Penang – More temples plus spice & fruit

Penang, Malaysia

One day left! We are stopping in Penang, an island and a state of Malaysia, on the way back to Singapore and our return flight. We have all decided Malaysia is a wonderful country, relatively unscathed by the wars that have plagued the other countries for centuries, (except for the Japanese occupation during WWII). It has a more or less democratic government, which appears in various incarnations from enlightened to heavy-handed, depending on the issue and the moment.

The country was a colony of Britain during the late 17^th through the 20^th century, as we have described elsewhere in this blog, achieving independence in 1957. You can click here to read a very complete history of Malaysia on Wikipedia.

The Malaysians have a very strong sense of tradition and family, and this seems to promote a sense of stability and has led to what appears to be a vibrant and growing economy. At this point about 60% of Malaysians are Muslim, 20% Buddhist, 10% Christian, and the rest follow Hindu and Chinese religions, and animism.

The reason I mention all this is that in 1786, Captain Francis Light, an English trader-adventurer working for the East India Company, landed on and took formal possession of the island “in the name of His Britannic Majesty, King George III”. Though, of course, the nation of Malaysia and the state of Penang are independent, the capital, Georgetown, retains its English name to this day, and retains many building and traits of the English colonial era, beside its own Southeast Asia feel. We will drive by Christian churches, Chinese temples and Muslim mosques, along with other sights – and everyone seems to play well together.

After a short drive around Georgetown, the first stop is the Penang Museum, where to me (JB) the most interesting things were examples of old Opium Beds, as historically during the colonial periods (and probably before and after that!), opium was an important money crop for the area. In addition I spied a fantastic old phonograph and music box. Penang has a rich history of the exploits of traders over the centuries, and many artifacts and photos are shown in the museum; it’s a nice museum.

Next is a visit to Wat Chaiya Mangalaram, a Thai Buddhist temple, housing ANOTHER reclining Buddha, the third (or sometimes said second) largest of its kind, at 108 feet. You may remember we have already seen some very large ones together with their temples. This temple, however, is of Thai influence, showcasing bright, sparkly colors and fantastical Chinese dragon statues adorning the entryways. Chinese New Year paraphernalia and lanterns are everywhere – Red is the new black!

A short stroll across the street takes us to the Burmese Buddhist Temple, which features a large standing Buddha together with lovely gardens and a gallery of beautifully intricate (almost fantasy-like) pictures detailing events from the life of the Buddha. There are also a couple fancy dragons demonstrating their dominion over the world – I (Carol) love dragons! It turns out this will be our LAST temple visit on this trip. It’s been amazing – they have all been so different and beautiful in their own ways.

Lunch back on the ship and then ventured out for an “Optional Excursion” to a Spice Farm and a Tropical Fruit Farm on the north side of the island. There was to be a Butterfly Farm visit included in there as well, but they were closed for renovations at the last minute – ah, well. This was probably the one ‘optional’ deal we could have skipped. We drove from Georgetown up the coast past large condominium project after resort after luxury hotel and ended up at the Tropical Spice Garden, where we had a great guide who plucked little seeds, flowers and shoots off plants to have us smell, taste, and see the beginnings of those powdered and mashed treasures that end up on our kitchen cabinets. We experienced turmeric and cloves and all sorts of gingers growing; it was fun and he was very enthusiastic! He even pointed out a napping flying lemur clinging to a tree overhead. We bought some pepper in the gift shop.

Note:

The next stop at the Tropical Fruit Farm was a little harder to figure out. What were these people doing exactly? It didn’t look like large-scale farming. It seemed like a strictly “get the tourists here and maybe they’ll buy something” type of deal, although they were particularly effusive about their fruit infusion concoctions, made by putting all sorts of fruits together. We figure maybe this is a big tourist draw for Chinese or Japanese tourists, but it didn’t seem to make a big hit with our group.

Many people, such as JB, tried a sample of one of the “fruit enzyme” brews and then regretted it later on. Thank got for antibiotics. Carol fortunately abstained! ‘Nuff said about that! These are apparently popular with health food afficianados in Japan and China, though we did not get the whole story. They provided a little fruit buffet after the tour and that was refreshing (but may also have been the culprit, if you get my drift). Well, it was a very long bus ride out and back – and probably not worth it in the long run.

Tonight, we had a Road Scholar Private Cocktail Party up on the Lido Deck and then we all went to dinner together down in the Marco Polo Restaurant. These “Private Cocktail Parties” have been a fantastic place to get all the champagne you can stand. We got some good pictures of our fellow travelers at these events, but we’ll share these in a separate post at the end.