Selamat Datang, It's 24 Jam KL Zaman.
Today I flew into Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Along with the usual "welcome, welcome" ("Selamat Datang") on the landing approach, the flight attendant made the announcement that the penalty for drug trafficking is capital punishment. They have this printed on the entry cards (and they had it on the Taiwan entry cards), but I thought it was an interesting juxtaposition.
Everything went smoothly except that like clockwork I get a mind-smashing headache everytime I travel to a new destination. Luckily, my hotel has a kitchenette with lots of ice trays. KLIA is a crazy distance from the city center (74 kms I believe), but my brainache aside, the drive is past very lush green scenery, though covered with a thick haze today. Before I left BBC said there are clear cutting fires in Indonesia that have polluted the air in Singapore and Malaysia for the past few days.
I'm in the business district of Kuala Lumpur and can see one of the Petronas Towers out my 31st floor window. It's interesting to see the varying architectural influences. Once the haze clears, I think this may be a very scenic city.
On the flight, I read a local Sunday paper. One of the sections had an interview with a government director of some sort of language police (they can fine companies for "misuse" of language). The official language is Bahasa Malaysia, but as a former British colony, English is a lingua franca. My untutored impression so far is that more people have a high level of English or are native speakers than even Hong Kong. I'm waiting to come across someone who doesn't speak English.
While I'm writing this I'm watching a Malaysian program that switches languages about every other sentence, and then switches subtitles accordingly (from English to Malay to some Chinese dialect). It seems laughable to protect the "purity" of a language in a situation where most people are bilingual or trilingual and switch midstream.
This is also farcical due to the extensive number of loan words in the Malay language. Everytime I read a new sign, I can spot some Arabic (zaman = time) and many English loan words. Realti. Universti. Impotensi (I guess if charred lungs don't scare you off smoking).
They have some Mandarin shows on the local tv. I was watching a Taiwanese show that seemed to be a "who can be the most anorexic" model competition. And then they had a South Korean soap opera dubbed in Mandarin, subtitled in Malay, which I watched all of five minutes.
I tried Malaysian peanut-sauce satay for dinner, but I think I like the Thai-style satays that I've tried better.
I went to a mall near my hotel, but it was pretty deserted, as was the food court. There are signs festooned with "Selamat Hari Raya" and "Happy Deepavali[sp?]." Hari Raya is the month of Ramadan, and Deepavali is a Hindu festival.
(Stream of consciousness, disconnected-thought mode. End stream.)
Everything went smoothly except that like clockwork I get a mind-smashing headache everytime I travel to a new destination. Luckily, my hotel has a kitchenette with lots of ice trays. KLIA is a crazy distance from the city center (74 kms I believe), but my brainache aside, the drive is past very lush green scenery, though covered with a thick haze today. Before I left BBC said there are clear cutting fires in Indonesia that have polluted the air in Singapore and Malaysia for the past few days.
I'm in the business district of Kuala Lumpur and can see one of the Petronas Towers out my 31st floor window. It's interesting to see the varying architectural influences. Once the haze clears, I think this may be a very scenic city.
On the flight, I read a local Sunday paper. One of the sections had an interview with a government director of some sort of language police (they can fine companies for "misuse" of language). The official language is Bahasa Malaysia, but as a former British colony, English is a lingua franca. My untutored impression so far is that more people have a high level of English or are native speakers than even Hong Kong. I'm waiting to come across someone who doesn't speak English.
While I'm writing this I'm watching a Malaysian program that switches languages about every other sentence, and then switches subtitles accordingly (from English to Malay to some Chinese dialect). It seems laughable to protect the "purity" of a language in a situation where most people are bilingual or trilingual and switch midstream.
This is also farcical due to the extensive number of loan words in the Malay language. Everytime I read a new sign, I can spot some Arabic (zaman = time) and many English loan words. Realti. Universti. Impotensi (I guess if charred lungs don't scare you off smoking).
They have some Mandarin shows on the local tv. I was watching a Taiwanese show that seemed to be a "who can be the most anorexic" model competition. And then they had a South Korean soap opera dubbed in Mandarin, subtitled in Malay, which I watched all of five minutes.
I tried Malaysian peanut-sauce satay for dinner, but I think I like the Thai-style satays that I've tried better.
I went to a mall near my hotel, but it was pretty deserted, as was the food court. There are signs festooned with "Selamat Hari Raya" and "Happy Deepavali[sp?]." Hari Raya is the month of Ramadan, and Deepavali is a Hindu festival.
(Stream of consciousness, disconnected-thought mode. End stream.)
brainfart by Daniel at
7:52 AM
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