Penang

I have lost count of the number of times I've stepped foot on this island, but I was certainly a fairly frequent visitor. Only that, I haven't done it in the last... say, 10 years possibly? So this year, I've decided that the lovely island deserves some of my attention, and the main attraction? The food of course!!!

Penang has always been well-known for it's not only wide variety of food - but of good quality food with extremely affordable price. *though I beg to differ on the latter*.

We started our trip in the late hours of a Thursday afternoon, after the rest have attended work. I forgot how it was like to actually take a road trip, so that was pretty fun. Somehow, it just differs from taking the bus/train/plane, even if you are going with the same people. In the car, there seems to be more personal space, being able to be goofy without being judged or stared upon - man, I love them to bits!

Getting on bridge

We stayed at the G Hotel, a modern contemporary hotel located along the Gurney Drive which was wonderful. That's where all the food is! :)

Hotel lobby

I was pretty impressed with the hotel, especially it's pool. The designs were of minimalist style, especially in the washroom. Just different from all the other places I've been to locally.

Our room

Bathroom

We made our way down the road later that night for some food. The food although wasn't bad, it wasn't the greatest. Definitely not how I remembered it. But oh well - I had better luck the next day :).

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We (or more correctly, yours truly), have decided to actually see Penang as an actual tourist, we hired the service of a local cab driver for the day to take us around to historical & tourist sites plus the secret places of good food! (Okay, maybe they weren't secrets to the locals - but places that we wouldn't have known).

We started the day fairly late, sleeping in until almost 9 odd and even that, was because one of us had to work. Otherwise, we would have probably slept in for a while longer. Anyway, first destination of the day - Brunch. Our driver brought us to the famous 'Char Kuoy Teow Sisters' - it wasn't too bad, but I wouldn't call it chopstick-licking good. The ones we had in the afternoon were muchhhhh better!!! :)

First tourist stop : Khoo Kongsi Clan House

Surrounding buildings

The Khoo Kongsi Temple/Clanhouse is the grandest clan house in Malaysia, built in the 19th century by the Khoo ancestors who came from South China.

Quote:

"Leong San Tong Khoo Kongsi and it's sub-clans, Boon San Tong and Khoo Si Toon Keng Tong, have their ancestral origin in Sin Kang Seah, Sin Aun village, Sam Toh District, Hai Teng County, Chiang Chew prefecture, Hokkien province, China presently known as the Sin Aun village, Hai Chiang distrct, Xiamen city, Fujian province, China."

The grand Clan House

How do I say this... The temple carried a lot of the traditional architecture work and had many ancient chinese influences. But the location of it was quite ..... distinct. It's located in something like a square, but with fairly modern, mixed 20th and 21st century buildings. It reminded me of the Rome, where it too, was in a square and all it's surrounding structures were modern buildings.

Such fine details

The whole place wasn't that big, but we spent quite a while here. Partially because I was just staring in the artworks such as the ones above. They were just too pretty to walk on by without any appreciation.

The Clan House wasn't always like how it looks today. During World War II, the clan house was partially destroyed when the Japanese bombed Georgetown. It former glorious state was only returned in 1957 after much repair work.

Just underneath the worship area is a little museum/information centre that elaborates more on the history of the Khoo Kongsi Clan as well as the history of the clan house.

:)

On the other side was some wax models that depicts the lifestyles of the ancient days.

Traditional clothings, and utensils

The olden days version of a stove

The brilliant artwork aren't just limited to the walls and pillars of the clan house, but also at the roofs. One wouldn't really notice it if they aren't paying any attention.

:)

After that, we tried making out way to another house, the Cheong Fatt Tze Blue Mansion, but it was unfortunately closed at that time. There are only 2 visiting tours for that clan house, and we arrived in between them. And they weren't exactly close together. But I suppose it is fairly reasonable... as the clan house also functions as a retreat/guesthouse nowadays.

Guess it would help it I could read Chinese :S

Not much that I can say for the place, since I was only allowed to walk till that archway. But one's able to make tour reservations if you're really keen. Otherwise, tour times are 11 a.m and 3 p.m. Entry fees are Rm 10.

Since we weren't able to visit that place, our driver brought us to a chocolate shop to get some of the local sweets, but what gem I found there wasn't the chocolates. It was the coffee! The 3-in-1 coffees. And man, they were good! :)

Chocolate/coffee place

As it was still quite early, and we were still quite stuffed from brunch, we headed towards another famous site, the Thai Buddhist Temple : Wat Chaiyamangalaram.

