Category: 2006-08: NRT, KL & SIN

31 August is Hari Merdeka, the founding of the modern state of Malaysia. I was in KL on 30 August when celebrations into the night welcome in Hari Merdeka.
Kinda like New Year’s Eve parties to welcome in the New Year. People in Malaysia are very patriotic by showing their colors all over the place. Sometimes on buses. Definitely on the streets. Nicely on their persons (complete with bad pun). And sometimes patriotism just spurts out of their cars.

Must’ve driven into a flag storm…

Saw this car at lunch in Klang, on the Road to Singapore.

KL in some ways is an urban planner’s nightmare. The roads aren’t in a grid, thus making navigation a challenge for first time visitors. And the traffic!! The traffic jams are legendary.

This is traffic at 1600. And it’s really not that bad YET!
To help deal with this, KL has several rail lines (LRT and monorail and high speed) running through the city. However, they are all run by different companies and transferring between them is an exercise in patience (and ringgit). If you plan to muck around in KL, it’s best to PLAN PLAN PLAN and to use your map reading skills…
After I finished my Petronas Tower tour, I decided to check out the Bukit Bintang area. This is one of the busy spots in downtown KL with lots of shops, restuarants and bars for expats and upwardly mobile types. Tonight is Merdeka eve; many of the bars were getting ready for evening festivities. It even has its own KL Monorail stop!

It’s really the Coca-Cola stop…

As if you had any doubt about who is sponsoring this staion..
Ah, you’ve probably noticed that it’s a co-branded Monorail stop. Apparently ALL the stations on the KL Monorail have corporate “sponsors” that blanket their respective stations with advertising. It’s useful in a touristy way if you have to give directions. “Take the monorail and get off at the “Coke” station”. Hey, if it keeps fares down and brings in revenue, it’s all good with me!

Can you recognize the companies that have stations here?

THE Malaysian landmark (the one thing that people think “Malaysia” when they see it) is unquestionably the Petronas Towers.

They’re quite tall. And there’s a mall at the bottom!
I was last in KL in 2003 when I was introduced to Tiger Beer with ice, spicy chicken noodle soup, World Union Rugby and the mother of all hangovers. During this lost weekend, we tried to get tickets to the Petronas Towers tour, but got there too late (all gone!). Tickets for the tour are free, but rationed. They are distributed on the same day, from 0800 until they run out.
My first stop after arriving at KL Sentral from KLIA was to the ticket desk to try to get a tour ticket. I arrived there around 1015 and I’ll have to admit, I wasn’t too optimistic. But sometimes things work out. Because I got a ticket for the 1400 tour!

A view of a tall mall

My favourite store in the KLCC!
After lunch, puttering through the mall and an all too brief internet session, I went on the tour. It began with a brief film on the construction and design of the Towers followed by a ride in what seemed to be a freight elevator to the skybridge on the 41st Floor.

Looking down! Note the brace supporting the skybridge

It’s a nice view from 41 stories up

The park that’s adjecent to the KLCC

Detail shot of some of the 65000 square meters of stainless steel cladding used on the Towers
Tower 1 is occupied by the Petronas company and Tower 2 is leased out to commercial tenants. No restaurant or view deck at the top of the towers. Still I wonder who has the highest office in the building?

As this is a corporate headquarters, the usual disclaimer…

Hmmmm. Since I don’t speak Bahasa Malaysia, should I retitle this entry to “Aeroline Basi”?
So after an evening at the Singapore Island Club (because Wild Rocket is closed on Mondays!!) and overnight in the Summer Tavern, I dragged my roller bag toward Waterfront Plaza. Then I gave up and flagged down a taxi and RODE to Waterfront Plaza. A very inconvenient location since there’s no MRT stop nearby. Aeroline has since moved their Singapore terminal to Harbourfront. It’s a good location since all the buses and taxis know the location and it’s the terminus of the NEL.

Get on the bas…
Now why am I riding the basi instead of flying or taking the train, you may ask? Well, taking the train is SLOWER than taking the basi. And taking the basi is hella cheaper than flying and it’s just a few hours longer. See, Singapore and Malaysian Airlines have an arrangement where they monopolize the KL-Singapore route, keeping all others (such as Air Asia, JetStar, Tiger, etc) out. The prices that are charged are expensive for a 40 minute flight. In other words, RIP-OFF! There’s movement to change that, but for now, the basi is your best bet.
And for basi, it’s not that bad. It’s a modern double decker with seating for about 20 upstairs and a lounge area and seating for another 10 or so downstairs. The basi left promptly on time and drove to the Tuas checkpoint. Where we all played the “immigration hokey-pokey” which went something like this:
Get off the basi. Queue up in scary building. Stamp passport. Get on da basi.

Drive across the bridge
Get off the basi. Take your luggage. Queue up in scary building. Stamp passport. Toss luggage into back of basi. Get on da basi.
A bit of a pain, this is. I do understand the need for passport control on proper sides of the border, but geez, still a pain. Kenny Sia wrote about this too and made a neat-o graphic.
Apparently, it’s a special thing if your KL basi has food. From what I’m told, it’s usually a cold sandwich. On Aeroline, you get a bottle of “processed tap water” and a hot lunch.

