Highland pleasure palace

Killing some time

Just for a change, instead of staying in Kuala Lumpur any longer, I had booked to go to Genting Highlands instead for a one-night stay.  I had been perhaps 27 years ago in May 1997, that being my first and only visit.

There’s no point getting there too early due to the hotel’s check-in time.  I had time to make the most of the city first, starting at 0815 by taking the train to Kampung Baru for breakfast at Kak Som.  My choices were delicious:

• Chicken in black sauce, slightly spicy.
• Salted duck egg (in shell, half) mixed in with a mango kerabu.
• Salted duck egg (poached, whole) in a coconut curry sauce.
• Cucumber, pineapple and onion lightly-pickled salad.

I had time to visit the Indian barber to tidy my beard before killing a couple of hours in my room.

Getting to Genting

The 1230 bus from KL Sentral to Genting Skyway station took only 50 mins on the highway and then the windy roads.  The regular Awana Skyway was closed for maintenance and the bus transferred us to the older Genting Skyway for a 20 min ride from around 800m to 1600m.

I had been worried that once disembarked at Genting Skyway, I faced an outdoor walk in the rain to get to the First World Hotel.

It turned out that a lot of online photos are outdated and the walk was entirely covered in through interconnected large malls.  It was a difficult 30 min exercise navigating indoors following the signs which weren’t perfect.

It was another 30 mins waiting till the official check-in time of 1500 to avoid paying a small surcharge.

My Genting experience

After about an hour’s rest, I ventured out to explore the place.  I felt like I had a good feel already walking from the cable car.

I knew that the place had grown to include 7 hotels but I didn’t expect a mega-complex of three inter-connected malls offering shopping, dining, cinema, theatre, theme park rides, accommodation and two casinos.  It’s paradise for many people I guess but not it’s my thing.

In comparison, when I visited Genting in May 1997, it consisted of one hotel, a casino and an outdoor theme park by a lake.  We ascended by the Genting Skyway which was the new cable car, but now it is the old cable car!

As I explored the place, it was virtually impossible to get to the outdoor area.  The few areas that I found were closed for the day or barricaded against jaywalkers.  [Edit:  It was only next day I had found that one of the hotels had a driveway drop-off rather carpark building access, but it was so misty I couldn’t see anything.]

Now that shopping, eating, theme park rides are largely indoors so in theory the cool highland location isn’t really necessary. I guess it was often too wet and misty when they used to have facilities outside.

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As I wasn’t hungry, I looked at the café cabinets and noticed that late in the afternoon, all pies and sandwiches were 40% off.  That ended up being my only spend for the day!

The casino

After several long walks exploring and getting lost in the indoors, I hit the Sky Casino, closer to my hotel rather than the original one.  Back in 1997, there was a dress code.  Now I see flip-flops and shorts.  Casinos in movies are glamorous but the reality is that it often attracts the people who can’t afford to gamble.

With no gambling skills, I tried the slot machines (cash notes rather than coins).  I put MYR30 and lost a fair chunk of it before building up to a balance of over MYR40.

I was nearly ready to cash up and keep the profit but a moment of weakness saw me gamble away a few more ringgits.  I was finally left with MYR37.

I then realised that they would only pay out from their inhouse ATM in multiples of MYR10, so I gambled away the MYR7 and walked out completely as rich/poor as I had walked in.

Sky Casino.

After that, I thought it would be good to find my way back to the Genting Skyway cable car for tomorrow morning.  I followed the signage and with some areas being closed off, I simply couldn’t get to it.  I gave up, making a mental note to allow plenty of time in the morning.

Conclusion

This highland pleasure palace called Genting isn’t my kind of place but it’s good to see what other people enjoy.  It’s always good to try and retry what you don’t like as times change, things change and I may have changed!