Raga Muffin

Nothing Could Be Finer

…than to be here in this diner, in the eve-ning.

It’s just so good to come into a South Indian dhaba and order a masala dosa. You know it’s gonna be delicious.

I love ‘em. This’ll be my second one in 2 days.

In case you don’t know what a masala dosa is, it’s basically a large thin crispy pancake filled with delicious spiced potato and some other veggies, and then rolled up. It’s generally served with a white or orange coconut chutney, veg sambar (a runny curry) and some other little dippy curry or chutney.

The pancake itself is made by soaking rice and lentils overnight, and then grinding them into a batter. The batter is then fermented overnight, which gives it a slightly sour taste. The batter is cooked on a really large hotplate, spread out nice and thin. It’s so delicious!

Right now I even have the luxury of being able to wash it down with a Horlicks Ais, a sweet milky malt drink that I really love.

It’s the simple things.

I love their Customer Service statement.

Yeah, it’s so great to be in Malaysia.

I’m in another town that neither you (nor I) would’ve probably ever heard of, it’s called Sitiawan, and it’s on the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia, about halfway between the capital, Kuala Lumpur, and the island of Penang in the north.

This is my second night here, I chilled for most of the day today because I’ve done some long rides lately and I needed a rest.

It’s a really interesting town, sort of run down and a bit messy, but I love it because it’s a diverse melting pot of Malay, Chinese and Indian cultures.

The town basically represents the demographic breakdown of the whole Malay Peninsula - which is about 70% ethnic Malay or Indigenous (orang asli), about 22% ethnic Chinese, and about 7% Indian.

85% of Indians in Malaysia are descendants of indentured labourers, who were brought here from India in the 20th century by their British colonial masters, to work in the tin mines and rubber plantations. Most of this work became mechanised, and many plantations were replaced with oil palm trees decades ago.

Today, oil palms are everywhere.

The plantation owners now hire cheaper Indonesian labourers. There’s about 3.5m migrant workers in the country, out of a total population of about 33m. Most of them are Indonesian.

The palm oil industry is huge here. Malaysia now supplies a quarter of the world’s total palm oil every year, a staggering amount for such a (relatively) small country.

Leaving Indo

I had some nail biting times waiting for my transported bike to actually arrive in Jakarta from Pangandaran, it was really late. Luckily I’d allowed extra time for that possible scenario.

I found a nice Chinese Indonesian guy in a bike shop not too far from my guest house in Jakarta, Henry (they often create English names), who boxed up my bike for me, in one of their old bike boxes. I was so pleased not to have to do it myself again. And he was happy for the business.

The box wasn’t quite big enough, they really squeezed it in, it wasn’t ideal, but they did a pretty good job, considering what they had.

And then in the dead of night, in the rain, off I went to the airport.

Stealing away

We got trapped in the kampung for 15 minutes because there were all these locked gates and one way streets, and the driver didn’t know his way around

The check in procedure was fast and smooth. Way more efficient than in Brisbane. The Air Asia  counter staff didn’t even ask me if I had a flight out of Malaysia (I didn’t). Phew!

Malaysian passport control didn’t ask me for a flight out either. They also gave me a 90 day visa, without me asking for it. Yay! I was expecting 30 days.

Javanese traditional clobber

And a farewell Happy Chinese New Year

Yeah I was sad to leave Indonesia, I love it, and really feel like I’ll be back sometime. It’s the most amazing country, so hugely diverse. The people are so warm.

This particular trip I only just scratched the surface of a relatively small part of the country.

In the past I’ve travelled in Indo for months at a time, and still I’ve only been to a little less than half of the 38 provinces. It’d take years to really feel and understand the full diversity of the place.

I just had to show you how dirty my plane window was. That’s Peninsular Malaysia in the background.

I just had to show you how dirty my boots were. Despite being pole-ish and Polish, I’m very unpolished.

KLIA

Everyone refers to Kuala Lumpur as KL, and to the Kuala Lumpur International Airport as KLIA.

