Impressions of Malaysia

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A stop on the KL food tour
A stop on the KL food tour

Malaysia is a country of 30 million people that co-anchors the SE Asian economy with Indonesia. It’s also a place known to have great food and friendly people. So I was delighted to have the opportunity to visit there for the first time recently to give a couple talks.

I was only in Kuala Lumpur so it’s probably more accurate to say I was in Kuala Lumpur rather than Malaysia, as the smaller towns and countryside are quite different from the capital city. (The most striking example of this distinction in Asia is the grand canyon of a difference between “Beijing/Shanghai” and “the rest of China.”)

Kuala Lumpur was more relaxed than I was expecting. A few years ago I spent several days in neighboring Jakarta, a city that overwhelms you with traffic and chaos. KL felt positively tranquil by Jakarta standards.

There isn’t a must-see attraction in KL. There are plenty of striking skyscrapers to gawk at; all the luxury hotel brands with posh buildings; some nice looking mosques; various museums, an aquarium, and so on. The malls are fun and huge and contain everything: movies, nice restaurants, casual restaurants, salons, coffee shops, all sorts of retail, banks, and more. Just wandering around a massive Malaysian mall gives you plenty to look at and think about.

The Kuala Lumpur food tour is very much worth doing. We tasted Malay, Chinese, and Indian food in places where there wasn’t a tourist in sight. A food tour remains a favorite way for me to see a city, learn about its culture and economy, of course taste some of its food. I’ve done them in Istanbul, Copenhagen, Kyoto, and now Kuala Lumpur. It’s great for non-foodies: they tend to emphasize cheap local eats.

Malaysia is predominately Muslim and seemingly a bit stricter about religious rules than its neighbor Indonesia. In Malaysia, if you’re not Muslim and marry a Muslim, you legally are required to convert — a requirement that’s uncommon in other Muslim-majority countries. Also, the local scandal of the moment in KL, as it was relayed to me by a few secular locals, was a boycott of Auntie Anne’s restaurant. Yes – the Western chain that sells those delicious hot dogs and pretzels. The reason for the boycott? The phrase “hot dog” on the menu. Dogs apparently are sacred to some Muslims. Thus, the phrase “hot dog” offends. Strange world. Strange times…

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The Factor That Colors Happiness and Unhappiness the Most

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Is she enjoying the city she’s living in? Is he enjoying his job, his co-workers, his boss? How’s he feeling about life?

The factor that has the most explanatory power, in my view, on questions having to do with personal happiness and satisfaction in one’s personal and professional life, is the following: Is this person satisfied with their romantic relationship status?

Note I am not saying “in a happy relationship.” There are plenty of people who are single and very happy with that status. But those who are single and yet would like to be in a relationship tend to be unhappy, and project that unhappiness across all aspects of their lives. Those in unhappy relationships act similarly.

Romance rules all. To deeply understand a person and their probable happiness is to understand their romantic happenings. Of course, in almost all professional contexts, and a great deal of personal ones too, it is inappropriate to probe on such topics. Which is one reason why most friendships are not very deep.

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What I’ve Been Reading

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Books and more books.

gold1. Digital Gold by Nathaniel Popper. An incredibly engaging journalistic introduction to Bitcoin and blockchain, with cinematic storytelling about the people who pioneered the technology over the past 15 years. The book is about a year old and since then, Bitcoin has struggled, though I suspect many of the characters in this book — and the experts in real life — remain bullish on cryptocurrencies in the long run. Excellent for those learning the fundamentals of bitcoin and bitcoin history.

2. Dark Matter by Blake Crouch. I made the mistake of starting this sci-fi thriller at 11pm one night in bed. I was up till 1am. It’s a classic page turner set against the backdrop of the Many-Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, which is a real thing and which is super interesting to contemplate. (There is a universe right now where Donald Trump is not the current president-elect, for example.)

3. Lightning Rods by Helen Dewitt. I definitely would not admit to being entertained by this entertaining novel. Definitely not.

4. Upheavals of Thought: The Intelligence of Emotions by Martha Nussbaum. I’m a Nussbaum fan and the early chapters here contained provocative reflections on the power of emotions. How an emotion like fear of death manifests in so many aspects of our thought stream. Ultimately this was too dense for me to make it all the way through, but I’m glad I read as far as I did.

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