Penang – Day 1, around Georgetown

I checked into my hotel in Georgetown at 7am and slept for a couple of hours before deciding to walk around the town for the day, to see what I could find.  There was a lot to see!  One thing I discovered over the day was that I don’t really need sunscreen in this part of the world.  I guess the ozone layer is pretty thick here.  The weather was fantastic for the two days I spent here.  I took a ride on a trishaw, and discovered that the drivers are usually homeless – they sleep on the trishaw at nights.  Penang is very expensive compared to KL, and they can’t afford a roof over their heads.

A couple of men were playing checkers on the street, with bottle tops.

There is a tower in Penang called Komter. Like so much of KL and Penang, it was under renovation, upgrade or construction, but I was still able to get up to the top floor, which I think was the 60th or something. This gave me a 360 degree view of the entire island of Penang. I circumnavigate this tomorrow.  In the middle of the Komter observation deck is a very tacky wedding area. I don’t know who would want to get married here, but it looked like somebody was planning to do so that night.

For lunch I chose to eat from one of the many street stalls. This is an example of how many of them look.  I ate the Chicken Rice, as it seems to be one of the traditional and very popular meals in Malaysia.  I have to say I was expecting a whole lot more than what I experienced, after seeing Anthony Bourdain wax lyrical about it in one of his travel/food shows.  The rice was fluffy and well-cooked, but the roast chicken was almost cold.  I found out later that it is meant to be.  You have to add chili to get flavour, as the savory flavor we expect from roast chicken simply wasn’t there.  On the flip side, it cost me about $2 for tea, fresh juice, and the chicken rice.

Since Thailand, pretty much the only rock music I’ve heard outside Rock City has been The Scorpions. I first heard a “best of” album at poolside in Patong, and I’ve heard it regularly throughout Thailand and Malaysia.  Seems they’re huge in Asia.  Of course “Winds Of Change” is the real reason.  If Asians knew what their primary musical style was, I’m not so sure they’d be so crazy about them.

A phone booth with simple instructions on what to say once your dialee picks up.  I like it.

The tailor you go to when you’ve been asked to host the Academy Awards.

There are temples, shrines and mosques (and even some churches!) everywhere in Thailand & Malaysia.  From what I can gather, Hinduism has many gods.  My Indian is not at it’s best right now, but I think this temple is honoring the Goddess of breast implants.

And for those like me who don’t have time to stop for anything, there is always the fast food option. Self-installed in just 5 minutes, you can use this one to pray that the car to your left is not about to veer into your lane without indicating (as they always seem to do over here).

This is generally how the Hindu temples look in Malaysia. Penang and KL are both made up primarily of Indians and Chinese, with authentic Malays being in the minority.  Therefore Buddhism and Hinduism are both very popular, even though this is a Muslim country.

Once again, forgive my Indian translation, but I believe this could be a temple worshiping the Gods of Guitar Hero and Rock Band.

I walked past this very run down hair-dressing salon which advertises itself as “delux hair saloon”. Hate to see the budget ones!

A street-side shoe repairer still has work to do on a very quiet day.

The beggars are not as aggressive here as they are in Thailand, but I am glad I was not the only one to ignore them. It is very difficult to walk past without helping.

The street sweepers are human here, and they just walk into moving traffic without a care in the world. Here a couple of locals trade views on an upcoming footy match.

After a very long day walking around town I was picked up at my hotel by a friend of friend – Communications professor at Penang University, Sam.  She and her friend Kash took me to the best (but messiest) seafood experience I’ve had yet. Below you see the just caught trays and boxes of clams, pipis, whelks, crabs, fish, prawns & squid.  You load up trays with what you want, and they cook up a storm with it.  And boy, do they do a great job.  With the exception of the yucky orange crab fat, everything was stunning. I particularly loved the butter prawns.  Thanks Sam!  Only thing missing was some nice wine or beer to compliment the seafood – this is a Halal restaurant, so no alcohol allowed.

A view from the restaurant.  What a great way to spend a balmy evening.

In keeping with my ongoing obsession with macro bug photography, I present you with the unidentified giant bug that was crawling up my hotel room wall when I arrived home from dinner. I’m sure it was harmless but I relocated it to the outside corridor all the same.  Oh, and it had wings – don’t think having this thing dive-bomb my pillow at 3am would be that enjoyable.

OK – that was a very long post, but there was a lot to see in Penang. Tomorrow we have day 2, where Sam takes a day off work to drive me around the island.