Until just before the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, I lived in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with my family for a short time.
It was my first time in Malaysia, and I decided to move there without knowing anything.
Mont Kiara is famous for being an area with a large Japanese population.
However, areas with large Japanese populations, not only in Malaysia but in other countries as well, tend to be very expensive, so I chose an area with few Japanese people.
I rented a condominium in the Masjid Jamek area, near the mosque and the Indian quarter.
It was truly an exotic experience, full of new experiences.
As I expected, it was significantly cheaper than the condominiums in the Japanese quarter.
The first thing that surprised us was when we were woken up in the middle of the night on our first day by a tremendous noise.
It was the sound of the Islamic adhan.
Hearing this adhan for the first time kept us up until morning.
This was our first culture shock.
I tried nasi lemak, Malaysia’s national dish, but it can be a challenge for people like me who don’t like spicy food.
The condominium I rent is located in an Indian neighborhood, so there’s only Indian food available.
I rarely eat Indian food in Japan, so I decided to give it a try.
Like nasi lemak, it’s quite spicy, but I did find a few Indian dishes I like.
The first is dosa.
A traditional South Indian dish, it’s a crepe-like dish made from a batter of fermented rice and beans.
Apparently, it’s eaten as a snack or for breakfast in South India.
I’d never seen dosa in Japan, so I became addicted to it and ate it about three times a week.
The other dish is banana leaf curry.
It’s a curry set meal served on a banana leaf.
It seems that banana leaf curry originated in Malaysia and Singapore, not India.
