From Catherine's Perspective
I wrote this when I first moved to Malaysia, but it's still true. We've moved to a nicer apartment on the 11th floor so we get less bugs and more light. We definitely don't have all the U.S.A. amenities.
The weather seems like a good place to start. When we first got here, a friend of ours from Northern Canada was writing an email to her parents who had asked about the weather. She wrote, “hot and sunny, hot and muggy, hot with a light drizzle, hot and rainy….” She had to stop writing because she was laughing so hard at what she’d written in all sincerity, trying to describe the weather with accuracy. Now that it’s mid-October and it’s still like August in the mid-west, I think it’s safe to say it’s just hot here. It gets light at 7 a.m. and dark at 7 p.m. every day. Sometimes it seems too early to get dark, because I associate hot days with long evenings.
There’s no
hot water in the apartment except where a little box (about 12”x16”x4”)
has been added. You have to flip
the switch to heat up water for a shower. In
a way, it’s nice because you never run out of hot water during a long shower.
The sinks don’t have hot water, which includes the kitchen sink.
We just have a one-sided sink that’s not really big enough to wash
dishes. (No chance of a
dishwasher—I don’t think they have them here).
So, I’ve got a big bowl that I fill with soapy water and set by the
sink to wash dishes. The soapy
water is cooler than the rinse water from the tap because it adjusts to the
temperature of our air-conditioned apartment.
Also to do
with water, there’s a prominent floor drain in every room that has plumbing.
Aside from being visually strange, you can hear the gurgling as you run water
and occasionally when you’re just sitting quietly.
The drains have lids with holes that allow water to go down, but don’t
let creatures come up.
Uncovering
bugs and other creatures is always startling for me, and I’d say it happens
about once a week. The Spiders come
in all the usual varieties (long-legged, jumping, small, huge, brown, black,
etc.) There’s a shoe mark—clearly my Birkenstock--well placed about 2/3 up
and directly under the light fixture on the painted-white cement living room
wall where a medium sized one met its fate. There’s a bigger Ecco print (brett’s
bigger sandal) by the door for a bigger spider with a kidney-bean-sized-body.
Brett suggested we find a new method (one that doesn’t involve shoes) for
disposing of spiders in our new apartment.
We
don't have a car here. We've been
getting around by taxi, because taxis are unbelievably cheap---the highest fare
we've paid is RM 16 (or $4USD) and most errands only run 5RM ($1.25 USD) or
less. It's uncomfortable to walk
here because of the heat during the day and also sidewalks (if they're there at
all) are what looks to an American to be a curb which has been widened to 2
feet. The sensation of cars passing so close really gets the adrenaline going.
Traffic is
really different and driving on the left side of the road is the least of it.
The lines on the road are just suggestions.
It’s best to stay basically on your side of the street and basically in
your lane. When you hear honking
here, it’s not because someone violated road etiquette; it’s to let a car
know that they’ll be passed. They
do stop on red and they don’t stop in intersections that are marked with a
yellow “X” so that cars can turn onto and off of side streets during stopped
traffic.
There’s a
lot of traffic jams. There are only
a few main streets that don’t dead-end, so traffic is always slow. What looks
to be the most efficient way to get around is a moped or a motorbike, if you
don’t mind risking your life. The
mopeds drive in-between lanes, in the opposing lanes or on the sidewalks, if
necessary, during stopped traffic. It’s
not unusual to see a family of four, including an infant, on a motorbike.
I even saw a kid that looked to be about three years old sitting
in-between his father and the handlebars, head drooped over the right side,
sleeping, as the bike wove in and out of traffic. There’s a helmet law, but
police look the other way if kids don't have them because helmets are expensive.
I think kids may be somewhat expendable in this culture.
If you were recruiting drivers to race motorcycles, I’d say here would
be the place to look. Pizza Hut and McDonald's have nicely painted mopeds for
delivery and the post office delivers mail by moped.
What with
the traffic jams and not knowing if you’ll get a cab right away, it’s
difficult to get any place at a scheduled time.
If I can’t walk, I’m usually there way early or a little late. When I was having kidney trouble, I never had an appointment
with the doctor any more specific than “Wednesday,” which worked out rather
well.
We do take
the bus regularly. They don’t come at specific times, but you can usually get
the one you want with no more than fifteen minutes wait. The bus stops have
places to sit that are just two long parallel pipes raised off the ground at the
right height for sitting. When we
got to the peak in the middle of the Cameron Highland jungle walk, there were
two logs laid parallel on the ground and due to our bus stop experience, we knew
that these logs were a Malaysian bench for relaxing before moving on.
