In the morning, we got up and went back to our original hotel for our free breakfast. I used their wireless to Skype call my siblings, and then we left our bags. That will learn them to give away our room! For the rest of the morning, we went shopping. We were staying in Siam Square, the shopping center of Bangkok, so we decided to take advantage of our location to buy some presents for our friend Jee. We spent hours in the BKK shopping center, wandering through stalls and stalls of DVDs, electronics and other legal and sometimes illicit treats.

After lunch at the ritziest food court I have ever seen, we headed to the airport for our flight to Kuala Lumpur. The original guesthouse, which had said they booked us a taxi, did not, and we left completely assured of their incompetence. Once again, the taxi driver tried to trick us into paying him off the meter, and once again I walked away.

We arrived in KL at about 8pm, and were shocked to realize we were not at KLIA, my favorite airport, but at some local one. We called our friend Joy to inform her, but duh, she already knew. We ate dinner at McDonald’s while we waited for her to pick us up, and T had a prosperity meal, which he enjoyed. Joy finally arrived at 10pm—how rude of her to make us wait for two hours for our free ride to the airport and our free accommodation! Some people are just so selfish.

T and I keep going back to KL not because we love it so much (though we do like it a great deal), but for the hospitality. Joy and my friend Hwei Jee (who shall now be known just as Jee) were my roommates in Melbourne in 2000, and they were crazy fun. I liked them so much that now, 8 years later, I am still in touch with them and I can see them as if no time as passed.

This means that they regularly insult and mock me, and I return the favor. T loves coming to KL because the girls treat me as poorly as he does, and I love coming to KL because they drive me around, let me stay at their house for free and even give up their bed, order delicious local food, and don’t let me pay for anything. The girls are the greatest (unless they are reading this, in which case, eh…they’re okay).

The last time we came to town, they took us all over the place in KL, and even drove us to the Batu Caves, where we saw a lot of stairs and monkeys. This time, Joy informed us we would be going to Melaka. Melaka is a Portugese-Dutch-British colony about two hours each way from KL. Joy bought us some nasi lemak for breakfast, which was rice with chili paste, nuts and anchovies inside a banana leaf.  It was spicy and good. We picked up Jee at about 10am and hit the road.

Melaka is really pretty–full of colonial buildings and Chinese houses. The girls made no pretense about why we were there, however; we were there to eat. As Joy put it, a “food fest. “The first place we stopped was a little restaurant known for its chicken rice balls. When Joy told me that was the purpose of the trip, I thought CHICKEN RICE? What’s so great about that? Well dude, let me tell you—chicken rice balls are delish. We got a half a chicken with a bunch of rice balls and some chili-lime sauce. Who would have thought something so simple would be so good? I’ll tell you: the Malaysians. After lunch, we wandered around town and saw a local mosque, bought some local art, checked out the Dutch colony and walked to the top of the hill, where we saw St John’s Church and Fort.

Then it was time for dessert, obviously. I’m not sure what the name of the dish was, but we ended up eating something with crushed ice, noodles, peanuts, corn, kidney beans and some kind of toffee sauce. It sounds completely bizarre, but it was good, yo. We also had two different kinds of laksa. Next, Jee took us to the Baba and Nyonya Peranakan Museum, which was a Peranakan heritage town house with three atriums, multiple bedrooms and really beautiful design. If you’re looking for a nice gift for me, you may buy me this house and thank you very much. Then we got in the car to drive to the beach. We couldn’t find the beach, so we just headed to dinner. Dinner was some local Nyoyan food, with fish cakes, chicken devil, and some greens. Again, delicious.

On the way home, the girls decided to take us to Putrajaya, the new capital of Malaysia. According to Joy and Jee, about 10 years ago the prime minister decided to move the capital from KL to Putrajaya and an entirely new city was built, like Oz. It was really beautiful, especially at night, and was full of families playing with their kids and couples making out. When we got back to Petaling Jaya, we all went straight to bed, completely exhausted from all the driving and eating. Eating is really hard work!

