I was feeling a little despondent today, so I decided to have a solo half-day trip to explore the city centre of Kuala Lumpur. It’s effective, the walk. My despondency was instantly gone and replaced with something more fervent, hatred.

Judging by the title alone, you know what I’m ranting about in this post.

Heat, and boy do I detest it.

It’s always bizarre to me that foreigners, especially white people, love to be tanned. I know that this joke has been told by so many comedians, and yet it boggles me because I still don’t know what the motivation is.

Like why would you want to actively increase your likelihood of getting skin cancer? Why do you love the sun so much?

I know there is this thing in America called “Summer Body”, which is the perfect physique that people start training for really early in advance so that they can show it off during summer at the beach. And I also know that Americans usually associate summer to holidays.

I can only think of those 2 reasons that could at least explain to some degree why foreigners, especially Americans, love to walk around under the blazing hot sun in the middle of city where all sorts of vehicles are congregated in one dense spot. It’s basically walking in an extremely small microwave whose power is cranked up to the maximum.

However, other than those 2 reasons, I don’t know what else the motivation could be, especially for those who are not from America.

Or perhaps it is the tourist adrenaline, characterized by the desire to explore as much as possible all the destinations, highlights, and specialties of places in foreign countries to make your money worth.

Whatever the reason may be, I just hate it. I dare to make the conjecture that 99% of Malaysians would share the same hatred as me.

I know what you are thinking,”It’s only because you have spent your entire life living in Malaysia and experiencing the humid, hot weather. If you were living in, for example, Quebec, you would have come to despise the gnarly, gut-wrenching snowstorm and would kiss the ground when there is finally a ray of sunlight coming through to embrace you in a warm hug.”

What kind of comparison and argument is that?

One, I don’t kiss grounds; I only kiss asses, only of the rich ones (for any furture employers who are reading this, it’s a figure of speech, a satire. It’s not real. I feel I need to explain this)

Second, of course I would be glad that I’m not suffering from frostbite and eventually die of hypothermia. Who wouldn’t?

But between becoming a frozen statue and melting like a strawberry ice cream into a puddle of red, I choose the former.

What is the perfect temperature, then?

As with everything, the perfect balance of a temperature is the most ideal for just about everybody. By perfect balance, I would say around 15 degree Celsius (whatever that is in Fahrenheit), day and night.

At this temperature, if you are indoor, all you need is just a regular fan, or you could just open the windows. Imagine the electricity bill I can save from not using any air conditioner at all. Gosh!

Additionally, at 15 degree Celsius, any sort of outdoor activities will be hundred times better.

If you stay in Malaysia for just 3 days, you will realise that it’s not really a pedestrian-friendly place to be. Sure, in the city centre, you will still have connecting bridges, sidewalks (most of which are not well-maintained), zebra crossings, etc.

However, if you go just a little beyond city centre, being a pedestrian becomes a betting of your life; most of the time, you will have no choice but to walk along the main roads at the side, where many motorbikes drive along, just to get to the other side.

Hell, sometimes you even need to cross a HIGHWAY just to reach the opposite site.

There are many reasons to this seemingly underdevelopment for pedestrians or any public transport users. Some would say that due to the lobbying of the powerful automotive industry in Malaysia and the incredibly cheap petrol (as compared to other countries, especially Singapore), owning and driving a car here is relatively easy. As a result, most urban planning is geared toward a more vehicle-oriented fashion.

While it’s not a substantiated claim, there is some sense of truth to that argument.

But I have a simpler and more straightforward theory: all Malaysians just hate the blazing hot sun and, by extension, walking. Since nobody walks, there is no need for pedestrian-friendly urban planning.

In other words, heat makes a city unwalkable, which is why living in a place where it’s 15 degree Celsius majority of the time is the most ideal state of living.

At 15 degree, you wouldn’t feel so exhausted even after walking for half an hour.

I am somebody who loves a good walk, and I sometimes would consider making it my life goal to save enough money to move to a place where it’s 15°C all the time.

There is only one place I could think of in Malaysia that has this quality, and that is Genting Highland, and while it has the perfect weather, it’s not a hospitable place, at least not for me, as it’s so far away from every conveniences.

Well, I guess the only solution is to move somewhere outside of Malaysia, and damn it, because it’s expensive and almost impossible.

Well, where does that leave us?

Back to my room. Yep, after a whole day of sweating walking around and finding the perfect hideaway cafe (which proved to be quite difficult because every people in Kuala Lumpur seemed to have the same plan as me), I went back home.

Here’s the thing: this is my very first time walking around in Kuala Lumpur by myself. Yeah, I was having a fight with my family yesterday, and today I decided to wander around aimlessly in the big city.

Despite the extreme heat and crowded streets, it’s still nice to be in a big city once in a while. It widens and zooms out your perspective, making your personal problem seems just a little smaller and easier to manage.

As you can see from the picture, as I tilted my head up and gazed upon the Merdeka 118 tower, blinded by the merciless sunlight just peeking over the dilapidated, eccentric shop lots, while sweating profusely and feeling uncomfortable with so much stickiness on my entire body, I felt just a little smaller and some sense of relief.

Only temporary, though. As I said in the beginning, it was quickly replaced with the hatred for the heat.

Gosh, imagine snowing in Malaysia! Yes, it would be the end of the world, but that’s the best way I could imagine living the last moment on earth.