Yes, I’m two weeks late. But it’s been a busy two weeks!
We recently took our first trip to Malaysia, and wanted it to be a mix of big-city-Kuala-Lumpur / shopping, and seeing monkeys and apes in Borneo. Something for everyone. So New Year’s Eve, smack in the middle of the week-long trip, was spent in Kuala Lumpur. At 4:30 the next morning, we were on our way to the airport, ears still ringing from the celebration. Why ears ringing? You’ll see in a minute.
The epicenter of Kuala Lumpur’s New Year’s Eve celebrations, i.e. fireworks, is the Kuala Lumpur City Center park, in the shadows of the city’s famous twin Petronas towers. By 10 pm, huge crowds of people were already headed that direction, as we exited a restaurant after a late dinner. The park was already packed, but there was a steady stream of people continuing to pour in. We decided it would be better to pull off at the periphery, were lots of families with really young kids were already seated.
The big thing in Malaysia seems to be this canned soaplike spray stuff. As the magic hour approached, people who had initially seemed very reserved started to come out of their shells with the aid of this spray foam.
And everyone was blowing these horns. It was a nonstop drone. For about three hours. In all, the actual fireworks lasted about 6-7 minutes. I’ve shortened them a bit, because it’s not the same when you’re not actually there. Anyway, see for yourself in this short video. And happy new year from TAZM!
