It's been a while so this will be a long one. Pictures to come later. 

Upon arrival at the airport with time to spare and then some, we discovered that you can't check into your flight until 2 hours before boarding so we ended up just sitting in the ticket area for about 2 hours in Phenom Phen, other than the DQ, there really is not much to do on that side of the security.

Flight went well, flying Air Asia is interesting as I have never been on a flight before that charged for in flight non-alcoholic drinks but as we are about to learn, In Kuala Lumpur nickle and diming is not just practiced but is perfected.

Upon landing in Kuala Lumpur (KL from here on out) the first thing we saw was a Starbucks followed quickly by a Micky D's. My first thought upon this "Hello first world! How I have missed you" I have since learned that KL is actually still considered 3rd world (But Greece is first world???). Anyway, this place is a development central, construction projects are everywhere and the center of KL is a huge shopping district that rivals the best you can find in LA or NY.

Alright so after we got settled into our rented house/hotel thing, we went out and explored some of the city which is actually quite nice. We called it early as most of us were pretty exhausted from traveling.

The next day we met with the staff of HOPE that is stationed in KL and they are FABULOUS. Super nice people who are organized and have a plan. We had schedules in hand that day and were ready to rock and roll. First day however was our "learn about KL day" so we had the day to walk around and see all the things the city has to offer. We saw The KLCC, which are the two huge towers with the bridge in the middle, for the 1 of you reading this who has seen the movie Entrapment with Sean Connery, the buildings they are trying to escape from are the towers of the KLCC.

We have been eating all kinds of different food since we arrived as will be pictured below by our wonderful food picture taker. We have been able to eat traditional KL food but due to the trifecta of Chinese, Indian, and native Malay, depending on who you talk to the traditional meal changes. We were able to eat twice in the Chinese open air market for breakfast which was amazing. The hope staff would go and order dishes and we just passed everything around so we were able to eat many different dishes.

On Tuesday, bad luck reared its ugly head and caused problems with our first big clinic day. We were going to be working with a doctor in the local HOPE clinic however the first doctor came down with a chest infection and was unable to make it. The backup doctor was then called, They, however, were out with a bad fever, The third doctor called at the last minute the night before called and had something come up and was thus unable to make it. We were still able to work for a half day doing blood pressure and blood sugar checks on regular patients and also learning how they do drug distribution in Malaysia. It was a good experience and it was great to meet the staff of the clinic who were all great people.

The next day we met up and went to see the UNHCR refugee program which is set up in Malaysia, it is not affiliated with HOPE but rather is part of the United Nations. It was still very interesting to see how people are processed and what is done for them before they are relocated to other countries. The majority of refugees are from Burma however there are other refugees from the middle east and other war torn countries. The UNHCR has its own free clinic only for refugees  and we were able to visit that but due to many different restrictions from the UN, students are not allowed to work there. That night was filled with more eating and the HOPE staff once again took us out to some of their favorite locations which were delicious.

Thursday was our next clinic day and it was great. We got to see patients from 10-5 and we were able to get some good hands on experience with how basic health care is given in free clinics in the third world. The doctor working with us that day was Russian trained and was very knowledgeable about the patient population. While many patients had the usual symptoms of Hypertension and Asthma, we were able to see a pretty serious oral allergic reaction, we were able to give 2 IM injections of pain medicine and for the Lolz we were able to do an ECG on our good friend Jared. That night at 11:30, we worked with a Scotsman who runs a charity/NGO based on getting people who are living on the streets, off the streets and into a functional job. He was a fascinating person and had a great pulse of the plight of the homeless in Malaysia. he had been working with them for 5 years and has an interesting way of working with them. While the base of his program is providing food, after he is able to build trust, he learns about each individual and what they used to do. He then uses his contacts in the city to try and get the individual employed in their old profession rather than in some job that has no relation to their skill sets. While we were out working with him we ran across an individual who was clearly in great pain. Upon further examination it became pretty obvious that his shoulder was dislocated and had been that way for 2 days when he fell on it. The program that the scottsman had set up also helps pay for medical bills of individuals if they are unable to pay and so this individual was taken to the hospital immediately.

The next day we were tired, We started the day at 6:00AM and headed down to Panang which is both the name of a state in Malaysia and the island it is located on. Here we were able to go to the local pediatrics charity clinic run by HOPE. They were not super busy that evening, only two patients came in, but we were able to talk with the doctor who was from Malaysia. He trained in the Czech Republic and came to Malaysia to do his Residency.

The next day we went to go work with some of the indigenous people of Malaysia, the kind of indigenous where you have to take an hour long boat ride on a boat that is probably older than I am and has been patched, badly. The path to get their is known only by the boat drivers as the water is the result of the building of a dam  and thus is just covering a forest that will shred the hull of our boat with one bad turn. We got out to the villages, there were two that we visited, and brought food as well as medical supplies and three doctors. We set up to see the kids first with the common problem of malnourishment, however some had scabies which was diagnosed and treated but will likely return and reinfect individuals. One of the women was very pale in her hands and feet, upon examination of her conjunctiva she was anemic. Her heart revealed a systolic murmur and she was informed to seek hospital assistance because she is either pregnant with her sixth child at 23, or there is a serious underlying disease and either way she should get checked out.

We spent a day exploring Penang, some went to a temple, I just wandered around, some just rested in the hotel to get over whatever illness was ailing them. We headed back to KL the next day and that is where our tale leaves us, as we prepare to hop over to Indonesia.