...Sky's the Limit

At work, I completed the SRI rating for my second company and made corrections to the first one. The second company’s ratings were a lot faster because it wasn’t particularly sustainable. I repeatedly selected “no information disclosed.” The ability to know enough to be critical made me feel like an actual analyst.

A new intern from Germany started today. I was part ashamed, part excited to share so much in common with the other Westerner. He follows the NBA (a Mavericks fan for obvious reasons) and watches a lot of other US television. He also partakes in the nightlife, since he’d been in KL for a month already. The advise that he offered was not to have high expectations, because I won’t go out and see anything that I couldn’t in the US.

Exiting the KLCC LRT station, I was at the foot of the Petronas Towers. I stopped worrying about who’d scowl at me in my touristy excitement. I whipped out my Blackberry and started taking photos.

Nicholas was almost right right in his assessment of night life—almost. I met up with Caroline and Eva (from our program) and some of their friends. Luckily I arrived late to their RM90 (US$30) per person dinner. That’s 9x the price of the average meal I’ve had for the entire week! There’s a difference between being cheap and doing what makes logical sense. Led by Eva’s Malaysian friend (who was presumably rich, judging by his car and taste), we went to Skybar at Traders Hotel. Imagine the most sleek, contemporary-designed bar you’ve ever been to. Add an indoor pool with floating, glowing, neon balloons. Cap it off with an overwhelmingly ethereal view of the Petronas Towers and other buildings, visible from every window. In person, they appeared digitally illustrated.

Our group’s conversations ranged from Katrina, East Timor, Asian bigotry, and rap music with people from Hong Kong, Spain, Costa Rica, Malaysia, and the US. The Malaysian let it slip that he preferred not to sunbathe (tan) with Eva and the Spanish girls for fear of getting “as dark as him,” pointing to me. In a joking voice, I nudged him and mumbled something to the effect of “Don’t we all wish we were white.” My delivery was casual enough for him to know that I wasn't angry, but reminded him that his standards of ugliness are either Eurocentric or elitist. An acquaintance of mine, who is a marketing professional at L’Oreal, explained that Eastern favor to light skin is not always/necessarily an obsession with looking white. Traditionally, darker skin was associated with peasantry and manual labor. If you were wealthy enough not to have to work in the fields, your skin would indicate it. The guy was pretty ashamed, but I laughed and told him that I was just picking on him.

At midnight on the dot, the blinding Petronas Towers’ lights were shut off (they do it at midnight to save energy and money). I paid for my RM 27 (US$9) beer, and split a RM 40 (US$13.33) taxi back home with Caroline. Today, I obviously went over budget. At the same time, when I considered the US dollar amounts, my stomach stopped hurting as much.