Living in Malls

 Kuala Lumpur has taken awhile to grow on us. We immediately could see all the strong points the city offers. This is a metropolis that has every amenity a person might need while still being affordable. It is very multicultural with a strong base of Malay, Indian and Chinese with many additional international expatriates. This background means comes with a high level of tolerance and acceptance for differences. In Malaysia citizens are granted public holidays for Christian, Muslim, Hindu Malay and Chinese holidays. The few people I discussed religion with divulged that though they identify with a certain religion they celebrate all the holidays. Similarly, they eat all the food. The city is rife with eateries that are both of local and international flavours. Tova joked that grocery stores in KL are so great because they stock the junk food from so many different countries. Even though Malay is the official language of the country school is also provided in Mandarin and Tamil and of course English. Because of the British history of the country English is spoken everywhere making life quite easy for expats and visitors. Still, there is another side of the city that took some getting used to.

Kuala Lumpur is a city made for cars. We like to walk and make every effort to walk wherever we can but this is an instance where making walking work has been tricky. The city is not set up for walkers and there are frequent busy roads and highways with no crosswalks. Walking from point A to B involves long arduous detours to navigate across and around busy roads. Often pedestrians are forced to J walk as the sidewalks on offer are isolated concrete loop islands. I am an avid J-walker but still it is daunting J-walking an 8 lane road with children.If you download app programs to really understand the KL roads and potential crosswalks at the end of the day it still just isn't that nice walking on the side of the loud busy roads. Even taking public transportation is often a futile exercise as the pinwheel shape of the transport is ideal for commuters heading into the centre of town and less ideal for urban explorers. And so we have acquiesced to this life style of taking taxis. The taxis are prevalent and affordable and efficient, and yet, I still prefer the longer slower life walking places. Turns out walkability of a place rates extremely high in my personal livability index. 

Kuala Lumpur is a city dominated by malls. Life is conducted in the malls. The mall are where you would go for dinner, meet friends, go for a haircut, workout, buy groceries, celebrate a festival, take music classes, seek legal advice, got to a theme park, visit a doctor, buy clothes, go for a climb, furnish your house, do your banking, buy a hammer, and on and on. Even many schools are in malls. In some ways this is an efficient and nicely air conditioned system. But it does all get a little awkward if you are a person who just can't seem to love malls; The lighting too bright, the ambient noise incessant, the crowds of people milling around aimlessly daunting. We have developed some coping mechanisms. We have learned which mall entrances are closest to the point we want to get to to minimise the journey through the mall. We try to frequent the businesses that operate outside malls. We have identified malls that are smaller and easier to navigate. We are slowly developing a mall life even if our love is malls is taking longer to develop. It is interesting for us to live a different kind of life. Mall life in some ways is an easy and convenient life, and yet, we are not yet convinced we require so much convenience. 

Oh the luxury of this city!

Rainbow stairs up to the Batu caves

Magic in the malls

River of life. Cleaned up at this spot but further down is lethally dirty and full of street dogs and large monitor lizards.

Malaysian food

His and Hers blood tests. Good to know if anyone needs a second honeymoon destination

Malls can be cool

Cute in a mall

Socializing in the space between IKEA and the mall

How can there be so many shops!!!

Mall living

Kids favourite breakfast

Festival preparation in the mall

Chinese chess

Also in a mall

View from our apartment

Happy mid-autumn festival!

Shenzhen Economic zone

Hong Kong is one of those cities where nature is never too far away from the chaos of city life.  It is made up of beautiful large island and coastal mountains lush with green and bustling city nestled between. Doing one of the longer Hong Kong hikes has always been something appealing to me. I convinced the girls that what we needed were a few days of hiking and eating in Hong Kong. Somehow, though, our five days hiking in Hong Kong turned into a five day foray into Shenzhen. Whether or not you have heard of Shenzhen, everyone has a relationship with the city due to its high levels of manufacturing - especially in electronics. While Hong Kong was at its peak Shenzhen was still a small fishing village until it was designated, and constructed to be, an economic zone in the 70's. Shenzhen was China's first experiment in capitalism. I would deem the experiment successful given that the rest of the country followed suite and Shenzhen continues to grow and produce. 

Our days in Shenzhen were all a bit of a jetlagged haze. Still, we got a feel for how life is different in China. We used a whole new set up apps, navigated a different set of norms, and navigated a maze of high rises. The museums we went to were large and impressive. We especially enjoyed the art museum which was a hangout for grandparents with toddlers. Little Levana fit right in to the group of two year olds running around as their caregivers smiled benignly. The dafen oil painting village sure did have a lot of reproductions. We were impressed at the range of quality of reproductions. We went to a revamped old town. It was very tastefully revamped and we enjoyed the mix of old buildings with cute modern shops. We also enjoyed making a friend in the old town - it was an unexpected gift to get to eat lunch with a local family. Our hike up Wutong mountain was cancelled due to a typhoon that decided to visit at the same time as us, but, it is always nice when there is a thing left undone that might draw you back to a place. 

