People: In West Malaysia I met lots of friendly locals, while in East Malaysia (Borneo) unfortunately they sometimes seemed a bit intrusive, especially the men. Sometimes I didn’t feel so comfortable between all the suggestive comments and honking. In Malaysia you don’t meet as much travellers, as in Thailand – a few are still including West Malaysia into their journey though. The travellers on Borneo are very different to the many young „party backpackers“ you meet in the Mekong region. There are not too many other backpackers, but you always meet someone. The time I spent alone was mostly chosen like that on purpose 🙂

Food: I love Malay food. There’s just so much to choose from! Since there are a lot of Chinese and Indians living here, there is lots of different food in different flavours. My favourites are: Roti Cheese and Claypot Soup and Mee Goreng… Oh, I’m just getting hungry writing this!

Weather: Lots of rain… Unfortunately rain followed me around after crossing the boarder from Thailand. On Borneo, it always rains a lot, there are no really dry months. In West Malaysia I guess I was unlucky – even the locals couldn’t understand all the rain in April. Still, there was enough sun in between to discover all the sights in a good way!

Costs: West Malaysia was actually a bit cheaper than expected. However, in Borneo my budget took a bigger hit than planned! Here I had to book many tours which were always quite expensive. So in total my daily budget is at 30 Euros for Malaysia, respectively 38 Euros including the diving (Perhentians, Semporna). This however does not yet include the 6 flights which I mostly couldn’t have avoided…

Accommodation: Accommodation in West Malaysia was expensive and not good. One of the worst price/performance ratio I have had so far. On Borneo this improved a lot and I always stayed in quite good hostels in dorms, where breakfast was mostly included as well…

Infrastructure: Busses, boats, some flights. On Borneo everything was a bit slower and the busses were not as good quality-wise, as in West Malaysia. However, still everything waas easy to organize and quite cheap…

Illnesses: Everything fine! 🙂

Safety: Same! Despite the suggestive comments I never felt unsafe…

Highlight: For the first time, I cannot answer that. The spot is shared equally by the Bako National Park, Mount Kinabalu, the Kinabatangan River Cruise and – of course – the diving around Semporna!

Lowlight: Kota Bahru. Definitely.

Click here for all my pictures of Malaysia: