Day 2 and 3 in Malaysia

We're beginning to get a bit of a handle on life in Malaysia. Slowly but surely. We found out on Sunday that our household goods will not be arriving until July 24th, then will have to go through customs, so we may be in this temporary apartment for over a month! It's a nice place, but let's see how well we're feeling after 4 weeks of togetherness on the 26th floor of a downtown KL building.

Sunday, June 25
We started the day with a nice workout in the fitness center. Cheryl, Ash, and I all ran about 3 miles (oops, 5 km) on the treadmills overlooking the city. Then, I managed to find a church via the Internet that looked worth a trial run. Location was near our future neighborhood, and its website seemed promising, so we went. The Bridge International Church meets in an International school building near the embassy district.

Although you can see from Ashley's post that this type of church seemed different to her than recent experience, Cheryl and I both remember many, many Sundays spent in similar surroundings: rental building, mobile equipment, small(ish) congregation. In fact, it kind of pains me that Ashley doesn't have the benefit of really knowing how "small / mobile church" the same way that her mom and I do. What the church lacked in size and appearance was quickly eclipsed by its spirit and warmth. The congregation was less than a third of Cy-Fair Christian Church, but the volume of its singing was easily double. The worship time was a deep blessing to me, for as I heard the words of truth being proclaimed, I was reminded of what I KNOW to be true -- our God is just as present here in KL as He is in the US. As we sang, he is our "All in All". Somehow being this far away from "home", the meaning of Savior is ten times deeper to me. To say that this church was a light on a hillside seems like an understatement. Ash recounted in her post about Kim and Barbara -- two ISKL students who introduced themselves so quickly to us, reassuring our girls. Wow.

I was also surprised to find one of my co-workers here in the same church. She said she was surprised to see me there as well. How cool. This may end up being the church for us; I'm not sure. One thing that was evident at the Bridge was that this place was thriving. The message was right on target, and not to soon be forgotten. More on this later.

During the afternoon, we enjoyed a great performance by the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra in their beautiful hall at the Petronas Towers. All three pieces were by Russian composers, and all four of us loved the music. Dinner was in our apartment, followed by email / reading / rest.

Monday, June 26
Started the day with another nice workout -- cycling for me this time. We made numerous calls and began handling logistics. Alfredo is doing great at the Quarantine Center at the KL airport. We found that he howled for us after we left him on Friday. How sad... We met with our cultural relocation host for lunch, where we received all kinds of valuable info. We will be able to take the girls to ISKL on Wednesday, show them our house, and then receive our first official cultural "briefing" on Malaysia. The company is committed to helping us adapt to Malaysian life, so this briefing is just the start. We'll also begin some basic language lessons as well.

We ventured out and purchased three cell phones this afternoon. I won't even go into how DIFFERENT the options are for cellular communication here. Completely different. Overall, prices are better (about 4 cents/minute flat rate without a monthly fee), but they charge a HUGE deposit to foreigners of $360 per line that is not refunded until the lines are cancelled. This means over $1000 out of pocket. Ouch, man, that hurts. Hopefully tomorrow we'll bite the bullet and pay up. The girls are so excited to have their own cell phones. SMS is low cost, and will be used like crazy.

Access to cash is another dilemma. Since it will take 4-6 weeks for our local bank account to open, we will have to draw cash from our US accounts somehow. Still working on that one... Also, trying to find the best exchange rates in the era of the weakening dollar...

That's about all the updating I can muster for the moment. I'll write more soon. Also, FYI -- there is very little coverage of US happenings out here. Major league baseball does not exist, and NBA Finals coverage is nowhere. It's all World Cup ALL the time. Love it...

greg

p.s. I may be traveling to Thailand for a business trip later this week...