Hole in the Wall and a Lipas... I mean Lipit..

Having lived in Malaysia for over a year now, the opportunity for new and interesting experiences comes a little less often these days. This is not because of the lack of places to explore, but more the lack of time to do so, coupled with the inevitable tendancy to fall into a day to day routine. Tuesday, however, was the Prophet's birthday, so also a federal holiday. A few blogs back I mentioned needing to get a traditional Malay outfit made for an upcoming presentation, so yesterday my friend Christine and I went shopping for kain (material) and for tailors.

We started the afternoon getting Indian food at one of Christine's favorite restaurants. She mentioned that it was just about 100m from where I lived, which caused me to scratch my head a bit, as I couldn't think of any restaurants within 100m of my building. So she came to pick me up, drove about 100m, and stopped in front of a very old empty storefront on a road with mostly printing shops and vacant buildings. I asked where the restaurant was and she pointed at the empty store front. Up there she said. So, in we went, stepping over dusty, ruined floorboards until we reached a decrepit old staircase at the back of the room. There was no signboard and no name on the restaurant that I could find. Up the stairway we went. We left our shoes on the top step and walked into a room that looked more like a classroom than a restaurant. Old long tables set up in a U shape, chairs lining the outside. On one side of the room, a small make-shift kitchen, and at the end of the tables, a man sitting at an old desk. Each place on the tables were set with a large piece of banana leaf and a silver cup of water.

As soon as we sat a waiter came around and slapped three types of vegetables on our leafs, and then another came around with rice. All that was left to do was mix if all together and eat it, traditional style... with our hands. While you rarely see this in modern establishments in KL, (indeed, even muffins are served with a fork and knife over here) it is a common way of eating in more traditional Malay or Indian restaurants here. And whenever I eat like this, I inevitably look up to see someone giggling at me. Awhile back I was told that this was because I ate woth only three fingers, instead of all five, but now I'm using all five, and the giggling hasn't stopped... hmmm... go figure. As Christine and I were mashing our way through our meal, I looked up to see an atttractive young Indian couple sitting across from me, the girl smiling and giggling at me. I smiled and laughed a little too, looking down at the mess on my hands, and went back to eating. The food was really really good, the staff was very polite, and I now have a new favorite "hole in the wall" restaurant, 100m from my apartment. :-)

Next, we headed off to Little India to go shopping for kain. This too was a new experience in Malaysia. I was expecting it to be dirt cheap, as it was in Vietnam, but in reality, it was a bit pricey. We wandered in and out of shops, amazed at the amount of shop keepers who looked like Bollywood actors, and we tried, with limited success to avoid some of the more aggressive salespeople. We looked over silks, cottons, satins, and laces before finally deciding on a solid blue Thai silk for the top piece of my kabaya, and a plaid like blue, green, and black material for the skirt. We found a satin and lace combination for a much fancier traditional dress, suitable for the theater or orchestra. Then, it was off to find a tailor.

The tailor was hilarious, to say the least. She was around 45-50 and Chinese, though she was speaking to us in a rapid-fire mix of English, Malay, and Chinese. Did fine with the English and Malay, but needed Christines help with the Chinese. I did mix up one key word though. She asked it I wanted lipit on the front of the shirt. I was slightly alarmed by this, as in my head that translated to "cockroach." Luckily, cockroach is actually lipas and lipit actually means "fold." Anyway, she was a very jolly woman, obviously very used to measuring out women's bodies. She was the kind of person who could get away with behavior that would otherwise considered highly offensive. She had Christine and I rolling on the floor as she compared the size of our butts, amongst other things. After Vietnam, where it was common enough to over hear the tailor calling me "rat beo" (very fat), this was a hilarious and far less traumatic experience.

The day ended with me taking Christine to one of my favorite hole in the wall restaurants for margaritas. Chilli's. :-P