Last night we parted from our friends in Kuching. As we left Amanda said, “Well now it will be come to Australia My Third Home”. Life certainly moves in uncertain ways as parents support their children in their educational endeavors.
So we boarded the Air Asia flight to Penang. Liz wrote the last/first segment of our blog, which I haven’t read (I don’t want to be intimidated as she is a fluent blog writer). I don’t remember much about the flight (I slept shedding the remainder of my jet lag). The flight was smooth (I wasn’t woken up) and the landing was great. We got off the plane and waited a mere 5 minutes for our luggage. The taxi ride to our hotel was uneventful (thanks to the coupon system for taxis at the airport) and at 23:00 the streets were clear of heavy traffic.
We are staying at the Hotel Royal Penang (previously the Penang Sheraton, the Penang Dorset, etc.) We are on the 17th floor overlooking Gurney drive to the North.
We are just outside of the buffer zone for the Georgetown UNESCO world heritage zone…..which explains the picture. Look closely at the front façade of the mansion in the picture. You will see “Colonel Sanders” in all his glory.
KFC is all over Malaysia as it meets halal standards. Only vegetarians do not eat at KFC (and certain Americans…us).
After a nice buffet breakfast in the hotel, Liz is off to USM (Universiti Sains Malaysia) to meet with friends, colleagues, acquaintances, and deans. She is delivering the last of our goodies from the US…..Amazon ordered books (shipping is more costly than the books themselves).
I was on the elevator leaving the hotel I was asked by two English ladies what I was doing today. I replied….housekeeping tasks (read.. the laundry). So off I went looking for the laundry recommended by the hotel. I couldn’t find it so I dropped in at the Tune Hotel in Georgetown. For those of you who don’t know Tune Hotels, it is started by the same group who started Air Asia, on a low cost model. Everything is al carte (AC, hair dryers, towels, soap, TV,….etc.). Well their reception couldn’t have been nicer and told me to cross Jalan Burma (a neat trick) and walk five minutes to a laundry. Perfect instructions and 4 kilo of laundry was deposited to be picked up at 5pm today. Total price 16RM (about $5.25 US)….less than the RM 30 quoted for the hotel laundry with the 100% markup for same day service.
Then it was off to Komtar ( the 70 storey tower in the center of Georgetown).
The shopping part of the building is well worn, with 70-80% of the shop stalls empty. I also wandered the streets of the World Heritage area looking for non touristy art. It is going to be harder to find that stuff and just wandering the streets. Art collecting can be hard work….It just doesn’t fall into your hands. After a while of wandering I decided it was not wise to play the Englishman in the noon day sun and ducked in for a cool mug of iced coffee. Thus sated, it was off to the New World Mall…..a hawker’s market mall off of Jalan Burma and only ten minutes or so from the hotel. I wandered a while…looking at all manner of street food and settled for a roti telor with vegetarian curry sauce….only RM 1.70 ($.60). Then it was back to the hotel in mid afternoon to write this missive.First impressions of this visit of Georgetown (and I have travelled here many times since 1970). The streets are noticeably cleaner than on the past few visits. Maybe this is attributable to the DAP lead government of Penang…but who knows. I did find that many of the street shops near the center of the city were closed….but that may be due to my early exploring. Penang is a late city.
Dinner was at the Hot Wok restaurant. Our first choice, a Nyonya style restaurant we had visted several years ago, was closed on Tuesdays. Hot Wok came from an internet search, and was close by.
That it was close was great since a large thunderstorm was rolling in. The dinner was good and Liz enjoyed the Sago pudding.
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