Cosmopolitan KL

Kuala Lumpur was a surprise highlight. With our late evening arrival after thirty-two hours of travel by taxi, ferry, coach, songthaew and two trains, we were glad to be back on the pavements of a non-undulating city, and after a short outing for some late-night food at a nearby Middle Eastern restaurant we concluded that we liked the laid-back atmosphere. Stepping out the next morning, we were also struck by the diversity of the city and the surprising number of green patches.

Keen to continue our culinary tour of the Malaysian melting pot, we had a late breakfast in Little India where we followed our noses into a Jain veggie restaurant and our waiter cut through the overwhelming menu and recommended a thali plate.

We expressed our individuality with identical mango lassis and stood by as an incredible variety of foodstuffs paraded past. Between soup and fruit salad with ice cream we tackled the thali plate, a deceptively dense selection of curries with biryani, poppadoms and a chapati.

We wandered through this part of KL towards Mederka Square, the colonial heart and the place where Malaysia declared its independence from Britain. Actually, we didn't wander so much as walk purposefully, but the intense sunshine and heat made it look much like wandering. Mederka Square did not disappoint, with its impressive colonial buildings and unexpected greenness. It used to be used as a cricket ground by the British, which explains both its grassy centre and the obvious cricket pavilions alongside.

Since they were really the only image we had of KL before arriving, we had to have a good look at the Petronas Towers. We had decided not to go up due to the brevity of the allocated visiting time and the fact that you can't see the towers from inside, and instead planned to visit the KL tower. However, we wanted to get close so we had a wander through the posh mall underneath before popping outside to enjoy the public spaces.

As we had foregone the opportunity to visit the very expensive aquarium in Bangkok we were excited to find a much more affordable option in the basement of the convention centre. Overexcited, perhaps, so let me share a photo of even more excited children on a school outing for perspective.

The next day's breakfast came from the food court in the Berjaya Times Square mall, where we ducked in to use the post office. I loved the system here. You visit the cashier, give them cash that you think will be plenty to cover your meal, and they give you a plastic card with credit on it. You are then free to wander around and choose whatever you wish from any of the stalls or booths, where they swipe your card (I suspect it saves time when there's a queue, not having to fuss about with change) and your food catches up with you in due course. You then return to the cashier on the way out to return the card and receive your refund of the remaining credit.

The vista from the KL Tower is spectacular, and highlights even more the greenness of Kuala Lumpur's city centre.

Nearby there's a cultural village, easily missed but worth seeing, which demonstrates the traditional styles of houses across Malaysia.

The Islamic Art Museum was a long, lunch rush hour taxi ride away. We're going to tell you about our wonderful driver in a separate post, as he is one of the favourite people we met on the whole trip! The museum itself is a model of modern arts display, with engaging and air-conditioned exhibitions, including one on the batik collection of Ann Dunham (Barack Obama's mother) with insight into the importance of batik crafting for the empowerment of women across South East Asia and the world.

"Engaging" and "air-conditioned". These are of equal importance when visiting on a day like ours. We don't know how hot is was during the day, as I only bought my exciting thermometer pen at the museum, but it reached 40 degrees while we were waiting to visit the National Mosque at 6pm. That's 104 Fahrenheit, and we were melting.

Donning the complimentary purple robe and hijab to go inside didn't cool us off, but it did let us see the modern and interesting interior. By the sanctuary, a nice man in a nifty outfit was doing some hard-sell evangelism with glossy pamphlets and explained how the Malaysian Muslim community is diverse. He didn't think it was necessary for women to veil their faces, but explained that many Arabs thought that a woman should save her special face for her special husband. Tallulah was itching to ask if men didn't have a special face, too. I wanted to know what it meant for Malaysian Muslims to have a national mosque at the centre of national life, but our guide didn't really have much of an interest in the non-theological!

We washed down the tranquility of the mosque with a chaser of chaotic Chinatown - and I mean chaotic. KL's Chinatown is, by far, one of the most claustrophobic main streets that I've ever seen, even though it was also heady and atmospheric, with tightly packed stalls leaving only a narrow passageway down the centre of Petaling Street and sellers pouncing on the slightest glance as an indication of interest and a cue for the sales pitch.

We ducked out of the chaos to buy Tallulah a backpack and found a food court to gather our thoughts over a drink (and an opportunity to try some lychee juice for me). This offered a surreal blend of morose country music and the occasional rat darting out from under one of the stalls to startle a tourist. Funnily enough, we decided not to eat there.

Kuala Lumpur was good to us, and it's sad that we didn't have more time to explore, but what we saw was an engaging and easy-going city with all the benefits of its diversity and, for us, a budget ticket to some much appreciated comfort!