Heading to Malaysia

Sunday, April 17: Day 5
We just had a couple of hours in the morning in Singapore b/c we had to catch a late morning flight to Penang, Malaysia. So we packed (meaning I, while Joe wrestled the crazy beasts we call our children. I'm not sure who gets the better deal here...) Scarlett was still a bit warm this morning, but her temp never got over 99 today. And oddly enough, the runny nose stopped this morning. Thank goodness b/c I was dreading the thought of taking a sick kid to our friends' Tim & Laurel's house & infecting their 15 month old son.
We arrived at Changi Airport w/o trouble. And immediately upon seeing the kids, some airport employees presented the girls with stuffed 'animal' airplanes. Scarlett's is named Changi & Audrey named hers Stuffy. During our now 2 trips to Asia, we have been treated with nothing but kindness while traveling through airports simply because we have children with us. They really have it figured out here! You get priority boarding, toys/ games for the kids to keep, special lines opened just for us, etc... It is the ONE & pretty much only (and yes, I challenge you to disagree with me here!) instance where having kids along makes things easier. Don't get me wrong- I'd love to take a 3 week tropical vacation with just my hubby, but it's nice to know the kids are valued as important little people here.
About 20 minutes before landing however, there was this totally foul stench. Of course everyone started doing the uncomfortable looking around to see who the guilty person was. Then a liquid substance started dripping out of the overhead compartment a few rows ahead of us. I can best describe the smell as this: rotten kim chi/ teenage boy sweaty gym socks & shoes. Seriously! Ew! The flight attendants got rubber gloves, a ladder and cleaning supplies and got busy. They later told Joe it was, and this is in their words, "Some gross Japanese snack food."
Our friend Tim picked us up from the airport in Penang after a 1 hour 15 minute easy flight. We drove the 30 minutes or so back to their place on the northern side of Penang island near the town of Georgetown. Penang is connected to mainland Malaysia by a long bridge, but Laurel told us they never have any reason to go over there. All you need is right there on Penang.
We hung out for the afternoon while babies napped, then we went to dinner at this open air Indian restaurant just around the corner from their apartment. Our "plate" was a giant banana leaf, the size of a standard placemat. We ordered the food which they scooped into piles on our banana leaf. Technically, we should have mixed up the different foods with the HUGE pile of rice on our leaf then eaten that with our hands. But we fork & spooned it. I'm all for eating with my hands, but when you are constantly "on call" with kids & you may need to grab them, spilling glasses, tipping chairs, etc at a moment's notice, it really doesn't help to have a handful of curry, rice and soupy vegetables. The other marks against eating with your hands here, in my opinion, is the lack of napkins. Of course there was a small sink right in the middle of the restaurant that we could use if needed. The food was really good and cheap! For 4 adults & 3 kids to eat dinner, including lime juices for all, it cost 15 Ringit. 1 US$ = 3 Ringit. Isn't that crazy?
Then back to their apartment, kids to bed, hanging out, then lights out. We all started to feel pretty normal today and seem to have adjusted to the time change.