KLIA is big, efficient, and, like all airports, full of kitsch.

I was there for awhile, magically converting this:

Into this:

And then into this:

(Pre-enactment)

There was a fullscale dragon dance going on in the terminal while I was there, it was so amazing (and so loud).

Hot fresh soya milk. Yum.

But eventually I was fed, I was entertained, I changed money, I got a new SIM card and Malaysian phone number, I got into my bike clothes, and off I rode. Right from the terminal.

Two really nice cleaners looked after my gear while I was doing all that stuff. They were legends, and stared at me for the whole time (except when I got undressed).

Panting To Banting

Riding out of KLIA is not dissimilar to riding off from Brissy airport, or from any other large airport that’s been built a little bit away from a population centre in a wealthier country.

It’s all highways and motorways, overpasses, underpasses, side passes, handballs and sneaky little tiki-taka dribbles. There’s massive signs, super fast trains and big multi-laned highways. But luckily they have fat shoulders, for skinny-shouldered cyclists like me.

The palm oil plantations start pretty much straight away.

The ride wasn’t long, but there were a lot of high bridges to climb. 30km down the road I arrived in the small-ish town of Banting. I was so happy to be able to diversify my menu, with Chinese, Indian, and of course Malay options.

Downtown Banting

Big supermarket and variety store chain

Thanks you too. Luckily they didn’t find my bombs.

Whenever I think kitsch can’t possibly reach new heights, it does.

This was actually the window shade in my room. Lucky I was psychedelic free there, otherwise I probably would’ve communed with these gorgeous deer for hours and never left my room.

The main drag at night

One helluva strong iced Milo

Chinese spirit shrine. There’s lots around.

If the packs were smaller I would’ve tried these.

Oooh, and these darling

The Malaysian flag looks nauseatingly like the American one. They have exactly the same number of stripes (13), with the exact same colours. Yeah they’ve got the Islamic crescent symbol and one star with 14 points (representing the 14 different territories that make up the country), but it does look very much the same.

Officially that was a complete coincidence. But I don’t believe that for a second.

Hijab tween fashion

Relatable models

I know Malaysia's a conservative country, but this is ridiculous. I didn’t try these either. The packs are so huge. Haw flakes are actually made from the fruit of the hawthorn bush, and are used in Chinese medicine to aid digestion.

Kuala Selangor

So, something I didn’t think about before I booked my flight to Malaysia was Chinese New Year. There was a few things I didn’t realise about it.

Firstly, I didn’t know that the Lunar New Year celebrations, also known as the Spring Festival, can go on for around 23 days, from the 23rd day of the previous lunar month, through the new moon on Chinese New Year’s Eve, and then all the way to the night of the following full moon, about two weeks after that.

Secondly, I didn’t realise that every Zhang, Li and Qawi in Malaysia would be on holidays at that time, meaning pretty much all the accommodation is totally booked out.

It’s rainy season too. Did I mention that? It’s been pissing down every day, for a time, so my camping options are limited.

So basically I’ve had to really scour accommodation sites to find places to stay, which luckily I’ve eventually found, but they haven’t been within my normal day’s cycling range.

As a result I’ve been doing some super long days of cycling. It’s been great, but tiring.

Kuala Selangor’s a beautiful little town, about 80kms up the road from Banting. It’s old school Malaysia, quaint little buildings that have been looked after or renovated, cute little eating houses and shops, and a small town friendly vibe.

I had to partly ride on highways today, it was the only way to get over some of the big river systems along the coast. And I wanted save a few clicks too, as it was a really long ride.

Delicious roti telur (eggy bready pancakey thingy) for brekky. And an iced lemon tea of course.

My brekky spot was an Indian Muslim place. The pic is of Mecca, the holiest of holies.

Going to Mecca, called the haj, is the fifth pillar of the Islamic faith, which all Muslims are supposed to do once in their life. If they’ve got the health and the money for it, that is.

