A Little Bit About Malaysia

Since most people (including myself before this program) hardly even realize that Malaysia exists, I'll divulge a little bit of information about it. We haven't started our class section on Malaysia yet, so I only know a few vague, imprecise things. I still think it will be useful and interesting information, though:

- Malaysia is an officially and predominantly Muslim country. That means the government is run on Islamic principles, and the majority of the people are Muslim. However, as my host father was eager to assure me, they are a very tolerant people, and all faiths live peacefully together.

- Malaysia is some sort of democratic/constitutional monarchy. I don't really know what that means, but they have a king and queen. I think. I'm not sure how much power they have, or if they aren't more like figureheads.

- Malay is the official language. It is in the "Austronesian" family of languages, and is closely related to Indonesian. Personally, I think it's unpleasant, but that's just a matter of opinion.

- The "indigenous" Malay are the dominant ethnic group. Chinese are the largest minority. In addition to religious tolerance, the peoples are also racially tolerant, and all ethnicities can live peacefully side by side (according to my host father, anyways).

- This is sheerly based on my perceptions and experiences, but it seems that Malays have a strong sense of national identity. They are proud to be Malay, and have more or less clear ideas of what that means (speaking Malay, being of Malay ethnicity, practicing Islam, feeling connected to their homeland, etc.)

- Again, sheerly based on my perceptions, Malays seem to value close family ties, religious and racial tolerance, and a laid-back lifestyle. My host family was generally late to everything, and it didn't matter to them or to the neighbours whom they were meeting. Don't quote me on this, though - I realize it is a gross over-generalization based on insubstantial evidence. I'm just trying to provide a rough sketch!

Alright, now here's a map I made with Google maps of all the places we went!

A) PGP dorms in Singapore. Yes, Singapore is really that tiny compared to Malaysia!

B) Johor Bahru - We stopped here for breakfast on the first day.

C) Segamat - We stopped here for lunch on the first day.

D) Kuantan - Where we spent our first night.

E) Cherating - The location of our first hotel, The Legend Resort.

F) I think this is where we had our homestay, a small village called "Teluk Ketapang."

G) Kuala Terengannu - We went to a museum and a mini-mosque-world (you'll have to see the pictures to know what that is) just outside of this city. We never entered the city.

H) Kota Bahru - Our "ultimate" destination and the only place where we spent two nights. It is a city in the state of Kelantan, which runs along the border with Thailand.

And then we drove 18 hours straight from H back to A on Sunday! That was a nightmare! We left at 8:30 and didn't get back until 2 in the morning!