Nate and Kara Buchanan vlog as they explore Little India in Kuala Lumpur, arriving by subway and finding a local Indian restaurant where they eat a multi-item meal served on a banana leaf. The video documents the experience of eating with hands (staff instructs them to use right hand), the banana-leaf custom (fold leaf to signal finished), washing hands before/after eating, and trying iced chai. They reflect on authenticity, hospitality of local restaurant staff, small cost of the meal (around $5.80), and plan to return to Chinatown later due to rain.
Questions this video answers
About $5.80 (Nate says: "$8 $5.80").
Chapters
Here's been traveling too long. She's eating noodles and beans and other things for breakfast.
Well, we spent some time at the pool this morning. Just came back to the lounge to grab a cup of coffee. And now we're going to explore little India in Chinatown.
Lots of eating.
We should bring this with us.
I literally feel like I'm in star wars.
That's, like, my favorite thing I've ever recorded on this camera.
We're at Central Station.
According to that, our subway ride took us further. I don't even know which direction we should be facing.
It's going well. We are going to try to go out the other side of the train station. Following that guy. There's an exit. This looks Chinatown. Yeah.
I think this is supposed to be a little Indian.
Oh, looks little Indian.
Dusty. This is for you and peanut butter friends.
Carrot's gonna beat on the vitality gong for Roaring Hill.
The louder you beat, the more healthier you'll be.
We think we found Little India. We're not exactly sure. There's no sign to specifically say it, but I think quite a few Indian people and food that looks Indian. We are going to have Indian food that comes on banana leaf leaves. I think I saw some Anthony Bourdain with that.
As long as I get, like, four pieces of naan, I'll be happy. That's like the little India we saw in Singapore.
Looks very authentic.
We found the restaurant. We didn't take into consideration that it's 2:15. Didn't really look like anybody was eating. So now we're trying to decide what we're doing. Kara, thoughts?
I might need to eat.
Here we go. Bismol.
Oh, dang it.
Thank you.
Okay.
I'm saying there's, like, a 95% chance you're getting sick.
Oh, gosh n. Don't say that.
See how much you wash.
How much do you eat?
Thank you. And eat. Sure.
What's that? Wash. Ah, thank you. Okay.
Just with your right hand.
Sure.
Okay, so eat with. Eat the rice. Do we dip the rice in this, or do you just eat this?
Okay, what are we eating?
All right, so once again, we're eating with our hands at a local Indian place. We have some rice with some kind of spicy curry on top. No idea what this is, but it's some kind of veggie.
And it's really good. These are also some kind of, like, pickled veggie, maybe with some carrots. These are potatoes. And then we have these ch. So they're made out of rice flour and they are delicious. And then a plate of chicken, chicken curry, some soup.
And what of this did we order?
We didn't order any of this. He came in and he just started putting things on our link. I don't know if that's the norm. We've decided that places like this that don't speak good English kind of take control. When Americans come in and they just tell you what to get and they.
Just give it to you.
We had no say in this.
I would say it's gone well so far.
It's gone very well. I'm thankful that they do it.
Did you not enjoy it?
Now, after finishing your lunch, what you do when you fold the leave.
This.
Way, then fold it towards it if you are finished. Just like the British, they put a spoon upside down. So in Indian style, the leaf, they put it the same is.
I learned that this is the proper way to say you're done with your meal. When you're eating off a banana plate.
Just fold it over.
There's no napkins. You can't put your napkin on the plate, so you just fold it. Go wash your hands.
Before and after you eat Indian food, you wash your hands. Kara is back there at the sink washing hers now getting the curry off him. So eating with your hands isn't as unsanitary as it seems.
Thank you very much. Yum. This is like our fourth time eating Indian food. And every time, everyone is always drinking tea.
That looks like we thought it was coffee.
Yeah. So we decided to try it. It's chai tea with ice.
Tastes like very sweet chai tea with milk. And that sip was extremely hot, which I did not expect. Astrologers down the bottom of the gut.
It is super milky.
Yeah. I think that's like whole milk.
You think you've eaten chicken.
Wow.
We have really hit the jackpot on choosing Indian restaurants on this trip.
Every time we've gone in, like, a local restaurant, they've always taken the time to, like, help us figure out how to eat it and walk us through exactly what we needed to do. So it's just, like, made it such a better experience. Yeah.
The people of definitely made it. I loved that guy.
And the banana leafs, those were super cool. And it's just cool to think about, like, how that came about. Like, that was like, the original paper plate. Somebody decided that either they didn't have plates or it was easier to throw a banana leaf away than it was to wash dishes. Yeah.
Who wants to wash dishes when you can eat off a leaf?
But you know it goes about 24 hours and we don't get sick. It was just a lot of, like, raw vegetables and water on the banana leaves. I don't think, like, the place we ate was unsanitary. Just like for our American stomachs. We'll see.
I feel like our stomachs are becoming more and more international every day, though.
We've really international stomachs. We're gonna rename our vlog. I forgot. And I haven't even told Carrie yet.
Guess how much that meal cost.
Oh, gosh.
$8 $5.80.
One chai te. Starbucks is that much.
Here's a superstar. Notice this off YouTube. Totally kidding. No clue who this person is.
I love that. So fun.
Do you have any idea what just happened?
Those ladies walked by and asked for a picture. So why not?
That is not the first time that we've gotten stopped to have our pictures taken with people.
Is it white people?
American beauty.
I'm sure that's what it is.
It's raining.
Stuck shopping area.
But that thing is very bad. This chair might break a street. Fuck. Decided not to go to Chinatown for two reasons. One, we're full.
And we like to eat when we go places like that.
And two, it's raining. And so we're gonna go back to the hotel and save Chinatown for tomorrow. So we can eat.
Little bit traffic this afternoon.
Oh.
What'S up, guys? Probably be eating you in a few minutes. Quit eating out of the dumpster. That's probably not healthy for us. As usual, I spilled some on my pants.
That's not how much I spilled. That was an attempt to get the curry out of my khakis.
Guess which hand I ate with.
Days.
It's all in my fingernails. Furry fingers. Aw, the bye bye cats. I got yelled at last time I videoed these. It's a creative little coin. Just a quick stomp and. Dang Wang. I found a new phrase I'm gonna start using whenever things go wrong. Inspired by this subway stop. Dang wangy. I stomped my toe. Oh, dang Wangy. We went the wrong way. Dang wangy. Carrie, you can't buy that. What do you.
