Doing the In-Out, In-Out through Malaysia

Malaysia is a country that I have visited often, not only in transit (with Air Asia), but also out of interest for the many cultural heritage sites and natural wonders it has to offer. I have been to Penang, Kuala Lumpur, Johot Bahru, Melaka, Kuching, Labuan, and Kota Kinabalu. Because of all these trips, I have been able to amass a collection of different immigration endorsements from many different entry points in Malaysia over the past few years. From my many visits, I have come to learn that Malaysian immigration has some quirks to it, especially when traveling to and from Sarawak in East Malaysia as well as traveling by train from Singapore.

I am very proud of this collection an present it here in chronological order.


This was the first Malaysian immigration that I have ever received and it is in my third US passport (I am now on the fourth one). What is cool about this one is that the checkpoint "Johor Bahru" no longer exists as it was replaced by the new Sultan Iskandar Checkpoint in December of 2008. More information on this new checkpoint from this Wikipedia page. Fortunately, I also have a clear chop from the new checkpoint, which I received during my trip to Melaka a few days ago.

From what I remember of the old checkpoint, I can say that this new one is a MAJOR improvement. The old one was small, a bit dirty, and not air-conditioned and the immigration counters and facilities were not impressive. Some of them used computer monitors which looked like they were from the early 90s, and I wouldn't be surprised if they were.

The new one is huge, air-conditioned, and the largest checkpoint of its kind in Malaysia. It is very impressive and is comparable to the one found on the Singapore side of the causeway - if not better! I guess Malaysia is leveling up and showing the world (most especially Singapore, I suspect) that it can meet first-world, international standards and that it is indeed capable of providing modern, high-tech services and facilities. I am not sure how it is in other government offices, but certainly this and all the other checkpoints I have gone through are impressive and world-class.
What is cool about these two immigration stamps is that they weren't planned. It's just that I had some time to kill and so I decided that I might go to the Woodlands checkpoint and have my passport stamped for my collection of passport chops. It's great that this spur-of-the-moment decision to make the short "visa run" gave me the opportunity to have an entry stamp that reads "Johor Bahru," especially considering that the next time I entered Malaysia was by train and they do not apply any stamps when you clear immigration there.

Some more information on this strange arrangement, from Wikipedia:

Since 1992, KTM has worked with Singapore on re-aligning its railway tracks at Woodlands when Singapore built a new immigration checkpoint there to replace the old checkpoint, and with new facilities to carry out train passengers' immigration clearance at the point of entry into Singapore rather than at Tanjong Pagar. In 1993, Malaysia responded that it would transfer its CIQ operations to the new Woodlands checkpoint.

However, in June 1997, Malaysia stated that the Malaysia-Singapore Points of Agreement of 1990 would come into effect only after it decided to relocate Tanjong Pagar station. Malaysia also informed Singapore that it had changed its mind and decided not to co-locate its CIQ with Singapore's at Woodlands Train Checkpoint (WTCP) but to remain at Tanjong Pagar. In April 1998, Singapore informed Malaysia that it would be moving its CIQ operations to Woodlands while Malaysia would have to move its CIQ out of Singapore from 1 August 1998. Malaysia requested, instead, that space be made available at the WTCP, as an interim arrangement, for Malaysian Immigration officials to operate from there and thereby overcome the problem of sequence of exit and entry stampings by Singapore and Malaysia immigration authorities.

According to a press release from the Ministry of Home Affairs of Singapore dated 24 July 1998:

• Singapore will allow Malaysian customs officials to operate at Tanjong Pagar railway station. Singapore officials will be present at Tanjong Pagar railway station to lend their authority to Malaysian customs officials during the interim period.
• Singapore has agreed to Malaysia's request to allow Malaysian Immigration to put some desks for its immigration officers on the passenger platform at WTCP to clear passengers after Singapore has cleared them for exit from Singapore. Singapore Immigration must clear departing passengers for exit from Singapore before Malaysian Immigration clears them for entry into Malaysia. Otherwise, the sequence of immigration clearance will be illogical and it will cause problems in crime investigation and prosecution. These interim arrangements will overcome the problems which would be caused if Malaysian Immigration were to remain in Tanjong Pagar railway station.