People
“litter” here, plus leaves fall from the trees every day.
The streets are kept pretty clean by street cleaners, usually very small
women, with Malaysian style brooms (twigs spread like a fan on the end of a
short bamboo handle). They wear big
straw hats over their veils and masks to keep from breathing the exhaust.
If you’re out around town, you have sometimes have to pay to use a toilet. Most places it’s 30 sen (about 8 U.S. cents) and another 30 sen for tissue. The girls’ toilets are squatting toilets. Squatting toilets are something like a western toilet, but it’s set into the floor. Aiming is difficult and if you get in a hurry, there are all kinds of things that can get wet - cloths, bags, shoes. There’s also a hose, which is apparently used in the same manner that we use toilet paper. The floors of the bathrooms are always wet, partly from the hoses (and accidents), and partly because of something about washing ones feet before praying, which is done five times a day. In the malls, there are prayer rooms right next to the bathrooms. There’s usually a mix of western toilets and Malaysian toilets in the bathrooms. But squatting is safer, because if a Malaysian has used a western toilet, they’ve stood on the seat, so the seats are pretty much always filthy. Also, brett says there’s a law in the U.S. which says that restaurants must provide toilets. They don’t have that law here.
The visible
culture here is definitely a male culture.
If you walk around during the day, the streets and restaurants are filled
with men only. Downtown, in the
business district, which has a wealthier profile, you see more of a mix. In shopping areas, there are about equal numbers of both
genders and usually a few kids.
There
is a variety in women’s dress here. The
ethnic Chinese women wear the latest fashions—short skirts, tight tee shirts
(all those outfits you see in store windows and think, “who the #*%# is ever
going to fit in that?”)—no hips, butts or waists at any age, they look great
in all the teen-driven fashions. I’d say about 40% of Moslem women wear a
veil. When we first came, we kept seeing all these great scarf stores.
We were thinking, “why do they have so many scarf stores?” and
“that would look really nice tied around the neck…” when we realized that
it was for women to cover their heads. Some of the younger women wear jeans and long, loose tee
shirts with a veil. The
conservative look is something in dull colors like tan that looks like a nice
full-length rain or overcoat when it’s on the hanger (worn with a colorful
veil). The most common look is a matching tunic and long skirt in very bright
and colorful patterns, worn with or without a veil. Traditional Indian dress,
both the sari and the tunic type outfit, is common here, too.
Occasionally
we see a woman with full black veil (nothing showing but the eyes).
The first time was when we were on the observation deck of the KL Tower
on one of our first days here. A
lady in full veil was taking a picture of her husband and young son with the
cityscape in the background. I
thought of asking if she wanted a picture of all of them, but didn’t ask since
you wouldn’t be able to tell who she was in a picture anyway.
Guys tend to wear western dress, but it’s not the rule. Malaysians are proud of their traditional dress and one the outfits for guys is a kilt-looking thing that is floor-length. There’s also something of a short skirt worn over pants. One day I’d agreed to meet brett for lunch, but rehearsal was changed and I ended up standing in the lobby area for a long time. I just happened to be there when Petronas employees were coming back from lunch. It was fun to watch what they were wearing. A lot of them wear flip-flops (those small rubber sandals you wear to the pool) and I saw every combination of clothing including a gentleman in a long skirt with a western button-down collar shirt untucked over it. Small round hats that only cover part of the head are very popular with men.
I
think for many Malaysians, the measure of success is how busy you look. (Also
a western concept, but I think it’s taken to an extreme here.)
A six-day workweek is the norm, and most people work long hours. The
doctor I went to had morning, afternoon and evening clinic hours for everyday
except Sunday, when he only had afternoon and evening hours. I’m not sure what
time the apartment complex cleaning staff arrives because they’re always here
when I wake up and they stay through late afternoon.
This apartment employs a good 15 people at anytime.
There are 2 or 3 guards on duty 24 hours a day.
The cleaning staff just cleans the pool area and walkways (there aren’t
really any grounds). The job is important—they brush the water out of the
gutters, which keeps mosquitoes from breeding, but I think it could probably be
done much quicker if the pay was for the task rather than by the hour. There is also the management office and I know that they’re
supposed to help us with plumbing problems, but I’m not sure what they do.
When we
first moved here, people felt the crush of the economic crisis and resentment of
foreigners living in Malaysia was probably at a peek. People (waiters, random
people on the street and in elevators) would ask us where we were from.
