The pool at seven in the morning

Not every attractive building in Malaysia is a hundred years old. A lot of people who stay live in condominiums: a gate, a lift, a pool the brochure oversells. At midday that pool is a bright, empty rectangle. At seven in the morning it is the social club. Laps, a conversation in the shallow end, someone walking the path in a hat.

This is lifestyle in the practical sense. The apartment may be plain. The shared garden, if the maintenance fee is actually spent, gives you air and water and neighbors without a club membership. Older walk-ups lack the pool and cost less. A condo adds the fee and the desk and, on a good morning, a kind of grace.

Look at the pool when you inspect a unit, and then look at it at the hour you would use it. A beautiful deck at noon tells you nothing. A shaded one at dawn, with people who live there, tells you whether the building is a community or a photograph in a listing. Ask what the fee was last year. The tiles do not pay for themselves.