Affordable Malaysia

How to eat, stay and play in Malaysia without breaking the bank.

Best for Culture: George Town

Established in 1786 as a tin port for the British East India Company, World Heritage-listed George Town is one of Asia’s best-preserved colonial towns.

Sleep
A former stables, Muntri Mews (doubles from 300 ringgits, or $94) is the latest venture from Australian hoteliers Karl Steinberg and Christopher Ong.
The charcoal-grey weatherboard building offers nine rooms and an airy street-side café serving local staples like nasi lemak in the heart of George Town’s heritage quarter.
The duo are currently putting the finishing touches on Noordin Mews (doubles from $66), a 16-room hotel on the outskirts of the heritage zone with a swimming pool and café decorated in what they call “Chinese Hollywood", the sexy art deco of 1930s Shanghai.

Play
Explore George Town with the Penang Heritage Trust (pht.org.my; tours from $57), who take small groups through Little India and to artisanal workshops.
Pick of the many museums is the brilliant blue Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion (cheongfatttzemansion.com), former home of shipping mogul Cheong Fatt Tze, built in the 1880s on principals of feng shui.
Chinese revolutionary Sun Yat-sen architected the fall of the Qing dynasty from a terrace house, now museum, at 120 Armenian Street (sunyatsenpenang.com).

Eat & Drink
Penang is renowned for its extraordinarily diverse local foods, like char kway teow (Hokkien-style fried noodles) and assam laksa (a sour mackerel soup that blends Chinese and Malay spices).
There are better food courts, but none that dish up location, atmosphere and cheap beer like Red Garden (20 Leith Street; redgarden-food.com).
For superb local Chinese cuisine, head to Tek Sen (18 Carnarvon Street; +60 12493 9424). The tamarind-based fish curry and salted fish bean sprouts are both excellent; the double-fried pork belly almost ethereal.
For lunch, French-born Mathieu Guegan at 42° La Boheme (42 Sri Bahari Street) bakes croissants and quiches that would stand up in Paris.

Best for the Beach: Langkawi

A cluster of 99 islands off Malaysia’s northwest coast, the languorous resort island of Langkawi is South East Asia’s only UNESCO-designated Bio Park.

Sleep
Set inside a quiet tropical garden overlooking Pantai Cenang, Langkawi’s main tourist strip, Sunset Beach Resort (+60 4955 6200; doubles from $60) has 28 clean and cosy rooms with private verandas or patios.
Offering a few more luxuries, the freshly renovated Four Points by Sheraton (+60 4955 6888; doubles from $108) sprawls onto a private beach at Kuala Muda.
The 214 spacious rooms each have plush beds, rain showers and bathtubs.
Other perks include Langkawi’s largest infinity pool – which spans a whopping 1680m2 – a kids’ pool, a fitness centre overlooking the sea and free Wi-Fi in public areas.

Play
German-run Blue Water Star Sailing (+60 13407 3166) offer cruises around the island’s south coast, stopping at uninhabited beaches en route.
The best pick for your wallet is the boozy Sunset Dinner Cruise on a traditional wooden schooner for $140 per person. Hire a car to explore the island’s forests, buy bags of tropical fruit straight from the farmers and spot hornbills.
Then, get your bearings over the island on the vertiginous Langkawi Cable Car (At Oriental Village, Burau Bay; adults $10) that flies to the 700m-high Sky Bridge suspended on top of Machinchang Mountain.

Eat & Drink
Pick your own fish at Orkid Ria (Lot 1225 Jalan Pantai Cenang; +60 4955 4128) and have them barbecue it over wood flames.
On Pantai Tengah, L’Osteria (Lot 2863 Jalan Pantai Tengah; +60 4955 2133) dishes up great thin-crust wood-fired pizzas. More upmarket, Nam at Bon Ton (+60 4955 6787; bontonresort.com) is set in a traditional Malay house. Order the Nyonya platter and feel good that the profits from the restaurant will go to support the resort’s cat and dog shelter.
Langkawi’s best Malay food is at Gulai House, an open-air restaurant set deep in the rainforest at the Datai Resort (+60 4959 2500; thedatai.com.my).

