Perhentian Island - Sundström Travel goes Asia.

FINALLY, Kerstin and Bengt arrives!! 12 hours late and flying Singapore Airlines instead of Finnair. We met them at Changi Airport in Singapore at 6 am June 21. Eva has booked two rooms at Hotel Robertson, fairly central with just a “drive’ to the city and for a quite good price. We will now, in the best Sundström Travel way, show our Gothenburg-friends our “pearls” in this part of the world. Can You think of a better beginning than after a guided walk in Little India with lunch at the “Indian-on-the-corner” guzzle on a Singapore Sling at Raffles?! Eva is, once again, celebrating her 50 birthday and she receives a silver necklace from WWF that contains water from the 7 oceans in the world, What a “proper” gift! Her eyes shone of happiness!!

We managed to have some Black pepper-and Chili Crabs, Mee Goreng, Tiger beer, cable car to Sentosa island, a visit at Fort Siloso, a "dive" into Singapore’s Aquarium, underground (yes, it is VERY clean) to Singapore’s symbol Merlion – that unfortunately was taking a “shower” and some late evening shopping at Orchard road, before it was time to take the train up to Malaysia and Kuala Lumpur.

We are staying at a four star hotel, Melia and in the price includes a full buffet breakfast (we are really enjoying our favorites: Chicken porridge, Beef Radang and Kaya, yummi!). Eva has found the hotel through internet and for a very good price, 210 RM (=55 USD) per room including breakfast! "K.L." feels a bit like our second home and on top of this it is really great to meet “Lipton” again; our watch guy at Jalan Petaling. We have bought watches from him for more than 10 years and nowadays we never have to bargain, he does that for us! And we know that we always get the best price. We are buying some watches to the guys (A-team) at Sepik River and also some T-shirts that we have sent to them earlier today.

Kerstin and Eva goes shopping for a day at Sungai Wang Plaza (yes, Eva’s favorite brand, Goggles is still to find at Metrojaya) and the newer Times Square. We all had lunch at the food court on the highest floor in Sungai Wang, a bit crazy very cheap and very, very tasty! We had our dinners at Jalan Alor, on the pavement and among the cars (!) AND as always the food is delicious. We have our favorite Roti Canai at Central Market but…….Central market is under renovation and our favorite place “is no more”…….some fast food restaurant has taken the place……sad! No problem, we found Roti Canai in another restaurant on the street. Kerstin & Bengt believes we are a bit crazy when we told them that this is a normally breakfast in KL: “Pancakes with spicy curry sauce” in the morning? And guess what?? In 1994 You could get a Roti for 0,70 RM (1RM= 25cent) and now, 2006, it will cost You…………………………hold your horses………………………0,80 RM! Glad we are not in the restaurant business in KL. Of course we treat ourselves with a Mai Tai at Hotel Federals rotating restaurant. Both the Bellman and the Headwaiter recognized us and wish us: Welcome back!! That makes us feel even more like home……We are also admiring the view from K.L. Tower and this day we are very lucky; the weather is clear and you can see very far. We stopped at the Bird park for a few hours on our way back to Melia, and this time it is really fun because we recognize many of the birds from our trip, there is even one “Greater Bird of Paradise”, but it is not dancing……………

The Football is on every screen even at our hotel bar and at 11 PM Bengt & Anders is preparing (Tiger beer of course) for the game between Sweden-Germany. Anders decorated the bar with pictures of the Swedish team and the staff all had Swedish pins…..but that didn’t helped……………0-1 after a few seconds and the rest of the game is a torment but still the Swedes are in a good mode and the other guys wished us look 4 years. Let’s hope that Argentina beets Germany. But they didn’t!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Times travel fast and after three days in K.L. Sundström Travel are heading east towards Khota Baru and Perhentian islands. We flied with Air Asia early morning on the 26. Air Asia is for Asia what Ryanair is for the Europeans, very cheap and easy to book through Internet. So................Taxi, Airplane, Taxi, Boat and Boat and……………here we are!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

At Water Colours we are staying in Sea view bungalows with our own toilet, cold shower (who needs a warm?) and a fan. The big difference from 10 years ago, except more tourists, is that they now have electricity for 24 hours. So we tried to cold down the rooms by having the fan on all the time but it is always between 29,9 and 31,9 Celsius!! It is no use to try to cool down in the sea, it is around 30 Celsius, and it is absolutely WONDERFUL! It is really cheap to eat and to live here (very good for our budget) and we are enjoying breakfast – Banana pancake at Mama’s, different kind of Mee (noodle) and Nasi (rice) for lunch and tasty fish dishes with fruit shakes at Mama’s for dinner We are not eating ALL the time – the rest of the days we are: Diving, Snorkeling, Canoeing, “Sudokuing”, Reading and playing cards. Eva is the champion of “Plump”.

Bengt as a beginner Snorkeller sees everything!! The most Sharks, the biggest Trigger (a fish) and the most beautiful stingrays. We will not be surprised if we have to arrange a diving trip for the “Gothenburgers” to maybe Fiji in about a year or so !!??

It is always sad to leave when you have met new friends. Nikki (the best service in the dive shop), Claudius (our very, very good Dive master that showed us all the fishes in the book after the div), the Waiter at Mama’s (that sings in Swedish for us), the Waitress at Coral View (that had her first day and us as here first guests) and of course all the nice things underwater...

Kerstin and Bengt has just taking the train back to Singapore and we are staying in KL until tomorrow when we are leaving for Bangkok and will meet daughter Lina and her boyfriend Peter that are waiting for us since a couple of days. We have had a very, very good time with our friends and as we said, there will probably be more “Sundström Travel's"......We are now looking forward to have holiday together with Lina and Peter, in Thailand and maybe Vietnam…..don’t know yet……

Those of You that are on vacation: Hope You all are enjoying your Holiday and “It is really good to calm down” ask us!!

Kisses

EvAnders