At first we said, “United States” or “Amerika” as they call it
here. After a few weeks, we started
adding, “but we live here now.” I
stopped saying the last part because everyone was always visibly disappointed.
They’ve tried hard to establish a strong tourist industry, so the presence of
foreign tourists is a big triumph, but the presence of foreigners living here is
perceived differently. There’s
the perception that foreigners are paid too much, which is not unwarranted
compared to Malaysian standards. For
people paying debts and planning retirement in the U.S. or other countries,
brett's actual pay is good, but not incredible or outrageous.
There’s also the perception that jobs are being taken away from
Malaysians. Even though in most cases the jobs were created for the purpose of
bringing in foreign experts (with the idea that it’s best to start with
someone with the know-how who will pass on his/her knowledge, rather than making
people learn the hard way), the perception is still there.
They’re especially worried about foreign wives working.
My visa says in all capitals/bold print, “ANY FORM OF EMPLOYMENT
STRICTLY FORBIDDEN.” brett isn’t supposed to take on any work, like teaching
privately, because his visa only covers playing with the orchestra. You can
apply for papers that allow you to create your own business.
From what I understand, right now, it can take over a year for a
foreigner’s new business to be approved, if it’s approved at all (it’s
likely to be rejected if it doesn’t create jobs for Malaysians).
There
are laws that protect Malaysian jobs. For
example, a bus picks up brett and the other orchestra members who live in this
complex every morning for rehearsal and brings him home at night.
Apparently you can’t have a busload of foreigners without a Malaysian
tour guide, so a tour guide sits on bus with them every day.
Some
nationalism has religious overtones. Christianity,
Buddhism, and Hinduism are all popular here in addition to Islam. However,
because it is illegal to convert a Muslim, any publication from any non-Muslim
religion must say, “For non-Muslims only,” to show that the intention is not
to convert Muslims. I was a little
shocked the first time I saw an advertisement for a church service that said
“For non-Muslims only,” but I’ve gotten used to seeing it now.
It’s
the custom here to take off your shoes when entering a home, but it’s
obligatory to take them off when in the presence of anything having to do with
Islam. It’s best not have on your
tennis shoes. We’ve only looked at the outside of Mosques because in addition
to taking off the shoes, it means (for me) having to put on robe and cover my
head. Non-Muslims and all women aren’t allowed in prayer room.
We
have been in a Buddhist temple (it’s also obligatory to take off your shoes).
It would be good to go back and have someone explain it to me. I was
impressed by the number of Buddha tiles—like bathroom tiles, maybe 4” by
6” that covered the walls of a room the size of a small grade school gym.
We saw the gargantuan sitting Buddhas that were in Plexiglas cases.
There were art works hung in a row outside that definitely depicted a
story, maybe of Buddha’s birth. This
temple was part of a monastery, so there were a few monks circling the main
temple building and prostrating themselves every few feet.
We’ve
also seen a few Hindu temples (again, it’s also obligatory to take off your
shoes—you can see why flip-flops are so popular here), and these are easier to
view since they tend to be very open-air structures.
There are
two parts of the city that are fairly populated with “ex-pats” which is what
we’re called here. We live in
“Ampang” which is one of the areas, and the other is on the opposite side of
downtown and is called “Bangsar.” Even
in these neighborhoods, when we’re walking, (which we tend to do a lot,
because we don’t have a car), there are occasional honks and “hellos” from
passing cars and motorbikes. I’m
not sure if people want to try out an English “hello” or if it’s like
saying hello to a celebrity (“Look! it’s Donald Duck—Hello, Donald
Duck!”). Especially when you’re
with someone, it’s easy to smile or ignore it, but it’s a little tougher
when you’re on your own. Usually
I find it doesn’t bother me at all when it happens, but if I think about it
later it upsets me.
The
other day when I went to the orthodontist, I was on the edge of Bangsar.
When I came out of the office high-rise, I had to walk a block to get to
the main road to catch a cab. There
were lots of men in street, eating at the hawker stalls, working in shops that
open up onto the street, walking somewhere or just sitting or standing around.
I hear “hello…hello” but since I’m not expecting to see anyone I
know, I don’t really look around. Then
I can’t miss, “Hello, white woman! How are you?”
I yell back “Good. How are you?” and keep walking.
I never feel unsafe, just strange.
