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Published: March 14th 2010
The Butterworth Ferry
Allegedly the oldest in Asia. Not sure about that its been around since to 1920s and is very nice to look at.After the ritual slamming of Thailand in my last entry I feel I should iterate that we went there at the wrong point of our trip and didn't plan our travels there particularly well. Would that we would have headed up North and got a bit more of a feel of the character of the place. It should also be noted that this was the first place we saw sharks and it will thus always have a very special place in our hearts. Anyway, I have resolved to write no more blog entries whilst hungover from taking a dram too many of the local 'whiskey' (a loose term that many of the countries we've visited seem to adopt for various brown liquids of high alcoholic volume). As of writing this, I'm mainlining The Orb ('Outlands') and Eno ('On Land') and feel happy and well adjusted. On to our trip, then...
We decided to get to Malaysia via train as the countries are next to each other and the plane was stupidly costly for such a short distance. The train took 24 hours but was clean and the journey was on the whole pleasant. We had to suffer with a very
depressing Australian lady (around 65 years old, at a guess) who was extremely negative. According to her she gets followed around by Indians oin Malaysia, Thai people are all stupid, one minute Cameron Hieghts was nice (more about that in a mo) the next minute it was dreadfully boring... all this negative feeling and she's travelling around Thailand and Malaysia for four months of every year! It really did take it out of us by the end. Imagine, with my obsession with going to Wales, all I did was moan about it? Deary me... Anyway, we opted for Georgetown as our first Malaysian destination which meant getting the train to a place called Butterworth and then getting the (aparently famous) Butterworth Ferry across to Georgetown itself which lies on the island of Penang. The ferry has been around since the 20s and is, apparently, the oldest ferry in SE Asia. This I find hard to beleive but they are grand old vessels and very pleasing to the eye (see pic).
If Thailand was really, really, REALLY hot then Malaysia went that little bit further. It was sweltering in Georgetown but we did our best to explore what is a
Georgetown
Can't remember what this building is for... truly remarkable city. It serves as a microcosmic display of the various cultures, religions and races that make up the population of Malaysia. Georgetown's origins stem from 1786 when a trader called Captain Francis Light (excellent name, you'll agree) obtained Penang Island from the Sultan of Kedah. In return for this, Captain Light promised the sultan that the East Indian company (the corperate face of the British Empire in India) would protect the Sultan from his enemies. Georgetown was founded, named after the chap on the throne at the time, and a duty free port was set up. Subsequently everyone turned up, trading like nutters and engraining themselves in to a truly multicultrual city. There are Hindu temples, Mosques, Churches, Bhuddist temples and a healthy smattering of big buildings of British architecture, all within (hot and sweaty) walking distance from each other. The, sadly crumbling, architecture of many of the shoop and house fronts also adds a hearty sense of history and the bustle that has gone on over the centries. Alas! We didn't get round to seeing some of the sights on Penang island (such as the vehicular railway up to the top of Penang Hill - should have
Georgetown
...looks nice though. seen that for my Dad's sake if not mine) but we did thoroughly enjoy our stay there. I think the pictures speak for themselves. It has, any many occasion, been described as Malaysia's living museum but there's also a really good museum in Georgetown on top of the one that's living. Ponder on that!
Buffetted by the temperature, sweat in our eyes blinding our vision, we groped around in a few tour operator shops and arranged a minibus to take us the cooling climes of the Cameron Highlands. I can't help but smile when I think of the sensation of the slight nip in the air that we felt during our first night there. It did us the world of good. We relaxed in the cool for a couple of days, wondering around taking photos and eating rotis, dahl and rice and put of exploring until we felt ready. We decided to check out the tea plantations, in part due to our own curiosity but mainly because of my mother's obsessive fondness with cups of tea. We were instantly glad we did. After being plonked down by the bus, we walked around 4km to the centre. It was a
Town Hall
Georgetown fantastic walk, nice and easy, with plenty of shade and stunning views of the tea covered hills. The temperature was like a hot summer's day in England. Once we got to the plantation, we had a pot of the local blend of black tea - very nice - and took a tour of the factory. All very pleasent. After returning to the point the bus left us, we went to a butterfly farm. Quite what posessed us, as animal loving vegans, to do so, I'm not sure. We found that they had lots of different reptiles, insects and amphibians in pretty small enlosures. It was a bit miserable and we felt bad that we'd paid to get in. The butterfly section was better but still an enclosure so not great. Still, I took lots of pictures of the butterflies as I felt they were still worth celebrating.
