Its Been a Month

If we get the internet this week (we should) we'll start posting pictures as well.

Subang Jaya is the city we live in. It is about 30 minutes from Kuala Lumpur . Sort of like Mississauga from Toronto . Subang Jaya is a mix of very modern 1st world shopping & commerce with some 3rd world life styles still lingering. Pollution is pretty bad. Vehicle exhaust is the worst pollutant. People put out their garbage every day & it often rips & scatters & people don’t really clean it up well. Some areas are spotless & clean & other areas are quite littered. Subang Jaya is a very working class neighbourhood. We are in a gated community/neighbourhood & it is very nice. We have met some wonderful Malaysians who cannot do enough to help us out.

It is hot but nothing we haven’t experienced in Bolton during our heat waves . But it is always very very humid. It is about 31 degrees during the day & about 29 at night. Every place, store, classroom, taxi is air conditioned to the max & we are often freezing, but we don’t complain because it feels sooo good. We are getting used to sweating!! Bill bought a couple of little towels to mop up and then we noticed that many Malaysians also carry little towels too. We are noticing the heat less & less each day. I guess we are acclimatizing!

The food is interesting. We’ve had lots of rice with a variety of veggies & chicken – actually really tasty. I haven’t ventured too far from my taste bud safety zone yet!! On Sunday we went to a beautiful Japanese restaurant with a couple who took us to church. The meal took about 2 hours & it was wonderful. We tried eel, oysters, sushi (just a little bit), & many other delightful items - all very tasty.

The people we have met are wonderful – the school staff members are terrific. The new Canadian group - 10 of us - have gotten together many times for short parties – lots of fun. 4 are brand new graduates, 2 are 5 year teachers & 4 of us are retired – a great group. Almost all of us know people in common. It is such a small world.

Pangkor Island - We had a staff team building weekend July 27-29th. We left Friday am about 9:30 for a 4 hour drive & 20 minute Ferry ride to Pangkor Island - a destination restort island. We stayed at Puteri Bayu Hotel. It was once a very lovely but there has not been the upkeep & maintenance to keep it a 4 star place. Parts - eg foyer, entrance were lovely but other areas were older & a liitle run down eg rooms. But it was neat & clean. However, Taylor's hired a team to lead us through the weekend & they were terrific. We had a lot of fun and we met so many other staff members from other Taylor's campuses. They had many activities including "An Amazing Race" that took us around the island. The island is very pretty and picturesque with some beautiful beaches. The island itself seems to be a very poor settlement of "Chinese/Malaysian" fishing families. The "downtown" area reminded us of Wasaga beach of old where there were lovely beaches, some resorts/cottages & tacky little souvenir shops!. But we had a terrific relaxing weekend - and it was free!!

The Canadian section of Taylor's College took all of the Canadian staff out to a lovely restaurant in the Sheraton Hotel last week. This is where we stayed for the first week. It is a beautiful hotel. Dinner was great.

That's the news so far. I could go on about so much that is the same but so much that is different. It really is amazing to "live" in another culture. But, is it basically so modern that there has not been any culture shock. We are having a great time. It is like we are on a very long holiday.

Take care & hopefully we'll be sending some picture soon.

Love Kim & Bill