Like a dehydrated hyena heading blindly for an oasis, I sprinted from one end of One Utama shopping mall to the other in anxious search of the one drink I had been craving for months: Vanilla Coke!

Yes, it is finally in Malaysia! Acting on a tip given to me by a very informative reader named Nurull, I rampaged myself into Jaya Jusco's supermarket and headed straight for the beverages section, never mind that I looked ridiculous as my feet automatically formed jigs of joy upon discovering the bottles, standing tall and proud on its table display! I had to get Vanilla Coke, and I had to get it now. In shamelessly large quantities.

And I did! (Reckon that's enough to last me two days?)

Malaysia is probably the last Southeast Asian country to actually sell this latest installment of Coca Cola flavor. Our neighbors in Singapore and Indonesia have already drunk themselves sick with the stuff (and are maybe yawning at my small sense of satisfaction). Even wackier, I actually got my first bottles of Vanilla Coke from a country I had never stepped foot on, South Africa (this is another bizarre story on its own)!

So here I was standing in the supermarket aisle, wanting to purchase Vanilla Coke in small bottles or aluminum cans, but all that was left were the large 1.5 liter bottles.

You see my philosophy when it comes to buying carbonated drinks is to go with the smaller bottles because I can never finish those 1.5L drinks at one go and usually end up recapping the bottle and storing it away. I'd have to be giant Hagrid from Harry Potter's wizarding world to be able to gulp a 1.5L beverage down at one go.

Moreover, I don't fancy leftover fizz. It's pathetic. I much prefer fresh fizz. So the small 500ml bottles or the 325ml cans are just perfect for a petite drinker such as myself. Small and full of fizz, it's a done deal, man.

Back at the supermarket: not wanting to pass this opportunity for a Vanilla Coke binge, I loaded my cart up with as much Vanilla Coke as I could afford. Afford? How expensive can Vanilla Coke be? Brace yourself:

RM5.60? Surely that isn't so pricey, you lament. Well, I think the next question you should be asking now is, how much does regular Coke with the same volume cost?

I'm glad you asked. Regular Coke (per 1.5L bottle) in Malaysia costs:

RM2.65! So we're essentially paying twice as much for Vanilla Coke than we are for regular Coke. (I think the Wah! logo in the RM5.60 price tag really implies "WAH!! Mahalnya!")

The next screaming question should be, why is there a 100% price markup for Vanilla Coke, or to put it in a more Malaysian way: Why lah so mahal??

A closer inspection of the Vanilla Coke bottle labeling revealed the reason.

Good heavens, it's imported Vanilla Coke! Aiyah! From Singapore, no less, so we're probably paying the equivalent of the Singaporean price! And would you look at that, Vanilla Coke was sold in Brunei too before Malaysia ever got a chance to even take a sample sip!

Prevailing injustice, dear Malaysians? Beyond a reasonable doubt, yes!

I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes as I placed the Vanilla Coke bottles into my shopping cart, feeling torn between not wanting to overspend and wanting to finally swim myself in my favorite American carbonated drink. Predictably, I eventually lost my financial rationality to my drinking Coke lust. I know. I'm vulnerable. Slap me.

Interestingly, my friend MK speculates that these limited imported stocks of Vanilla Coke are sort of thrown into the Malaysian market for a test run, to see how well received the drink is in Malaysia before it is actually produced locally, hence why we were importing the drink from Singapore.

Dear me, we must be really ulu (backward) such that Coca Cola doesn't think that our teh tarik Malaysian taste buds can actually comprehend the sophisticated flavor of Vanilla Coke.

Sarcasms aside, according to one reliable source, the distributor of Coca Cola in Malaysia claims that there were licensing issues in regards to distributing Vanilla Coke in the country, thus the reason why Vanilla Coke in Malaysia never made it into the stores as early as it did in other Asian countries.

Well, Malaysians, let's hope that Coke Malaysia irons out its issues, whatever they may be, and that Vanilla Coke gets manufactured locally soon before we overspend ourselves silly over this yummy gassy beverage and make our southern neighbor richer (they're rich already lah, no need help from us! Hehe.)

I'm already on my merry way to bankruptcy.

EXCLUSIVE! Cute Coke Cans!

As I finished writing this story, I received a most coincidental email from Tasia of Sarawak who is about to wrap her studies up in Purdue University, USA. She had snapped a picture while shopping at the supermarket and sent it dutifully to me. Her email read:

Hi there Fairy,

Aa ni Coke nye new packaging [in the USA]. Cute isn't it? I think it's a brilliant idea coz sometimes the normal size can can be too much.

[One can contains] 8 oz, or 227.3 ml (specific tu!) So far this little Coke is not for individual sale; it's 6 cans per pack for $1.98 [RM7.52]. We already have diet VCoke here. It's still new though.

The new extra small Coke cans are so comel (cute)! Perfect for people who like their beverages in small sips. I think this new packaging will do very well in the Asian market, especially among the ladies and kids. I just hope Malaysia won't be the last country to actually get this into the market.