137. A defunct mob spawn rate at the terrace bar

09 Feb, 2024

"You know Kayla, when you're playing Pokemon and you go into the ocean, you expect all these water types right? What's wrong with your mob spawn rate? Why are you finding all these weird French guys? In Malaysia of all places?"

-- a comment from my game developer brother when I told him about my life lately

I have received a lot of nice comments about my previous escapades lately and I would like to thank everyone giving me such kind feedback. Glad you all are enjoying my stories as much as I like telling them.

We continue the story from the previous post and continue with the rest of the evening.

I was heading into Chinatown because my friends invited me out for a speakeasy-crawl (it's kind of like a pub crawl, but the atmosphere is less lively and more chill). Before I left my companion for the day, I messaged him quickly about the when and where of tonight's outing. I had no expectations if he would come or not. It really wasn't his scene at all, so I highly doubted that he would show up.

My fellow Filipino-American friend was waiting at a table with a Moscow Mule. I arrived just 10 minutes after he arrived at the bar. I was #2 out of the five people in our group. I ordered the same cocktail and we dove into conversation about our week. We went on and on about the decor, about friends, about the latest gossip in the city. It was very Sex and the City adjacent and I've been truly living several Samantha/Carrie moments in my life as of late.

After a couple of minutes, I took one look at the entrance and saw that our beautiful, modelesque friend was standing on the threshold of the bar doors. She hailed from Lyon, but her family background is from the Caribbean. The reason why she's here: she is a current barback volunteer of our Malaysian friend's bar. She's also just exploring around SE Asia for a little bit before returning back to Europe.

"I invited another French guy from my hostel. He might be bringing friends?" she said when we were sipping on our drinks together. I guess I get to practice more of my French this evening.

Our Malaysian friend and her German boyfriend/husband¹ arrived next. She runs a bar in the city center. She told me that she was hungover because she had a long night of karaoke with a couple of colleagues that she had to entertain. Karaoke is a really big ordeal in Asia.

Drank a lovely Moscow Mule right in this very bar

I told my friends that I had invited my date over to the bar and that I wasn't really expecting him to show up… until he actually did.

He wore the same clothes, but he seemed to have brought along a more eager and chipper attitude compared to our date at the botanical gardens. He told me that he was looking forward to talking to more people, local or otherwise. I was really glad to introduce him to more people so he can get more of a feel of the city. He was happy to chat with my other French friend. I think he’s just happy to speak in his mother tongue after thinking in English all day.

We were waiting for one more person and the other French guys, but we decided to transfer bars. We told the stragglers to join us later at the next location. After walking across the street and some blocks, we arrived at a very swanky, but hippie looking hostel. We had to climb 3 flights of spiral staircases. Although I appreciate the helical design, I fear that many drunk patrons didn't have a very good time descending after their nightcap.

Perched on top of the hostel is a cocktail parlor with a terrace that overlooks a small bit of Chinatown. It was packed with locals and international people. We all made our way to the terrace and sat at a tiny table on the fringe of the rooftop. Some of us couldn’t all fit in the table, so a couple of people in our group retreated back inside the lounge. Me, my fellow American friend, and the two french people in our group were the four that made it outside, enjoying the atmosphere and the cool outside air.

The thing about these swanky-looking cocktail lounges... they just love hanging things from the ceiling for some reason.

In the middle of the terrace, a group of young Australian women were sat around a table, accompanied by two good-looking, European Adonis’ (they were giants) who sat in between them. The girls were obviously giggling and chatting up these two guys, who sat beside them and teased them with their foreign accents. It was a marvelous cultural exchange.

“Oh! That’s my friend from Réunion and he brought his friend too!” my friend said beside me as we looked over at the big group of Australian girls.

The two guys in that group of Aussies immediately caught my friend’s eye, and made their way over to my entourage to greet us. Both of these gentlemen towered over everyone and it was quite intimidating, but they quickly broke the tension with their “mignons bisous” and flamboyant attitudes. My Malaysian friend whispered to me,

“Holy shit, who invited Jacob Elordi and Glen Powell?” Two very excellent face claims and descriptions of these dashing French guys. Although, I think I would mix Jacob Elordi with Jean Dujardin. The mix of these two handsome actors seems like a great doppelgänger concoction for the guy from Réunion.

