Friday 2nd December 2022
In the morning, we walked from our hotel to the Bank Negara Malaysia Museum and Art Gallery. The museum opens from 10am-1pm, closes for an hour, then reopens from 2pm-5pm. There’s quite a lot to see so if you visit, I’d recommend going soon after it opens so you don’t end up being rushed.
It’s an impressive looking building, very modern both inside and out. We started on the top (3rd) floor, which is the art gallery.
There’s quite an eclectic selection of art, from bright modern art to more traditional paintings. I found it a very enjoyable gallery to browse.
The two floors below the gallery (2nd and 1st) tell the history of currency and banking in Malaysia. The 2nd floor is focussed on history, and also has a smaller exhibition on world currencies. The 1st floor is dedicated to Islamic finance and economics. The museum is very well laid out, with detailed explanations in both Malay and English. We found it very interesting, and learnt a bit about the general history of Malaysia as well as its banking system, which was only set up more recently after they gained independence.
On the ground floor is the children’s gallery, which we didn’t bother visiting.
We walked in the direction of Taman Tugu park, stopping at Nasi Briani Lori for lunch. The restaurant is outdoor (but covered) and was packed when we arrived. There’s a big food truck with huge pots of curry. They give you a plate of rice (either plain white or yellow), and then you help yourself to the curry. We shared a plate between us. The chicken wasn’t my favourite (slightly dry and a bit on the sweet side) but the beef curry was excellent – the meat literally fell off the bone and it was fragrant and beautifully spiced.
After lunch, we continued to the ASEAN Sculpture Garden, which is in Taman Tugu park. It’s a beautiful little garden, with some interesting sculptures.
We also saw a huge lizard wandering along, which was pretty cool.
We’d just finished walking around the sculpture garden, when we heard thunder and felt the first spots of rain. Luckily there were some covered benches where we could shelter, and the rain was heavy but short lived.
It looked like the storm was far from over, but we took the risk that the rain would hold off for a bit to walk through the Botanical Gardens. It was a very pleasant walk (ignoring the ominous claps of thunder we could hear in the distance).
There are a lot of different areas to the gardens, including a dinosaur topiary section, a bird park, a butterfly park, an orchid garden, and a couple of kids play areas. We didn’t see everything, as we were very aware it would rain again soon, but if was a nice clear day we’d definitely have spent longer in the gardens.
At the far end of the gardens is the National Museum, which is all about the history and culture of Malaysia.
There are two galleries on the ground floor, which tell the story of prehistoric and ancient Malaysia, through to the middle age. The exhibitions are very engaging and well thought out, with very good English translations throughout.
The two upper floor galleries cover more recent history, with one describing colonial times and the other from independence onwards.
We walked from the National Museum to the National Mosque of Malaysia. On the way we passed Kuala Lumpur Railway Station, which apparently is considered an architecturally significant building. I wouldn’t make a special effort to see it, but can imagine if must have looked very majestic in its heyday.
It’s not far from the station to the National Mosque of Malaysia, an impressive building that’s absolutely vast in size. I’d already bought a scarf to cover my hair and was wearing a dress with elbow length sleeves over long lightweight trousers just in case we could go inside. However, I needn’t have bothered. All female tourists have to wear full length purple robes to enter even if your shoulders and legs are already covered – basically you can’t show any skin (or hair) whatsoever. Men don’t need to fully cover up, but should wear full length trousers. It’s worth going inside, the building seems to go on forever and it’s beautifully decked out in white and sea blue.
After the mosque, we continued walking to Chinatown. Just before crossing the river, we got a good view of the Dayabumi Complex. It’s one of the earliest skyscrapers built in Kuala Lumpur, and I really liked the way it looks.
We saw the Sri Maha Mariamman Temple, but disappointingly it was covered in scaffolding so not quite as impressive looking as it would usually be.
We then stopped at Da Bao 打包 for a cocktail and snack of dumplings and a pork bao to share. It’s not the cheapest (our bill came to 135 ringgit, or about £25) but both the food and cocktails were very good.
We exited the bar to find torrential rain outside. We crossed over to Petaling Street market, just about managing to avoid getting our feet wet. Fortunately the market itself is covered, so we browsed it while we waited for the rain to ease. Pete had secretly bought me a grey-blue pearly when we were in Halong Bay last month, and gave it to me yesterday (the one year anniversary of our engagement). So we used the time to find a silver chain for it.
We ate nearby, at Al-Baik Di Bistro Restaurant. All the reviews rave about the naan bread, so we were disappointed to find it wasn’t available tonight. Instead we ordered a nasi kambing (rice with lamb curry) and an egg roti. The roti was exceedingly good, really light, fluffy, flaky dough. The curry was ok, but not the best we’ve had in Kuala Lumpur.
It was still quite wet outside, so we got a Grab back to our hotel and did some laundry in the self service laundrette in the basement, before going to bed.
Emma and Pete’s Asian Adventure 