Malaysia Travel Guide

Malaysia is a country in South-East Asia, located partly on a peninsula of the Asian mainland and partly on the northern third of the island of Borneo.

West Malaysia shares a border with Thailand, is connected by a causeway and a bridge to the island state of Singapore, and has coastlines on the South China Sea and the Straits... (more)

West Malaysia shares a border with Thailand, is connected by a causeway and a bridge to the island state of Singapore, and has coastlines on the South China Sea and the Straits of Malacca. East Malaysia shares borders with Brunei and Indonesia.

Malaysia is a mix of the modern world and a developing nation. With its investment in the high technology industries and moderate oil wealth, it has become a rich nation in South-East Asia. Malaysia, for most visitors, presents a happy mix: there is high-tech infrastructure and things generally work well and more or less on schedule, but prices remain more reasonable than, say, Singapore.

Before the rise of the European colonial powers, the Malay peninsula and the Malay archipelago were home to empires such as the Srivijaya, the Majapahit and the Melaka Sultanate. The Srivijaya and Majapahit empires saw the spread of Hinduism to the region, and to this day, despite being nominally Muslim, many Hindu legends and traditions survive in tradtional Malay culture. Mass conversion to Islam only occured after the arrival of Arab traders during the Melaka Sultanate.

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