Potential Move

Its always toughest for a wife as they have to start from scratch and find and create a home and a social life for the family. However, living abroad is also an adventure and opens many new doors, opportunities, experiences and impressions. Life with children is a bit different in Malaysia as traditionally families will have a maid who will help in the home and look after the children. Many families have either a live in maid or one who comes in the daytime and lives elsewhere. This extra pair of hands can be very helpful and allow the parents some free-time to socialise. The maids get together and entertain the children. If you live in a condominium, you will have access to a swimming pool and kids just adore playing in the water and learning to swim. There are many women's clubs dotted around KL and the suburbs and any nationality can go to them i.e. the American Womens Club is not just for Americans. I am sure your family will settle in as you will automatically have contact with other families through your work. Although it can be daunting to leave family and friends behind and everything familiar, there is much to look forward to.  It will take about 6 or 7 months to settle down and this period will have its difficulties. Safety is talked about a lot these days, and I know other families that have worried about it before arriving. The atmopshere is quite different when you get here and settle into an expat area. The worst challenge in KL will probably be driving.

I appreciate the information. Can you recommend a couple of expat communities that will provide a family friendly setting? Thank you for the feedback.

Much will depend on your workplace location and whether you like suburban or city life. An often cited expat family friendly community is Mont Kiara. Personally the high rises are too close together, you need a car to get around and the traffic is not very friendly.  The rentals can be high.

Another area that is expat friendly is Beverly Heights, which I think has a shuttle bus to the city (need to check this out), but again own transportation is required.

Living on the LRT Gombak to Kelana Jaya line is convenient as it connects a lot of places e.g. Twin Towers and Suria Mall/Park in the city and Sentral station/Mall. However, living somewhere near Ampang Park Station is probably preferable. There are some new units just built close by and some slightly older ones. From this area some of the popular Ampang facilities are accessible and of course the city centre.

http://www.malaxi.com/map_transit.html

I have some teacher friends who choose to live in the city / Bukit Bintang and commute to their workplace as they enjoy the city buzz and life.

Bangsar, Damansara and Hartamas, One Utama are other areas often chosen by expats.

It all depends where you will be working. But all international schools tend to have an interational community living reasonably close by.