045 “Ciao, Baby”

POSTCARDS FROM MALAYSIA [4 of 4]

(You’ll have to read the commentary for 42 before this one)

Okay, I’ll admit. By the time I got to this one, I was running pretty dry. This is the last one completed on the Malaysia trip, with a panel done by Aimo, back in Multimedia College, and the remainder while I was in Kuching.

Although I stayed with Eisu while in KL, I didn’t have such a place to stay in Malaysia — I had to stay at a hotel. And stupid me didn’t plan in advance.. I got off the plane and looked for a hotel room, the Lonely Planet guide my only resource.

Finally, I went to the Holiday Inn. I went up to the front counter, and asked them if they had any vacancies for 4 nights. “No,” they replied. I thought I was going to sleep on the street, this was the fourth hotel I tried so far.

They continued. “The only thing we have left are Executive Suites.”

It wouldn’t furt to find out how much it would cost. “Since it’s all we have left, we’ll give you a bit of a discount, 15%. That’s 400 riggit a night.”

Owch, I thought, 400 ringgit? That’s … lessee.. divide by four…

FIFTY DOLLARS A NIGHT???

I can’t even get a closet in Shinjuku for that. And this is for an Executive Suite! So I had this wonderful hotel room overlooking the river. Fresh fruit left behind when my room was cleaned. A king sized bed (the last time I have seen one). Free meals, access to an executive lounge, and the executive secretary (you want something done, you tell her, she’ll get it done. Free alcoholic drinks. And the best of all, the elevator doesn’t have a button to stop at my floor. You need the executive card. It was always a small thrill to get into an elevator full of people, and whip out the card that activates the Executive Floor. And then to walk out, and hear the secretary say, “Welcome back, Mr. _____, would you like a drink?” Man, staying in that Executive Suite was one of the biggest thrills of my pauper-like life. When I return to Kuching — and mark my words, I will — I’ll be back at that hotel room, living like a King again.

Kuching is a beautiful place as well. This time I got to tour around. I saw the Cat Museum (thankfully called that instead of the Cat Mew-seum), some longhouses in the middle of the jungle where people didn’t have phones or electricity in their homes but had Hard Rock Cafe T-shirts and a local Coca Cola machine, and various other interesting wonderful places. Everywhere I went I heard Santana and Deep Purple.

I met Kim Loh and Laine there, and we finished this strip. And I found out that having different people draw the same panel doesn’t work. I wish I had them draw something else that showed off their wonderful in every panel.

So that wraps up my trip to Malaysia, the fourth country in which I drew a strip with others (the other three countries being Canada, the U.S., and Japan). I hope you enjoyed my “postcards” and a chance to see some really talented people, if you haven’t seen their work already. And mark my words — I’ll be back.