After that, we decided to head to a nearby temple called Sam Poh. The temple is Buddhist and is often referred to as The Temple of 10,000 Buddhas due to the thousands of painted tiles, bearing the Buddha's image, that cover the walls. There are also some of the biggest statues in
Town Hall
Georgetown Malaysia. It was a pleasure to visit and very nice to look at although the temple at the big Buddha in Lantau, Hong Kong, was grander and more richly decorated.
And so concluded our visit to Cameron Highlands. Reluctantly, we boarded a bus for Kuala Lumpur, complete with ridiculous humidity levels and unnecessary amounts of heat. We stayed in KL for a few days. The heat really hampered us so we didn't do mad amounts of sight seeing other than a wonder over to the Twin Towers one night. We did meet up with friends from home, on their way back to the UK after a year in Oz. Joe and I used to be firm friends throughout secondary (and slightly beyond) but had a typically teenage falling out and drifted apart. Nowadays, there's no real bad blood between us, just distance. This was the first time we'd met up independently of anyone (i.e. other than when we've both been in the pub with everyone else) and it was understandably a little strange. It was good fun though, Joe's girlfriend, Emma, is a lovely girl and Oriel and her enjoyed discussing the various trials and issues which surround taking
City Hall
Georgetown boyfriends on travelling trips whilst Joe and I went on beer runs and discussed DJing etc.
The food in KL was good. We had roti, rice and dahl for breakfast most mornings at a big Indian cafeteria, next door to our guesthouse. We also ate at the mighty Blue Boy Vegetarian Centre. This is another cafeteria effort but with small stalls around the edges selling everything from burgers to noodle soups to various stand alone fake meat dishes (like Peking Duck). We ate lots of interesting fake meat experimentation in there, all of them slightly unnerving (fake duck skin is very lifelike) but very tasty nonetheless.
Sated with KL, we arranged transit to the Perhentian Islands on the East coast of Malaysia. We were told that it was beautiful and blissfully relaxing. For reasons best known to myself (in charge of booking again - when will Oriel learn!) we took a nightmarish 12 hour train journey overnight, in seats (not a sleeper carriage). Our seats were at the very front of the carriage so we had the wall of the carriage directly in front of us which presented problems with foot space (or, rather, a lack of problem
Town Hall
Complete with wedding awnings etc! seeing as there was a total lack of foot space). We were also sat next to the carriage door which everyone seemed to heartily walking through but not closing. To top it all off, there were a group of youths chain smoking between carriages all night which also made things unpleasant. Thankfully, the reports of the islands were correct and after a relatively painless taxi journey to the jetty in order to catch an invigorating speed boat, we found ourselves in a beach paradise.
We stayed in a nice resort, in a relatively new and very clean hut on stilts. The toilets and showers were communal but kept fastidiously clean. Much to my elation and surprise, we found that monitor lizards were also residents on the island and a fair few could be found near our resort. Monitors grow well over 2m long and are relatives of the Komodo Dragon. Unlike the Komodo, Monitors don't eat children and tend to shy away from humans. We found a rubbish tip near one of the resorts were they liked to hang out as Monitors are carrion eaters. They were are charming and surreal addition to our stay on Perhentian and I
A church
Shame about the nasty building in the background. feel real privileged to have seen them. I know that my best friend, Christian, will be jealous that I have seen them as he's always had a fondness of lizards in general.
We whiled away our week snorkelling (nice but not heart stopping. Saw the small blue spotted ray on one occasion and Oriel spotted a young moray eel), we went on a dive although the visibility was shocking and I had a mare with pretty much all of my equipment, and the rest of the time we just sat around reading and taking small wonders around the island. There is a quieter beach front about ten minutes from Long Beach where we were staying and we had some fantastic rice, roti and dahl there one afternoon. The island we chose to stay on was one of the first to be developed for tourism. It was done so specifically with backpackers in mind and the island has clung to this ethos. As a result it was a very relaxed, happy place to spend our time. Down points were the cost of drinks (2 quid for a small can of beer, about a fiver for small bottles of spirits). This
Georgetown Museum
One of the best museums I've been to! did, however, force us to continue with our detox so we didn't mind so much.
We are now back in Kuala Lumpur having travelled back from the Perhentians (by coach this time and only taking 9 hours. And not over night). We really enjoyed our stay in Malaysia. The mixture of cultures has created a truly remarkable country. The whole place is extremely photogenic, as you can see plus there is more of an abundance of wildlife on land. The monitors were are real highlight for me as was the roti, rice and dahl.
Next stop will be Dumaguete, Philippines, staying at Harolds (sic) Mansion. Harold has advised us that he has prepared some 'world class' dives for us in the surrounding area. Thus we prepare ourselves, yet again, to be enveloped in Pinoy Pride.
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Julian Hawkins
non-member comment
Tea time?
That's enough photogrpahs of tea! Ed