Best for Adventure: Kota Kinabalu

Home to the world’s oldest forests and three quarters of its marine ecology, Sabah’s languid capital, Kota Kinabalu, crows numerous escapades from its doorstep.

Sleep
In downtown Kota Kinabalu, Hotel Eden 54 (doubles from $37) has 23 small but stylish rooms in red and green; beware that the cheapest rooms don’t have windows.
A few notches up in class, the Jesselton Hotel (doubles from $65) was built after Japanese occupied forces bombed Kota Kinabalu in 1944. The rooms are a little dated, but the hotel has plenty of old-world charm.
For more facilities, including a pool, gym and room service, Le Meridien (doubles from $125) has 306 rooms and the reliability of an international chain; request an ocean-facing room for views.

Play
Nestled in the azure blue waters off Kota Kinabalu, Tunku Abdul National Park is a cluster of five islands with white sandy beaches and multi-coloured reefs.
Most islands have small shops renting snorkels, or organise a diving trip with Borneo Dream. In the other direction, the lush forests below Mount Kinabalu made it Malaysia’s first World Heritage treasure.
The park abounds with day walks, or for the energetic, a red-tape-rich two-day trek to the summit. See sabahtourism.com for more.

Eat & Drink
Locals from KK, as Kota Kinabalu is fondly known, rave about the Night Market, a bustling, sweltering sprawl of food stalls that prop themselves up outside Le Meridien Hotel each night.
The star of the show here is fresh seafood eaten the Filipino way: char-grilled over hot coals, then devoured by hand with rice, seaweed salad and a sweet chilli dipping sauce.

After youth-led protests in 2025, this year Nepal elected a 35-year-old former rapper as Prime Minister. In a country where tourism is its biggest industry, what’s next for travellers?

In 1986, Nepal changed its clock. It had used India Standard Time since 1920 so, to differentiate, it wound its clock 15 minutes ahead of, not behind, its big-brother neighbour. Boss move. “Nepal is strongly opposed to the idea that our identity is connected to India,” says Community Homestay Network (CHN) guide Bikal Khanal.

Tharu dance is traditionally set to hand drums. (Credit: Kate Lewis)

Today, Nepal is the only independent country with a 45-minute deviation to universal time; an oddity that’s become a symbol of national pride. The quirk is nearly as endearing as Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan airport where carved varnished wood and shiny red bricks rule. One sign points to a ‘Travelator’ and another to a ‘Grievance Handling Desk’ while visas are noisily stamped at customs for US dollars, cash only. When am I?

Spot the endemic Nepal gray langur. (Credit: Simon Urwin)

The 15 or 45 minute anomaly sees me tap out completely on timezone calculations. Why bend my brain calculating if it’s quarter to or quarter past elsewhere when I’m in the honking here and now of Kathmandu where the air is high-altitude crisp, the prayer flags flutter and the street dogs howl?

How tourism is changing in Nepal

Bardiya National Park is rich with wildlife. (Credit: Simon Urwin)

India is not the only association many Nepalis would like to shake. With eight of the world’s 10 tallest mountains, including Mount Everest and Annapurna, Nepal has long attracted mountaineers and trekkers, and expedition numbers are continuing to rise.

Tourism is one of the country’s biggest sources of foreign currency, so this growth is not negative, per se. But according to Ang Tshering Lama, who co-founded Phaplu Mountain Bike Club, being reduced to a mere trekking destination is limiting.

“Trekking is just one layer of our identity,” says Ang. “When it becomes the dominant narrative, it limits how we’re seen and how we see ourselves.” Nepal’s recent success, however, in diverting trekkers to less-trafficked areas such as Manaslu mofuntain, where visitor numbers rose by 117 per cent last year, offers hope that tourism can diversify even more radically.

Local men in Bhada village. (Credit: Simon Urwin)

The founder of CHN, Shiva Dhakal, wants that change. “The whole idea of the Community Homestay Network is to promote experiences outside of trekking,” he says. “Community tourism changes lives and helps kids stay home instead of coming to the city or migrating to the Middle East.”

Ang grew up seeing people leave, “not because they wanted to but because there weren’t enough opportunities to stay”, he states. Yet from remote villages to living traditions; food, art, music and emerging subcultures, “there’s so much that’s not being seen.”

