Visiting KL

Hello sir, ive been a tourist bfore but now working here in KL. With my 3 yrs of stay and sometime going out late at night I havent encounter any incident of whatsoever. I can say KL is still a safe place to stay.

Hi,

Malaysia is a great place to stay.
You can go to the famous theme park in Malaysia.
Below are some link to purchase great promotional tickets:

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Hi. Thanks for the replays this is very comforting to know that not all reports of KL being unsafe are not true. It could be just down to personal experiences I guess.
Thanks for the recommendations of places to go for children. I will check their websites.

Im in my 18th year and never once had any problem on any street or elsewhere either.

Yes there are reports of all sorts of crimes, snatching bags is probably No.1, but taking ordinary precautions can ward off most of it. Example, dont carry a shoulder bad ON the shoulder, mount it ACROSS the body; dont walk near curbs with said bag on the road side, walk closer to buildings away from the street so that motorbike riders cant grab and run when one is near the street; dont blurt obscenities to locals which might get a rise out of them; when you see a group of young boys, just steer around them and if they talk to you, just smile and keep going. Things like that. Dont LOOK for trouble and you'll be fine. I have never once felt unsafe in Malaysia, no matter what time day or night.

Stay at park royal serviced suite apartment at jalan nagasari.. would be a great place to stay as being city centric and very live all time.. and completely safe area...

Of the locals ive polled over time, I would say few or none feel safe, and believe the police are not doing enough, and have no faith that the government even cares about crime as a priority. There is a reason for this that goes to the basic culture of the country: Are you being robbed right now? No? Then everything is ok and the topic has ended. But Mr. Policeman, I could be robbed tomorrow or the next day, what are you doing to help prevent that? As long as you are not being robbed this moment or last night, there is nothing to talk about. Thats the attitude about not just crime but everything here. Expats would say the country needs an attitude adjustment.

But back to locals, they dont feel safe and think they will be robbed five minutes from now. Expats suffer from a different psychological problem, they (we) believe things are better than they really are because we dont wish to admit any error of judgement in moving to any country in the first place. So we tend to gloss over problems because if the naked truth be known about anything, we would have egg on our faces as idiots. After all, if expats feel safe here and locals do not, there is something wrong and its not just written off to cultural differences. Humans are humans and there is a certain amount of commonalty in all human thinking. Does this mean we rush to the other side and say Malaysia is a very unsafe place? No, but between expats and locals the truth lies. Malaysia isnt Crime Central of Evil and its absolutely not a Safety Zone either. And Im being pretty generous here.

Also, expats are given to believe that crime would be dealt with swiftly which couldnt be further from the truth. If you are involved in a crime you will be forced to write it off to your bad luck, possibly even if you caught the criminal red-handed. If you lose your handbag, you are much more likely to be blamed for your carelessness than be assured the criminal will be caught or even pursued at all. Thats a guarantee. You be in Malaysia entirely at your own risk. After all, as new expats will soon hear over and over again, "nobody forced you to come here."

There is another aspect which doesnt get talked about at all so i will bring it up.  This is primarily a muslim country and as such, Islam does not consider itself at peace with western civilization, Christianity or Judaism. My family abroad has always worried about that kind of safety. Like all countries, most of the population is peaceful but there are extremists as well. I cant really speculate about safety because on the surface Malaysians are peaceful but what lurks below remains a question. 9-11 was planned in Kuala Lumpur and the country remains a crossroads of all types of people. I dont rise everyday in fear but this topic is never far from the mind either.

The last point about safety is racial tension. There has been no explosion of tension since 1969 but the tension remains nonetheless. Its hard to say how and why and when expats might find themselves in the crossfire of race problems but it bears keeping in mind.

That covers the main aspects of safety.

I suggest Sunway Lagoon or Kidzania for kids to play.

DickieD wrote:

Hi. Thanks for the replays this is very comforting to know that not all reports of KL being unsafe are not true. .

KL is a big city and all big cities have issues.
The ones I noticed in KL are mostly about buying cheap DVDs, but they sell them down a quiet alley where muggers happen to hang around or my old favourite:

Woman or man walks up to tourist ...

Hi, where are you from?
I'm from <country>
I'm shocked - my daughter is going there to study and I wonder if you can make sure she's fine whilst she's there.

