Yin and Yang

Penang, located at the western end of the Malayan peninsula was a place I had unheard of. Its historical salience lay in its strategic location at the crossroads of oceanic trade routes, thus attracting people from places beyond its domains. My ignorance notwithstanding, the historic city of Georgetown which is a small island on the Strait of Malacca, graciously hosted me back in 2014 and 2015 when I had to travel there for business.

The opportunity to travel to Penang came rather unexpectedly. Our client, a major automobile manufacturer, decided to implement a new business functionality. Being an implementation project, it was a great opportunity and I had no second thoughts before agreeing to join the team on-site. As such projects are executed over several months(sometimes years), I had to travel every month and spend a fortnight or more in Penang to meet with the customers.

One of the most striking features of the city that I noticed as soon as I landed there, was its diversity. Malaysian society is largely composed of ethnically distinct Malayan people, people of Chinese origin, and people of Indian origin. This is quite often reflected in the languages prominently displayed on boards, with the same matter written in Malay, Tamil, and Chinese.

The next thing that enthused me was the availability of South Indian food everywhere. The dosas and idlis served in most ‘restorans’ made a lot of difference to me coming from a place like Bangkok where such items were a luxury. Thus a major strategy of my settling in the new place included the task of starting my day with Appams and Dosas. Of course, a mandatory accompaniment is the Malaysian tea(‘Teh Tarik’), served in large glasses with lots of sugar!

Another thing that I noticed as I moved around the city was the cleanliness of the streets. Very rarely does one come across discarded garbage on street sides. The same goes for the discipline on roads, with pedestrians given priority over motor vehicles. However the mad rush I witnessed during peak office timings, with cars tailing one another on busy roads, revealed the yin-yang of the place.

But the best part of my time in Penang was something else. I lived next to the rustic streets in Georgetown, declared as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. My daily evening long walks to have dinner in ‘Little India’, an area dominated by establishments run by Malaysian Indians, were made enjoyable by the sights and sounds in the street. The streets in Georgetown have some century-old buildings that hold hundreds of stories of migration, struggle, and survival hidden away from those passing by. The colonial architecture of the buildings, which looks as if they are almost ready to give up and crumble, gives a special character to the place. The past is neatly fused with the present by the creative paintings and artworks on the facades of those buildings. They gain a new life, in their declining years, when lit up by the carefully installed lamps in the evenings.

If my dinner route was dotted with remnants of a disappearing past, the route I took every evening for my jogging took me past the majestic official buildings built during British rule. My long runs culminated at the Esplanade playground, where the local people congregate for some family time. This playground is sandwiched between the Fort Cornwallis on one side and the City Hall and Town Hall, both very proud colonial-era buildings, on the other side. All of them face the calm sea that extends to the town of Butterworth a few kilometers on the other side. Gazing at the waves, enjoying the sea breeze in the evenings is how my days on this little island normally ended.

My long stay in Penang called for a trip to the nearby island of Langkawi, a tourist attraction. My colleague and I decided to visit the island on a Saturday morning and headed to the Swettenham Pier to catch a ferry by 7 AM. We bought our tickets from the pier itself. The ferry was air-conditioned and modern, quite different from the quaint ones back in Thailand. The initial part of the journey by ferry felt very good, and we climbed to its deck to catch a glimpse of the sea. After snapping some photos we went back to our seats. I was reminded that the journey would take a total of three hours and with nothing else to do, I soon dozed off.

Langkawi is an archipelago of around 99 islands in the Malacca Strait. Out of this, only two are inhabited and our ferry docked in the largest island that goes by the same name. The island was well developed with good roads that are connected to every corner. We decided to roam around the island first before heading to our hostel. So we rented a taxi.

Our first destination was the Langkawi SkyCab. This is a cable car that travels a distance of around 2 kilometers to the peak of Gunung Machinchang, climbing a height of around 750 meters above sea level. As the gondola slowly makes its climb, one is served with a breathtaking panoramic view that includes the thick green forests on the mountain interrupted by streams flowing through its rocks, a turquoise sea dotted with several small islands and a vast skyline that meets the sea afar in the horizon.

The exhilarating ride in the cable car took us to the top where the famous Sky Bridge, only recently opened, was located. The construction of the pathway was still in progress and hence we had to wade through the forest to reach the bridge. The Sky Bridge is no mean architectural feat. It connects two hilltops and is constructed as a curved walkway to get the best view out of its surroundings. The floor is partially laid with transparent glasses that give a view of the valley beneath. I was holding my breath as I slowly put my feet over them and tried to walk. After spending a few minutes on the bridge, we took the cable car and headed down to our hostel.

After getting some shut-eye in the afternoon, I took a stroll along the beach to see what’s around. With the sun already down, I was expecting a party vibe with great food and music. But the kind of ambiance in that part of the island was a let-down. Nevertheless, I managed to make myself at home with whatever the place had to offer. After having dinner and trying some flavored hookah from one of the cafes on the beach, I decided to call it a night.

The next morning started with us packing our bags and leaving for Georgetown. Having visited the Seven Wells waterfalls too the previous day, there was nothing much left to explore on the island. We booked a cab and reached the pier to board our ferry. The return journey was terrible, with the heady motion of the boat riding the rough waves, putting me on the verge of seasickness. The three-hour journey in reality felt like a complete day at sea!

That weekend was thus consumed with fatigue and recovery thanks to the Langkawi trip. I can go on about my outings and gastronomic adventures in Penang. However, that’s all worth another write-up. Overall, I can say that the time spent in Penang was a mixed bag, with a hectic work schedule during the whole week as well as a lot of great experiences outside work, again a sort of yin-yang. To this day I cherish those moments in Georgetown, a charming city exuding its own strange sense of familiarity, welcoming every foreigner like myself as one of its own.