CHN is opening some of those doors. It doesn’t own, or fund, any homes. Rather, it promotes homestays to travellers on a single, slick platform, while fostering entrepreneurship in places where women, marginalised castes, Indigenous people and the youth stand to benefit the most.

A new generation demanding more

Dalla Town Hall, where volunteers discuss anti-poaching tactics. (Credit: Bheem Thapa)

The future prospects of next-gen Nepalis can no longer be ignored. On a Kathmandu tour with 33-year-old guide Monica K.C, we pass buildings torched in the September 2025 ‘Gen Z protests’, including the Supreme Court and Parliament House. Seventy-two people died. “They were anti-corruption protests,” says Monica. “Politicians’ children are living a lavish life but the airports are crowded with youngsters leaving to find work.”

We stop in ‘little Tibet’ at the wondrous sixth-century Boudha Stupa. “The wheel of life is Buddhism in a nutshell,” says Monica. “Things such as hate, ignorance and anger keep you rotating around the wheel, so you must follow the principles of Buddhism to detach. If you can’t, there’s no nirvana for you.”

Boudha Stupa's prayer wheels — Boudha Stupa’s prayer wheels are used to recite Buddhist prayers. (Credit: Kate Lewis)

In a sun-drenched twist to the usual temple visit, we ascend the stupa’s sloping plinth and roam its whitewashed dome. Tendrils of diaphanous prayer flags stream from a steeple-like structure where the Buddha’s unblinking eyes stare out. No nirvana for you…

bouda stupa prayer flags — Tibetan-style prayer flags embellish the whitewashed dome of Bouda Stupa, a Buddhist temple. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)

The dome is delightfully free of guard rails or chiding from security. There is, however, a stern ‘No TikTok’ sign, perhaps in response to the youth’s newly flexed power. The booted-out Prime Minister, K.P. Sharma Oli, was replaced in a resounding election victory in March by 35-year-old Balendra Shah of the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) – a former rapper and mayor of Kathmandu. The RSP’s manifesto indicates tourism is a priority, and that Nepal’s cultural identity in areas such as gastronomy will be strengthened.

Boudha Stupa vendors — Vibrant souvenir shops and cafes around Boudha Stupa. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)

A more confronting stop awaits at Pashupatinath Temple. Today is Bala Chaturdashi, a Hindu festival where thousands of devotees gather to honour their dead ancestors. Vendors hauling foam mattresses do a lucrative trade as people set up for a night of vigil. This includes burning the bodies of recently deceased relatives on bamboo pyres in the Bagmati River, which flows into the sacred Ganges.

A woman at annual Hindu festival Bala Chaturdashi, in Kathmandu. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)

Wrapped in a shroud, the bodies are positioned with their heads facing north to the Himalayas where Lord Shiva resides. They’re covered with flowers and straw and set alight by male family members.

Hours later, the ashes are swept into the river where devotees will take a holy dip the next day. As much as Monica assures us it’s not voyeuristic to watch, I struggle to do so. “Here you see the reality of life because everyone ends up there,” she says, gesturing to the river.

Life unfiltered in the Terai region

tharu woman — Tharu woman and master weaver Parbati Chaudhary in Bhada Village. (Credit: Bheem Thapa)

The reality of life needs processing time, which the western Terai region delivers in spades. The Terai is largely separated from India by the Karnali River and Bardiya National Park, where elephants, rhinos and the elusive Bengal tiger roam.

Once a nomadic tribe, the Indigenous Tharu people are now the largest ethnic group here. “They didn’t know their daily life was interesting for international travellers but they’re starting to understand now,” says CHN founder Shiva.

Take a Jeep safari through Bardiya National Park. (Credit: Bheem Thapa)

We fly Buddha Air to Dhangadhi airport and drive five hours to stay in Tharu homes. The journey to Bhada village is a blur of roadside fruit stalls, traffic-stopping sacred cows and fields sown with wheat, rice, mustard, spinach, cauliflower and potatoes. Nepal’s agriculture feeds only Nepal.

Marigolds are an important part of Hindu rituals. (Credit: Simon Urwin)

“The only thing we export is young people,” says our guide Bikal. As the light dims and we plunge evermore rural, mysterious mounds of compacted hay – some house-sized – loom like the creatures from Where The Wild Things Are. Even our trusty driver gets flummoxed by a dirt road that abruptly ends and we find ourselves hurtling across a paddock.

