Swine Flu

It has become apparent that the average Malaysian person is paranoid of Swine Flu. I have seen many signs around KL and Kuching warning people of the dangers/symptoms of swine flu. In some department stores staff member’s temperature is measured daily to ensure they don’t have a fever and they wear stickers if they have a clean bill of health.

As a result of this paranoia, saying you are from Melbourne, Australia doesn’t make you heaps of friends. This is so much so that all students coming from Australia to study at Swinburne Uni in Sarawak were required to undergo a period of quarantine. It turns out that the quarantine wasn’t really as serious as expected – the rules being: “do what you want, just don’t come to campus.”

This was easy enough to obey, so during the “quarantine period” I was able to meet some other exchange students, familiarise myself with Kuching and see and taste some of the local sights.