Also more commonly known to us locals as the Temple of the Reclining Buddha, the temple and shrine was built in 1900. " It was built in 1900 after the land was granted on behalf of Her Majesty Queen Victoria of UK on the 30th of May 1845. The main shrine of Chinese influence structure stood serving for 88 years until renovations became necessary. "

:)

I remember that I was literally skipping on my feet here. We were meant to be barefooted. That plus the bright scorching sun on the tiles = recipe for burnt feet.

Although the shrine has undergone renovations, the pagoda has retained it's original design.

The famous sleeping Buddha

The reclining Buddha was built in 1845, by a Buddhist monk. It is 33 metres long and is gold-plated. Surrounding it, including behind the structure, are more statues of Buddha in different postures. And also some memorial boxes of those who has passed on.

Directly opposite the temple (both along Lorong Burma) is another temple,the Dhammikarma, which is the only Burmese Temple in Penang. Originally known as the Nandy Molah Burmese Temple, it was the first Buddhist Temple in Penang.

Entrance

Chinthes

Although not striking different from other Buddhist temples that I have seen, the temple was a pretty one. It suprisingly (to me anyway), has many other mythical looking statues surrounding the prayer hall. Of note, is the pair of Chintes guarding the entrance to the main prayer hall.

Buddha in Main Prayer Hall

The Hall was basically very simple, but that's just how Buddhist temples generally are. To maximise the amount of places for people to sit and perform their prayers, I suppose.

Right behind the main Buddha statue, is a row of more statues. Each one with a slightly different decoration on the base.

We then wandered around the temple, and there's another little shrine area on the side. There were also smaller little 'houses' for the Gods on the sides.

Little worship areas

:)
*the smaller shrine is behind this*

There is apparently a little pond filled with carp from a website that I saw before going, but somehow we weren't able to see it... My memory is failing me already, but I think there might have been some construction that was ongoing while we were there.. hhmm...

Next stop : Kek Lok Si Temple

The pleasures of having a designated taxi driver for the day is being able to get to anywhere you want without the hassle of trying to hail a cab under the unforgiving sun each time you want to get somewhere. Not to mention, he planned the sequence of things to visit as well :). Saved the lazy me heaps of headache!

The iconic symbol of Kek Lok Si

Known as the "Temple of Supreme Bliss" in Hokkien, the construction of this building was started in 1890 and only completed in 1910. It is also the largest Buddhist temple in South East Asia.

And now, just random photos - coz I can't remember what's what anymore :(

7-tier Pagoda along the corridor

Pavilion of the seated Buddhas

The pavilion is made up of a main shrine, where most prayers are made and is surrounded by a large number of standing Buddha statues, as above. And from here, we could also see the main pagoda against the clear blue sky - which made it looked really quite pretty.

One of the main worship sites

Wall carvings

It wasn't the best time to visit the temple when we were there as the area of the famous bronze Guan Yin statue was closed to visitors for construction or something. So, we spent the time just walking around the place and taking random photos. It was still enjoyable, nevertheless.

Inside another main worship area

In this particular area, there was 5 statues of Buddha - each with a slightly different posture, some very subtle between the two. It took us a while to actually noticed the difference.

One of the statues

In case you can't read :)

From here, we made our way towards the main pagoda.

Main attraction of Kek Lok Si - Pagoda of 10,000 Buddhas

From there, we went on to lunch, which was a fabulous idea! I was a little disappointed with the Char Kuey Teow we had in the morning so I was more than keen to try out another famous stall!
Furthermore, our driver told us that they also had a really good Assam Laksa stall too! Double treat!!

Char Kuey Teow - definitely the best I've ever had!
At RM 5.50 it's pretty pricey by M'sian standard , but it definitely worth every single cent!

Yummylicious Assam Laksa

I was never a big fan of ''Orh Chien", which means fried oyster with eggs, but the one sold here - it was mind blowing! This is definitely one place I am going to drop by each time I visit Penang. There's no doubt about it.

After being fed, with all that COH in the bloodstream, we were too lazy to go around any further and opt to return to our hotel for some rest.

Hotel pool

Poolside chillout

:)

For the rest of the day, we didn't do anything else touristy but chilled out in the hotel. The massage in the hotel was pretty good for me, although not the best. He definitely found it pretty average, but I suppose it's operator dependent as Janie found hers average too. Or maybe, I'm just easily satisfied :).

Didn't take any much more photos of food although we did head out for dinner and lunch the next day. But here's a couple to finish off :

Don't know what it's called - but pretty good

His braised duck noodle soup