VIDEO DESCRIPTION:
I decided to take part in the latest Internet and YouTube craze (that I just invented). It’s called “My Neighborhood Is Better than Yours.” It’s sweeping the nation and soon the world.
The idea is that you step outside your front door and turn on your camera and show the world your neighborhood. No cheating! You can’t travel across the city and go to a different neighborhood. You have to start filming right outside your front door and show the world what makes your neighborhood special and awesome.
I came up with this idea because I happened to be out late at night walking back to my hotel here in Chow Kit, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. And it struck me just how amazing this neighborhood is. So I grabbed my GoPro with the idea of just going for a short walk starting at my front door and recording the life of the streets of Chow Kit.
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:
Good evening and welcome back to Planet Doug. I am going to start a brand new internet challenge called My Neighborhood is Better Than Yours. The idea is that you just step outside your front door, whatever it is, right outside your front door, and show me your neighborhood. Let’s see if it’s better than mine. Anyway, basically all I wanted to do was go for a walk around my neighborhood and capture some of it on video, and I thought I would turn it into the newest internet challenge. So that’s my hotel right there, right up above me. That’s my front door right there. I just stepped outside my front door. This is what you see: Chow Kit, Monorail station. Then, if I walk across the road, the first thing you’re going to see is this amazing fruit shop. Check this place out. Every kind of fruit imaginable. They’re open 24 hours a day. Hello. They even have fresh fruit all chopped up, ready for you to take away. So, that’s a great part of this neighborhood.
Right across the road is my favorite restaurant right here, the Kashmir restaurant. Pakistani food. I eat here almost every day, and they have all kinds of great food there. Amazing buffet, naan bread, fresh naan bread right over here where they do all of the cooking. To emphasize, my front door, my neighborhood. Check this out. Right here. I’m not talking about cheating on this challenge. You can’t drive across the city to get to a different neighborhood. It has to be right outside your front door. So, this is basically the scene here every night. It’s a very active part of Kuala Lumpur, Chow Kit. There are lots of neighborhoods like this around, but this is the Chow Kit District right outside my front door. Look at that restaurant. Amazing place.
All kinds of food stalls right over there and over here, selling children’s toys, local color. An amazing building here adding character. I learned recently that this building was used in the Malaysian movie Abang Adik. I really want to watch that movie, so I want to find a copy of it. There’s another nicer hotel over here, the M1 Plaza. The hotel Selesa is here. Mishe Ice Cream and Tea. I don’t think that’s how you say it, but that’s how I say it. A 24-hour KK Supermarket right here. Right over there, Nasi Lemak. Look at the seating. It’s amazing right there.
Right down here, we have a Ramly Burger Outlet, the Hot Papa Burger. They make an amazing burger over there. Yeah, there’s a lot of traffic coming down this alleyway, but right there, that’s a Hot Papa Burger. They make all kinds of great burgers.
Yeah, little restaurants all along here. I was out here earlier, which is what gave me the idea to shoot a little bit of video to show you my amazing neighborhood because there were things going on I hadn’t seen before, like used clothing. Right there, there’s a little clothing shop. I think once we go around the corner here, we’re going to see a lot more. I hadn’t seen any of this before, but it’s like a clothing market just springs up out of nowhere at night. I think a guy here was selling hundreds, if not thousands, of pairs of shoes. That’s what it seemed like.
So, yeah, all this clothing for sale here at the side of the road. If you need a ball cap, a t-shirt, some shoes, baby shoes, kids’ shoes. Look at that right there. All those shoes for sale. Hundreds of them. I’ve never gone down this way before, so this is brand new to me as well. I think this is also a used clothing area that just pops up out of nowhere at night. We’re going to go down here, but then we’re going to turn around and come back to the main street. Just wanted to see what’s going on down here. Oh, yeah, he’s just arrived. He’s laying out his shirts. This area is probably going to go on late into the early hours of the morning. People are just setting up their clothing stalls right now.
Another little snack kind of restaurant there. I’ve never been down this way before, so this is all brand new to me. Imagine if you’re driving, parking anywhere in Kuala Lumpur, you’ve got to know what you’re doing. It’s not always the easiest thing to do to find a parking spot. That’s what all these people are trying to do. But look at this. Clothing stores everywhere. It’s cool.
Even a hip, chic clothing store over there with music playing. Anyway, I don’t want this video to be too long, so I’m not going to go all the way down to the end of this street, but you can see there’s clothing store after clothing store after clothing store. Hi, how are you? I’m just going to turn back, head back to the main street.
As you can see, I live in a pretty cool neighborhood, or I don’t live here, I happen to be living here temporarily. I’m staying in a pretty cool neighborhood, and it may be better than yours. Yeah, looks like there’s some parking down there.
