Penang

We arrived early this morning in Penang and we were dumbfounded!  Honestly, we had no idea Penang was such a big city, mostly modern.  We love historic places and had I focused my research on the historic old city.  Wow!  What a surprise!  For lots of information on Penang, go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penang.  Amazing!

I arranged a 3 hour Heritage Walking and Food Tour several months ago.  Our guide, Lim is fifth generation Chinese born in Penang.  He knows the city well and took us all over the historic area of George Town, a UNESCO site, eating as we toured, at two Michelin recommended restaurants plus several others, and tasting things we never had before and loved!  George Town is colorful, and the multicultural capital of the Island of Penang.  It is known for its British colonial buildings, as well as skyscrapers.  Lim is very proud of the city’s multicultural life, blending Chinese, Indian, Malay, and the rest of the world.  The city is obviously proud of the locals religions, celebrating Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist and Christian traditions.  One street has churches of each religion within a two block area.  We had a great time with Lim!

We spent the afternoon on Penang Hill, taking the funicular to the top, and visiting The Habitat rainforest, with the world’s longest two span stressed ribbon bridge and the highest public viewing point on the island, 800m above sea level.  The views were beautiful and the experience was quiet and cool.  We enjoyed every moment!

Kuala Lumpur

I arranged a private guide for our day in Kuala Lumpur.  He picked us up at Port Klang and off we went!  Our first stop was Batu Caves, a Malaysian National Heritage Site and a Hindu religious site.  We climbed the 272 steps to the top, along with hundreds of Hindus coming for the day.  It was an interesting site for us to see!  

We continued into the city of Kuala Lumpur and saw Merdeka 118, the world’s second tallest building, and the Petronas Towers, 88 story twin towers, along with dozens and dozens more skyscrapers filled with businesses and apartments.  We stopped at the Old Railway Station with its Moorish architecture, across the street from the National Mosque, of contemporary design.  We drove through Indian town and Chinatown, stopping at the Thean Hou Temple pagoda, with weddings lined up.  We drove to the gate of the King’s Palace.  We saw the train system at work, the monorail, and a multi lane road system that moves a lot of traffic.  

There was so much!  All interesting, beautiful, tidy, and thriving, with 2 million people in the city and 8 million in the metro area.  We learned that Kuala Lumpur is ranked in the top 8 most-visited cities in the world.  It houses three of the world’s ten largest shopping malls.  It is ranked 2nd in Southeast Asia after Singapore for Liveability and 2nd as a Technology Hub.  All of this has happened since 1990.  Our tour guide grew up in Kuala Lumpur and told us none of the tall buildings existed until after he was in his 20’s.  He is 57 today.  We had a great day and were very impressed by Kuala Lumpur.