On arrival, some are ferried to mud-walled cottages greened by gourd creepers, with thatched roofs and rustic-chic mosquito nets. Myself and two others are ushered to the home of corner store owner, mechanic and mushroom farmer Man Kumar Chilaruwa and his wife Rajkumari.

community homestay entrance — A warm welcome at a community homestay. (Credit: Simon Urwin)

They escort us to a bunker-esque back building with steel doors and a folding security gate, behind which is gleaming linoleum, dolphin-printed tiles and a shower cavity that must be gingerly stepped through to reach the toilet.

The ceiling lights emit a rainbow of colours (the bathroom light gets stuck in, frankly, a quite frightening red). We’re nevertheless touched that our hosts invested in all this bling when the average salary is around $275 a month.

In the coming days, we participate in Tharu traditions such as making moonshine, dancing, weaving straw handicrafts and gold-panning. We’re fed well with staples of rice, mustard greens, lentil pancakes, daal, curried chicken and tomato chutney served on antibacterial saal leaves.

food at community homestay — Dig in. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)

Sonara community homestay president Indradevi Tharu tells us river snails are often served, and the boiled and pickled flesh of rats hunted in the rice fields. “Perhaps next time?” we say and all have a laugh.

The power of community homestays

community homestay owners in Nepal — Barda community homestay owners Parbati Chaudhary and Ram Krishni Devi Chaudhary. (Credit: Simon Urwin)

Immersing Western visitors in foreign cultural practices is not new. But with the Tharu, I never get that uneasy sensation that I’m being performed for. Despite being the only tourists, there’s no ‘othering’; just warm, composed and ultra-dignified welcomes. Like we’ve always been here.

“I love to have travellers in my village so I can see the world,” says local woman Parbati Chaudhary. “Why would I travel the world when the world comes to me?”

The graceful acceptance the Tharu offer, as well as the slow pace, works miracles on my frazzled nervous system. One day I even take a nap on a vacant homestay bed.

Sonara community room — An authentic stay in the Sonara community. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)

Roosters strut and goats bray as we sit on the ground in al fresco kitchens, rolling rice flour into cylinders steamed to make dhikri (dumplings). When water is needed, we fetch it using a hand-operated pump as a family of ducks strolls by, side-eying us like curious neighbours.

Animal lovers will delight in Tharu villages. Kind and resourceful inventions are everywhere, such as snacking stations where two posts lean together, with leafy boughs dangling on rope for baby goats to forage from.

CHN’s CEO, Aayusha Prasain, nods knowingly when one in our group says she cried when she left her host, Shayam Chaudhary, in Bhada. Shayam’s 17-year-old son, Prashant, had translated, which deepened the connection.

“Community tourism turns travel into a relationship, not a transaction,” says Aayusha. “It places decision-making power in the hands of local communities, especially women and youth.” Since 2018, CHN has hosted more than 4000 travellers from 52 countries in 408 households, and estimates women’s participation has increased by 381 per cent.

In the Bardiya community, where vexing human-animal conflict has been a balancing act for decades due to elephants raiding crops, long-time homestay operator Salik Ram Chaudhary says young people keep the older ones on their toes.

“We can’t keep homestays stagnant,” he says. “We have to upgrade our service and redefine our product or young people won’t see it as an attractive business. If we can keep evolving with this travelling trend we’re confident the youths will stay and continue it.”

Back in Kathmandu, Monica explains that after the deaths of young protestors in September, a determination had spread to not let their sacrifice be in vain. “We want to keep holding the government accountable,” she says. “We don’t know what situation we’re facing, but we’re ready to face it.”

Interested in Nepal but prefer to experience it in total comfort? Read our guide to luxury travel in Nepal.

Best for Culture: George Town

Best for the Beach: Langkawi

Best for Adventure: Kota Kinabalu

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These community homestays are changing how travellers experience Nepal

After youth-led protests in 2025, this year Nepal elected a 35-year-old former rapper as Prime Minister. In a country where tourism is its biggest industry, what’s next for travellers?

How tourism is changing in Nepal

A new generation demanding more

Life unfiltered in the Terai region

The power of community homestays

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