Penang Island, Malaysia

March 21.22, 2009

The trip from Thailand ended in a dirty bus terminal in Georgetown Penang sitting underneath a large shopping mall. Penang is an island (although that is also the state name) which had been colonized by the British East India Company back when they were battling against the Dutch for the spice trade. It now has over a million people in the area.

At one time, it was kind of a mega-open port and trading centre for the whole area. Consequently, there were Arabs, Chinese, English, Indians (Tamils), Burmese, Japanese and even Armenians (I am really not sure how they got there) and many others that settled in the area along with the resident Malays.

Most of the population is about evenly divided between those with Chinese ancestry and those with Malay (or other local inhabitants). Since there are little similarity between Malay and Chinese languages many of the locals have learned some English as the common language and many of the signs and street names are in English. This does not mean that you can have a conversation with everyone but it does make it a lot easier to order beer and ask when the bus might be coming.

The old town, where we stayed, is a series of small narrow streets with crumbling buildings and street vendors like you see in Thailand. There wasn’t quite as much garbage however and it seemed cleaner. Remember that is cleaner on an Asian scale. If you are clean freak or abnormally concerned about germs it is best that you stay in your condo in Toronto or wherever. The buses ran regularly and you got the idea that everyone gets along – sort of.

My personal favourite thing were the open storm sewers on most the streets. They were about 18 inches across and 18 inches down. Just the thing when you are wandering around without a light or with too much alcohol in your system.

There were lots of old Colonial buildings and since the weather was balmy (34C) Lana and I did a walking tour of the old area including the local museum which was quite good for its size. With me leaving sweat puddles along the sidewalk, we breezed past a BMW safe driver course on the waterfront and then passed hundreds of closed shops since most Chinese shut down on Sunday. We did stop at a very cool Chinese clan compound.

In the old days, the Chinese and the Malays formed societies to help themselves. Eventually these became warring factions. The clan house is notable because it was used in the movie the King and I since they were prohibited from filming any of the movie in Thailand. The carvings and decorations in the main temple were extremely ornate and worth the visit.

By the way we were in the New Banana Guest House on Chulia Street and, if you like sweet things, there is a street vendor just up the road who makes a really tasty banana, sweet corn & coconut pancake thing. Five small ones wrapped in a banana leaf for 2 ringgit (about $0.60 CDN).

If you stay in the New Banana the rooms look new but it is noisy. They didn’t brick over the old windows or shutters but just put up office dividers so it is dark but you think you are right in the heart of the activity outside. Not bad if you want to keep track of what is happening on the street below. We had a private room with A/C but shared toilet & shower. Actually, it was a water closet with toilet along with a shower head and heated water unit attached to the wall. We wore our sandals while showering!