The next morning, Joy had Muslim Banking class, so Jee came to pick us up to take us shopping. T and I had a list of things we wanted to get before going to India and Africa, so she was the designated driver. And what a driver she was! She started by taking us to a coffee chain for kaya butter toast. Kaya butter toast is officially my new favorite food. I’m not sure what it is, but it’s some kind of Malaysian jam, with butter on toast. I loved it. T and I also tried the white coffee, which I was able to drink WITHOUT SUGAR. This has never happened before, I must say. Of course, it only means that there was already 4 pounds of sugar in the coffee, but that’s entirely beside the point.

Then it was shopping time. Jee took us to an outlet village, where I got a shirt and T got some new jeans (miracle of miracles). Then we went looking for more shopping, but ended up driving around and through KL in search of banana leaf for lunch. After a long drive and a great tour of suburban Kuala Lumpur with Jee sounding exactly like Kevin Kline in A Fish Called Wanda, we found a restaurant with banana leaf. Banana leaf is Indian food, Malaysian-style. They give you a banana leaf and then plop all kinds of dal and rice and different pickle on it, and you scarf it down. Or we did, anyway. It is super delicious, and it restored my faith in Indian food. Thank you, banana leaf!

Then came more shopping. Jee took us to a local shopping center so we could go to Tesco to get another hair dryer (TRAGEDY: mine ate my hair in Phnom Penh and then died a slow and painful death). While Jee and I did girl shopping, T got a 15 ringitt, 15-minute haircut. Then, Jee took us to another shopping mall, next door, but we had to drive 200 miles to get there, around and onto a highway and into the world’s fullest parking garage. We spent about an hour looking for parking and then went inside. I spent about 6 years looking for jeans (note to self: jeans shopping in Asia is a highly humiliating and degrading experience that is never to be repeated), because Jee and I refused to pay for the $100 Gap jeans. I also got some flipflops, some soap, a bunch of shirts at the Malaysian Old Navy, and, finally, some jeans for $15. Jee is a master at budget shopping and should get a medal for her skill at finding deals and her patience for hauling us around all day.

After the shopping, we met Joy and her sister Tricia and brother Joe at a restaurant because obviously, it was time to eat again. The restaurant was packed with people, but we had a reservation, which was lucky because it took us about 20 minutes just to park. Tricia had just arrived from their hometown, and brought with her her fiance, whom we had never met. Michael, the fiance, is English, and a very lovely guy. Once more, we ate and ate and ate. We started with a dish called prosperity, which involved all of us putting our chopsticks into a pile of food and tossing it into the air as we made wishes. Rumor has it that the person who tosses the food the highest has their wish granted, but I tossed it pretty high and I am not yet queen of the world, so I’m not sure how much truth there is in that theory.  The girls ordered tons of food again: shrimp and a whole fish (whose eyes Jee gleefully ate), and a bean curd and some soup.

After dinner, we went back to Joy’s house and talked for ages. T and Michael had English Man Talk, and the girls and I had Girl Talk, mostly about all the men who love Joy, whom she shuns because she is picky. We also played with her little dog, Sebastian, and talked about how he is the perfect man. Tricia had brought some pineapple back from Sarawak and she spent most of the evening trying to make us eat it, despite the fact that we were already stuffed from our 58 meals that day and the one prior. We went to bed at about 2, exhausted and stuffed again (and in T’s case, full of beer).

The next morning, we went back to the coffee chain for more kaya butter toast. I won’t lie: I did the dance of joy. Once again, Tricia showed us her secret identity of food pusher extraordinare, ordering more and more food and trying to force us to eat it. We had our toast and our coffee and talked some more, and then Michael, Tricia and Joy drove us to the airport. Then, they came inside to make sure we were really leaving (I kid you not—Joy actually came up to the check-in counter to insure that we were getting on the plane and not coming back to her house).