One
time I took the bus in with brett in morning to buy symphony tickets at the box
office before his rehearsal started. When
we got there we discovered that the box office didn’t open until 10a.m., which
is the same time rehearsal started. The orchestra hall is part of a building that houses office
building, of course, and also a mall. I
went to sit down in the mall (which also didn’t open until 10a.m.) and try to
decide which tickets to buy. Pretty soon there was a group of people mulling
around and a few of them (men) joined me on the bench and some more moved in
around the bench. I’m still
trying to figure out which concert tickets to buy because the season packages
overlap so that if you buy two packages of five concerts each, you’ll see
several concerts two times rather than seeing ten different concerts. Someone taps my shoulder, points at a lady in front of us
with a camera, and says, “Do you mind?”
I smile; the camera clicks. The men move away from the bench and the
women in the group move in. The
camera clicks again. I spoke to one
of the guys enough to understand that they were on vacation, traveling from
rural Malaysia. They thought I was
a student since I was studying the symphony schedule so hard. Getting a picture with me was a one-time opportunity you
wouldn’t want to miss, like getting a picture with Mickey Mouse if you were at
Disneyland.
The
flip side of being an ex-pat is that you are pretty much irrelevant. Some people
do seek you out because they want employment. I turned down someone who wanted a few hours work per week
cleaning and ironing and she almost started crying and said she had to make a
living somehow. It is cheap to hire
a maid here (about $2.50 USD per hour) but it’s an expense that adds up over
time. Since I have no earning power
or anything else better to do, I’m still the maid so far.
Unless
a Malaysian is pretty into Western culture, they have to no reason to seek you
out as a friend. We’ve really only got two Malaysian friends here who sought
us out because we seemed interesting. One
of them studied music for a while in the states.
As
visible as I feel when I’m walking around, the women in this culture are
mostly invisible and I fall into that category. When we’re in a restaurant,
most of the questions are directed at brett.
In some cases, they make it extra clear by punctuating every sentence
with “sir.” (“Is everything
all right, sir? “Do you need anything else, sir?”)
This
is the part of culture shock with which I’m having a tough time.
I’m invisible and irrelevant, but all eyes are on my pale skin.
The culture shock guidebook says to take pictures in the first six months
of your arrival, because after that, these things that seemed so strange are
taken for granted. When we first
arrived, since everything seemed so new to us, it seemed reasonable that people
would want to say “hello.” Now
that it’s become strange, I guess it’s just a matter of deciding how to deal
with it, and letting it become reasonable again. And to give Malaysians the
benefit of the doubt, we find ourselves staring at white people, trying to
figure out where they’re from by their features, dress and accent. They are interesting to look at since they’re in the
minority.
In addition to trying to fit into the Malaysian life-style, there’s an
orchestra subculture that is made up of largely Europeans.
Having watched enough movies, I’m familiar with the stereotypical
American abroad. One of the latest
examples was the character of “Molly Brown” in the movie “Titanic.” Her
character was brash and gutsy. Her
words and actions were just a bit shocking to the cultured Europeans. Whenever I
see those stereotypes in movies, I can’t really relate to them because they
seem to be shocking people on purpose because of a misplaced sense of integrity. Here, I find myself fitting the stereotype of the American
abroad. I’m the one who is
shocked because I’ve shocked people with jokes that weren’t even meant to be
jokes in the first place. For example, I had expressed concern over the price of
housing in KL and the real estate agent was saying something about that’s why
people were living with roommates and I felt the need to make it clear that
there would be no roommates. I
said, “I can barely live with my husband.”
The three Canadians and the real estate agent couldn’t stop laughing,
mostly from surprise. (I know
exactly what my European friends would have said.
“Well, it is difficult to live with other people, isn’t it?) I think
Americans are less judgmental and guarded in what they think and say, which
makes them seem less sophisticated than others. The problem I still have with the stereotype is that somehow
it doesn’t show the sincerity of being more honest, and the vulnerability that
involves, because I’m certainly not feeling gutsy over here.
We buy our
groceries from the “van ladies.” They
were introduced to us when we went to an orientation session for living in
Malaysia. At
our first apartment they came on Mondays and Thursdays around 7 p.m.
The vans have flaps that open up the sides and the doors have shelves in
them, so when they’re open they display cereal and cookies.
There are two or three freezers for dairy products, frozen TV dinners and
meats. They have an amazing number
of foreign products, and if you ask for something they don’t have, they’ll
deliver it the next day. They got
us some Pace Picante Sauce “HOT.” They
said it was hard to get, which we believe because it’s hard to get in the
states. Sometimes the fresh eggs
are dirty and you have to wash them before you put them in the refrigerator, but
it’s worth it not to have to carry 3 cases of cokes from the grocery down the
road. At our new apartment, there's no place to park the van, so we have the
groceries delivered. I e-mail my list the night before and everything comes in a
cardboard box that a man brings to my door on a trolley.
