snapshot of the stats last week as I was getting ready to meet some friends for a morning run in the park.

We arrived right in time for the September/October smog.  Apparently it is a seasonal thing and specifically heavy in October.  The Malaysians blame the air quality on the Indonesians burning the jungles and/or rice fields. However, from what we hear the Malaysians return the favour another time during the year. Whatever is to blame, the air quality can be horrendous.

Thankfully the smog is gone, but now we are into monsoon season.  KL tends to get a lot of tropical rain, but it's particularly heavy in October and November.  It comes in short, heavy bursts in the afternoon and evening and can include some pretty spectacular thunderstorms.  We are now very aware that it is pretty important to carry an umbrella with us at all times. However, we are slow learners and have been known to get caught in a storm, sans umbrella, only to return home drenched and looking like a drowned rat.



The rains can be so heavy that you can't see what is in front of you.

Now when it is not raining or smoggy, it is beautifully sunny.  The days are mostly quite pretty and if it wasn't for the rain snarling up the already horrible traffic, I wouldn't mind it much either.

 

 

So there you have it.  Our introduction to Kuala Lumpur. We are getting settled into our new life and still have a few boxes left to unpack.  We've started being tourists in our own city, visiting local places, tasting local foods, and even picking up new hobbies. I will post more on that soon, as well as our US trip and Aussie goodbye. Stay tuned.



A Celebration in Sydney and A Bittersweet Farewell

 

In February,  we took a long awaited trip to Sydney for my birthday.  Truth be told, we had already been to Sydney and viewed the iconic landmarks, the Sydney Opera House and Harbor Bridge, from the decks of a cruise ship. (Sydney was our port of departure/arrival for our New Zealand cruise last November.)  However, we didn't really think that counted as an official visit, so it was time to actually experience Sydney.

Our flight was very early in the morning and as a result we arrived hours before we could check into our hotel.  We dropped off our bags at concierge and didn't waste a moment of time.  

Good Morning Sydney!

We started off by catching the ferry to Manly. It's a very pretty ride through the harbor and includes beautiful views of the opera house and city from the water.

Opera House from Manly Ferry.

We immediately strolled down a coastal walk to Shelley Beach hoping to get a closer view of all the dolphins we could see in the distance.  Unfortunately, the dolphins had moved on, but we did get nice views back to Manly beach. 

Along the pathway there were many of these mini statues in and amongst the rocks.

After returning to Sydney, we walked through the beautiful Royal Botanic Gardens.

 and had views of the opera house and bridge from another vantage point.

From here we thought it would be a good idea to walk back past the opera house, through the city, and across the bridge.  

On the other side of the bridge is an old amusement park called Luna Park. 

The Luna Park face



View of Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbor Bridge from Luna Park.

After the picture above was taken, we decided to call it a day and head back to our hotel downtown and out to dinner.  This meant we needed to walk back across the bridge and into the city.  Take a look at my footwear.  Those were the sturdiest shoes I packed.  Yikes. 

The next day we had arranged a city and opera house tour.  Giving our feet a bit of a rest, we were able to see all sorts of city sights including Bondi Beach, one of Australia's most famous beaches. It's known for its beautiful people and also for its dangerous rip currents.

The lifeguards perform about 5000 rescues a summer and have a television called "Bondi Rescue" where you can watch the lifeguards at work.

The lifeguard station is a prominent fixture in "Bondi Rescue."

We were amazed at how uncrowded the beach was for 11am on a Saturday.  However, we were told is was quite crowded the day prior, as the cast of Modern Family was there filming.

We also headed out to the Gap, which is an ocean cliff facing the Tasman Sea and is the opening to the Sydney waterway.  It is a beautiful location in the National Park with spectacular views.



The Gap

We missed the Modern Family cast, but we did see Russell Crowe in his Woolloomooloo penthouse apartment. Can't you see him?  He's clear as a bell, right?  Our tour guide was so excited that we sat and watched for a little while.  Hadn't really planned to snap a photo, but stuck my camera out as we were driving away.

We drove all throughout town and our final stop was the Sydney Opera House.  We were looking forward to stepping foot into one of the world's most recognizable buildings.

The inside of the opera house is not very elaborate, but I found the structural aspects to be quite interesting. 

 

There are eight different venues inside the opera house.  The main concert hall is not ornate, but it is known for it's superior acoustics and houses an organ with over 10,000 pipes.

After our tour, we had a little bite at the Opera Kitchen.

That night we headed to Darling Harbor to take in the sights and the Saturday night fireworks.

Having had our fill of views of the bridge and opera house, we took to the city for our last day.  We started the day with breakfast at a great little café at The Rocks.

Market at The Rocks

Then we walked through the city to Hyde Park.  The city landscape is a mixture of really old buildings and very modern buildings.

Sydney General Post Office

a mix of old and new



Fountain in Hyde Park



St. Mary's Cathedral 

If you ask the girls what we did during our three days in Sydney, they would say we walked....and walked, and walked, and walked.  Which is basically what we did, with a lot of sightseeing in between. It was a great trip to a beautiful city and now we can say we have officially been to Sydney.

Waiting for the train to take us to the airport.

Unfortunately, February also brought with it some sadness as we had to say good-bye to Chase, our first "baby" and trusted companion.  Although he still seemed to be of sound mind, his thirteen-year-old body was giving up on him.  Due to his age, the length of the flight to Australia, and quarantine, David's parents have spent the last two years spoiling him rotten. He could not have been in better care.

 

just a pup

We Skyped with him every time we spoke with Grammy and Granddad, and even though he probably couldn't see us or hear us, we enjoyed getting to see him. 



This photo was taken right before our departure to Australia.

 He was a large and loving part of our family and will be missed.  "Good Boy Chase!"