One week before I started my
trip to Penang, I got an email notification from Air Asia that my flight was
rescheduled from 6.20 to 16.45. I have no idea why they had to do this,
operational matter was what they said. A bit worried whether I want to continue
this trip, I almost lost 1 day of my travelling time because of this. After
thinking and discussing with my friend, I decided to have this trip since she
said it’s worth enough to have a short gate away from your hectic activities by
having holiday in Penang.
One day before I flew to Penang,
I got sick. My body felt so unwell at the office, suddenly it got cold and
fever, I also felt so fragile even I felt that I couldn’t support my body and
almost black out. My boss then asked me to go home with her and asked me to
have a nap on her car. Surprisingly after a one hour trip from office to our
home, I felt much better – less cold and headache, but still not so well. I
told my mom and she gave me some medicine before I took a rest. Slept quiet
tight but I vomited in the middle of the night, I felt so ashamed with myself
since in less than 24 hours I will have a trip that I’ve planned before. I woke
up in the morning and felt better but still had a weird feeling on my body. I
started to pack up my stuff and convince myself (and my family as well because
they really worried about my condition) that I will be ok. Around 2pm, I
decided to continue this trip and ask my mom to accompany me to the nearest
taxi’s pool.
I arrived at Penang
International Airport 10 minutes faster than expected. The airport is not that
big as international airport. After passing the immigration, I went down stair
and bought a Malaysian sim card with only buy the internet data, it was RM 20
for the sim card and 1 week internet data. I was heading to George Town to find
my hostel, and as my friend’s suggestion I took a taxi from the airport. it was
quite bit expensive, around RM 40, whereas actually you can just take a bust to
George Town and it costs less than RM 5. The journey was about 40minutes, and
it was quite easy for the taxi driver to found my hostel where located on
Stewart Lane and my hostel name was 33 Stewart Houze. it was owned by a Chinese
couple, and they were already waiting or me because they thought I would be
there earlier. The uncle then accompanied me to the room and the toilet. It was
a nice hostel, even thought it was a dorm but you have your own room because it
has curtain on each bed so you still have your privacy. After leaving my luggage on the room, I
decided to find dinner by myself and suddenly felt lonely because other
tourists were hanging out with their peers. I remembered that I was invited to
Penang Couchsurfing group on Whatsapp and I tried to ask whether someone was
around George Town. Suddenly there was one person who replied my text and we
agreed to meet up and had dinner together. His name is Wan and worked as a
pharmacy staff on government institute; he picked me up by his car and brought
me to Gurney area for dinner. I did enjoy our conversation and also he gave me
a good impression of Penang. I ordered Char Kway Teow, Ice Kacang Merah (red
bean) and Pasembur. I really wanted to try all the food but I couldn’t because
I felt something wrong with my stomach. After
dinner, he accompanied me to have sightseeing around the area and to the
hostel. Before I slept, I drank some medicines both for my stomach & fever.
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| Pasembur |
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| Char Kway Teow |
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| Ice Red Bean |
I woke up on my second day with
a mixed feeling condition. My stomachache was getting worse, it seems like a
got a diare but again and again I convinced myself that everything will be just
fine. I took a bath then continued to find some breakfast outside (the hostel
is actually providing breakfast) and grabbed some tourist information about the
mural street art around here. I already found some murals not to far from the
hostel and then I stopped in an Indian restaurant to try Nasi Kandar, I ordered
chicken curry with hot milk tea (if you order tea, it means milk tea. If you
want to order just “tea” then you have to say tea-o). The portion was so big
for a breakfast, I couldn't even finish it.
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| 33 Stewart Houze |
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| Nasi Kandar |
After having a full belly, I texted
on the CS group again and a girl sent a reply and said she was available to
accompany me. We agreed to meet up around 10.00 and before I met her I
continued to find other murals on food and even I got lost somewhere in the
Chinese Market. It was 10.00 already and
Syakirah (it’s her name) texted me about the meeting point, she picked me up
and drove me to her apartment because her friend wanted to join us, on our way
to her apartment she told me that she just finished her night shift as an
intern doctor at the hospital. After waiting about 10 minutes, her friend, Elena,
appeared. She was coming from Russia and already 2 days in Penang. The 3 of us
then decided to go to Penang Hill, unfortunately we didn't go there because it
was insanely crowded during the long weekend and afterward we decided to go the
biggest Chinese temple in Penang, Kek Loh Si. The weather was insane at that time,
extremely hot, but the three of us were still continuing our trip to the top of
the temple to see giant bronze statue of Kwan Yin Goddess.
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| Giant Bronze Kwan Yin Goddess |
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| Elena, me & Syakirah at Kek Loh Si Temple |
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| three Buddha statues |
After more than
one hour, we continued to had lunch in a Avenue Mall, I tried Laksa there (a
fish soup with some herbs and rice noodle) and went I went to the drug store,
coincidently I met Wan whose was still on his shift. Afterward we decide to go
back first to take a rest, Elena were still at the mall to continue his job as
journalist freelancer and Syakirah back to her apartment to have a sleep after
her night shift and guess what, I also go back to the hostel and had my
afternoon nap. What a lazy bump!
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| Laksa |
On the afternoon, I continued to
explore George Town and found some of the famous murals art such as the big cat
and children with bicycle. I also visited the heritage area where we can find
authentic life of the Penang community. Around 19.00, I went to Syakirah’s
apartment and go to the floor where she stay and luckily I could see the view
of whole city of Penang from the top. It was quite astonishing scenery,
especially with the colorful afternoon sky. Before we had dinner, she accompanied me to the Chinese heritage area,
very beautiful at night because the Chinese lanterns were turned on. Before I
went to the hostel, I had an opportunity to see the live performance of Chinese
Dragon dance, so many tourists saw the show and so noisy because there were
also fireworks and loud sound from the instrument
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| One of the famous mural art |
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| Me and Shakirah @ Clan Jetty |
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| Baringsai - Chinese Dragon Dance |
. After had enough sleep, I
started to packed up my stuffs and decided to have breakfast at the hostel. The
served bread with some choices of jams, tea, coffee and since it was during the
CNY, they also prepared Mandarin Orange there. I put my luggage there since my
flight was still at night then I went to Batu Ferringhi by bus. After had a trip
around 1 hour, I arrived at the beach. It was quite clean but I must say that
Bali and Lombok are better than here. I saw some people are doing water sports,
sun bathing and the rest was just sitting near the beach.
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| Batu Ferringhi |
Walking around for
awhile, taking pictures then I back to George Town. Again it was still very hot
there, I drank some coconut water to cool down my body temperature and I walked
to some area that I haven’t visited before; one of them was the Camera Museum. Back to hostel and just sitting there while
waiting for the time to the airport. It was nice to have travel in Penang
except of the hot weather and my illness.
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| The Smiley Syrup |
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| Good Quote at Bodhi Cafe |
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| Masjid Kapitan Keling |
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| Cat Photography at Camera Museum |
