Another day in Kuala Lumpur


The kids slept in until after 8; La Serpiente made an abortive attempt to wake everyone up an hour before that, but was herself so tired that she fell back to sleep. We got up and went straight to the roof to swim; I managed one lap of freestyle and was then wiped out, and La Serpiente did lots of jumping in and swimming around. Talking to my wife later, I realised I’m bitter never to have got my 5 meter swimming badge, but this is something La Serpiente could achieve with ease.

We had breakfast, checked out and took the train to KLCC, where the Petronas Towers and the aquarium are. The aquarium is much as I remembered; there’s a sort of petting zoo at the entrance where you can touch sea cucumbers and bamboo sharks, there’s a long tunnel where you can walk under the fish, and there is a big glass wall (now roped off, which is different to 2009 when you could stand right in front of the glass) with big fish behind it. The girls were super excited whereas I was a bit jaded (but then I have been to grand aquariums in Osaka and southern Taiwan that eclipse what you can fit in a downtown space covered by a shopping mall). Then we spent the afternoon wandering the mall and drinking lots of coffee, before heading back to the airport to get our flight home.

In some ways this was a complete dodge of doing anything cultural, but on the other hand most people from South East Asia who I’ve met like spending their weekends in air conditioned malls, so we were being kind of authentic.

At the airport, the girls were mostly good, then a bit manic at the end, which is to be expected. I had to chase after then and simultaneously unload a baggage trolley, which meant some helpful grumpy bloke remarked "great place to leave a trolley" as he walked past me. I bit my tongue and so regret not retorting "thanks Kojak, for your great detective skills", for he was bald, and that would have been a good bon mot, but better if I could have remembered Telly Savalas’ name too, and if I didn’t mind getting punched in the face in an airport.

I sat with the children on the flight back, having been assigned seats where my wife was in the row behind us. I had packed away the girls’ headphones so they couldn’t listen to Paw Patrol for the ten minutes during the flight that we were allowed to have electronic devices turned on, and although I stuffed the kids full of Haribo and all the other snacks we had, Destroyer screamed and screamed at me until we landed. And then she fell over and started crying again.

Still, we were mostly relaxed and home and with the kids asleep by 9:30, so all in all that was a good way to end the weekend. More to come tomorrow, I guess.


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