零點的邀約

2/23 Trip to Malaysia

I had a frustrating holiday. During Chinese New Year, I spent half of my time on taking transportation. Not only because I went home, but also my family went on a group tour to Malaysia. My travel started from 2.14 afternoon. I went to the bus station right after class. It took me about 3 hours to get to Taipei. When I got home, it was almost 10 o' clock. But, I couldn't go to bed until I finished packing. 

The next day, my family and I left home at 9 o'clock. We decided to take the MRT to Taoyuan airport. This was my first time to take the Airport MRT, as we used to drive to the airport. We worried that there would be a traffic jam on the high way. We arrived at the airport 3 hours earlier than the departure time. Our plane took off at 13.20, and we arrived in Malaysia at around 6 o'clock. Our group spent an hour to go through customs and to exchange currency. Then, we got on the bus, it took another 3 hours to Melaka. My first day in Malaysia was full of transfers.

The second day in Malaysia we went to the Legoland from 10 to 5 o'clock. After having dinner, we travelled another 3 hours to Johor Bajru. The third day we were heading to Singapore. So, woke up early to avoid rush hour. It took us about 2 hours to get to Singapore, one hour on the bus, another hour waiting to pass customs. Then our Malaysian bus driver got lost. We were supposed to meet our Singaporean tour guide at MRT station. Finally, the Singaporean tour guide took a taxi to find us. Because of this, we spent extra time to get to Universal Studios. I haven't been to Universal Studios before, so I was very excited. However, it turned out to be a bad decision. The whole park was full of people due to Chinese New Year. We lined up to wait for our first ride, Transformers, and it took us 3 hours. It was a bad start. In the end, we only had 2 rides and watched 1 show. Then, we left Universal Studios and headed to Marina Bay Sands to watch the dancing fountain show. We stayed at the river bank, for an hour, waiting for the show to start since we didn't have enough Singapore dollars to spend. After the show, the Singaporean tour guide left us. On our way back to Malaysia, the bus driver got lost again! When we finally arrived at the hotel, it was almost 11.30. 

Our fourth day started by taking a bus as well. We took 3 hours to get back to Melaka. We stopped at the Stadhuys Red House, spent 15 minutes taking photos, took a 5 minutes pedicab ride, and was noon. We took another 3 hours to Kuala Lumpur.  The afternoon was full of shopping. It began at 3 different souvenir shops. After that, we went to Petronas Twin Towers to take pictures. Our next stop was Pavillion Shopping Mall, which is another mall for luxury brands. We found a supermarket on the first floor, where I bought some instant white coffee. Then, we got on the bus and headed to Putrajaya. On the last day, we went to visit the Royal Selangor's Factory and Museum, and Putra Mosque. Our last trip was taking a hot air balloon, which took us 40 minutes waiting, and only 5 minutes riding. Finally, we arrived at the airport 4 hours before departure because our tour guide insisted. She gave us many reasons such as airport policy, peak season for travelling, and we were taking a budget airline. However, we thought that she just wanted finish early. 

In conclusion, this was my third time going on a tour during Chinese New Year. The first experience to Vietnam was brilliant, with a wonderful tour guide and tour manager. However the second experience to India was awful, and this time was even worse. I found out that it was very risky to go on a group tour to South East Asia. The local tour guide couldn't speak fluent Chinese, so they couldn't introduce the background or traditions or history well. This situation will be even worse during Chinese New Year, Taiwanese travel agencies don't have many experienced tour managers. Next time, I will strongly suggest my dad not to visit South East Asian countries, especially not during Chinese New Year.