Where people drink juices, hot milk teas and other suspiciously-coloured liquids from plastic bags, which they carry around like intravenous handbags on strings.

Where industrialization is still in a selfish state: Men throw wrappers and cigarette buts freely on the ground. Children send used napkins into the wind like kites, with their mothers silently cheering them on. Drivers leave their autos and bikes idling for longer than they’ve been driving them. And men abandon their wives and offspring in cars for indefinite amounts of time as they attend to indefinable business in nameless stores and bars.

Where shrimps are served unpeeled, food is meant to eaten by hand, and dishes are, literally, finger licking good. Yet napkins are never EVER provided. (Though hand-washing stations are.)

Where streets lack sidewalks but do have narrow three-foot-deep gutters which drain particular liquids as per time of day (dirty water, coffee dregs, coconut tom yam) and pose a special risk to bikers.

Where smoking ads cover half the cigarette box and present pictures so horrid – from decaying toes to football-sized cheek tumors – they may not even be smoking-related. And everyone smokes.

Where garbage is a part of the landscape.

Where men are so painfully nice and quick to say hello that not saying hi back makes a girl feel mean, but saying hi makes a girl feel perhaps a little loose.

Where a town set amongst tea fields, tea tours, tea plantations, and a whole lot of regional tea pride does not have a single tea house to let you sample said tea.

Where three dollars gets you a two-hour bus ride in the kind of luxe air-conditioned heaven that makes greyhound look like a second-hand school bus.

Where coffee is served strong and black save for an inch-thick layer of sweetened condensed milk settled at the bottom. Where not sweet is not an option.

Where Muslim women wear colourful silk headscarves, and 80 percent of women are Muslim. Where you are just as likely to see women in niqabs on hiking trails and tandem on motorbikes as you are walking in the street.

Where everything is lit up in a made-to-order neon sign by night. And power stations rule the vistas by day.

Where the capital city has the most extensive public transit system. Which is great because there are hardly any pedestrian friendly walkways.

Where pockets of Chinese and Indian culture enliven the cities with music, food and colour, while Malay culture sits more indistinguishable on the sideline.

Where the alphabet has the twenty six letters we know and Malay words are often similar to English ones.

Where everyone speaks pretty great English.

Where entire rice dishes come wrapped in bamboo leaf packages. Where chicken rice is succulent in lime juice, the satay, if not grilled, is cooked in boiling pots of peanut sauce, and vegetable soup actually exists…and is absolutely delicious.

Where coconut juice gets less coconut and more sugar water the further north you go.

Where you have roti (a thin crispy fried Indian pancake with dahl dipping sauces and the possibilty for fillings) for late-night snack, and can’t wait to have it again for breakfast.

Where motorbike drivers don’t honk but, based on daringly unpredictable traffic maneuvers, probably should.

Where call to prayer sounds five times a day, and strange guttural sounds fill the gaps in the night.

Where, in Kuala Lumpur, marketplace touts try to sell you knock off handbags, watches, and sunglasses, and don’t hesitate to lecture you on the value of your money and their dire lifestyle if you try to haggle with them too fiercely.

Where the seeming baby boom rivals the construction boom, though the buildings are often left abandoned or unfinished, optimistically erected for a demand that couldn’t be met.

Where strip malls are the architectural trademark.

Where upscale malls sell expensive designer clothes to women who will wear these styles at home, but cover them up in public.

Where bathrooms are Western style, squaty potties, or a combination of both. Where white women wait for Western stalls and Malay women queue up at squat doors.

Where women wear pale creams and concealer on their faces to make their skin lighter, but to the unaccustomd Western eye end up looking more grey than white, and more drag than pretty.

Where cars include makes we’ve never heard of – Kancils, Personas, and Protons – in pastel blues, greens, and purples that you only wish were available at home.

Where local tourism is king. Where Malay families flock to beaches on weekends and Muslim women hit the water in burkinis (head to toe black baggy track suits made in a Lycra material.)

Where three-in-one Nescafé reigns supreme on a coffee pedestal, and mini mart shelves are stocked with delicious frozen coffees.

Where foreign tourists are mostly French couples, followed by Dutch, German, and British travelers. Where Canadian backpackers are nowhere to be seen.

Where, on Pangkor Island, hornbills live and feed, and look far cooler than you you ever expected Zazu from the Lion King to actually look.

Where small geckos scurry up your walls at night.

Where the massive spike-covered durian is the king of fruits, beloved and sold by many. But, because of its rotten socks odor, its also (and thankfully) banned from many hostels and hotels.

Where Kuala Lumpur nightlife looks very much like the Playa del Carmen tourist strip.

Where, in any given town, you might not find a trendy cafe, but you will find the Hard Rock Cafe.

Where, in the Cameron Highlands, a hand-held car wash is the smartest and busiest little business around.

Where packs of dogs bark well into the night, nip off the tails of local cats, and eat up all the food that are left out on homemade Chinese altars honoring the gods. (The gods loooved their chicken bones and pink mini cupcakes.)

Where wi-fi is accessible everywhere.

Where the street corners are dotted with KFCs, McDonalds’ and Dunkin’ Donuts’.

Where the style is more ‘modern Muslim’ than trendy or breathable. Where thirty degree temperatures make a overheated traveller wonder whether showing a little skin, or showing a lot of sweat, would be most offensive.

Where, not surprisingly, homophobia is still present and homosexuality sadly misunderstood. Where a national English-language newspaper reports on a 16,000 teacher conference to curb LGBT behaviour: “…It is like a disease but can be cured with prevention…It is said LGBT tendencies could be spotted among boys wearing tight-fitting V-neck T-shirts and carrying large sling bags, and girls who enjoy the company of their own gender.”

Where every second man is named Mohd and wears the sort of Muslim beard you were convinced Asian men couldn’t even grow.

Where men and women are shipped in from Myanmar, Indonesia and Pakistan to grow and pick leaves at the tea plantations at 34 per hour (roughly $11 CAD,) starting entire lives and villages there, because the local Malaysians “don’t want to work those kind of jobs.”