The Pinay Solo Backpacker

“One, two princes kneel before you.”

I was humming the song in my head while walking the long stretch of the crazy Bukit Bintang.  My head kept spinning over loud clubs, diverse shops offering different services, restaurants bragging their world class cuisines, towering buildings and seductive hotels all lined-up on the bustling street. It’s like walking in a hippie world of faceless crowds and United Colors of Benetton models. It’s one amazing blend not just of Asian lineage but of the entire world’s descent.

“Just go ahead now”, the music continued.

But unlike Spin Doctors’ song, these Two Princes I’m after are both rich and perhaps like it’ll be a big headache to tell the difference between them. But little do most tourists know that these two towers where built by 2 competing contractors.  The two structural pinnacles atop the twin towers came from different countries – one was made in South Korea while the other from Japan. PETRONAS Towers is the world’s tallest building from 1998-2004 until the Taipei 101 was built.  But to date, it remains to be the world’s tallest twin building.

I could actually see them from the idle land beside my hostel which is by the way quietly tucked in the midst of Kuala Lumpur near the Puduraya Bus station surrounded by the old colonial district and the Golden Triangle.  I thought I could easily reach them by foot since I also saw a lot of tourists walking all the way to the Golden triangle.  I prefer walking around the metropolis for most of my trips despite the unforgiving heat of the sun because for me, it is the most effective way of getting acquainted with the city. Well I did reach Petronas Tower but EASILY seems to be the wrong word.

And unlike in the Spin Doctors’ song, I was the one who knelt before these Two Princes – the Petronas Tower, while attempting to capture them from its floor to its pinnacle in my lowly lens.  But God, they are both so handsome up close!

Walking inside the Petronas Towers, one will be rewarded with the sight of luxurious interiors and grandiose intricate details of its fine architecture.  The floor is inspired by Islamic geometric squares creating an eight-pointed star reflecting unity within unity, harmony, stability and rationality.  A well-crafted masterpiece indeed that perhaps even the best photograph of it couldn’t define its beauty as seen by the naked eye.

It maybe another tourist trap and somehow it made me shrink in a world where the posh and the luxurious hang out, but I don’t care.  Petronas Towers is love at first sight.   The grandeur of the two iconic towers embodies that great spirit of Malaysian dream and ambition. It just feels good to watch them both transform from daylight to darkness.  I sat there for 4 hours, enthralled by the Two Princes.

**This is part of my Malaysia travel series.**

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