The bus.
The trip begun on Sunday morning. I woke up at 5am, at 6 I left home and at 7 I was supposed to meet Marta at Masjid Jamek station, near Puduraya bus station. Marta’s train was late, so she reached at 7:20. We had only 10mins to bus departure, so we were almost running. And, when reached the station, exhausted and sweaty, we realized that our bus is not there YET. And after few messy conversations with random guys (but those bus-station-guys, who talk all the time using the shortwave transmitters) we decided not to wait on the platform but in the bus station building – there were at least few fans. When we were called to go to the bus around 8am – it was still waiting for I-don’t-know-what, so finally it left around 9am. Surprising? No, not at all :p
In the Middle of the trip the bus driver decided to make a break (I suppose a lunch break for him). So he asked all the passengers to leave the bus - for me it was quite weird, I was quite sleepy and wanted to continue my nap. He said that the break will last 20min, but obviously it was prolonged to 40min. Of course the driver’s lunch is more important than our day in Singapore, right?
The customs.
I was shocked. Marta was shocked. The customs building, so the place where you cross the border between Malaysia and Singapore is HUGE. Generally Malaysian and Singaporean customs are separated and there is a bridge in between. But both of them are HUGE. I would compare it to Terminal 1 on Okecie airport in Warsaw. Or even bigger. And you know what since Sunday I’ve been wondering why those building are so big. What for? And till now I have no idea.
Singapore.
Clean, tidy, green. Good communication – thanks to MRT and regular buses. A lot of skyscrapers. A building which looks like two separated halves of a huge, silver durian. And a sculpture of Merlion. Chinese temples, Indian temples, mosques. Pictures have been already uploaded on picassa.
Marta book a cheap room, where we stayed for one night. Small room with 5 double-decked beds, I suppose that around 8 people stayed there during this night. And we met 2 of them: originally from Ireland, who teach English in Japan and currently are having their holidays in South-East Asia. Can you imagine that still there are people who have never crossed a border of their country?
Btw: pics from Singapore are uploaded already on Picassa.
Trip back from Singapore – LC visit in UTM
It took me a while to come back from the Singapore to UTM. UTM is one of the public unis in Msia, where we have an AIESEC local committee. Itinerary: customs – Johor Baru Larkin bus station – customs – UTM. And why the last part was the most memorable for me? Because of a bus. A bus which I took to travel to UTM. It was so old and scary that while going by it I was expecting that it will break down in the middle of the way (because of the sounds it uttered). Inside the bus it was very dark, because the light was turned on by the driver only for a while before the bus stops. And actually the driver was arguing with some people from time to time, sometimes he didn’t even want to pull out the bus. O M G.
And there was also a woman who was supposed to tell me when the bus will reach my stop. This old Indian woman looked very suspiciously, I dare to say that she looked as a witch :P Simply: I didn’t trust here. So fortunately I asked another woman, who was sitting next to me, about the bus stop. And after a while, ‘the witch’ told me to get off the bus, because it’s my bus stop. And it wasn’t! The sitting-next-to-me-lady started to argue with the old one, then the bus driver joined the discussion so for a while all the passengers were confused. But finally I reached the right bus stop. And I had my first ride on the motor bike. I was scared at the beginning (because my last time on the motor bike wasn’t nice at all), but then it was cool to feel the wind.. on your face (I wanted to write about ‘wind your hair’, but I had the helmet on so it’s kind of impossible to feel it that way :p).
The Muslim lecturer.
I was a panelist of an exchange participant review board today. So there were 2 people who want to go for an exchange through AIESEC and I, together with an English teacher from the university here, was asking them questions concerning their personality, exchange preferences and others. But I want to focus on the teacher. Her accent wasn’t British at all, even though she spent few years in England. During the review board itself I didn’t talk much with her about things not related to candidates. But afterwards she took me for lunch, paid for it (!). Generally it’s only the second Muslim woman I have met here and he treated me very well. After a short conversation with Isaac, an AIESEC member here, I found out that she treated me probably better than she would treat local students here. And the main reason is not because I am a nice girl, but because my skin is fair and I am from Europe. I have to admit that I like this special privilege, but it doesn’t help me to know people here just how they are.
So in the previous panel I had few weeks ago there was another Muslim lecturer who was the co-panelist. Actually it was my first time to speak to a Muslim woman so I was kind of scared. They wear all those headscarves and obtain all those ‘weird rules’…I didn’t know what to expect. But after a while I realized that she was a very funny person, we talked a lot. And after the review boards finished I wanted to shake her hand and say goodbye, but she hugged wishing all the best. I was confused, but it was very nice.
Campus’ rules.
There are a lot of rules which have to be obtained by students staying on a campus. And I was being educated on them during whole evening.
But before I will describe the campus’ rules it’s quite important to write that there are few rules to be obtained in Malaysia, since it’s a Muslim country. The first one: it’s not allowed to hug or kiss in public. What is very fortunate for me because I don’t see here those happy pairs in love who are touching each other all the time :p Malaysian couples in public touch only their hands, but it’s also very seldom.
Furthermore, male are not allowed to enter to the female dorm and vice versa.
It’s not allowed to wear shorts (at least knee length) in the university and sleeveless shirts.
It’s not allowed also to wear that kind of short wear in the Mosque. But in the church also, right?
And the last and not least (at least for today)! The rule which caused me stay overnight in the interns flat without towel, pyjama, and all my stuff. So: UTM’s students are not allowed to enter the campus later than at 12 pm and earlier than 5-6 am. So this is why they were checking who is going in when we were going back after a Chinese evening organized by interns. It was already midnight, so they asked about my student ID. And since I didn’t have it – they didn’t let me go in the campus. Well.. shit happens. At least I have a sleeping bag and I am staying in a house, not in McDonald, which was the first option to solve the problem.
Hope to have a good night here, tomorrow going back to KL.
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