However, Malaysia refused to have its immigration clearance on the passenger platform: they insisted that Malaysian Immigration should be inside the building at WTCP. If this was not possible, they said that Malaysian Immigration would remain at Tanjong Pagar. Singapore argued that Malaysia's decision to locate its Immigration Control Post in Singapore is not in compliance with Malaysia's own law. Under Malaysian law, it is Johor Bahru railway station, not Tanjong Pagar, that is gazetted as an Immigration Control Post for persons travelling by train from Singapore to Malaysia. Singapore also pointed out that this was confirmed by the endorsement on the passports of passengers boarding the train at Tanjong Pagar, which showed:

"MALAYSIA IMMIGRATION
JOHOR BAHRU
SOCIAL/BUSINESS VISIT PASS
Reg. 11. Imm. Regs 63
[Date]"
Permitted to enter and remain in West Malaysia and Sabah for one month from the date shown above"

On 1 August 1998, Singaporean Immigration ceased operations in Tanjong Pagar and moved to WTCP while Malaysian Immigration continued operating in Tanjong Pagar. Malaysia decided not to endorse the passports of outgoing rail passengers from Singapore and promised to provide legal arguments to show that Malaysia's CIQ has the legal right to stay at Tanjong Pagar.

The immigration clearance procedure which resulted from the impasse, and which is currently being practised until railway and CIQ operations cease by 1 July 2011, is:

• Towards Singapore, Malaysian immigration officers carry out immigration clearance on board the train at Johor Bahru railway station. After clearing immigration, the train crosses the causeway and stops at WTCP, where all passengers must proceed to Singapore Customs and Immigration. Therefore, travellers entering Singapore by rail are following the correct order of immigration clearance, that is, exit granted by Malaysian Immigration in Johor and entry granted by Singapore Immigration in Woodlands. After clearing immigration at Woodlands, passengers may disembark or continue their journey to Tanjong Pagar by train.
• Towards Malaysia, passengers must board the train at Tanjong Pagar and clear Malaysian Customs and Immigration before boarding. The train travels about 30 minutes to WTCP and stops for another 30 minutes to allow sufficient time for passengers to clear Singapore Immigration. In this case, passengers are granted entry into Malaysia before clearing Singapore Immigration, which is contrary to international practice. To circumvent this problem, Malaysian immigration officers do not stamp on passengers' passports.

In early 2007, news of a Singaporean woman being jailed for failing to have her passport stamped when entering Malaysia threw the spotlight on the unusual clearance procedures when travelling by train. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs reminded Singaporeans that their passports will not be stamped when departing for Malaysia by train, but will instead obtain a stamp on the disembarkation card, which must be retained until departure from Malaysia. The entry records are also entered into a computer system. Even then, this arrangement continued to present problems for some commuters.

Above is my departure endorsement at Kuala Lumpur airport at the end of the trip. The immigration officer penned in Malay "Masuk melalui KTM [Keretapi Tanah Melayu, tr. Malaysian Railways] Tg. [Tanjong] Pagar pd [pada] 24/5/07," which means "Entered through KTM Tanjong Pagar on 24/5/07." Perhaps the Malaysian immigration officers are used to this or have been made aware of this because we were not asked any questions as to why we had no entry stamps. But it was really cool having our entry information handwritten, like in old times.

This is the first of many entry stamps I would receive at the Kuala Lumpur LCCT (Low Cost Carrier Terminal). It was applied while I was in transit to Cambodia. If you are familiar with the new US passports, then you would see that this is on a passport different from the ones above. Notice that the checkpoint code is a "B." I believe that the endorsements at the Kuala Lumpur airport (the nice, big one) have a code of "A." I hope to one day also have an endorsement with a nice "A" on it.


