I met more instant friends at my hostel in Kuala Lumpur. I sat on the couch in the common area and checked out the free map the hostel gave me. I asked a guy sitting across from me, who was looking at his own free map, to point out our location. A conversation started, he said he was going to the Batu Cave Temple the next day. I said, "The what what?" He had a thick Chilean accent. The cave was this really great place about twenty minutes away. I said I'd like to join him, he said "great."
The woman sitting next to me, overheard us. "May I join you?" She asked.
We said "Yes." Her name was Svenya from Berlin.
A guy with a beard in the chair next to her said, "You guys going to the cave temple? I'll go to. "
We said, "No way, you smell, Beardman."
I'm kidding, we said "Great, how's 10:00 am?"
Beardman said, "Great." His name was Joe.
Svenya, said she was going to eat on a street with a lot of food, Javier and I said we'd like to join her. She said, "No way you stink."
We said, "You stink more."
I'm lying again. We went to eat.
I tried a drink called Black and White. It was a milk drink with these dark, jelly, lumps in it. The dark jelly lumps are a popular dessert in this region, they're served on crushed ice. It wasn't horrible, but it was very sweet. Javier and Svenya didn't like it either. I could only drink half of it before I gave up. It was only about 30 cents in US dollars.
We walked down to a guy selling very cheap beer out of giant cooler. I had two Changs before I noticed Javier was drinking a beer called Trucker that was 12% alcohol for the same seven ringgits as the Chang.. I switched to Trucker. Svenya taught us a card game called Shithead. The loser becomes the shithead. I won the first two games, but lost the last two so I was the double shithead for the night. Yay.
I ran into a British guy named Matt at the beer cooler. He'd been on my bus from Georgetown and was staying at my hostel as well. He was with a female "friend." I invited them over. They joined us. We stopped playing shithead and got shitfaced on Trucker. Keep on Truckin!
Matt's friend's name was Amber. She was from London, twenty-five years old and she was the editor of an ex-pat magazine in Bejjing. She told me a harrowing story about breaking her leg in three places and not being able to get medical care because she couldn't prove her insurance. They wouldn't even give her pain medicine. Her leg was broken too badly to fly home. A near stranger she had met days before saw her posting about her plight on Facebook. The guy went around to three banks that day to gather together seven thousand dollars of his own money to lend her. She didn't know he was the one who'd gotten the money until after she awoke from her surgery. She paid him back after she left the hospital. Some people are good people.
We left to go find the bar street. We got lost and decided to head back home.
It wasn't easy getting up before 1000.
Next up, monkeys pose for Travelman at Batu Caves!
!steemitworldmap 3.1465 lat 101.7033 long Fun at Hostel in Kuala Lumpur d3scr
Just saw your reply and you're in Kuala Lumpur already! Remember to wear long pants (at least length that cover your knees) and sport shoes before heading to Batu Caves :)
Thanks, The guys got by with long shorts.
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