Category: General

While we were in Indonesia, we didn’t bother getting internet service in our apartment.  It was a pain, the procedures were confusing, and we decided to just walk to the closest mall if we needed it.  Here in Malaysia, we’re trying to get something hooked up for our swanky new place.  The problem is that Malaysian internet service providers (ISPs, you non-techie people) have weird requirements.  To get DSL, you need, of course, a phone line.  To get that, you need to make a $600 deposit and sign up for an expensive 1 year contract.  That’s dumb, because it prices people like us out of the market.  (They’ll keep the security deposit for the whole year even if you leave the country after six months, and who knows if we’d get it back.)  Then you have to contact the DSL people and get that worked up, which also requires an expensive 1 year contract.  Again, it prices us out of the market for no reason.  You think they’d at least make an option for monthly service, maybe for more money per month but cheap enough to get more customers.  There are tons of foreigners in KL, after all.

What is so weird is the cost of the phone deposit.  Not the DSL router or the cable modem, the phone itself.  $600 for a stupid phone?  You could a phone of equal quality for $12 at Wal-mart.  In Indonesia, it was the same way–our phone deposit was $400–but it was compulsory with the cost of the apartment.  Here we were happy to avoid it, but now we have to deal with the phone company if we want to get this done.  We think that what these security deposits do is provide capital liquidity for these companies, which are probably pretty poorly run.  Or, maybe they take the money, invest it in a 12-month US government bond, and then keep the profit.  Jerks.

What this means is that it’s been a real pain to get to blog lately.  Wish us luck on getting this all sorted out.

After several days of haggling and waiting, we finally moved into our new apartment last night.  It’s pretty nice as far as these things go.  First off, the rent is $470 a month.  That alone is enough to make us smile.  More importantly, $470 a month goes a lot further in KL than it does in New Haven, or even in Jakarta for that matter.  In addition to the big bedrooms and bathrooms that we mentioned in our earlier post, we also have a washer and a dryer in the apartment.  That is so nice.  That means we don’t have to dry out clothes outside in the smog, thereby getting them dirty again.

We have also developed a new relationship with the mall.  We don’t really like malls that much in the United States.  Yes, they are convenient, but there’s something icky about the unrestrained display of consumerism, in our minds.  It has all the negative connotations of tract housing in the suburbs–think "Edward Scissorhands."  We have already mentioned that we spend a lot of time at malls here because they are hugely popular in both Indonesia and Malaysia.  Well, our latest find has been a gigantic health club running a special promotion this week, meaning that we have bought a six month membership for two for under $600.  Seems pretty steep when you put it in those terms, but given that we go every day, it’s worth every penny.  Plus, it’s usually pretty empty, meaning that we get to have all the machines that we want, and the machines are of better quality than anything we’ve ever experienced at home.  We’re going to be spoiled.

Last night we went shopping at the local pasar malam, or night market, that gets set up near our apartment every Monday and Friday night.  The quality of the produce was really high, enough so that we thought it looked better than the store.  The quality of the meat and fish was pretty low, so we skipped that.  We also tried all sorts of food from the stands.  First we had sate ayam, delicious chicken satay with peanut sauce.  Then we had apam balik, which is some sort of thin fried pancake, folded like a taco and filled with some sugar and something that tasted like durian, and was delicious.  We concluded with murtabak ayam, a doughy Indian-inspired bread fried on a griddle and filled with ground chicken, onions, and other tasty bits.  We could do this every day, but fortunately it’s not possible except for Mondays and Fridays.  There were literally dozens of other foods to try, and we’ll be going back to try them.