Post 12: My home

Hello! Russell Kong here. I am here to talk about my small country Malaysia and Town Tawau. If you guys are wondering why my old post about my visit to Charis International School, the post was deleted because we have infringed their privacy. Sorry for any inconvenience caused.

The Malaysian Flag. The 14 stripes mean the 14 states of the country

My country Malaysia is located in South East Asia. It is very near to the equator so expect hot and wet weather all year round. We are relatively small and not very powerful in terms of economy and militarily. Our country has two areas: West Malaysia and East Malaysia. West Malaysia is basically peninsula in the Malacca Straits while East Malaysia is Borneo, a part of it. West Malaysia was founded a long time ago by Malay people. They build villages but during the exploration era the Malacca Empire merge those villages into one big civilization/country. East Malaysia however remained out from the world until the british people saw it and controlled the area. On August 31^st 1957, West Malaysia declared independence as Malaya and a few years later called Malaysia after it merged with East Malaysia.

This is the Sabah State Flag. That Mountain you see there is actually Mt. Kinabalu.

I live in Tawau, a small town located in the south eastern corner of Sabah. Sabah is actually called North Borneo before it joined Malaya into Malaysia. In East Malaysia, there are two states. One is Sarawak and the other one is Sabah. Sabah now is still primitive compared to the big states of the US. Most of the land is still wild and untouched by humans. That is why the air and water of the area is not really polluted. The name Sabah actually comes from a type of banana that is only found in the state. It makes really good “Pisang Goreng” or fried banana in English. Tawau’s town is fairly small but the Tawau district is pretty big. In Tawau District there are a few small towns such as Semporna and Lahad Datu. Most of Tawau are actually palm oil plantations. Because of that many people in Tawau are quite rich. Tawau has no attractions apart from the tallest tree in the world which is located in Taman Bukit Tawau or Tawau Hill Park in English. That tree has attracted a small number of tourists but in my opinion I think that shopping is much better that going into rainforests. Talking about shopping, Tawau has only 1 shopping centre. The rest are all normal shops. Although Tawau is not a very big city, I still like it because of the fresh air and free life that I get to live here.

The top of Mt. Kinabalu

If you do have a chance to come to Sabah, you definitely won’t miss out the iconic Mt. Kinabalu. It is the highest mountain in South East Asia at 4km+. I haven’t been there before but my dad says it is awesome on hiking a mountain so high. Other than that, you will mostly go to Kota Kinabalu then if you finished hiking the mountain. Kota Kinabalu ( or KK in short ) is the capital of Sabah. Before it merged with Malaya it was called Jesselton. During the early days when merged with Malaya KK was called api-api. Only lately the name has been changed to Kota Kinabalu. KK is a moderately sized city but not as big as Kuala Lumpur which is the capital of our country. KK has some attractions like the famous Mt. Kinabalu ( Which I mentioned earlier ).

Alright folks that’s it for now. I hope you enjoy my post and if you do help me to spread the word by sharing my blog on Facebook or any other social media website. Once again I apologize for the delete of the visit to Charis International School and I hope to see you guys again.