The other four pillars of Islam are professing belief in Allah and Mohammed, praying, charity (donating a fixed portion of your income to the needy), and fasting during the daylight hours of the month of Ramadan.

More bunny business

Yeah right. Palms actually grow so well here, the real ones. But this is way cooler.

New fast commuter rail line heading to Klang, Kuala Lumpur’s main port.

One of many. The big candles at the front are lit for the Spring Festival.

I levitated to get a better view

Big Baccy’s making its mark here too (a nasty black slimy one).

Europeans first colonised parts of Malaysia in 1511, when the Portuguese invaded and captured Malacca, in the south. The Dutch then ruled the whole country (including Malacca) for 180 years, from 1641 to 1825.

Hence the windmills?

A treaty between the Dutch and the British then resulted in the Poms taking it over from 1825 until 1957.

I had to crane my neck to see the top of this lot. Btw, is there a collective noun for a group of cranes? A reach of cranes? A flock?

Anyway, there were loads of them.

Stunningly beautiful

I was somewhere in the middle of nowhere when my breakfast decided it needed to be ousted immediately. Those Indian egg martabaks I had late morning were the culprits I reckon.

Oh no, I know this feeling. It’s not my fave. Urgent action required.

I happened to be stopped at the time, in the middle of nowhere, standing on the side of the road with my bike, and was chatting with Frankie. I told him I had to race, these matters are rather important. Luckily I found a servo with an underground bunker to contain the damage.

We’ll just stick with the Before shot.

Btw I’ve had more than my fair share of bad belly stories in my travelling lifetime, I can tell you. Some didn’t end as smoothly as this one.

If you’ve ever travelled to India you’ll know that one of the common topics of conversation amongst long term travellers relates to bowels. Sad but true. Stomach problems are really common if you’re there for a longer period of time. Eventually.

Once I took a bus from Siliguri to Darjeeling, in the NE of India. I was at the very back of the bus, and it was absolutely packed, with people, suitcases, boxes, cartons of fresh food, you name it, it was on that bus. Being right down the back, I found myself in a position where I basically couldn’t move.

Right from the start of the trip I realised my posterior Red Sea needed to part. But it was about a 7 hour bus trip, and there was no chance for me to go to the loo, as it would take me at least 10 minutes to get off the bus (all the boxes and luggage and people would have to be removed, a major mission for the whole bus), and we only stopped for less than that a couple of times. I thought I’d make it if I just hung on and thought of Mother England.

By the time we got to Darjeeling I was completely desperate. I felt like a balloon blown up as far as it could go, just one tiny puff away from fully exploding. But rather than go to the main bus station in the town, which would’ve had a toilet, the bus just dropped us off on some random road in the middle of nowhere, which they do sometimes (probably near the driver’s house).

I was frantic. It was dark. I ran down the street madly, and finally came to a tiny shop. I explained to the shop owner that I needed a toilet desperately and could I please please use his. He said “yes, backside,” and pointed down the laneway.

I found the toilet. I ripped my gear off and let it rip. It was a complete mess. I didn’t care, I’d made it, relatively unscathed.

I used the water in the small plastic bucket that was there, to start cleaning up (no loo paper used in those parts of the world). I turned on the tap to refill the bucket.

No water.

WTF??!!

Yeah, no water. The power was out, the pump wasn’t working. There was no water to clean up the filthy mess I’d made all over the place.

What could I do?

I had to leave it as it was. My butt and hands were clean, but that was all. I said thanks to the old shopkeeper, but was too embarrassed to tell him about the gracious gift I’d left him "backside."

Ah, the joys of travel.

Remains of exploded firecrackers. I’ve heard thousands and thousands of them already, every day, every night. Randomly.

Originally, firecrackers were exploded by the Chinese to scare off evil spirits, the original firecrackers were just pieces of bamboo thrown on the fire, the air inside the bamboo pockets explodes and makes a loud noise.

These days it seems like it’s done mainly for fun.

