More Markets and An Indian Birthday (May 26 – May 28)
Although I was a little bit disappointed that I’d decided to stay back this weekend to catch up on my blogging, to do my resume and to generally get things accomplished rather than going to Malacca with the rest of the group, the weekend turned out to be quite a cultural experience. Friday night we went to a club which was supposed to be free entry before midnight with free flow drinks while supplies lasted. As it turned out, we got free entry and one free drink voucher…apparently false advertising is allowed over here..ha ha. The night was interesting since it was a DJ’ing competition…lots of cool music, rowdy dancing and mesmerizing laser light shows. Not unlike in Canada, we always seem to be famished when we get home from the club so we have developed a little bit of a ritual…we stop for “Malaysian McDonald’s”…aka the little local Chinese hawker stand that’s open till 4.00 am. We usually order Singapore noodles, fried rice or Hokkein noodles and shovel it in just as ferociously as if we were eating Kraft Dinner or McDonald’s at home.
It was extremely nice to enjoy a long sleep-in the next morning…fortunately the full scale percussion marching band that practices just below our windows and wakes us during the week doesn’t starting pounding on its drums until about 9.30 am on Saturdays.
With full intentions of being productive today, I was somewhat sidetracked when I tried to quickly pop out for lunch. It’s far too easy to be distracted and drawn in to the hustle and bustle of haggling in Chinatown. Today I scoped out a purse that I had my eye on, but since the whole haggling process is much more effective if done over the course of a couple of days or weeks, I began with slow negotiations. Here’s some haggling tips that I’ve picked up over the weeks…
- Tell them that you are a local and that you live here (this must be followed up with frequent and consistent visits to their stand so they believe that you do live here)
- Ask for the price of something similar to what you want, but not actually what you want
- Ask for the price of a larger purse, wallet, watch, etc than you actually want…then bargain down for a smaller piece
- Laugh at the first price they suggest
- Buy in bulk…buying more than one item from the same shop with yield higher discounts
- Tell them you are a student
- Pretend you are not interested in anything
- Simply walk away if they don’t give you a good price
- Always make them give you a price first…don’t offer the first price
Finally after reassuring the salesman that I would be back this week or next and that I didn’t have any money on me at the time, I snuck away. Intrigued by a dark little side market, I decided to pop my head in as I weaved my way through the pyramid-shaped banana leaf pouches that dangled from the roof. Turns out that this was the same local market we’d stumbled across on one of our first days here…this time I decided to take some more time and talk to the vendors. Upon entering the market, the very first event I observed was two men holding a squawking chicken. One was holding its feet and body, the other holding its head and a large butcher knife. It took me a moment to realize what they were about to do and I stepped behind the chopping man to shelter my eyes with only seconds to spare. Still oddly curious, I peeked around the man to see them drain the blood from this poor chicken’s neck into a large pail of water. The rest of the locals were watching me to see my reaction…if my white skin didn’t give it away, clearly the horrified look on my face revealed that I’d never witnessed anything quite like this before. Not wanting to offend anyone, I controlled my gag reflexes and smiled weakly.
It was strange to see chickens at so many stages of its life cycle…all within feet of each other. There were live chickens squawking in cages below the counter (or simply running around) awaiting their fate; right next to the water/blood bucket was a 5 gallon pail nearly completely full of chicken guts and innards. Beside the counter one man was plucking feathers and on top of the counter there was another man expertly skinning and chopping a chicken on a wooden chopping block. With the aim of a blind person, he tossed the skin and fatty bits behind him into another bucket, using the wall behind him as a backboard in case he missed. Judging by the years of layered, caked, dried-on chicken skin covering the wall, I assume he missed a lot. He then neatly lined up the chicken carcasses on the counter beside him for sale. The chicken feet were placed separately in a second basket for sale, apparently they are to be deep fried and eaten whole…skin, nails, bones and all. After moving on to another stall, I began chatting with another chicken vendor who showed me a black chicken. They kept making jokes saying it was from Africa, a negro chicken. It was quite strange to look at and apparently the black chickens still have white feathers like the rest of them. I took some more photos of a pig’s head, dangling from a hook that pierced it’s ear and some por
k legs, hoof and all. A few stalls down were the fish stalls – the vendors were madly cleaning the fish and scales were flying everywhere. The filleting process was quick and some fish were simply de-headed, sliced down the middle and set out for sale. I saw one fish for sale that was sliced completely in half, with no head, but its heart was still beating…
My stomach had had enough of the market so I started back for home. I realized I’d originally gone out for something to eat, but the idea of eating meat didn’t sit well. So the little Chinese man that I went to said he would make me a special mixed vegetable soup. The broth, spring onions and cabbage soup was served with rice and it turned out to be delicious.
I spent the rest of the afternoon sorting out my photos on the computer when I was interrupted by Candace who stopped by to say that we’d been invited to a traditional Indian birthday party celebration by one of the security guards at our building. At first we weren’t that interested because we’d already made dinner plans, but upon further consideration, we decided to go for it. We said we would go, however we prefaced our acceptance by saying that we had to meet up with friends later, just in case it turned out to be an awkward situation.
