Penang, Georgetown and a Surprisingly Prosperous Island

After two short but enjoyable days in Malacca, Nathalie and I headed north to the island of Penang, situated at the entrance to the Straits of Malacca and bordering the Andaman Sea. What was in store for us? An island experience Malayisan-style (read more after the jump).

Getting up to Penang was a breeze. We took an hour-long flight from Malacca up to the main airport on the island. We flew on a modern turbo-prop aircraft meaning that we would be crusing at a much lower altitude than we would have been if we were in jet. This had it's advantage as we had a much better view of the sea below us. As we skirted along parallel to the coast, we were able to see ship after ship traversing the strait. It was truly impressive as to how much commercial maritime traffic flowed below us and gave weight to the claim of being one of the world's busiest shipping lanes.

Upon touch down, this status as a logistics mega-synapse was made even more abundant by the large presence of all three major express shipping companies (DHL, FedEx and UPS) each having large operations at the airport. Joining them were various air cargo operators meaning that for what appeared to be a largely insignificant island was in fact a shipping hub in it's own right.

Street art in Penang

We didn't have a chance to grab breakfast before leaving Malacca (we only managed to split a protein bar between us) and once we collected our bags and cleared security, we felt the need to stop and refuel ourselves. Also, we didn't have any hotel booked yet so we set about getting that out of the way while eating at the same time.

45 minutes later, we had food in our stomachs and a place to stay for the evening. Malaysia is really unlike any other country in the region (I'll elaborate on this a bit more in the near future and have alluded to it in my seven reasons to visit Kuala Lumpur post) and getting a taxi at the airport is as simple as walking up to a stand, telling the agent where you want to go, paying for voucher and you're set. No haggling, no stress, just simply pay a far price and it's done.

On the drive out from the airport, we passed high-tech factory after high-tech factory. Semiconductor manufacturing shops were practically on every corner. We even drove by a building owned by Western Digital, who is a market leader in the hard disk drive market. While we had landed on an island, it certainly didn't feel like it.

Colonial remains

Half an hour after we left the airport, we made it into Georgetown, Penang's capital, and the location of it's historic center. We found a deal on a hotel close to, but not directly in the touristy part of town. The Apollo Inn is aimed towards budget travelers looking for comfort at a reasonable price. This more or less came as advertised, although we were pleasantly surprised to find out that breakfast was included in our booking. The hotel came with a rooftop terrace offering a gorgeous panoramic over old town, the commercial district, the hills behind it, the sea out towards the horizon and the deliciously-named town of Butterworth across the channel.

We spent the next three days casually exploring the town. A casual walk here, an exploratory bike ride there, coffee in the late morning and late afternoon spent on the rooftop terrace pretty much defined our way of life. Coupling this in with Penang's famous food culture and we really weren't left with many reasons to complain.

The town is an UNESCO world hertitage site. This was granted due to it's colored history stemming from it's spot on the Northern exit from the Strait of Malacca, in no doubt influenced by the countless sailors, merchants and travelers stopping there before clearing into the Indian Ocean or after a long stint in open waters. Leftovers from past colonial glories were scattered about the city, with Spanish and Portuguese buildings intersecting their larger British cousins. So important was the port to the Brits that they fortified the island, with the oddly funny name “Fort Cornwallis” still keeping watch at the north end of the island. The Chinese left their mark too via a large immigrant population that has been present there for centuries.

As like every other facet of Malaysia's melting-pot society, the food selection in Penang was as diverse as the people. Chinese food hawkers and Nasi Kandars were literally on every street corner. Independent cafes, restaurants and coffee shops lay in plentiful supply lining tiny one-lane streets running out of the main boulevards. Towards the coast and on the outskirts of old town was an international food court (muchlike one that I wrote about here). Inside, you could find everything from traditional Malay food, to Indian pizzas, Japanese Izakya-style cuisine, pad Thai and even, oddly enough, a stall selling Filipino food. We wound up eating there...twice.

A red car

Georgetown, while being the capital, had an oddly small-town feel to it. Even though the island is by no means small and we passed block after block of high-rise apartments on the cab-ride in, old town felt like it didn't have more than a few thousand people living in it. It was wonderfully relaxing being able to walk and bike around this urban environment but not feel the stress of a big city.

Perhaps the only really 'strange' part of the town, at least from my perspective, was the one street with all of the hostels and western restaurants on one street. As soon as we would enter on it, we would pass cafes hawking cheap or even free drinks (Malaysia doesn't really have a strong drinking culture and the Muslim community actively tries to keep fellow believers from imbibing in alcohol). The food on the street, at least from looking at the menus, seemed overpriced and bland in comparison to the enormous other options found throughout town. The crowd was either young elephant-pants-wearing kids backpacking down from Thailand or older adults who seemed determined to make a career out of doing nothing but living out of hostels and backpacks until their bodies gave up on them.

Seeing all of this again brought my thoughts back to these lingering questions about this way of life. Mainly, I'm trying to figure out why these people would trek half-way across the world just to stay in these bubble streets. There's so much more out there to see than the bars offering free shots (head's up, you're in for a fantastic hangover...although if I was 10 years younger, I'd still be able to hack the cheap hooch). It's as if these people stereotype themselves, for greater or for worse, and I'm just having trouble figuring out the reasons why. To be clear, I don't mean this as a critique, it's merely an observation I hope to have explained at some point in the future.

Kuala Lumpur, where we'd spend our last 48 hours in Malayisa before heading off to paradisaical island of Bali in Indonesia.

One of the main mosques of the city

The three days (well, three days and an afternoon, counting our arrival on the Monday) seemed to have flew by. Before we knew it, it was time to head out to the airport and return to

As we left the island, I felt bittersweet. I was happy to be returning to KL, back to the city I've weirdly fallen for, but at the same time, I felt that there might have been a bit more to see in Georgetown. This wasn't too far from the truth as we didn't visit any of the temples nor head for the beach nor hills (something about the crippling humidity coupled with the constantly overcast sides kept us from it), but on the other hand, we saw and experienced the city exactly like we've been doing for so many months now. In the end, I couldn't harbor any regrets. Besides, there's something telling me that I haven't yet finished with Malayisa. Who knows, I could be back sooner than I think.