Trippy pavement

Kuala Selangor murals. This is a traditional scene of a guy with a kris, the ceremonial dagger.

More Indian tucker

At another certified kitchen

Watching the rain through le louvers

The main mosque at Kuala Selangor. Btw kuala means river mouth or river flat or a convergence of two rivers.

Many hotel rooms have the direction of Mecca on the ceiling, so you can face the right way when you pray.

Teluk Intan

Today’s ride was the longest one day ride I’ve ever done with a fully loaded bike, about 110 clicks. Riding that far in one day isn’t really my personal cup of Jasmine tea, but due to accommodation shortages and the fact that I wanted to be in a larger town for Chinese New Year’s Eve, I decided to fang it all the way to Teluk Intan, a larger town further north, and then east.

It was a hard day’s ride. It pretty much rained all morning, but not torrentially. I got to experience that thrill the next day and the day after, and the day after that.

But actually the rain’s ok, as long as my stuff doesn’t get trashed. It’s just water, after all. Luckily it’s not cold. The rain’s actually awesome, because it cools the place down bigtime.

Is that a Queenslander? Er, no, I’m in Malaysia, that’s right. It must be a Selangorer, given that I’m in the state of Selangor.

Is that a rotting water rat? Er, no, it’s a cat, poor thing.

Beautiful Tamil temple. Unfortunately I couldn’t go in, as I looked like a rotting water rat, and was dripping all over the place.

My current go-to drink. Horlicks with ice.

Amazing river system. I can just imagine the forest that it used to flow through. Now it’s all palm oil trees.

A brief foray onto the expressway. Rather comfortable I must say, a smooth-as-silk wide shoulder, and safe as houses. Bit boring though.

The buggers are taking over my world

The tropics takes no prisoners

It’s Chinese New Year’s Eve! Wow! It was incredible! And in this amazing town, Teluk Intan, guess what happened??

Pretty much nothing.

Major bummer. I looked everywhere. There were a few dragon dances. There was a constant stream of firecrackers and fireworks going off at random all over town. But that was it. There was no organised central celebration or anything in town. I needed to be in a more major city for that, and I wasn’t, unfortunately. Well, not yet anyway.

Dragon dance. In traditional Chinese culture, the dragon drives away evil spirits, and is an auspicious beast, symbolising wisdom and power.

Btw, did I say Teluk Intan was amazing?

If I did I was joking. It wasn’t. It really wasn’t that nice a town, actually. I mean, it was fine, it’s just that it had no real centre, no heart, it was all spread out along these wide roads, and each of them had little pockets of action, but nowhere really made me want to hang out that much.

After my super long ride I arrived at my hotel with legs that knew something major had happened. I parked up outside the hotel and slowly climbed the two sets of stairs to reception.

No one there.

So I went back down and unloaded my bike, and then ferried all my multiple bags panniers musical instruments backpack water bottles blah blah blah all the way up to reception, in 3 trips, up and down.

When I got up there the third time, with legs feeling a little like grass jelly, the receptionist told me in Malay that there were no rooms. I told her I had a booking. She was very apologetic, and said all the rooms were taken, it was very busy, and the mixup was the fault of the booking agency, not her.

She was lovely, and felt really bad about the whole thing. She actually had called me a couple of hours earlier, but when I answered in English she hung up. I assumed she was a telemarketer and didn’t call back.

Anyway, she managed to find me another hotel for around the same price. I was grateful, as everywhere was pretty much full. Luckily the other hotelier was a friend of hers.

I wasn’t rapturously happy about having to reload my bike though, and then ride another 5 km to the other hotel, but hey, it was no big deal. By the time I finally got there my legs were pretty sore.

The hotel was great, the owner a really friendly Chinese man. He couldn’t believe how I was travelling.

Pretty much every single person I meet is amazed by the fact that I’m riding around their country on a pushbike.