There are a lot of malls here. You
could practically walk through the city, never leaving a mall unless it’s to
walk on a raised walkway connecting two malls over a busy street.
Stores tend to have the weirdest combinations of things for sale. For example, the “Sony Wings” store in the KLCC sells
medium to high-end stereos, TVs (with flat 90” screens), DVDs, etc.
But at least half the store is devoted to a few day-glow trash cans in
different colors, lip stick, a few bath towels with Winnie-the Pooh on them,
movie-sized candy, etc. Malls usually have 2 to 3 department stores, just like
in the states. The odd thing is,
every department store has its own supermarket, sometimes on a separate floor
and sometimes, right next to the house-wares section.
We haven’t been able to buy clothes here, which is a small problem
since our clothes were stolen from the shipment and we just had the things we
brought with us on the airplane. We
probably clocked in about 40 hours of shirt shopping before we gave up on ever
getting a shirt for brett here. We
found a 17 shirt collar which fits his neck, but when he stretches his arms out
in front of him, the cuffs literally come up to his elbows.
For me, the problem is that I’m too chunky.
Ethnic Chinese women are the women that buy western fashions in the
stores. Malaysian women are
shapelier, but they wear the standard Muslim dress. I was starting to panic,
because even things marked “L” don’t come close to fitting. Then I saw a
conversion chart. “L” is an U.S. size 7-8, “M” is a 5-6, and “S” is
a 3-4. The alternative is to find a seamstress and a tailor.
They do a reasonably nice job. The
cost is about the same as buying something “regular price” in the states.
The first few months we were here, we were still getting things fixed in
our temporary housing. A real
estate agent was around quite a bit. As
the liaison between the owner and us, he had to oversee plumbers and
electricians. He’s a pretty big talker and gave me advice on where to
vacation among other things. He
boasted that Malaysia is a great country and one of the reasons he gave was that
you can buy movies here before they are even released in the states.
It’s true. There’s an
incredible “black market” of movie VCDs and CDs of computer software.
VCDs are video compact discs and they are the equivalent of a
videocassette here. Movie quality ranges from a hand held camera in a movie
theater (so you can’t hear the movie very well, but you can hear the audience
coughing and laughing) to copies from a DVD.
The number of computer programs available is amazing. Half of a mall can be devoted to black market software or
movies, and it’s tough to find the real thing.
Usually the bookstores have it, though.
Right in line with the black market is the buyers beware policy here.
If you buy it, it’s yours. We
haven’t gotten taken for anything except a few broken light bulbs and moldy
bread. At first we didn’t pay
attention as the salesperson opened the box and held up whatever we were buying,
before dramatically placing it in the bag like they were going to perform a
magic trick. A friend of ours
wanted to buy a pair of jeans at the open-air stalls of the night market. He looked at the Levi’s on display, agreed on a price, and
then got upset when the seller put a generic brand of jeans in the bag he handed
to him. Apparently salespeople in
what looks like “legitimate” stores (I think it’s a fine line here) are
suspected of some of that street selling mentality.
We do pay attention now, especially with expensive stuff.
One other strange thing is that there are lots of stores owned by
Cigarette companies, like cafés, CD stores, etc.
Smoking is permitted most places, too.
Entertainment
There are
some things that are different at the symphony concerts.
In order to buy a snack at intermission, you have to stand in line for a
ticket and pay for your snack. Then
you have to stand in line to trade the ticket for the food and drink itself.
It’s best to buy the ticket before the concert starts because there’s
no line and you can be toward the front of the line to trade in the ticket for
food. Like at sporting events in
the states, you have to buy your program, and there are corporate boxes that are
owned by companies. I don’t think
they’ve sold them all yet because some of them are always empty.
Last, but not least, we can still be movie buffs here, although our selection is somewhat limited and what does come is heavily edited by the censors. The theater in the KLCC has amazing seats--great big cushy things that look like they belong on deck of the Star Trek space ship. When you buy your tickets, you buy specific seats, although they don't necessarily give you seats where you want them and not everyone sits in the right ones anyway. They only let you into the theater 5-10 minutes before it starts, so it helps to be orderly. The popcorn is covered with sugar instead of salt. It tastes like breakfast cereal. There’s long, movie like commercials, especially for beer before the movie. Of the movies showing now, some are 3 or 4 years old and some are still playing in the states.
 
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