Here is another sample of a Kuala Lumpur airport "B" departure stamp.This stamp applied at the Penang airport is found on my first Philippine passport, and it is quite interesting because there is a handwritten annotation that reads "Less Than 6 Month [sic]." This is because that passport was to expire in March of 2011 and usually immigration authorities do not let you enter if your passport is valid for less than six months. Fortunately, as I was just in transit to Macau, the rather rotund immigration lady let me through and simply wrote in the annotation above after consulting the immigration officer next to her in the same booth. The strange thing is that I cleared immigration at the same airport not more than a week earlier and there was absolutely no problem, and that time I was not in transit - I was actually there to spend 3 nights in Penang! Also notice that Philippine passport holders are granted only 30 days on social visit while US (and most other Western) passport holders are granted 90 days.

The reason why I decided to use my Philippine passport was because my exit stamps from Macau was in that passport as my residence permit to Macau was in that passport as well. I wanted to have Penang airport stamps in my two passports and since I was going on a short trip to Singapore from Penang, I would have to clear Malaysian immigration again en route to Macau. So I thought that it would be great because I could just switch passports from Singapore to Penang. That didn't happen because I had to leave my US passport in Penang for Thai visa processing, which is a better deal since (1) I get a free Thai visa, (2) I got the special 6-month annotation, and (3) because the Philippine passport has not messy-looking background images, the Penang stamps I have are very clear.

Here is my first entry stamp from the Kota Kinabalu International Airport. On this trip, I cleared immigration at this airport twice (I went to Brunei and returned to this airport before returning to the Philippines), and twice were the chops unclear and very light, so much so that they might fade just like the chop I received in Niagara Falls in 2004. I suppose that the "S/V" written at the top stands for "Social Visit." Also, the date was written in hand in the space below, unlike inmost other chops which have 30 or 90 days already written on them.


Here is a sample of a Kota Kinabalu airport exit stamp.


This was applied while I was on another "visa run" (just because I wanted an endorsement from a different checkpoint), this time from the Tedungan checkpoint in Sarawk, which is on the Brunei-Malaysia border. Notice how this one reads "Permitted to enter and remain in Sarawak/Malaysia" while the previous ones all read "Permitted to enter and remain in West Malaysia and Sabah." More on that later.

Also interesting about this chop is that it grants a stay of only 30 days (although I was in and out of Malaysia in less than 30 minutes). This is probably because the lady at the immigration checkpoint expected only to receive ASEAN passports at her checkpoint. This is because I noticed that many of the pedestrians who cross this border are actually workers in Brunei who want to extend their stay in Brunei by clearing immigration again and receiving another 30-day permit for Brunei (or maybe they are required to exit Brunei every once in a while even if they have legitimate papers?). At any rate, perhaps the lady was too tired to bring out the 90-day chop and so she just used this one.

It was also surprising that we were no longer required to fill in an entry form. It was convenient at the time, but in retrospect, I think it was not a very good idea as exiting Malaysia might have been made difficult if we did not have the departure card. Then again, perhaps the lady could feel that we would exit from the same port and the officer on the other side could just walk over to her and consult her personally about the matter, should a problem arise.

No problems came up and we were given an exit stamp from Tedungan with no questions asked.

This immigration endorsement is from Kuching international airport, in the Malaysian state of Sarawak. It wouldn't be strange for me to have this stamp had I flown in from another country, but I was actually flying in from the neighboring Malaysian state of Sabah (these two states are located in the north of Borneo, which is known as East Malaysia or Malaysian Borneo. This is why some guidebooks sometimes specify "Peninsular Malaysia" when referring to the Western half of Malaysia.)

Kuching and Sabah are peculiar in that, when it comes to immigration matters, they have their own policies as though they were different countries from Malaysia! Even Malaysian coming in from West Malaysia and Sabah have to go through a checkpoint so that they could enter!

