The Magnificent Merdeka

Today is yet another day to marvel at some amazing design and engineering. We plan to go to another mall, which looks not too far from us, but we are also going to take in the magnificent Merdeka 118 Tower, which is another iconic building in Kuala Lumpur.

One thing about Kuala Lumpur is that, unlike Bangkok, it is sometimes much more difficult to get from one side of the road to another. There are some overhead road crossing points, which usually involve stairs, and they are sometimes a bit grotty and neglected-looking or have people sleeping or begging on them. Some of the road crossovers also have elevators to get up and down the crossover level, but I honestly would not trust these, as they don’t look like they are serviced or well looked after (the smell of pee can also be detected from these). So, sometimes you end up thinking you can get from A to B quite easily, but you can’t, and you need to walk a bit further on to find a crossing point and then double back. It’s such a shame that more thought has not gone into how people get in and out of these places. Also in Bangkok, you can often use the BTS or MRT walkways to get from one side to another, but you cannot do that here.

We planned to go to the mall first and then afterwards visit the Merdeka building. However, we could not easily get across to the mall, which was on the other side of a very busy dual carriageway type of road. As a result, we ended up getting a little frustrated with the lack of access and dead ends we encountered as we tried in vain to get to the big mall that we could easily see, but could not reach. In the end, we could see that there was a crossover a bit away and headed towards that. This crossover led us closer to the Merdeka building, so we decided to go see the building first and then go to the mall on our way back.

Another strange coincidence was that a few years ago, I watched a documentary film about a couple (they were Russian, I think), who illegally climb these types of buildings as a challenge! Well, I didn’t realise at the time I watched the film that I would one day be standing right in front of this actual building. If you don’t mind heights and can bear to watch people doing scary things, then I would recommend you watch the film. I did ‘enjoy’ it, even though it scared the bejesus out of me at times because I thought they were absolutely nuts! It’s called Skywalkers: A Love Story and was available on Netflix (and is probably available via other places too). See the trailer here:

After walking around the Merdeka building area for a short time, we made our way back the way we had come and crossed over to the other side of the dual carriageway, to access the Lalaport Shopping Mall.

Lalaport Shopping Mall

The Mitsui Shopping Park LaLaport Bukit Bintang City Centre, also known as LaLaport Bukit Bintang City Centre and LaLaport BBCC, is a Japanese lifestyle shopping mall located within Bukit Bintang City Centre. LaLaport is famous for offering a unique Japanese-inspired lifestyle and shopping experience, known for its modern, aesthetically pleasing architecture, abundant natural light, and integration of Japanese brands (like Nitori, Nojima) with local favourites, especially in its flagship Kuala Lumpur location (LaLaport BBCC), which features rooftop gardens, unique food courts (Depachika Marche), and vibrant public spaces like WOW Plaza. It's a destination for both serious shoppers seeking new brands and casual visitors looking for Instagrammable spots and diverse dining.

We really enjoyed this mall. Once again, it is a huge mall with lots of sections on each floor. However, it is very clean, spacious and really nicely designed. We spent hours wandering around in here, looking at the various stores and interesting features. They have the fancy Japanese toilets too!

Today's route:

Day 53: 16 January 2026

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Merdeka 118

The Merdeka 118 building is an iconic skyscraper in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, becoming the second tallest building in the world (after the Burj Khalifa) and the tallest in Southeast Asia, with a height of 678.9 meters and 118 floors, featuring a unique diamond and spire design, and housing Grade-A offices, a luxury hotel (Park Hyatt), an observation deck, and the 118 Mall shopping mall, symbolizing Malaysia's progress and heritage. It was officially opened in January 2024 and is expected to be fully completed in 2026.

"Merdeka" means freedom or independence in Malay, and "118" refers to 118 floors of the building, reflecting the outstretched hand gesture of Malaysia's first Prime Minister during the declaration of independence in 1957.

We thought there would be some areas that we would be able to see, as there is supposed to be a mall in here, too. However, we soon discovered that the building is not yet fully completed, and the mall is expected to open in late 2026. That said, it is an amazing-looking building. We also noted that there were some suspended window cleaners on ropes cleaning the windows when we were there. I think R’s legs were turning to jelly just looking at them!  It's hard to see the scale properly when up close to the building, but I'm sure you get the idea.

For our food, we went to a Chinese restaurant on the lower ground floor, which was very busy with people, and we had some delicious food there. They are on Grab, so I can even see us ordering from them directly to the apartment complex! The place itself wasn’t very fancy, but the staff were brilliant, and they had a robot doing deliveries too!

After having some food, we wandered around for a bit more before we headed home with our purchased goodies. We did laugh on the way home when we noticed that the Malaysian Police signs appeared to have a bit of Scottish in them… (i.e. 'Polis')

Later in the evening, we went up to the rooftop areas to see what the views were like from there, and they were pretty cool. Though we have almost as good a view from our balcony (though we cannot see the Merdeka from here as it’s behind us).