By the way, my grand mother is about to die and needs a serious operation and would you like a nice game of poker?

They tend to shake your hand but not let go in the hope you'll think it's rude to force them away.
None have been violent but a few have followed me around until they get the message.

Bukit Bintang has some seriously dodgy people about but they leave families alone.

Basically, KL is no problem at all as long as you have your head screwed on properly.

Thanks for all the helpful info everyone.
Can't wait to visit

Enjoy the vacation soon & have a good time in kl/Malaysia.

Lara5 wrote:

Enjoy the vacation soon & have a good time in kl/Malaysia.

It's hard work not to enjoy KL.
I have a soft spot for the place, it being one of my favourite cities.

I agree with something.

1) If you are ever asked by anyone to join a card game, run away right now.
2) If you take in the many wonderful waterfalls in the country and you are walking along the quiet and beautiful jungle park paths and hear, "Hey, whats your hurry," run away now. GO.

My wallet just got robed last night and that too in a monorail at Hang Tuah. I too had a good opinion about KL but after this incident I suggest you have to be more careful on all your personal belongings and wallet while you commute . I am totally disappointed since all my vital documents are lost , I never care about the money .. but it's a pain to retrieve all the ID cards and Driving license

Rosh2706 wrote:

My wallet just got robed last night and that too in a monorail at Hang Tuah. I too had a good opinion about KL but after this incident I suggest you have to be more careful on all your personal belongings and wallet while you commute . I am totally disappointed since all my vital documents are lost , I never care about the money .. but it's a pain to retrieve all the ID cards and Driving license

Crowded areas are the same in any city so care has to be taken to avoid these people.
I started using a hidden wallet that goes around my waist to keep the majority of my cash, cards, documents and so on in. The stuff I need easily available is kept in a neck wallet but a jeans pocket works just as well.

Any man wanting to get my cash would have to feel around in my shorts and that would attract an extreme reaction but the weak point is a female thief, especially if she was good looking, could probably manage to steal my cash.

DickieD wrote:

Hi. Thanks for the replays this is very comforting to know that not all reports of KL being unsafe are not true..

Mostly not true.

I stopped a tourist going down an alley with a man selling really cheap DVDs - That trip would have cost him.
The biggest danger is the con men who have a daughter/niece who is going to work/study in whatever country you've just told him you come from.
He wants you to stay in contact with her and, by the way, he has a sick grandmother and would you like to play poker.

Stupidly easy con to spot but people fall for it as a Japanese girl I met found out to her cost.
I just lie about the place I'm from them when the con starts with the study bit,  I apologise and tell them I thought they asked where I'd just come from, not where I was actually from.

Con busted and they sod off.

Last up - Keep your stuff close and in view when in bars.

exactly how did you wallet get stolen, rosh?

Another way to be safe is to carry nothing at all.

When I first came to KL I left everything in hotels and only carried some small cash. In time, I got asked for my passport for different reasons and so I needed to carry it all the time. But it didnt fit well in a pocket so I got a small shoulder bag. The passport, being so lonely in a bag all by itself, was soon joined by everything else and now you really have yourself in danger.

I went for many years in that fashion and lately i've been reverting to leaving the house with nothing. If a cop wants my passport or if something else is needed, i'll have to go home and get it and that includes my phone. Thats right, I almost never carry my phone either, maybe only twice in a month.

If you dont have it, they cant steal it.

The post ends there but here is a postscript. If you are fit, alert, can fight, carry a good-sized knife and are prepared to use it and defend yourself, you can scratch this post.

cvco wrote:

The post ends there but here is a postscript. If you are fit, alert, can fight, carry a good-sized knife and are prepared to use it and defend yourself, you can scratch this post.

No point having a phone  if you aren't going to use it and some hotel staff steal things - rare but it happens.
I recommend sticking to the hidden wallet.

Fighting is easy if you're trained or just a street fighter but for most it's a pointless waste of time that will get you a black eye and a broken nose to add to your misery at losing your cash.
As for the knife - DON'T.
Carrying a knife is likely to get you arrested and using it is likely to see it taken off you and buried in your stomach.

I carry a small Swiss army knife but that's a tool, never a weapon.

Fred, you misunderstood me but its ok......i wasnt advocating for fights and knives because I already know 99.99999% of the people would never be up for it. In a way the postscript was a joke, see? So, I meant that people should go back to the main post. Understand now?

I stayed in hotels that had their own safes, the office safes, like Sheraton and such. If there was a loss, you know who did it, so they never touched anything.

But thats a small thing, the big thing is street life where anything can happen and there is no culprit, no help, no good result. If six guys drag you to an alley for your bag or wallet and you have no phone, money, anything, well then you lose nothing.

I think I told this story before but my friend was standing outside a shop and a Malay man walked up and asked to use his phone, he had some urgent, desperate problem. My friend gave him the phone to use and the Malay promptly jumped on a waiting motorbike and scrammed. In another case, in a mamak stall i frequented, a Chinese man was having coffee at a table and working on his laptop. A Malay kid came up on a motorbike, parked, walked right up to the Chinese and grabbed his laptop while he was typing, and scrammed on the bike. People tried to catch him but failed. Later, the polis, who had clues about similar thefts, went to a certain apartment where they not only found this laptop but 18 others.

Thats how easy misfortune occurs. Well, I dont take my phone out, I dont take my money out,  I dont take my laptop out and guess what, I NEVER LOSE THEM.

That said, people can learn self-defense and there are classes for it, especially for women. Youtube is full of videos of people who successfully defended themselves against criminals in Asia and elsewhere. In an attack in KL which started so innocently in a simple conversation on the street, a Chinese fellow beat the living daylights out of the perpetrator and saved himself and girlfriend. Of course it can be done but it has to be learned! I promise this, if this happens to me or anyone im with, the perpetrator is going down and will never get up again. And im no spring chicken. And that goes for what I may see, like an attack on an elderly person. Oh! Thats the worst of all and I would never tolerate it. Im not a violent person but while Ive been in Malaysia ive had this recurring daydream in which I hear this voice behind me--stop, man! youre killing him! youre killing him!! Stop!!

I almost got into a fight in Ipoh.
I  was returning to my hotel late at night without the slightest clue I was in a red light area. I chose that hotel because pizza hut was just over the road.
Anyway, you know the covered pavements there wit the arches, 3 dudes looking a lot like they wanted my wallet blocked the archway.
3 choices -
Turn - they'd follow me and I'd already shown weakness.
Go around on the road - They'd  follow me and I'd already shown weakness.
I chose the last - Smile, get my fists nice and tight in a way that showed I was serious, than walked directly at them with a "Great, time for a fight" look on my face.
They buggered off.

Fred - when did your events take place? Recently?

I arrived at the Bukit Bintang monorail station at 7pm. Since the arriving Monorail was jam packed , I thought of alighting on the next rail(unfortunately). So the rail arrives , it's packed again, but , couldn't wait much longer so hopped in with a street food in one hand.
I usually tend to cross check my wallet on my jeans pocket every 5min.
My destination station was Hang Tuah where I was supposed to catch the Putra Heights LRT. Just few minutes(maybe 2min) back prior to the Hang Tuah station I had cross checked my wallet which existed on my back pocket. 7:22 , I get off and check my back pocket .... it's gone!!!!! Bloody hell! How could this happen to me???
I entered the same monorail again to see if it's been dropped or something, but in vein..
I lost it and given a written complaint to the station person. He too tried to search at the tracks. But unfortunately, it's stolen!
I am only worried about the original docs and cards and ID s I had in that which is gonna take a lot of time to reapply and a real pain in the A** process.

Never, just never, keep your wallet in a back pocket.
Far too easy to get ripped off regardless of the country you're in.

Gravitas wrote:

Fred - when did your events take place? Recently?

These were some years ago so it's possible the police have cleaned the con men off the streets since then.
It was a very common scam, sometimes tried on me several times a day.

Fred wrote:

Gravitas wrote:

Fred - when did your events take place? Recently?

These were some years ago so it's possible the police have cleaned the con men off the streets since then.
It was a very common scam, sometimes tried on me several times a day.

Like 12-15 years ago?

Gravitas wrote:

Fred wrote:

Gravitas wrote:

Fred - when did your events take place? Recently?

These were some years ago so it's possible the police have cleaned the con men off the streets since then.
It was a very common scam, sometimes tried on me several times a day.

Like 12-15 years ago?

About 9 or 10 would be closer.
Have the cops cleaned up the scammers now and how about the prostitutes and pimps on Jalan Bukit bintang?