The friend, on the other hand, is a bit more of a jokester. He told me that he is from "near Paris," but I asked "where, specifically?" I pulled out a map on my phone.

"Tours." he said, and I zoomed on his city.

"That's like 250km away from Paris."

My thinking is that most foreigners are not familiar with the geography of his home country. He was surprised that I understood some of the conversation he drilled out when he approached the two French people in our group. Although I couldn't make out the slang words he threw in (just to throw me off), my ears could keep up. He even played a "countries capitals" game with me. God, It's so difficult impressing French people².

After a while, I went inside to go fetch the waiter for our cocktail orders. I saw the non-French people in the group lounge around on the sofas with their drinks and chatting up a storm. The friend we've been waiting for finally arrives to the bar. He brought along the South African guy³ I have beef with. It hasn't even hit 9PM at this point.

We got a ragtag group of people. My friends that were sat on the couch were laughing a little bit. I asked what what so funny and they motioned over to the terrace. It looked like a cozy place to be. My date was talking to our lovely French-Caribbean friend and it looked like they vibed well. Aw man.

The night continued on. Some space opened up on the terrace, so my group migrated over to the outside sitting area. It was a tight fit, so I sat next to a couple of Australians. They were quite nice actually. They all flew north from the cosmopolitan coastal capital of Adelaide, South Australia.

Unfortunately, the Aussie girls had to leave right away, they were catching a flight to Indonesia in the morning. Before they all left, I noticed that they wanted a group photo. I became a short-term photographer for the evening. After the group photo with the women, I asked the two French Adonis' to jump in the photo with all of them. I chuckled when I heard them all giggled in sync. After snapping dozens of shots, I handed the phone back to one of the Australian girls and whispered in her ear, "I figured that you guys wanted a photo with the two European men... ya know, for the memories."

"Thank you so much, you're such a girls' girl."

Anything for the ladies.

The group decided to migrate over to a club. My date stepped one foot in, looked down, and then dipped. Before he ran out of the bar, he went over to me, bent over, and said:

"I don't want to be here anymore. See you, Kayla."

He just left. It was peak comedy.

--

The rest of my friends danced the night away at this bar. My group and I were gathered around the center of the room and ordered their drinks. Honestly, I've been pretty stressed lately. I just wanted to let loose and groove and watch people do their thing. I watched as the other patrons move to the rhythm of the music and noticed this vivacious American lady twerking on the "fun gays⁴" on the dance floor. I decided to join the crowd, and so did the two giant French guys.

The French guys were entertaining the gay guys on the dance floor. Every single person they encountered loved the attention. It was hilarious to watch this all unfold. I found out that the twerking dancing queen (before I usurped her throne on the dance floor, of course.) came from Atlanta, but she worked for many years in Finland. She moved to Malaysia to get a taste of the tropical life. She was very fun. She invited our whole group to go clubbing after the bar closed. I looked at the time- it was literally 2AM.

Baby, I can't do this no more.

As the bar was closing down, the music was fading away. The drunk customers were making their way slowly out the exit. I chatted a bit with the French Glen Powell and Jacob Elordi. They even took photos with the locals who loved it when they were talking to them. It was quite cute.

« Je sais pas... j'adore les gays. Ils sont drôles et mignons... mais ils pensent que je suis homosexuel.» ("I don't know... I love the gays. They are funny and cute, but they think I'm homosexual."). Whelp, we love an ally.

My friend group all decided to go to a mamak⁵ after the place closed. Funnily enough, the American lady who worked in Finland joined our group for some late night grub. We all ordered different dumpling and noodle dishes as we tried to keep our heads up to stay awake. It was a pretty eventful night out.

Note to self: Maybe let's not get involved with good-looking French guys anymore.

~ a pokemon trainer,

<3 K

🍄 https://exponixio.bearblog.dev/

Places I visited:

1. Junk Cafe @ Chinatown KL (124, Jalan Petaling, City Centre, 50000 Kuala Lumpur, Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur)

2. The Attic Bar (Third Floor, 15, Jalan Balai Polis, Kuala Lumpur City Centre, 50000 Kuala Lumpur, Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur)