Penang Malaysia

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I woke up at 4:50 only 5 minutes before the carriage guide started to wake everyone up. “Butterworth, Butterworth” he yelled out. I drew Jacinta’s curtains back as she was sitting on the other top bunk from me. She didn’t sleep very well and looked terrible. We managed to gather everything ready for the stop. We waited for the train to stop as was ready to make a quick exit. The train had been stoping letting off and picking up passengers all night so we were ready for the quick exit. As soon as the train stopped we jumped off in a hurry, I scanned our dark surroundings and realised all our effort were a waste of time anyway as the train was at the end of the line, Oh well better to be safe than sorry.
It was just after 5:00 and it would be a good 1 ½ before first light so we hung around the train station for a bit longer as we really didn’t have any idea where we were going. Jacinta couldn’t keep her eyes open as was no managing the early wakeup call very well.
I managed to grab enough info to find out the ferry is only 5min walk so we got our packs on again and walked off into the darkness. We found the ferry and it only cost us 1rm for both of us or 15c each Aus. I could see in the short distance Penang’s lights and it looked like Singapore. 15min later we were on Penang and I could just see the first wisp of light starting the new day. As we walked down the peer we meet up with some backpackers from the UK, Jim and Ross. They said to catch the free hop on hop off bus that takes you around the main area which is George Town. We all hoped off at the same area and got to know them a little better. Ross went off to find hotels while Jim stayed back, meanwhile Jacinta was trying to steal free Wi-Fi again and I was trying to study a tourist map that we had just got from a tour operator. We said goodbye to Jim and Ross and wanted to have a look around for accommodation close to everything. I had the crappy tourist map, and I got crappy directions on our location at the time, I looked for north as best I could in the morning and we started walking, 100m up the road no street signs, 300m up the road street signs but no nothing familiar on the map. 1km up the road and still nothing familiar on the map. I was getting very frustrated with these tourist maps with no scale and no reference to small side streets only major roads that were a considerable walking distance apart. I asked directions from a security guard and he pointed directly where we were on the map. It indicated we were at the top end of the major road and needed to walk back to the bottom end, “No prob’s” it didn’t look that far on the map, 4km later and our packs started to get really heavy and our legs started to hurt. I asked directions again, no one knew where we were. By this stage I knew we were lost so I study the map closer and tried to relate the strange street names in a different language back to the map, I scanned the edge of the map and “BINGO”! A street we had just crossed was on the map and that was followed by “Oh no we have been going in the totally wrong direction”. I had North the wrong way around and we were way out of town, this would not of happened if I bought that compass back in China town. Time to catch a taxi, we hailed a taxi or TEKSI in their language and pointed on the map our destination. He couldn’t understand English very well and couldn’t read a map or know the location of the street we wanted to go to. I pointed at the main centre of town and said “Komtar” he nodded and knew how to get there. I asked how much “25 ringits” he said. I looked inside the teksi and there was a meter on the dash. I told him to use the meter and he agreed reluctantly as they do not earn as much from the meter and would rather rip off a couple of confused travellers. I got in and I looked down at the meter, he hadn’t reset the meter and it read $11.50rm he started to drive off and I pointed sternly at the meter to reset it, It took him ages just to press one button to reset, and I’m sure he was trying to find another way of putting more ringits on the meter. I just about had enough of this driver trying to rip us off and just one more thing I was ready to hope out again. We headed towards Komtar, I’m not sure how a taxi meter works but he was going extremely slow, I only assumed that it was to get more money out of us. I kept a sharp eye on the map and followed every street I could to make sure he was going in the right direction. I kept saying “keep going, keep going” in order to hurry him. We were going in the right direction when no more than 500m from the drop off point he took a wrong turn, at the time I wasn’t sure if this was because the road up ahead was one way or he was taking us the long way. I pointed up the next road to get us back on course, we ended up crossing the road we should off been on, and there was no reason why he couldn’t of taken us on that road. I got the shit’s and at the next intersection told him to pull over. Jacinta got out of the car to get the bags and I stayed in until our bags were out, this is a good tip for travellers because if you both get out he can drive off with everything. The meter read 7 ringits “allot less than 25ringits he quoted me”. I shoved the money into his hand and got out. A good start to the day and it was only 8:30am. Our plan had not changed we still wanted the visit the tourist information centre. We were going in the right direction by know and we had only gotten 100m away from the tourist office when we recognized the back Police station we had passed only 5min walk from when we had started out early this morning “Dam, Dam” Oh well, good training for the Himalayas. With quick directions from the tourist office on where to stay and what to do, we went to find accommodation in George Town little India. Most of the hostels were located in the street of Lebuh Chulia. We asked all the hostels and guest houses for accommodation and their prices were quiet expensive for what they were and there were no rooms available in most of the hostels as they were booked out for xmas. We found a hostel with free Wi-fi and the rooms cost 30rm/night around $10aus. I tried to screw them down to 50rm for two nights but he couldn’t make a decision until his boss came back after an hour so I was confident I could find something cheaper in the meantime. 20min later I rushed back to the hostel where Jacinta was waiting I put 60rm on the counter and said in a breathless voice “do you still have the room available”. There was nothing left and I told Jacinta to search for rooms in Bangkok Khoa san rd because I was worried we wouldn’t find anything for our next destination. The guests houses name was the “Tourist Guest House” and we had to climb these steep stairs to get up to the first floor, it was more like climbing a ladder and with the packs on our back you could feel the muscles working. Our room was only 3mx2m with no window, this was our home for 2 nights at least it had aircon. The bathroom was shared, and it was only 1.5mx1.5m with a shower head mounted over the toilet and a hose to wash your arse. Knowing full well where that hose has been you have no idea how valuable toilet paper can be these situations.
We sorted out ourselves by 1:00 and went out to explore George Town Penang as we had worked up an appetite. We were told about an Indian restaurant called Kapitan so we headed in that general direction. We must have smelled the good food because we were in Kapitan’s and didn’t even know it.
We had a Garlic and cheese Naan, I had a prathra pizza and Jacinta had a tandori kebab. Is was soooo nice. We headed in the direction of Penang bay, on the way we found the town hall and the city hall. A quick lie down on the esplanade wall of Penang bay. It was a nice peaceful place but we were both disappointed about the rubbish in the water. Only 5meters up a young teenager tossed a garbage bag over the wall and he didn’t even think twice about it, there was a rubbish bin only 10m from him. I thought they would teach the younger generation not too litter. Next time I see someone littering I’m going to say something.
We kept walking up the esplanade and found the night restaurants, they were all closed but we would be back later. We made our way back to the guest house to rest our feet after what seemed to be another 5km walk. We caught up on more internet and talk to a few people on Skype. Gotta love Skype.
Back to the night restaurants around 6:30 and we meet a local Malaysian man and his wife, we spoke to him for around ½ hour and he was great to talk to. We both had an Anchor beer each and it was really relaxing on the water front. We ordered a chilli crap as a few people recommended that we try it when we get to Malaysia. It wasn’t cheap at 60rm compared to other food, they said 3 crabs would be enough for 2 people. They brought it out on a plate and it looked great. The chilli sauce that it was cooked in was incredible, more than I could say about the crab. The crabs were to small and we battled to get any meat without a mouthful a shell. When they prepared the crab they must of beat it with a baseball bat as there were shards of crab shell right through the meal, it was a real disappointment and the first meal we haven’t been happy with on the trip so far, and I was so looking forward to the chilli crab.

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Comments

[jonathan chang]

about penang
i'm a penang guy love to backpack , after reading your travel blog what i feel that so shy to become a malaysian. actually penang georgetown was a nice island. but what i read from ur travel blog what the hell of malaysian people doing this. can't imagine penang people doing this. hope u can do some complain to malaysia torism office.