The Last Leg of our Holiday

It was an early start of the day, woke up at 3 am and off we went to the airport. We had to catch the early morning flight to KL. Most shops at Bali airport were still closed except for a few coffee shops. Nonetheless it was quite amazing to see the presence of so many shops, probably nearly a hundred shops in total. The other amazing thing to see was the presence of a body scanner machine in the airport. We don't have that in our own country!

The flight from Bali to KL took 3 hours. Most people go to KL for food and a bit of shopping. However one thing that always spoil the plot and hope it to be changed for the better is the taxi service.

In Bandung and Bali, even though the taxi drivers are earning less, and in fact just enough just to feed their family, they do duly comply to use the meter. Even if they ask for more, it is not too much and they are very humle and polite. The taxi drivers there normally rent a car for about 190000 rupiah a day which is about B$29. Each ride normally cost B$3. After paying for petrol, they normally earn B$10 to 15 a day.

It is a contrast in KL and has been like that for a long time. Not all are like that though. The bad one set their price right away as you enter the taxi.

In one of the most outrageous incident I encountered was when going from KLCC to go on a 1.5 km ride, the taxi driver asked for RM28! The next one asked for RM15. I could easily jumped in and just weno for it. But I was not in a hurry and if we all want to teach these taxi drivers a lesson, just leave them. As I was leaving them the two taxi drivers were still trying to convince me and claimed that there were traffic jams everywhere. No sooner I found another taxi which uses the meter and the trip only cost RM8 ringgit! .

In front of the Pavilion shopping mall, one could see lots of taxis lining up by the roadside just waiting to rip off the next customers. These taxis are asking for at least RM20 to RM30 for any destination.

And so if ever we want to stay in KL, we like to minimise the use of taxi. This time around we are staying at Prince Hotel which is just across the Pavilion, a real superb place to stay.