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Posts from the ‘Malaysia’ Category

Mar 25

Colours of Penang

Penang is a must-see city if you’re ever in Malaysia.

When I was applying for university many many (MANY) years ago, I opted for Universiti Sains Malaysia as my first and second choice because it’s located in Penang, about 4 hours drive away – the furthest I had ever lived in my life at that point in time. It turned out to be one of the best decisions of my life. Not only did I made some really meaningful friendships, I also spent much of the wonderful 3 years exploring the island’s food prints.

Upon graduation, I still visit the city every now and then, to catch up with friends as well as to continue to pamper my palate. Penang is best known for its street food but in recent years, the island city has become somewhat a yuppie place with many boutique hotels and unique cafes popping up. This is partly thanks to Georgetown becoming a UNESCO World Heritage Area back in 2008, which led to many conservation and rehabilitation projects that helped to preserve the uniqueness of the city.

I must say, Georgetown is more appealing now than in my uni days, albeit the worse traffic jams.

One of the key attractions is the the wall murals by Lithuanian artist Ernest Zacharevic, which are scattered in the centre of Georgetown – read his interview here.

Boy on bike - one of the most photographed walls murals in Georgetown's UNESCO World Heritage area.

Boy on bike – one of the most photographed walls murals in Georgetown’s UNESCO World Heritage area.

This lego mural was apparently transferred from Johor after it was banned the painting because it reflected too much of reality. Go figure.

This lego mural was apparently transferred from Johor after it was banned because it reflected too much of reality. Go figure.

Within the UNESCO World Heritage area, there are many colourful colonial buildings. Some of them are still being occupied by residents who have lived here for generations. Others have been converted into guesthouses, or museums, or cafes.

This batik painting museum has red wooden windows.

This batik painting museum has red wooden windows.

 

Colonial buildings serving as shops.

Colonial buildings serving as shops/homes.

In this latest visit, I checked out one of the boutique cafes recommended by a Penangite friend. Ete Cafe is apparently opened by a Taiwanese couple who was once trained in France. The place turned out to be almost a hole in the wall kind of cafe – not easily visible unless you really look out for it. They serve syphon coffee as well as French pastries. The slice of gateau that we had was good but it didn’t come cheap (for Penang prices anyway) as it’s RM15 per slice.

Our slice came with a small macaroon on top.

Our slice came with a small macaroon on top.

Colourful options available @ Ete Cafe

Colourful options available @ Ete Cafe.

Now for street food, I was pleasantly surprise to find a super yummy wanton mee @ Love Lane in the evening. This plate of delicious noodle had pork lards, and as we all know, pork fat makes the world go round 🙂

Best wanton mee I've had in a while. Found at the evening stall at Love Lane.

Best wanton mee I’ve had in a while. Found at the evening stall at Love Lane.

When in Penang, one of the must-try street food is char kuey teow (CKT). It’s stir fry flat rice noodles with chili, prawns, Chinese sausage, bean sprouts and cockerels. Locals are particular about their plate of CKT – it must taste good and not expensive. The expensive and famous stalls are usually patronised by tourists or out-of-town fellas like me and my friend. We went to the stall at Lorong Selamat, which has been featured in various newspapers and food blogs. The kopitiam (local word for coffee shop) only has 1 stall, which is the CKT stall and that’s not common since kopitiams usually offer more than 1 option. This means this 1 stall alone makes enough profits every month to pay for rent. Not surprising since a plate of CKT cost RM8 here – extremely expensive! Fortunately, it lived up to its reputation as one of the best CKTs in town (or at least to our taste buds).

Char kuey teow at the famous stall at Lorong Selamat

Char kuey teow at the famous stall at Lorong Selamat.

To accompany our plate of char kuey teow, we also ordered a plate of lobak from a nearby kopitiam.

To accompany our plate of char kuey teow, we also ordered a plate of lobak from a nearby kopitiam.

Penang is no longer as cheap as it used to be. Prices for accommodations and food have gone up, like the rest of this country. Here’s the expenses for 2 persons for 3D/2Ns.

Accommodations (guesthouse, twin sharing with shared bathroom, excluding breakfast) = RM168/night

Petrol and toll = RM220

F&B = RM150

Apr 7

1 Comment

Blue Eyes goes to Melaka

We haven’t blogged much about Malaysia despite the fact it’s the longest blue eyes has stayed at one place during this trip. We haven’t done much, to be honest, except to repaint the walls of my living room. It’s blue eyes’ second time to Malaysia (he was last here in 2007) but it is also perhaps the country that he explored the least. Partly also due to the fact that I don’t have a car to move about and public transport in Malaysia sucks (!!)

Anyway, in his last week in Malaysia, we decided to head down to Melaka, the most historical city in the country (it was the first place that the Portuguese and Dutch landed before they occupied Malaya centuries ago). Getting to Melaka was a bit of a challenge. On normal circumstances, I’d have driven down and it would have taken about 2-hour drive. This time, since I didn’t have a car (I sold it before going RTW) we took the inter-city bus instead.

I’ve never taken public transport to Melaka before. I had to check online to locate the bus terminal. It sounded easy to reach the terminal as it’s connected via LRT and Komuter but it turned out to be a frustrating affair. For one thing, Komuter has lousy frequency. We bought the tickets only to find out that the next train was in 40 minutes (!!) so we aborted the plan and took cab instead.

Upon arriving at Melaka Sentral (the bus terminal of Melaka), we took the local bus to the city centre and had a calm walk to Jonker Street to have lunch – expensive plates of chicken rice balls (apparently I was wrong to think it’s expensive, as I was told that chicken rice in KL is around RM6-RM7 these days …) that cost a total of RM13.70. I’m not particularly a fan of chicken rice balls but it is a kind of novelty if one has never tried it before.

Blue eyes having chic rice balls

We had cendol for dessert and spent the rest of the afternoon walking around Jonker Street, admiring the old buildings and taking it really easy. We stumbled upon a shoe shop that sells shoes for bound feet (an old Chinese tradition that is no longer in practice) and blue eyes got interested and started chatting with the owner. After some 30 minutes later, we walked out of the shop with a pair of bound feet shoes, blue eyes’ souvenir from Malaysia 🙂 We took a break after that and sat down for beer at Geographer Cafe.

Blue eyes suggested that we check out the ruins of A Famosa Fortress, which was close to  St Paul’s church. I don’t remember having visited St Paul’s church and was surprised by the nice view on top of the hill. The weather was super warm and humid but fortunately the skies were blue so the pictures turned out quite nicely.

Blue eyes @ St Paul's Church

To get back to the bus terminal, we had to take the cab instead of local bus since I didn’t know where the local bus stops for the opposite route. Taxis in Melaka don’t use metre and the driver charged us RM15 despite me trying to bargain for a better price 🙁 Oh well, the perils of being car-less; you’re at the mercy of taxi drivers! We took the 6.30pm back to KL and upon reaching the bus terminal, again we had to take the cab, and this time round, we had to buy coupon first before getting into the taxi and the taxi company servicing the terminal charged a whopping 30% extra from the terminal to my place. What a rip off! But hey, like the locals always say, Malaysia boleh!

But to look on the bright side, we did have a nice day in Melaka and it was a trip worth making. Don’t believe us, check out the pix 😀

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