These girls clearly don’t realize that if they continue to treat us this well (and feed us this well), and pay for everything, that we will only keep coming back. We have been so lucky on this trip to have such great hosts—in Sydney, Beijing, Shanghai and KL—that now we want to return to all these places to take advantage of our friends hospitality again. Once again, the girls (and Michael) have been spectacular guides, and now they will undoubtedly have to host us again (though they claim they are only this nice because we come every other year). Thanks, girls. We’ll be back in 2010, so look out!

On what was meant to be our last night in Phnom Penh, T and I decided to go to a local Indian restaurant for dinner. BIG MISTAKE. I had a mango lassi, and we shared two dishes for dinner. As soon as I tasted the lassi, my brain said something was wrong, but my stomach overruled it, crying, “ME LIKEY THE LASSI! LASSI BE GOOD!” As you can see, my stomach is not as wise as my brain, and it soon paid the price.

I awoke the next morning with my first case of Delhi Belly. I had not expected it to come in Cambodia, but there you have it. It started with some truly disgusting burps that tasted like rotten egg, and progressed from there. T took one look at me and made an executive decision to stay in Phnom Penh and not get the bus to Kampot. He went downstairs to speak to our friend at the front desk, who kindly changed our tickets despite the fact that we were supposed to be leaving in an hour.

It was a full 48 hours before I could even consider eating another meal, and two more days in the beautiful Relax Guesthouse (I have never been so grateful for good cable in my life). I spent most of the time moaning about how stupid I was to stop taking my digestive supplements and swearing to take them every day to follow. T was the best nurse ever, going out to buy me some crackers and 47 cans of Sprite, and not kicking me in the head for ruining our plans. This is why I married this man.

I don’t ever want to eat Indian food again. That could be a problem in about two weeks.

Like others in my family, I grew up believing that American Chinese food is far more palatable than actual Chinese food. I’m not sure where this belief started, but it is a dirty, DIRTY LIE. Chinese food is some of the most delicious food I have ever eaten in my life, and the American version is about as tasty as saltines in comparison. Getting food in China was both our biggest obstacle and our greatest reward. Ordering it was often frustrating and embarrassing (its never cute to be the stupid white people), but it was always good. Always. Even at the hideous McDonald’s of doom in Shanghai, and that wasn’t even Chinese food. 

One of the things we noticed first about Chinese food is their love of food on sticks. You can get dozens of foods on a stick in China, which endeared the country to me immediately. You can get meat on a stick, sugary fruit on a stick—even a candied rat on a stick. Yes, you heard me correctly. One of the most popular foods we saw in Beijing was a candied rat on a stick. Ew, not a real candied rat, but toffee fashioned into the shape of a rat on a stick. Sadly, we never tried it, because it took us a while to realize it was toffee, and then we stopped seeing them! 

Other noteworthy eating experiences in China:

• Before Mara arrived in Beijing and showed us all the delicious local food we didn’t know how to order, we had an adventurous night and went out to a nearby restaurant. The restaurant was full of old men in a halo of smoke, talking as though their voiceboxes had been removed. We tried ordering some food, and found one of the most hilarious menus I have ever seen, including:

Old adopted mother’s fried kidney

Pimple soup

Explode a chicken

United States hook speculation

Lotus leaf in a small fry

Family food that goes well with wine

The peasant family cooks vegetables ingeniously

The fragrant flowered garlic fries pig liver

The open country growth mushroom fries the potato to silver filament

Hot bull’s penis

• When Mara arrived, she introduced us to the egg pancake—on Christmas Day! It was perhaps the best Christmas present ever. As the egg pancake is street food and we have no clue how to read Chinese, we would never have found them on our own. This is how the egg pancake is made: on a circular hotplate, the cook spreads a very thin layer of batter, then cracks an egg on it, while smearing the egg around the batter so it doesn’t clump. Then, she flips the whole thing over, smears some sauce on the other side and adds scallions and coriander before putting what looked like a waffle on top. She cuts the waffle into three pieces, folds the pancake around it, and puts it in a plastic bag. Mara told us that when she first discovered these, she ate them every day for weeks. We dream of one day being so lucky.