To me it’s a totally normal thing to do, but for them it’s something really out of the box, and they appear to be super impressed by it. When they see me or when I tell them what I’m up to, so many of them want to give me things to help me - food, drinks, etc. It’s actually really amazing.

And not just the wealthy ones either. Everyone.

People are just so overwhelmingly hospitable and generous here.

Sitiawan

So the next day I had another long slog, but not as long as the previous two days. The thing is, I was pretty tired right from the beginning.

And then the rain came.

It poured.

Torrentially.

There was no point trying to find a spot to shelter. There was hardly any shelter anyway, and it kept raining. Also, I needed to cover distance to get to my hotel before dark.

New palm oil plantation

Local fishing boats

This mosque looked like it’d lost its top

Ah, cool, I found it for them

Bustling brunch stop

Seafood on the menu

And more seafood. Ikan bakar (burnt fish), is very common all over Malaysia and Indonesia

And even more seafood. It was an incredible spread, if you’re into seafood. And I was the only customer at that time of day.

But actually, the veg spread, although small, was full of traditional local vegies that I remember from many days spent in southern Thailand over the years. The dark green one at the front that looks like pickled crocodile skin is actually a bitter melon (bitter being the operative word). The little purple thing is a peculiar flavoured Thai eggplant, and the two cucumber-like ones next to it are actually okra, which Indians use a lot too. The sambal (chilli sauce) at the top was super deadly.

Rain clouds over beautiful lush green grass, and a stunning lake system

So I arrived at my hotel looking and feeling like a drowned rat.

I waited outside for a while till the waterfalls cascading off my body slowed to drips, and then gingerly squished into reception, spreading water all over the floor.

The young woman at reception seemed to look right through me. I told her my name, she gave me a key and then disappeared without a trace.

Great.

She didn’t bother asking me for my passport (which they all normally do), or for a key deposit or anything. She wanted to get out of there, for some reason. I was happy.

I brought all my things upstairs (including my bike), and showered and dried off. It felt so good.

And off I went sniffing for food.

As usual, there was a marvellous selection.

Surprisingly, I chose Indian, including this delicious piece of halva, absolutely yummy, just like you get at Govinda’s, but with green sultanas in it. Of course, it was all deliciously sweet and ghee-ish, like they all are.

Flower power maker

Beautiful Tamil temple in town. It’s worth zooming in on some of those statues.

Lord Ganesha lording it over everyone

Major Announcement!!!

I’ve decided to give up cycling and get one of these instead. I’ve been looking around for an appropriate headpiece.

The day after the night before. There was lots of evidence of serious firecrackering in this town

Imagine the din over dinner

Too hungover to put the garbage in the bin

Smoked too much catnip last night. Even missed the last bus.

I went to this great dhaba (Indian food place) one night. It was packed, there was no table for me, so I asked a young Indian guy who was sitting alone if I could share his table.

He said “no, fuck off, you colonial pigdog.”

Nah, not really, he was the friendliest guy, we had a super interesting conversation.

His name is Wel.

Well, that’s his name.

His grandfather comes from Chennai (formerly Madras), the capital of Tamil Nadu, a state in the southeast of India. Tamil is the name of the people who come from there, nadu means “land” or “country” in the Dravidian or Tamil languages.

Wel is a truck driver, but he doesn’t look like one. He looks more like an IT sorta guy - thick-rimmed glasses, short hair, super clean and well dressed. Very polite too. And a conspiracy theorist as well, I might add.

Wel insisted on buying me dinner, so nice of him, and then invited me to the cinema. Coincidentally, that afternoon I’d walked into the same cinema that he wanted to go to, and asked them what was the best movie to see. They told me Thunivu was the movie to see. And, lo and behold, that’s what he wanted to see.

It was a date.

We went to this cinema

And watched this movie.

It was in Tamil, subtitled in English, and was made in Chennai, the home of the massive Tamil film industry, which is known as Kollywood. It’s true. The K comes from the main district in Chennai where the films are made, Kodambakkam.