Hot lunch!

What is this? Looks like chicken…
Besides the mystery meat, the rest of lunch wasn’t too bad. And the ride over was comfortable. The seats were leather (nicer seats than UA), they reclined and there were a couple of movies (Pirates of the Carribean and White Chicks) too. Thankfully, I slept through most of the movies.

The view from my seat
Didn’t really miss much out the window during the 5 hour trip because this is what you see for most of it.

Yep, it’s a lot of rubber trees. Going by pretty fast. That’s all you see for about 5 hours. Then 5.1 hours later, you see this (along with a LOT of traffic)

Petronas Towers at night from the basi
This means we’ve arrived! My frens are here to collect me so this means time for real food!!

Besides the usual accolades about Singapore Changi (home base of SQ, spa, movies, free broadband, cushy chairs, transit hotel, koi pond inside the terminal, hawker centre, great duty-free, yadda yadda), here’s more reasons why Changi is, quite possibly, a destination upon itself.

Free Financial Times!!
And when you get off the plane, you see these every 10 meters, from the gate to immigration.

These are foot massage machines. OK, more like reflexology machines!

You lose your socks and put your feet inside for 10 minutes of pain and bliss. Waaah!

This being Singapore, there are exact instructions so you dun hurt yourself
Both OTO and Osim have different machines on the path to immigration. By the time I finished my session and cleared immigration (the latter taking a whole 3 minutes!), my baggage was already off the belt waiting for me. I was the last one from my flight to leave the airport! Sheesh.

Yum yum yum! It’s lunch time!
And which one to pick? The “continental” or the “japanese” lunch? Choices, choices!

Check out the instructions on the “sauce for the noodles”. I wouldnt’ve figured it out…
And this being SQ, each big meal ends with the infamous ice cream cup. On today’s flight, our ice cream cup comes from France via Japan.

It’s a Fauchon cup! Verry rich french vanilla bean ice cream! Click between the French and US sites for some interesting insight…
And the fun continues…

Along with redoing the entire South Wing of Tokyo Narita for the Star Alliance, they redid ANA’s outer lounge. It used to be a small, unexciting lounge that you killed time at because you could. Now, it’s new, has a neat design AND has a soba bar!

Yup, that’s soba alrighty…

Wao! Check out the fish cake in the middle of the bowl! Advertising lah!

The usual beverage bar and food aisle. They have snacky treats and sushi. And a beer machine too!
They also have a fully stocked bar but since this was a morning flight, it wasn’t open. Oh well.

Looks like one of those trendy bars that you have to dress up to get into…

I luuuurve the specialty of the house. Too bad it’s morning!!
And this is the front desk, the first and last thing you’ll see when you use this lounge.

They’re just LOOKING busy…they’re really a cheerful bunch
ANA Lounge is highly recommended. I think there’s some other kind of united lounge here but what ANA lacks in size (it’s not as big), it makes up in quality.

One of the seating/lounge-y areas of the ANA South Wing Lounge
Did I mention the free wi-fi?

One ironclad rule I’ve tried to live by when travelling is, “find a crash pad near the train station“. Repeat that five times really loud. “FINDACRASHPADNEARTHETRAINSTATION” X 5. OK, done.
And for the most part, I’ve been pretty good about that. There are several advantages to having a guesthouse/hostel/hotel near the train station. They include:
You have an instant landmark (the train station).
If you find yourself iniebriated, you can simply tell the cab/police car driver, “drop me off at the “blank” train station”.

Convenience.
When you arrive at your destination late in the evening, you don’t want to be scratching your head trying to figure out where your lodging is, especially since everywhere else is closed (because it’s late). Also, since most Japanese towns have the eki in the center of town, all the useful things, such as combini and late night food are close by.
As I wrote about in an earlier entry, my JR Pass was due to expire this evening. If I spent the night in Tokyo and braved the commuter hell the next morning, I would be Y1150 and at least 2.5 hours poorer. Ever try to push your way onto the Yamanote with baggage during the commute? I have and it’s something I don’t want to do. EVER. AGAIN.
I had the brilliant idea of going out to Narita (the town) tonight, crashing in a hostel there and heading out the next morning to Narita (the airport). It sounds good on paper, right? Well, it didn’t turn out quite as painless as much as my Japan travel usually is.
In order to maximize my time in Tokyo, I booked myself on the last N’Ex of the evening which left around 2000. I spent much of the afternoon wandering around Kabuki-Cho and the Golden Gai, two places in Shinjuku i’ve not been to yet.

