We thought Singapore was cheap until we reached Malaysia, our first night in the buzzing port town of Melaka cost each of us £3 for a private twin room.
We spent our time there checking out the many historical buildings in the centre, including a still used 16th Century Chinese temple, an old fort from the days of the Portuguese occupation(not used) and a giant life sized replica of a Portuguese Caravel(a giant museum explaining the history of Melaka).
We also wasted a few hours walking to a mosque only to not be let in(we should have grabbed a cab). In the same breath we also visited the other side of the city, the modern glass shopping centre where we compared the prices to back home, many brands(Nike Levi and Lee) were disappointingly not that much cheaper(however a KFC meal costs just £1.20).
The small town came alive at night with a market down the main street of the prominent Chinese district. The town awoke, with the jingling lights and booming pop music of pedal rickshaws whizzing tourists about, bright lights of the street entrance and flashing beer signs above every bar on the side streets and the smell and sizzle of the street food (Malaysian pork sausages, dim sims, dried Chinese chicken meat which looked like greasy bacon and satay chicken among many others). The place was heaving with people, locals mixed in with the odd easy to spot tourist, people selling all sorts of goods for next to nothing including strange sandals with internet companies printed on them, pets and iced tea (I grabbed a wallet for RM(ringgits) 10 about £2). It was great that prices were displayed everywhere with no bartering going on(ie being western meant you weren’t getting bumped).
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| Dancers performing at the night market |
We ate in a restaurant packed with locals on the main street for £3 total including drinks (for the two of us) with a really spicy noodle soup with eggs and pork the main dish, very tasty but overly hot.
We spent the second of the two nights watching the premiership in one of the bars(beer is expensive compared to everything else still around £2 per bottle) before, after another hot night in the un-airconditioned room, catching a 30p local bus to the station and heading for Kuala Lumpur.
