P.S. This is a long one so go and make a cup of tea before continuing.
We arrived very late into Malaysia having been held up at the Thai border for almost 3 hours, the immigration officers closing their booths behind us as we crossed over. Our first impressions were therefore slightly blurred as our driver tried to make up the time by driving on the hard shoulder at 70mph past the slowly moving traffic. It was almost 11pm when we pulled into Georgetown on the island of Penang on the west coast of Malaysia and we had been traveling for about 15 hours. This did not stop us however as 1. We had no money, and 2......... We had no money. So off we went in a hunt for an ATM, which was harder to find than you might think. We walked past old ramshackle wooden shophouses, lovely boutique hotels, concrete monoliths and trendy bars.
This was then followed by streets crammed full of hawker street stalls selling food, old men sitting having tea and a gossip, young malaysians sitting in their parked souped up cars with the music blaring out reminiscent of the marina car park in Bangor (according to Louise) and old British colonial buildings silently lit in the eerily quiet financial district, funnily enough where we eventually found an ATM. We didn't realise it at the time but this was a real picture of the Malaysia to come.
For those of you who know nothing about Malaysia it was colonised initially by the Dutch and then by the British in the 1800's. They then transported, in huge numbers, Indians as laborers and Chinese as administrators to work alongside the ethnic Malays and exploit the spice crops and tin mines and its strategic position on the shipping routes. Over the past two centuries these two 'foreign' ethnic groups have lost practically none of their cultural heritage and traditions and almost any significant population has a chinatown and little India. It was quite surreal for us as we walked through the latter and were blasted with Bollywood music, pungent spices and overpowering incense smoke while walking past Hindu temples. The Chinese hold on strongly to their past with their ancestors playing a significant role in their belief system.
Part of this is having a clan 'house' where important meetings are held, weddings etc... but most of all it is were they record the ancestors of their particular clan. They take the form of a golden tablets which were stored alongside grainy black and white photographs of some of the first ancestors. The clan house itself was an impressive collection of sculpture and artwork but sometimes you felt you where looking at a new painting rather than something old and historic. This blend of old, new, traditional, modern, west, east, colonial and new country was to intrigue and tempt us (especially the food) as we travelled around the Peninsula.
After Georgetown we headed across to the Perhentian Islands off the east coast. We had heard of the nice weather and spectacular beaches and having spent 4 days in the rain on Koh Phi Phi and beaches covered in rubbish we were on a mission. Another early start and a 4 hour mini-bus blast across the mountains we arrived at the jetty, payed our 'environmental' fee and were on an old wooden boat with 400hp strapped to the back. A 30 minute bumpy speed boat ride later we were cruising over some of the clearest water we had ever seen and landing on the white sand beach you think of when you're day dreaming in the office. Louise didn't stop smiling and I didn't stop sweating as it was also lovely and sunny :o).
Four days disappeared in a whirl of diving, snorkeling, resting and eating and we soon found ourselves floating back over the crystal waters and bumping our way back to the mainland. Not all beaches in Malaysia are the same as we headed south to another island and another beach to find it strewn with rocks, seaweed, fishing boats and expensive cafe's. We stayed here less than 24 hours before we headed back west again to the historic port of Melacca, a decision well made as you will see.
Melacca is a mix of cultures as you would expect but with a few added bonuses such as arty little boutiques, chilled out cafe's, some amazing food outlets
and their crown jewel............ cycle rickshaws covered in fake flowers and built-in music systems! We initially only planned to spend a couple of days here but due to our early exit from Tioman island we ended up here for most of the week.
We had one of our most amazing meals here at a satay restaurant. It basically involved you walking along a massive chiller cabinet picking up your choice of meat (can't be too specific about what type), fish or veg kebab, taking it back to your table which has in the middle a massive bubbling pot of sweet peanut satay sauce. You then shove your various kebabs (we had almost 30) into the bubbling pot, wait 5 minutes and then eat away. The joy just kept increasing as various other things where put in front of us including massive whole prawns, bread and salad all of which got the snickers treatment! Needless to say we left stuffed and it cost a total of about £5.50, happy days.
Melacca is also THE place to get matching couple t-shirts, displayed in all their glory in the many shops within central walking district. These particular items have somewhat amused us ever since we were married since during our honeymoon saw many couples from Korea, Japan and China all wearing matching t-shirts.
I thought this would be the limit of our experience of such attire, however the moment I pointed out these items to Louise we were not exiting the shop without them. The next day was spent walking around and drawing much attention from tourists, locals and anyone else who had eyes. It was truly a SE Asia day when we climbed into a wonderfully decorated cycle rickshaw, rode around town and had our picture taken in SE Asia style!!
Onwards we went to Kuala Lumpur, or KL as it is known locally. We were ceremonially dumped at the new transport hub about 15km out of the city centre. The wonderful interior reminded us of a swanky international airport, that's where the good stuff ends. For those of you who have been to KL before you'll know that they have massive amounts of infrastructure in place to transport the masses from monorails to highways through the city, problem is that none of it connects! We had to get two trains, which were 5 mins walk from each other, across a very busy road with no pedestrian crossings while carrying our big rucksacks.
We managed to avoid any issues following this due to good accommodation location and a bit of research but we have heard of horror stories involving the airports which are approximately 120km appart. It is strange that there seems to have been very little thought when the 4 different companies that built the 4 different transport options didn't think to talk to each other, especially when walking below the Petronas Towers in the Kuala Lumpur City Centre (KLCC) you feel like you're in some architects model.
Malaysia is a funny place, full of life and the people are unbelievably friendly. It has amazing food, a real history that you can see but this is just peninsula Malaysia. Malaysian Borneo is still to come!!!