Just in case you didn’t know, the Indian film industry is absolutely massive, way way bigger than Hollywood, in terms of films produced. India produces around 1800 films a year, Hollywood makes only around a piddly 250. In fact, the Bollywood film industry, just one part of the Indian film industry, based in Mumbai (ex-Bombay), itself produces more films than Hollywood.

Then there’s Kollywood, Tollywood (Telugu films from Bengal), Golllywood (Gujarati), Pollywood (Punjabi), Molllywood (Malayalam), Ollywood (Orissa) {and potential new nickname for me}, Jollywood (Assam, don’t ask me where the J comes from), Bhojiwood (Bhodjpuri language), Sandalwood (other South Indian films), and a few more with names way less funny.

If you believe all that, then you’re super smart, because it’s all actually true.

If I had made it up, of course I would’ve added Dollywood, Follywood, Lollywood, Gnarlywood, Sallywood, Sallywouldn’t, Volleywood, Volleyball, Wallywood, Where’sWallywood, Xollywood, Xylowood, X-raywood, Axolotylwood, Yollywood, Yo!wood, YaRastafariwood and Zollywood.

The film was the best! Absolutely action packed, not a spare second to even think about getting bored. The audience in the cinema (all Tamils) cheered their lungs out constantly, especially when the lead character, absolutely ridiculously too cool for school, did things like slay an entire army regiment single-handedly with his machine gun, whilst every single one of them had their own machine guns and were firing furiously at him, and he was just standing up, completely out in the open.

He never got hit by a bullet.

Actually, that’s not true. He did get hit a few times, but each time in the very next scene his wounds had mysteriously disappeared and he sported absolutely no evidence that he’d ever been hit.

So fantastic(al)!

Imitating imitation

I found a great Chinese vegetarian restaurant. The brown stuff is vegetarian goose. It tasted just how I imagine baked goose would taste. From memory.

Over the days the massive wooden candles burnt down, bit by bit

One day I visited a beautiful wat (Thai temple). It’s the first I’ve seen here so far.

Enlightenment live

I went to a cendol stall. Cendol is a coconut milk dessert, with rice jelly and sometimes sweetened red beans in it, and other bits and pieces. Line-ups are always a good sign.

This one looks decidedly unappetising, but was actually decidedly un-unappetising

Another beautiful temple near my hotel

I bought this from a supermarket. It wasn’t till I took it home that I realised it was laced with arak (rice liquor). It tasted disgusting, just like arak does.

I’ve had a number of these wrapped Mandarin mandarins, each given to me by generous people. The words on the wrapper mean “good flavour.” I must say, most of them are a little old and past their flavoursome best.

This is not mould. They come like this.

More road kill. I’ve seen so much in these wet tropics, the most common being large monitors (goannas), and snakes, all squished and smelly. I’ve actually disturbed a few large monitors close to the road, we’ve scared the bejesus out of each other.

Squirrel victim. Whenever a car would pass its tail would move in the breeze. At first I thought it was still alive, and I might have to give it mouth-to-snout. Poor bugger.

These type of terraced houses are super common in Malaysia.

Australian mangoes for $7/kg. Crazy.

New Year gift packs

Chicken bits in the supermarket

Barack Obama is popular in Malaysia and Indonesia, having lived in Jakarta as a boy.

Sitiawan fire station.

Mangosteen juice is delicious. I’m not big on the plastic lid though.

Great way to keep your sign from blowing around

Lotsa pink bits

Typing in Taiping

Mish came up with that pun the other day, while we were on the phone. Thanks Mish, you’re an honorary dad.

After a thoroughly enjoyable day of doing nothing much in Sitiawan I headed off to Taiping, another 80km north-ish, as I couldn’t find any accommodation whatsoever in between.

It was a beautiful ride, the most scenic of my Malaysia trip so far. Lots of rainforest, small towns and kampungs, wildlife (including monkeys) and beautiful hills.