He told us it was a very posh affair, so we dressed accordingly. We questioned this when we noted what he was wearing: the same sweaty, ratty t-shirt and slacks he always wears. So, after the guard arranged for his friend to pick him and us up (in a rickety old van from the late 80’s) we proceeded to wind our way through the streets of KL to pick up another friend. It was pretty cool because we actually got into some residential areas and got to peek into some of the houses, something we hadn’t really seen before. They all appeared to be very open with large windows and veranda doors. Families seemed to all be sitting on the floors in big open living rooms watching TV or something. After picking up his friend, the five of us Guard (58 yrs old), Driver (31 yrs old), Friend (36 yrs old), Candy (Candace’s simplified name in KL) and myself (Dee is my simplified name) headed off to the party.
Upon entering the community hall, we were greeted by a very friendly and welcoming father of the birthday girl who was dressed in a traditional white outfit (looked sort of like our version of men’s pj’s). In front of the entrance, there was also a “kolam” display. The kolam was a very beautiful and intricately designed pattern on the ground made from coconut shavings. The coconut shavings were dyed in vibrant bright reds, blues, yellows, etc. There were also two lanterns burning in front of the design. After stepping around the display we entered the hall…not surprisingly, all eyes turned to us. Since we were two white girls showing up at a traditional 12 yr old East Indian birthday celebration we did stick out a bit…
We only stole the attention from the birthday girl for a brief moment, however, since she was definitely a spectacle herself. She was seated in
a chair at the center of the stage under a decorated four-posted canopy type thing. She was in a huge pink puffy Cinderella-like dress and had dozens of flower necklaces piled around her neck. She was holding several bouquets of flowers and sat patiently as family, friends and others brought gifts up to stage and presented them to her. She looked very tired like she had been sitting there for hours ‘receiving’ the gifts. Apparently fruit is a big part of Indian culture so every gift included a basket of fruit + something else. She was surrounded and the entire stage floor was covered with fruit baskets!
We were immediately shuffled over to the buffet line where we were served yellow rice, white rice, mutton curry, chicken curry, dahl and vegetables. Since it was such a traditional event and since everyone else was doing it, I decided to be brave and try eating my food with my hands for the first time (rice, curry, dahl and all). Before I began I tried to ‘observe’ the proper technique. The meat and vegetable chunks were easy (obviously) but it was the damn rice and curry sauce that was the most problematic. It appeared as though you simply mix it all together and then squish it into a lump with your fingers and then scoop it up into your mouth with your fingers facing up. They made it look so easy! I, on the other hand, looked like a small child trying to eat for the first time – rice and curry drizzled down my chin, instead of dirtying only my fingertips, I had rice and sauce on my palm and pretty much all the way up to my wrist, and for whatever reason I couldn’t use my pinkie finger so I looked like a Englishman drinking tea. I definitely got some laughs when I had to lick my palm after. I think the only thing I did right was to not use my left hand, however I suspect it may have been easier to have the use of both hands! I think I may reserve this cultural experience for rare occasions since it was kind of weird to have curry under my fingernails and yellow-stained fingers.
Once we’d finished eating, the security guard starting introducing us to his friends (basically the entire hall full of people seemed to be ‘friends’ of his). Eventually we made our way up to meet the birthday girl ourselves. She seemed very excited to have us there and they motioned that they wanted pictures taken with us. So the professional photographer took photos of us with the birthday girl, then more pictures including the parents, then even more including the friends that brought us. It was somewhat awkward, particularly since we didn’t have a gift for her, nor could we speak Tamil (Indian language), but I think they were happy to have us there anyway.
After thanking the birthday girl and family (charades-style) for having us, we were quickly ushered out of the hall by the security guard. He seemed to want to get us to a pub pretty quickly. We were en route for one of his favorite pubs when the heavens opened and a typical torrential downpour started. Usually this wouldn’t be a problem, but since the back window was jammed open AND the driver’s windshield wipers weren’t working, we pulled into a local pub. Since Candace was still on antibiotics, she could not drink and therefore ordered an orange juice. I attempted to order an orange juice as well and was abruptly interrupted. I believe the guard’s exact words were “no, you’re not sick – you take beer”. So…beer it was. I’m not sure whether it was Malaysian culture or whether this was just the way of these folks, but every time anyone’s drink was down about an inch, the glass was filled up again. After a few drinks (and since we were girls) they thought that we might like to try dancing at a real, local Tamil (Tamil = East Indian) nightclub. What the heck we thought?
If we thought we made an entrance at the birthday party, it was nothing compared to the nightclub entrance. I’m pretty certain that we were the first white people (especially female!) to ever set foot inside this bar. It was a dodgy little local nightclub that could seat 100 ppl at most. The band was right beside the door, so all eyes were looking our way anyways when we came in. What an odd entrance…two young white girls and three old Indian guys. It was at this point that the night started to get a bit awkward. They kept grabbing our arms to introduce us to old men (friends of theirs) and they wanted us to dance with them all the time. The crowd seemed to love the band, however I hate to say it but, to me, the music was just waling and screeching with tambourines thrown into the mix of sounds. Finally after getting a little bit firm with them (and threatening to take a taxi home without them) they agreed to drive us home. All in all, it was an interesting night!
Not much else over the weekend except treating ourselves to a fancy dinner out at cool little indoor food village with lots of trendy little restaurants. Rather than doing a pub crawl, we did a restaurant crawl. We had 4 different dim sum at a Chinese restaurant, we had yellow chicken curry and red duck curry at a Thai restaurant and we had an appetizer dessert and a main dessert (yes, we had two desserts) at a Spanish restaurant. All very yummy and it only cost about $20 Cdn.
