The 31st I visited the Batu Caves outside of KL. The Caves, discovered about 120 years ago by an Englishman are now home to a number of Hindu temples, tourist booths, and raging hungry blood sucking monkeys. Ok, so it was a cave, and there were Hindu temples, and there were monkeys, but not of the blood sucking variety (however, they were quite frightening). You must look at my pictures to really understand what I am talking about.
The caves were a sight to see, no doubt about that. The dominating golden statue at the entrance, the grand staircase ascending into the colossal cave entrance, it was all phenomenal. Unfortunately, what was once an amazing natural wonder, is now an overt tourist attraction, complete with concrete steps and railings, animals to pet, and trinkets galore. No doubt all the cave formations- stalagmites and helictites- have been damaged, as the natural environment has been devastated by the introduction of the temples and tourists.
There were several monkeys living and feeding around the caves. These particular monkeys were quite mischievous, and not in a cute way. They were voracious-grabbing peoples’ food, trash, anything they could get their little hands on. At one point, a monkey grabbed a coconut half offered from a tourist, then proceeded to climb up two stories to enjoy it, only to drop in nearly two inches from another tourist’s head. Upon dropping the coconut, the monkey flipped out, ran down the pole, and hissed at anyone nearby, myself included. At that point I decided, “Today I don’t want to be ‘friends’, today I don’t want to get rabies” and steered clear of any and all monkeys.
After leaving the Batu Caves, I bought a box of various Indian desserts and sweets, many of them I did not like at all, and a few were interesting. I ended up leaving them on the street in the hopes that someone who was hungry would pick it up-as often happens in places like Kuala Lumpur.
The afternoon was spent napping and getting psyched up for New Year’s eve. I had dinner with Frank and Johannes at Reggae Bar in Chinatown were we met up with several other travelers who were in for a fun night. Next we hit up a shady rooftop bar in Chinatown-dirty, gritting, cheap, but with a magnificent view. Merdeka square had free concerts and festivities, so we stopped by for a peak before heading over to the famous Petronas Towers for the countdown and fireworks show.
The towers were so beautiful and the lights were quite a sight to see. Unfortunately, the count down was a disappointment; as the clock on the skyscraper next door struck twelve, the count down hadn’t even started, thus confusing everyone…then the fireworks started before the M.C. had finished counting down. Still, it was a great place to be for the New Year.
We finished the night back at a club, were we met up with our Swedish friends and where I met a few more people. There was Damien from the Caribbean, who lived in Germany, and Ingrid from Norway.
The next morning I headed out early for the Cameron Highlands, five hours north of KL.
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Word on the street is that the writer of this blog is sometimes called "MONKEY"! How ironic.
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