Major river and port area

Small town on the way

Back in the forest

And back in the hills

Great old places

I found a guest house about 6km out of town, on the edge of the hills and forest.

This is my room, it’s the cutest little room ever, especially the soft fluffy retro carpet.

This is the view from my balcony. It seriously poured out there, pretty much every afternoon.

Abdul and I failing miserably at pretending to be happy. We were happy before the camera came out.

Abdul is a lovely guy, a good friend of the owner, Fuad.

I travelled to this large town, Taiping, many years ago, with a young Californian woman from Santa Cruz, Johnna, who was young, and travelling overseas for the very first time.

We had a great time, arriving right at dusk, as thousands of some type of blackbird descended on the town, chirping loudly as they searched for places to roost for the evening. After that beautiful display, we spent ages searching the whole town for some version of alcohol, I’m not really sure why we were so desperate. Actually in those days no one really drank in that place, so we eventually had to settle for some disgusting Chinese medicine that was made with an alcohol base.

It didn’t have much effect.

Today, Taiping is pretty unrecognisable from those days. The centre of town was so much smaller then.

One day Johnna said to me that she really liked my Australian accent. I said “thanks, I really like your accent too.”

She then replied, in a thick Californian accent, “Accent? I don’t have an accent!”

She was serious. She really believed that. She told me that in the US she was not regarded as having an accent.

Well well well.

I guess the US is the centre of the world, right?

I like Taiping. It’s set right in the hills, in the state of Perak, a state that houses a number of national parks, and a number of really diverse landscape and vegetation types, from coastal floodplains and beaches to undisturbed tropical jungles and peaks.

The town is big enough to have lots of interesting things to see. And, of course, places to eat.

It’s so nice to be here. Fuad is the friendliest guy ever. Yesterday afternoon it rained torrentially for a couple of hours, an incredible amount of water fell out of the sky. Today it’s just started to do the same, at about the same time of day.

Fuad was so concerned that I couldn’t go out for food last night that he went out to get me food himself, in his car - unbeknown to me. But while he was gone there was a break in the rain and I zipped out myself and ate out.

He’s so sweet, he just left the food anyway and told me to help myself whenever I want.

First I had to see to logistics. My bike was the first task. Both my front and back brakes weren’t working much at all, and really needed fixing. I found a bike shop.

They cleaned the grit from my chain and gears while they were at it. It wasn’t pretty.

All this came from my chain and gears

Remains of one brake pad, completely worn. All those hills with a heavy loaded bike made short work of those.

I ate here a few times.

Amazing vegie tofu egg spread, served on a banana leaf.

One day they ran out of banana leaves, so served the meal on a banana leaf patterned plate. I just love it. Unabashed kitsch.

Temple ceramics

Wax temple lamps

Great that gambling’s alive and well here too. So great for people’s lives, families, financial situations, self esteem.

Two little cats were regular guests in the homestay kitchen.

Taiping burbs

Pumpkin and red bean cake. Unbelievably good.

The local kampung night markets happen every Thursday night. This guy is making apam balik, the Malaysian version of a sweet rice flour peanutty pancake, that’s also popular in Indonesia. 3 pancakes for 50c.

All sorts of sweet drinks and desserts. Occasional drops of food colouring may have been used.

Petai, or bitter beans, taste a little like shiitake mushrooms

Catfish and rays

Taman Tasik Taiping (Taiping Lake Gardens)

One day I rode and walked through this beautiful large garden and lake area on the edge of town. The area was originally a tin mine site, but began to be rehabilitated as a garden way back in 1880. It was the first public garden in Malaysia, and is really beautiful.

There are ten lakes in the area, and one of the features of the park are the “rain trees,” beautiful rainforest trees that are prolific in the area.

Gorgeous rain tree

And one of its roots

The endless hills of Perak

Some of the top heavy rain trees have been propped up by supports

A bunch of Uni grads were out taking pics

Your guess is as good as mine

Bukit Larut

This is a beautiful forest reserve just out of town. I rode to the gate and hiked up, a really strenuous 10km hike that pretty much went straight up, a climb of around 1000m over that distance. I sweated a bucket, as usual, but it was great to use some extra hiking muscles instead of just cycling ones.