•  In Chengdu, we were wandering the city looking for a place with an English menu when we went into a restaurant to ask. Instead of answering us, they ushered us to a table with a big hole in the middle and sat us down. We assumed it was a hotpot restaurant, but there was still no menu. Two girls came over and tried to speak English to us while handing us an order form to fill out. Since we are, as we mentioned, ignunt foreigners who don’t even know how to speak Chinese, one of them finally yelled out “Turkey!” And we nodded. Then a man came over, looked at the food section of T’s book and pointed to chicken. Okay. Then he filled out the form for us, changed one of the entries to a lower price, and disappeared.

A few minutes later, one of the girls returned with a giant pot full of broth and a half a raw chicken. She turned on the heat on the table, put the chicken pot onto it, and left. I almost cried. What the hell do we do with a half a raw chicken in some broth? And how do you eat it with chopsticks??! Fortunately, she soon returned, took the chicken away, and came back with it all chopped into pieces.  After that, hotpot ended up being fairly easy. At first, the women would come over and dump the assorted condiments into the pot for us, but after a while, we were able to do it ourselves (that’s what 3 masters degrees between us has gotten us—thank you, higher education!). It turns out hotpot is pretty good, though I wasn’t keen to repeat the experience again too quickly.

•  Another night in Chengdu (the night we asked for a Sichuan restaurant with an English menu), we decided to eat local again, in the hopes of some spicy food. The woman at the front desk who laughed at us wrote down some good local dishes on a piece of paper, and directed us to a local hotel. At the hotel, they clearly thought we were brain dead, showing up with a piece of paper with Sichuan foods written on it, and then staring blankly at them when they spoke to us. It’s my personal opinion that the woman wrote “Please feed these idiots some food so that they don’t come back and bother me again with their ridiculous requests.”

Whatever she wrote, it worked, more or less. They had a photo menu at the restaurant (the saving grace of every stupid non-Chinese-speaking tourist) and we were able to indicate more or less what we wanted. And it was good.

• On our penultimate day in Chengdu, we walked around the city for ages, searching for a restaurant recommended by our book, described as being a tiny doorway with a long flight of stairs. Uh, thanks. Needless to say, we couldn’t find it. And so, we headed for McDonald’s again when we noticed a number of Chinese fast food options in the food court. We headed toward the one with the best photo menu, and then a miracle happened.

A young guy with a round baby face popped out of the restaurant and said “Hello! Welcome! Please come in!” I practically French kissed him, I was so happy to see someone in a restaurant who spoke English. He took us to the side of the queue and helped us order. We ordered the egg-tofu things we had in Beijing, and some spicy chicken and the milk, made at the restaurant. Our new friend stood with us in the line, speaking his beautiful English and Chinese, and I think I spied a halo above his sunny little face. 

We found a table, and waited for the food to be delivered. When it was, we each got the main course, the milk, rice and some interesting salad, and some soup—and, of course, chopsticks. The food itself was okay, but the service was fantastic. Our friend was circling the restaurant, checking in on all the tables and he came past ours a number of times to make sure we didn’t need anything else, and that the food was good.

When we told him he spoke beautiful English, he beamed and did what all Chinese people do when they get compliments—he shook his head and looked profoundly embarrassed. We were thanking him compulsively, and every time, he would say the same thing: “It is my pleasure to help you!” Oh, little Sichuan man with the baby face, it was our pleasure to be helped by you.

So now I’m officially terrified to go to China. In a conversation with my friend KamTamFram from Hong Kong, I was just informed that chicken feet are the least of my dining worries in China. What could be worse than chicken feet? Oh God, I don’t want to know.