What really impressed us all the most about Shenzhen was food delivery. So so so much food delivery. Shenzhen is the home of drone food delivery. Drone food delivery seems both novel and unnecessary until you have seen the food delivery situation in Shenzhen. There are food delivery motorbikes everywhere. Everywhere everywhere. For whatever reason the government is on board with the importance of citizens not having to cook as the food delivery vehicles have permission to use the sidewalks as well. Either too many food deliverers were dying in accident on the roads or it is just very important to everyone to get their food as fast as possible. Maybe it is the second option as food delivery motorbikes also seem to be exempt from any stop signs or lights. These deliverers are the ultimate j-walkers. They seem to be above any rules and regulations. I imagine at their briefings they all sit in a huddle and their boss strikes his fist in the air while declaring "whatever it takes." If you stand at the exit of the mall you can see the food deliverers jump off their bikes race down a set of steps and ten seconds later they are running back with their arms full of food, their legs pumping, their chest heaving and in one fluid motion their put the food on the back of their bikes rev up and streak across the sidewalk in a blur of 'whatever it takes.' If food delivery was an Olympic event the Shenzhen time would get gold. Walking on the sidewalks is sometimes a life or death situation. Thankfully the sidewalks tended to be wide and we were reassured in knowing that we were playing our part in ensuring all Shenzhen residents can have hot delivered food for breakfast lunch and dinner. 

Old and new. Cute little surveillance robot.

Thinking this one is definitely an original what with it being in a frame

She really enjoyed doing pottery

So much variation on the same repoduction!

If I had a house maybe I would have left with art

Pretty glitzy at night

View from our window

Food delivery lockers outside an office building

This was a very impressive museum

We liked how lifelike the people looked in this museum. 

Thank you Cathay Pacific for putting Frozen in your movie selection on long haul flights

Family summer

 The only things that makes a Summer trip to Norway even better is adding on a visit to Canada right after. It has been a glorious summer of ocean, and lakes, and family frolicking all to the soundtrack of a two year old singing frozen songs.  Thanks everyone who welcomed us with open arms in Norway and Canada. The love will carry us through the next months of travel in farther flung locations. 

Levana in Canada

Canada summer living

She uses shovels as paddles

Bridge walkers

Nature in the city

Learning to lounge

Learning cursive the old fashioned way

Fire

All five of them!

Carlton University has Tova's admiration because of its diving boards

Was the Summer of Cards

Norway, we missed you!

 After the novelties of Georgia, Armenia, Latvia and Estonia, it felt like a sort of homecoming to arrive in good old Norway. We started out on a stressful note: our Agoda booking flaked out on us at the last minute, and buying last-minute rooms in Oslo is never a pleasant (or cheap) experience. 

But soon we were relaxing by the waterfront with Tamar's brother David and his family, the 2-year olds playing happily. We joyfully reunited with Go' Morgen yogurt, binged on Firklover chocolate, and bought cardamom pastries in bulk. Then we bid farewell to Tamar's side of the family and drove/bussed down to Strandfjorden to join Jakob's side. 

Life at Strandfjorden is as changeless as ever; it was different without Jakob's mom there, but we had fun with his sister, aunt and cousins. Norwegian Codenames was a hoot, we learned a new dice game ("Tretti") whose level of fun was directly proportional to the quality of trash-talking, and a card game ("Amerikaner'n") which was a big hit, and played some hilarious games of Kubb. The girls bathed in the frigid sea every single day, just 'cause. Sophia, Tova, Zadie and Tamar ran a 5km race in Lillesand - the older girls came 4th and 5th out of 34 women, and Zadie got the biggest cheers as she cradled her heavily bandaged hand the whole way. We picked oodles of raspberries, made waffles, and walked to Grimstad where we borrowed library books, a bicycle, a basketball and a soccer ball. 

David and his family rejoined us, and we had a blast hiking, cooking and playing on the little beach. We visited our friend Nadia and her kids in Arendal, which was like a window into modern-day academic/family life in Norway...so different to our little hamlet that's largely frozen in time! Jakob's birthday brought an incredible homemade cake with fresh forest berries, and many socks. Tamar took the girls on a road trip to Lysefjorden, including an epic hike up to Preikestolen and a beach day at Sola, one of the prettiest spots in southwestern Norway.

All too soon, it was time to go again - but we left feeling more relaxed, suntanned and re-attached to our Norse roots. 

Happy Birthday Jakob!

The girls did their first 5k race - yay Sophia, Tova and Zadie!

One of many card sessions

Preikestolen girls hike

This picture is even better with the line up of picture takers

Sola beach on a foggy morning

Bjoroya

Mari's carryon luggage was a little over the weight limit

Toddler on a plane

Moving up the Baltics

 

In a funny way Tallinn felt like an extension of Riga. The two countries are similar in many ways as they are geographically very close together and share some of the same difficult history. While both Riga and Tallinn are 1/3 Russian both cities had a scandinavian feel. Tallinn felt more  Scandinavian to us but maybe that is just due to it being wealthier. Tallinn's medieval old town draws in a lot of tourists and I can see why given its intact city wall, towers, fortresses, churches and tunnels. We got to experience the medieval vibe in a restaurant made to imitate restaurants of 500 years ago. Before electricity indoor spaces were so much darker! With my parents visiting we explored town as much as possible given two children were ill and Zadie had to be taken to the clinic twice for bandage changes. Highlights included the tunnels under the city wall and the maritime museum. Tova got to swim at my parents hotel numerous times making her very happy. We did a day trip to Helsinki where we did a long meanding walk in the rain and fell in love with the library. Helsinki seem sthe type of place that tourists might label uninteristing but seems lovely to live in. I probably have more to say but suffice it to say that we were all impressed by both Estonia and Finland.

Our little elf

Russian orthodox churches are so much more lavish than lutheran ones

Old town

Zadie was appalled when I actually bought this cookie. She is of the opinion that it is way too big.

Maritime museum

Castaways

Grey on Grey in Helsinki

Aurora and I stumbled upon the pride parade

Helsinki Pride

Can't go to the home of Tove Jansson without getting Moomin pyjamas

Medieval ambiance

Tired out from a whirlwind Estonia visit