The last train outta town…or at least to NRT
One piece of advice for riding the N’Ex. When you acquire your ticket, you get a car and seat assignment. That assignment cooresponds with the signage on the platform floor. The N’Ex splits into two sublines upon arrival at Tokyo-eki from NRT. One part continues on to Shinjuku and the other continues on to Yokohama and points south. When you are taking the N’Ex back to NRT, the two parts arrive and combine to form one big train that leaves Tokyo-eki and arrives at NRT.
I watched some Amerika-jin chase the first part of our train to arrive down the platform before having to stagger back to where their seat assignments were when the second part of the train arrived a few minutes later. They did this even though there was a lot of signage saying “don’t do that”. Ha!
Hey, I may have attended the San Francisco Public schools, but at least I can read lah!
Anyway, the ride to Narita (the town) was uneventful aside from meeting a couple from South Africa who came to Japan for their honeymoon. They spent a lot of time in Kyoto and Hakone, as a lot of honeymooners who come to Japan do (heh heh). When the train arrived at Narita (the town), I ran into a couple of other flashpackers who had the same evil plan I did so we decided to get lost together. After a few wrong turns and some confused directions, we found our way to the Azure Guesthouse. It took us a grand total of 45 minutes to find the place, dragging baggage up and down hills. I developed ugly blisters the size of dollar coins (Eisenhower) on at least four parts of my feet. Pain!

The lobby of the Azure Guesthouse at 0600. That be early!
The Azure Guesthouse is a bit of a way away from the eki and what passes for downtown Narita. You pass through downtown, pass a hospital and a Chrysler (!) dealership. You also pass a Matsumoto-Kiyoshi (drug store), a used bookstore and a grocery/liquor store before you get to Azure. Once we arrived, we found out that there were a total of five guests (including the three of us who just arrived) in the entire hostel. There was a couple of Koreans who were staying here and commuting into Tokyo each day to play tourist. That’s like staying in Simi Valley and driving into downtown LA each day. Not the smartest use of your limited vacation time.
The hostel is on the small side, but was relatively new and whose interior designer subscribes to the “neo-japanese dark wood” design asthetic. It looks cool. There are three rooms with three bunk beds in each. One shower and one toilet for all. My brief stay here was tempered by some quirks that I normally would have expected in guesthouses in Bangkok. Or mainland China. But not Japan. First off, the guesthouse is on the second floor of the building. That really means the third floor, because here it’s “Ground” then “1st” then “2nd” floor. For much of the US, it’s “Ground” then “2nd” then “3rd”.
That’s to cut off any sort of wise ass remarks that may come because I had to go up ONE flight of stairs…
Then the signage. Signs everywhere. “No shoes past this point”. “Drinks only in the common room”. “Clean up after yourself”. “Make your sheets like this”. The last sign annoyed me to no end. Seems that they want you to fold your sheet into a psuedo-sleeping bag, covering your pillow so that the only thing your gaijin body touches is the sheet. Very uncomfortable and when I tried to comply, it didn’t work. The next AM, I woke up (EARLY!) with the sheet on the floor and the blanket and pillow in some unholy communion under my head. Guess they’ll have to wash the pillowcase! And the sheets! Did I mention that I got charged Y300 for a towel? And Y300 for plugging my MacBook into their (throttled) “broadband ” connection? That’s gotta be the slowest broadband I’ve ever experienced in Japan. On the plus side, they sell beer (Yebisu!) and there’s a combini across the street that sells pretty good kara-age.
Like I said, it felt more like Bangkok or mainland China, except cleaner and with smarter design.
It’s always easier to find your way back then to find your way somewhere. The next morning, I followed the directions posted to get back to the Keisei Narita-eki, which is next to the JR Narita-eki. I left the guesthouse at 0615. I arrived at 0635. And that was with me walking slowly, dragging my roller bag behind me. It’s definitely easier when you know where things are. And when it’s daylight.
The best thing was that Keisei took my Passnet card, which I thought was only good on the Tokyo Metro, because that’s where I bought it. The Passnet card is a stored value card (like a BART ticket or an Octopus/EZ Link) that you can use on all the subway lines in the Tokyo area (EXCEPT JR lines). I purchased one for Y1000 becuase I needed to take the subway for a few trips and I hate having to purchase a ticket each time I go through the wicket. Best of all, if you have to transfer between the Eidan and the Toei, you don’t have to purchase two individual tickets. Using your Passnet card makes the transfer seamless.

This is Keisei Narita-eki at 0646. If this were anywhere in Tokyo, I’d be drowning in commuters right now.
Here ends your Japan travel advice for today…

First off, I need to return here at night. It’s much more interesting then. However, I was put off by some of the signs that say “No Pictures”. Except it was on the street!
Much has been written about the Golden Gai and how it represents how Tokyo used to be before it became “modern”, how the misfits and rebels and gaijin hang out here, yadda yadda. Basically, the Golden Gai is a small area packed full of really small bars and alleys that look very “Shitamachi” in “Yamanote”.

The outer edge of the Golden Gai

This is how it looks inside the Golden Gai. In daytime. When everyone’s closed.

Wonder what’s upstairs?
Most, if not all of these bars have a steady clientele that they make their money from and many of these bars are not friendly, or are even hostile to strangers (gaijin, you AND me) who poke their noses into what many consider their private space. Most times you’ll be able to tell how welcome you are by how the mama-san reacts when you open the door. Other times, you can read it on the wall outside.

If you wanna visit, go with a local! Or take Nihongo lessons!!
Gotta save some money, drag some frens with me and drink here next time!!

A big ol’ billboard (out of three) in JR Shinjuku, the busiest train station in the world.

People have gotten lost in this station. Is it because it’s so big or because people are looking at advertising?