That’s something about life in this part of the world. It’s really hard for me to adapt because I’m a morning person and a daytime person. Yet, over the decades, over the centuries, the hot weather of Southeast Asia means that a lot of the living happens when the sun goes down. That’s when the people come out. So, once it becomes cooler, that’s when all this activity kicks off, and I’m not generally out at night. I’m not a night person, but it’s a whole different world once the sun goes down.
Turning the corner back on the main street here. There are all the shoes over there. Never seen that before. Nice restaurant there. Hot food, cold drinks, wholesale markets here for vegetables, things like that.
This is a pretty happening place across the road. It’s not open right now, but during the daytime, that’s pretty happening there. Kind of a discount department store, Mura Mura Pastura. Mura means cheap. During the day, there’s a pisang goreng place right here that’s serving pisang goreng. Check this out: Vietnam Coffee Chow Kit. During the day, there aren’t any tables here. They come out at night. They put out the tables here. Get yourself some classic Vietnamese coffee and coconut shakes at the same place. This is Jalan Raja Bot, the name of this street. I was staying in a low-budget hotel up here called the Hotel Raja Bot, named after a historic and quite well-known Raja from the Lukut, Port Dickson area. The last Raja of Lukut, I found out. That was a very convenient hotel here as well. All these restaurants up ahead and a 99 Speed Mart right there. Another great nasi kandar restaurant right there. But we are turning in this direction. Check this out. More used clothing. As I said, this is all new to me. I haven’t seen the used clothing market here at night before. I don’t know if it comes out every night. Probably does.
If you still haven’t found a pair of shoes that fit you, well, maybe this guy’s got you covered. Or a baseball cap. You couldn’t find your favorite team on the other street, just come down here.
There are lots of great little food shops and restaurants over there. Martabak Mi Acha, Mi Ayam Bakso over here.
Then, right up ahead, we’re heading into Cendol Heaven. I was just here earlier tonight, and I had mango cendol. A couple of friends of mine and I, we met up for some cendol, came down here, and again, it was all the activity that gave me the idea to head out and do some filming, capture the nightlife here in Chow Kit.
There was a great visual over on this side. I’m going to pop over here. I remember walking by here. It looks so cool. These plants, I always forget the name of these plants. I’ve given up looking up the name because I forget every time. But every time I see them, I take a picture, take a video, and then I look up the name, and then I instantly forget what they’re called. But, in the nightlight, they look so cool. We don’t have anything like that in Canada, of course. Pisang goreng, fried bananas, fruit drinks.
This is my friend. This is my country. Here as well. It must be the season for these. They certainly have a lot of them for sale.
Then, right here, just up ahead on the right, all those yellow tents. This is Man Cendol. He’s one of the places here. I think these tables are shared between a bunch of little cafes. But the one that I go to is the cendol place on the corner, M Cendol, I think it’s called. Oh, Maman Place.
So much traffic. But yeah, this is the cendol. They’ve got every kind of cendol you could want: M Durian Cendol. They seem to be split on both sides of the road. You’ve got Man Place just there, and then on the other side of the road, they have this part as well. Cendol Durian Man Place right here. Look at that.
You can smell the durian. Smells great. Right off in this direction, of course, is the Chow Kit Market. Then, if you turn and head in this direction, you get a whole bunch more restaurants. I was here just the other morning. There’s a place up here on the left called Rose Restaurant, an Indonesian restaurant. Amazing place. Had brunch there with Daryl and the boys from the Wander Eats YouTube channel. Hello.
So, this was one of the first places I saw: Laksa Kang Baru. Haven’t eaten there yet. It’s on my list. It’s on my schedule.
Over here on this side, pick the place you like. Empty tables. Tom, it’s a tom yam place, Mazney Tom Yam restaurant. Kelapa muda. They’ve got soto mi, daging mi, roti canai. I mean, come on. It really does not get any better than this. If you like your food, Palam, also an Indonesian name. Hello. Hello. Yeah, another cendol place. They have the ABC as well, Ais Batu Campur.
I am king over there, and over there, there’s the Rose Restaurant, an amazing place to have a meal. Really liked our brunch there the other day. Things are winding down. There are more places up ahead, but it’s starting to thin out a little bit. Beautiful mosque right over there, but here, yeah, I’ll turn around and head back in.
To be honest, I think I’ll end the video challenge right there. I think I’ve proved beyond a shadow of a doubt. I could keep walking. I could go all the way to the end of this street, and there’s more here. There’s more around. But I think I’ve demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that my neighborhood is better than yours. So, go outside your front door, shoot a short video of what you see out there, and see if you can beat my neighborhood. That’s it. Shutting down. See you in the next video.