Whatchamacallit??? (Malaysia)

I'm in a city called Melaka, Malyasia. Its a very touristy town with a few sights to see, nothing totally exciting though. Tomorrow I'm off to go to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia's capital... supposed to be huge and chaotic.

I've been travelling with this girl Marlene (pro-nounced Malina) for the last couple of days, she's from Austria. Its nice to have a companion and at the same time it can get a little annoying, but no offense to her at all. Just the fact that 2 strangers thrown together are going to have a few hiccups along the way, no big deal. I love how travellers put this huge trust into each other, its because we have no one else to. Yesterday, we got a bus to Melaka together from Singapore, I didn't have any Ringgit (Malay $$) so she lent me some.

Last night we just hung out at the hostel with a bunch of other travellers and drank beer, played cards. Marlene and I are also sharing a room because they don't have dorms here. I'm sleeping on a matress on the floor though, but its quite comfortable, we were going to trade the bed today, but since I had such a great sleep last night, I don't want to jinx it. Very nice place though with a roof top garden patio (not as glamorous as it sounds). Its a Muslim owned place so we can't wear shoes or slippers at all in the whole place, but Marlene and I have been sneaking our slippers into the shower. Nor are we allowed to bring any pork or chinese food into the place.

The food here is really good, tastes a lot like Filippino food. Rice, fish, stews, etc... spoon and fork! Yesterday at this market I wanted to buy some kind of dessert type food, it took us forever to decide what to get. I finally ended up getting this brown jelly type stuff. After eating it, its something I've totally eaten before, a Filippino food. I think there's coconut and something else. Its been bugging me the whole time as to what this... whatchamacallit is! I like the way the food stall are set up here, its kinda like buffet style. You get a plate of rice and then you can choose to fill your plate with whatever food there is on the counter to offer. After you eat your meal the worker will tell you how much it costs. Generally one big plate of food costs about $1 Canadian.

Speaking of Filippinos, I didn't realize how similar we look to the Malays. Everyone keeps looking at me with this white girl and get confused. I could totally fit in if I wasn't with the whitey. Oh well. Even the language seems similar. They Selamat which is like a greeting... as in Selamat Detang meaning welcome. However in Tagalog it means thank-you. At least I think its the same spelling. I wish I could actually speak Tagalog, I've got some months ahead of me to learn before I actually get to the Philippines.

Everything's so cheap, but others say that Malaysia's so expensive compared to Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. Can't wait. Its hard not to buy stuff, because there's some really cool things but I don't have any space for them in my backpack. I did buy this wood beaded bracelet yesterday and have been wearing it on my ankle, its pretty cool but its already starting to break. I think its too small for my ankle... and wrist for that matter.

Anyway, gotta go.... this cyber cafe is less than $1 Cdn/hour, but I've got to meet Marlene, we're going to eat some more yummy food.