The Malaysian Invasion (invAsian)

I accidentally booked a very snazzy, comfortable bus to Kuala Lumpur, with TVs and leather seats, for probably less than an economy flight there. Good start. However, the bus dropped me off in a hell on Earth, a vast maze of incomprehensible construction that would plague me again several times during my stay in Malaysia: The 1 Utama Mall. This mall is the 4th biggest in the world and is something like 7 malls in one. So, walking around in this crowded behemoth, sweaty and carrying 30 kgs on my back, I walked around in frustration trying to find shaving cream, a money changer and food/drink for over an hour. Fortunately I found the latter because otherwise I would have faced certain death. I was picked up by Mrs Shamsuddin, who very kindly let me stay in her house for 7 weeks, and instantly found everything in another, far, far smaller mall. It should be said now that KL is just one big mall. They are indeed the main attraction, and in KL and its surrounding Klang Valley, there are over 100 malls. They even have a "Top 20".
The house I stayed in, with the Zaid family, was AMAZING. There was a pool table, with which I spent a good amount of time honing my skils. I was able to try a lot of local cuisine, and it is incredible. There is no porc as it is a Muslim country, so I had a steamy love affair with chicken for 2 months. There is a lot of it in all its various forms and it is delicious. Fish is also very popular, although hard to eat with one hand (explained later). Spice is everywhere, most commonly found in a sort of sauce called sambal. Of course, rice is omnipresent, and in the most popular dishes such as nasi lemak (coconut rice with nuts, egg, chicken and sambal), nasi ayam(chicken rice), nasi goreng(fried rice) and all the various curries. Malays eat with their right hand, which is difficult but the rice and curry tastes much nicer in fact when this is done and you get the hang of it quite quickly. It was harder with meat, so I cheated and used my left hand. Tea is wildly popular, and wildly sugary. It has dollops of sugar, along with powdered milk. Diabetically dangerous, but addictive and delicious. It is called "teh tarik", although for the sake of my fitness I balanced it with "teh o kosong", which means no sugar no milk (it was actually still a little sugary). They use banana leaves as plates, which is quite fun, and a lot of meals revolve around "roti canai", a sort of pancakey bread. I was also introduced to many fruits and vegetables, which did taste rather odd to my unaccustomed mouth. One of them, durian, tasted like cake and smelled very pungent. It's actually banned in public places in Singapore because of the smell.
Of course, with all this curry came many uncomfortable moments in which I was sweating uncontrollably and could not even think because the mouth was so fiery. All part of the fun.