First leg of my world tour :)

My dream is to travel around the world (ideally, to visit every town, every village). Finally the process has been kick started with a week-long trip to Malaysia. An official holiday you could call it.

The marvel of cutting across time zones for the first time still hadn't worn off before I was overwhelmed by the large open spaces of Malaysia. Starting with the airport and the roads. Miles of greenery and disciplined traffic. Even the smaller terminal for low-cost carriers was better than Bangalore's international terminal. Took it all in with unabashed wide-eyedness.

The first port of call was Kuching in the state of Sarawak on the Borneo island. The land of tropical forests, mangroves and several indigenous tribes. All the fatigue of two flights through the night and sleeplessness vanished the minute I drew back the curtains in my hotel room. Kuching city lay spread out on either sides of the sluggish Kuching river. A golden domed mosque in the distance with a chain of mountains serving as backdrop.

Just enough time for a quick shower and a quicker bite of lunch and we set out. The city has several ugly and huge cat sculptures -- Kuching means cat and the cat is the city mascot. After the thickly populated Indian cities and towns, this laid back place seems almost deserted. There are comparatively so few people you wonder how much business sense the malls make. Some old buildings, Chinese temples, quaint little souvenir shops.

First stop is Sarawak Cultural Village. Spread across some 17 acres of land just outside of Kuching at the foot of the Santubong mountain is this model village. Developed and maintained by the government, it tries to recreate tribal settlements. Something like DakshinaChitra in Madras. A showcase for tourists. Model houses and workplaces have been built the way tribals build them. There are few of the indigenous people in each of these dwellings, doing the things they would do in the forest -- carving on bamboo and weaving baskets.

We see the heads collected by the head hunting tribe, the feathered head gears of the hunters, the magnificent colours of the weavers. My favourite is the Orang Ulu tribe and their string instrument sape. "It's like the sitar," says Francis, one of the tribesmen at the Orang Ulu house and a superb sape player. Mention we are from India, and he is playing Bollywood songs on the sape. The lilting haunting music dies out, and as we leave, we are followed by the strains of a wooden xylophone, which a craftsman is still working on.

Close to the village is the Damai beach, again with the Santubong mountains looming over it. Damai means peace. And peaceful it is.

By the time we return, there are claps of thunder and soon a mist of rain through the golden sunlight. The river takes on a hundred hues as it rains, as the skies clear, as the sun sets, as the lights come on. We venture out for some dinner. There are cafes and food stalls along the river, the city has cooled down. But the restaurants are quiet and empty. The home food must be excellent :)

The next day, we are off to the Bako National Park. A 20 minute boat ride along the Bako river almost right into the sea and mangroves all along. Apparently, 12% of the country’s land mass is mangroves and these wetlands are well preserved.

The Bako park is the smallest in Malaysia and is home to the long-nosed proboscis monkey, clouded leopards and pitcher plants. The last one was the one I most wished I could see. But such was our luck that we did not even see the most common macaques or the bearded pigs that are forever venturing out towards the park’s office buildings.

The trails through the park are laid out with wooden planks and marked with daubs of red paint every now and then. Our guide Rose tells us that some of these trails can take one to quiet beaches, where it would be just you and the sea.

The next day we fly back to KL, yet again by-pass the city, and head to Melaka. Right out of history books, the Straits of Malacca and the old buildings, the narrow cobbled streets and forts. The heritage society has seen to it that the old buildings maintain their facade; you can do what you want to do with the interiors.

Of all the museums I went to in that one week, the most interesting was the maritime museum at Melaka. Not because of what was inside, but because it is housed in a grounded old Portuguese ship.

Much of the city’s recent development has happened over reclaimed land. As we take a ride in one of the colourful trishaws, the trishaw guy tells us how the spot where our hotel is used to be the beach. "Now we have to go 10km to reach the beach. But it is better this way," he says.

The next day, finally, we enter KL. Cannot but marvel at the efficient infrastructure -- fly-overs, subways, metro and monorails. Soon the Petronas twin towers come into view. For the next three days, I will catch it spying on me at every turn, peeking from between other buildings, lording over the city.

Most of the next couple of days is taken up in attending Malaysia Tourism events. But I do get some time off to walk around the streets, take the metro, window shop. Later, we got bird’s eye views of the city first from the KL Tower and then from the "Eye on Malaysia". But come to the city of the twin towers and not walk the skybridge? So Sunday morning saw us waiting in queue for the coupons to visit the skybridge. Only about 1000 coupons are given each day and people start queuing up early morning. We finally bag an afternoon slot and when the time comes, we step into the high-speed lift that goes at 5-6m per second. The bridge is at the 41st level, which we reach in less than 41 seconds. The view is the same, but the excitement of being on the skybridge was something else.

After a week of pampering at the best of hotels, with the best of vehicles, it was finally time to return home. The calling card had been exhausted, patience had worn out and the suitcase was bulging from all the shopping. So it was with a sigh of relief that I stepped into the Bangalore airport. If you think of the KLIA as a football ground, then the Bangalore one is a mere chessboard. And the actual grounding experience was the wait for the baggage. One can get so used to an organised way of working. After a week of that, here suddenly was chaos. The conveyor belt was stuck and passenger were pushing it along. For a long minute, I missed the pampering. But then, this is home.