On the surface moderate Malaysia is a rapidly developing and increasingly rich South-East Asian country. Kuala Lumpur is bristling with skyscrapers and city-life and Malaysian are spending. At the same time Malaysia is a Muslim country with a government-endorsed positive discrimination of Malaysian with Indian and Chinese roots. According to friends one can go to a night-club in Kuala Lumpur and see the Chinese getting drunk on whiskey on one side of the club and the Muslim Malays drinking fruit-juice on the other side. Muslim caught drinking alcohol still can receive corporal punishment and strict rules about inter-sex contact exist.
I met an American who has lived for a longtime in Penang. He was even married to a Muslim Malay and became Muslim himself (otherwise he could not marry her). After a decade and a half of marriage he got divorced and started dating a Christian woman. One evening when they sat together at home eating pizza the police raided his house and he got arrested for meeting extramarital a non-Muslim woman. He got dragged before court and threatened with two years imprisonment but eventually got out on bail.
For example should I be dating a Muslim Malaysian girl and we would be found together in the same room at close proximity and alone, she as a Muslim but not me could be arrested and acquitted for extramarital close proximity with a non-Muslim.
Also Laos has a law against extra-marital close contact between women and men. Read more here: http://easteatswest.typepad.com/east_eats_west/2005/12/ladies_make_you.html
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