The Odyssey

So even though Natalie's adoption is final in the eyes of the Malaysian government, the U.S. government is still not convinced. So we had to travel to the U.S. Embassy in Kuala Lumpur (capitol of Malaysia) to file a bazillion documents and get fingerprinted and what-not so we can get U.S. citizenship for Natalie. We had a 4 day weekend so we decided it was a good time to go and we would just make it a mini-vacation since there is so much to do in KL.

Since Natalie has no passport we could not fly there and no one in their right mind drives there (the traffic makes New York look deserted and it costs more in gas and tolls then it would to fly!), and the train takes way too long so people here suggested we take their "double-decker luxury liner bus" system. I was skeptical to say the least. But I am here to recant. It was fabulous. Air-conditoned, reclining seats, movies, lunch served, the works. Very impressive and very inexpensive in comparison.

The boys brought a bag of treats to eat on the 4 hour trip and proceeded to consume them all in the first 15 minutes. John read, and me and the baby slept.

We stayed at the KL Flamingo hotel, which is NOT as nice as it looks in pictures...sigh. It was nice enough I suppose but I also learned a new lesson about hotels in Malaysia... they come with one king bed OR two twin beds. That's it. I assumed (silly me) that they would have the option of two queens but "no can la". So we got a roll away bed put in the room. John slept on that and I slept in the king with all 3 kids...and I use the term "slept" lightly as you can only get so much sleep with 3 kids rolling all over you.

That night we had a wonderful time as we got to go to OUTBACK Steakhouse. Doesn't seem like a big deal, I know. But when you live in a country where a third of the population considers cows too holy to eat, getting a good steak dinner is next to impossible. And seeing as how we are carnivores, we were excited (although it took 40 minutes in a taxi to go 3 miles with a taxi driver who sounded like he was choking on a fur ball the whole time and apparently lives in his taxi as Kyle had to move the guy's laundry out of the way in order to sit down).

The next morning we decided to go see the KL Tower since our embassy appointment wasn't until 2pm. The KL Tower is the 6th tallest building in the world at nearly 1300 ft. We went to the observation deck on the 85th floor and we got a breathtaking view of all of KL including the famous Petronas Towers and all of the SMOG.

We went to their "Animal Zone" and saw some really wild looking animals and Kyle and I both got to hold a boa constrictor and Alex got a pony ride.

Natalie looked so beautiful that morning...all dressed  up for her big day at the embassy...but by the time they finally saw us she was fed up.... pulled her hair bow out, yanked off her frilly socks and tried to eat them and filled her diaper in such a way that it CLEARED the waiting room in protest for having been stuck in a stroller for hours. Yikes.

The embassy trip was a disaster. They were so unorganized. At first they said they couldn't see us and we would have to come back. I threw a fit of course so they ended up seeing us. But the lady doing our fingerprints had no idea what she was doing and I had ink all over me that needed a belt sander to get it off. But in the end we got all the paperwork filed so now we wait.....

On day three we took the kids to the science center in KLCC. It was nice to go do something fun and put the embassy fiasco behind us. Even Natalie was in a good mood!

The place had a great dinosaur exhibit although as young earth creationists it gave us lots of things to discuss with our kids ...

And a great space station simulation....

Houston we have a problem...

This is how the astronauts sleep!

And they had fun playing with the virtual art exhibits...

We had a fabulous lunch at the California Pizza Kitchen inside this beautiful, enormous mall called the Suria KLCC Then we did some shopping. It was a great day. The next morning we headed back to Penang. We were all exhausted...

I have learned that I could NEVER live in KL. It is overwhelming. The traffic, the towers, the people...way too much. It was a fun place to visit but give me the mountains of North Carolina any day of the week!