Happy Chinese New Year

For months my sister had been trying to convince me to come visit her in Malaysia while I was in India.  I continued to say, "Yeah but I traveled to India to be in India."  Eventually the thought of seeing her in Asia won, and I booked my plane ticket.  My sister is never too far away from her passport, and always has some trip cooking in her mind.   When it came to convincing me to come her arguments were, "You've never been in a Muslim nation," or "How great would it be to celebrate Chinese New Year together!"  True, true, but still just seeing her was the most compelling reason to come visit.  So after the Pranayama course ended, I got on a plane that same night and headed to Malaysia for a four day visit.  My sister picked my up at the Kuala Lumpur airport, which coming from India, felt as modern as The Jetson's.  When we got to the hotel I took a hot shower that felt like it saved my life.  Let me back track to the showers in India to give you a sense of where I was coming from.  Each bathroom has a toilet or two foot marks and a hole, a sink, an spout to draw water from, and a shower head coming out of the wall.  The water from the shower may be hot for a while, but sure as the sun will rise, the water gets cold again.  What's more, after you take a shower and you've finally gotten the dirt out from the cracks of the soles of your feet, then you have to put on sandals in order to keep them that way.  I say all of this to express my complete joy in showering upon my arrival in Kuala Lumpur.  What's funny, is that since I've been in this five star hotel I notice things like pens, toilet paper, tea, water bottles, conditioner, and soap just lying there and think about taking them with me.  I never have these types of urges to steal, but being in a place of where everything is provided is quite usual after India. So it's not the flat screen t.v.'s or the marble countertop that have me in awe, but the little amenities that would be luxuries in Chennai.