According to The Star Online, the career beggar from Germany was spotted on Jalan Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka in Kuala Lumpur this week.
The intrepid 32-year-old has presumably returned from his holiday in Vietnam, for which he was reported to have headed on March 15.
Adrian Lai, 28, told The Star Online that he had seen Holst asking for money from motorists who had stopped at a traffic light.
“He was walking from car to car with a paper cup, begging. People were winding down their car windows and generously donating to him,” Lai said of his encounter with Holst around noon yesterday.
“Drivers were even gesturing for him to come over so they could give him money.”
It must be such generosity that has time and again drawn Holst back to Malaysia, where he has been sighted at trendy spots like Bukit Bintang in KL and the tourist attractions of Penang.
Holst and his swollen leg is a familiar figure in cities all over Asia, to which he has travelled to beg. His Facebook page is filled with photos and accounts of three years’ worth of exploits in luxury hotels, bars and with prostitutes in Hong Kong, the Philippines, Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia.
Lai said he believed Malaysians showed him largesse because they sympathised with his disability and were unaware that he was leading the high life with their money.
Holst suffers from a rare form of localised gigantism that causes severe swelling of his left leg.
In September 2014, he ran into trouble with Thai authorities when pictures of him having a grand old time in a Pattaya bar went viral after concerned Thais had raised 50,000 baht (RM6,300) for the poor “disabled tourist whose money and passport had been stolen”.
He was deported from the country, an experience that has been repeated in Cambodia and Indonesia.
Malaysian police are reported to be “looking into” the case of Holst. Because panhandling is a minor offence here, his deportation would not be automatic, but at the discretion of the Immigration director-general, if he is caught and found guilty.
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