Here is some information from Wikipedia:

Residency in the states of Sabah and Sarawak are distinct from the other 11 states. While Sabah and Sarawak each has autonomy in immigration affairs (which includes imposing immigration restrictions on Peninsular Malaysia residents), residents of Sabah and Sarawak are exempted from the immigration controls of their own states. A Malaysian citizen born to a Sabah or Sarawak resident would have Sabah or Sarawak residency, regardless of where the person was born. Birth in Sabah or Sarawak alone does not make a person a resident unless one of his/her parents is a resident. A person may become a Sabah or Sarawak resident by obtaining Permanent Residence (PR) status issued by the respective state immigration departments. The residency status of a person is indicated by a letter on his/her MyKad below the photo, with, "H" for Sabahans, "K" for Sarawakians and none for Peninsular Malaysians.

Above is the immigration endorsement I received when I land in Kota Kinabalu airport (Sabah) on a flight from Kuching airport (Sarawak), which are both in Malaysia.

Here is another Tedungan entry stamp, this time on a Philippine passport (my second one) and with the correct stay permit of 30 days.

The immigration endorsement above is very interesting an unique in the sense that it is a "transfer endorsement" to transfer my exit stamp from my Philippine passport to my US one. This is because I wanted to get a Brunei stamp on my Philippine passport, so I decided to do what I usually do and switch passports while crossing borders. Malaysian immigration, from experience, is rather lax when it comes to switching passports and I have done it a number of times.

But Brunei immigration is not as lenient. I exited Brunei with my US passport and then entered Sarawak, Malaysia, on my Philippine passport so that I could show my immigration exit stamps from Malaysia to the Brunei officers and make them less suspicious. The immigration officer on the Malaysian side was a bit iffy to let me in on my Philippine passport at first, but I convinced him by telling him I had switched passports before and after checking with his superiors, he endorsed my Philippine passport. He was actually very friendly and accommodating, not really the serious type. I even noticed when I passed through that he was playing Warcraft on his computer!

Exiting was no problem either. But when I got back to the Brunei side, they asked why there were no previous Brunei endorsements on my Philippine passport when there were Tedungan endorsements. I tried explaining that I wanted to enter with my Philippine passport, but a senior-looking officer said that they did not allow people to enter Brunei on different passports. I wonder if this was just a twist of fate and if I would have cleared immigration in Brunei had the senior officer not been there.

At any rate, I was made to walk back to the Tedungan side to ask them to transfer my Malaysian exit stamp to my US passport. Thankfully, the Warcraft officer was good-natured and did not mind my disturbing him with my strange requests. He brought me into a back room where his superiors were and consulted them about my situation. The superiors seemed to be having lunch or some snack as it was about noon at that time. Perhaps they really did not care too much or maybe my US passport kept them from flaming up in fury that I was bothering them with strange situations, but the superiors seemed to just wave it off and instructed the Warcraft guy to escort me to the rotund (and jolly-looking) exit officer (there are about five immigration counters, but only one immigration official on both the entry and exit sides).

Fortunately, both were good-natured and the rotund and jolly exit officer did not hesitate to cross out my exit stamp and write "VOID" over it and then stamp my US passport and write "Transfer endosement [sic] from Philipino [sic] passport (XX0000000)." It's cool to have these special endorsements as they have cool stories behind them.

This is my entry stamp from the Sultan Abu Bakar checkpoint, a "new"checkpoint opened in 1998 to ease traffic on the Woodlands causeway by attracting private vehicles with its smoother and faster procedures. More information on this can be found here. I was completely unaware before my trip to Melaka just a few days ago and the fact that our bus went through this checkpoint was a pleasant surprise as it gave me the opportunity to add a new checkpoint stamp to both my Malaysia and Singapore "collections."


This last stamp from Malaysia (at least for now) was also a pleasant surprise as I was expecting to cross the border again at Sultan Abu Bakar and Tuas, but the bus driver for some reason instead chose to go through the old Johor Bahru-Woodlands causeway. Because of that, I now have a stamp from the "new" Johor Bahru checkpoint opened in 2008.

What a coincidence that the first and last stamps on this post are from Johor Bahru!