Jalan Alor

Jalan Alor, in the heart of the city, has to be one of KL’s greatest nightspots. This is a place to come for food. All sorts of food. The street is crammed with local restaurants and food stalls, serving every Malaysian dish you could wish for. The abundance and variety can seem quite staggering. The little carts that make up the majority of stalls advertise everything from frog porridge (soggy rice – with frogs of course) to carrot cake (a savoury stir-fried mush). Bundles of squid hang above woks alongside leafy green vegetables. The air sizzles with the sound of frying and a thousand delicious smells assail you. There are barely-cooked shellfish which ooze blood (?) as you pick them from their shells, there are butter prawns with fried curry leaves, wantons, laksa, black pepper venison, soft-shell crab, lala, steam boat, chicken fish and a hundred kinds of noodles. Sugar cane squeezers grind to produce glasses of sweet, refreshing juice, while a huge stack of spent canes builds up on the pavement. On long thin barbecues satay is grilled, row upon row, smoke billowing as the cook fans it vigorously breaking off only to slop spicy peanut sauce into plastic dishes.

There are fruit stalls where you can buy mangosteen and rambutan and a dozen other local treats. An old man weighs huge, spiky durians before splitting them open with a hefty swing of a parang. At a table nearby, groups of people bite into the gorgeous, rich, creamy flesh of these mighty fruits whose stench overwhelms unsuspecting foreign passers-by.

Tables from stalls and restaurants spill out over the pavements, onto the road, where they butt up against parking meters, streetlights, parked cars and trestle tables full of pirated CDs. While you eat at one cafe, you can order extras from other nearby stalls. Cars nudge their way between pedestrians, men selling tacky light-up toys or packs of socks and children selling tissues. Mini-skirted girls in Heineken or Tiger outfits flit between tables taking orders for beer.

The whole street is buzzing. The lights and movement, sounds and smells give you a kick of excitement, but the atmosphere is always relaxed and friendly. This is Kuala Lumpur at its best.