I left after lunch, so there was hardly anyone there at all, I basically had the whole magnificent place to myself.

I noticed that of the very few walkers that were there, pretty much all of them were Chinese. No Malays or Indians. They really don’t have a hiking culture.

Macaques play vicious sometimes

Major erosion on the old road, which is now permanently closed

Just in case I was wondering where I was.

Every now and then there were big views of Taiping, and the ocean in the background. That’s the Malacca Strait, if you crossed that you’d get to Sumatra.

About half way down it absolutely poured buckets. I took off my flimsy sandals and walked barefoot, it was way too slippery with them on. I got drenched, despite having an umbrella. The rain was so strong it actually dripped through my brolly. I sorta love that. When it’s not cold, that is.

And it cooled me off.

Back at the entrance.

Parit Buntar

So after a solid rest at Taiping I hit the road again, heading north.

Rice at last! A break from the palm oil.

More beautiful mosques

I stayed in a really cool hotel in a town called Parit Buntar, right next to a food hawker place and some great eating houses and temples.

My ritzy hotel lobby

This was right next to my hotel. The OK Food Centre, sponsored by Tiger Beer. Tiger is originally a Singaporean beer, and is now half owned by Heineken.

I had a very fishy laksa (no coconut milk in the laksas around here), and wished there was some entertainment on the LOVE stage.

Pink rice flour bread/dumplings

Looking ominous

There was a magnificently beautiful Chinese temple around the corner.

Penang

Ah, it’s just so good to be here. I’m sitting in an amazing vegetarian Indian restaurant called Woodlands, right in the  heart of Little India.

Little India’s pretty big here. It’s a whole district, walking through here is really like being in India, minus the hassle, and minus the ridiculously dirt cheap prices. It’s still absolutely super cheap though. My lunch meal and fresh almond juice will cost me around $5 (AUD).

For this

But of course it depends where you go. There’s a lot of tourists here, the most I’ve seen since I was in Ubud a couple of long months ago.

So that means plenty of “expensive” places to eat and drink too. I just sat in a café where they were charging MR21 ($7) for a small smoothie, or the same for a croissant. Just cos the café has the vibe, and because there’s a bunch of European, American and Australian tourists, here for short holidays, who are quite happy to pay those prices.

A mango lassi here at Woodlands, a big one, is $2.

That's this place in a nutshell. You can be sitting in India listening to ragas one minute, and then drinking good coffee and hoeing into a muffin in a ritzy cafe the next.

I absolutely love this city, Georgetown. It’s the capital of Penang, a large-ish island off the NW coast of Penisular Malaysia.

My little bromance with it started almost thirty years ago. And yesterday, as I cycled over the really long bridge that connects it to the mainland, I could hardly recognise the skyline. There’s so much more high rise, and tall apartments and hotels now dominate the view. I hardly remember any from those days.

It was a pretty tough ride, the constant traffic was intense, and the cars trucks and motorbikes were travelling fast. There were a lot of highway overpasses, bridges, major lane changing difficulties.

This is the long bridge from the mainland to Penang Island. It looks mild, but it was a bit stressful, especially in the middle high bit, where the road narrowed considerably. Normally I’d throw my bike on the passenger ferry and have a very chilled crossing, but the ferry’s closed to 2-wheeled vehicles at the moment while they do an upgrade.

This is the bridge from the Penang side.

After crossing the bridge I got stuck on the highway for a couple of clicks because it was literally too dangerous and impossible to change lanes. But I’m not in a hurry, eventually I got back on track.

I slowly made my way to the old town, where my hotel is, and, incredibly, this area feels like it’s hardly changed in all these years. The old town is UNESCO World Heritage listed, so any development that harms the character and aesthetic of the place is prohibited. So the old vibe of the place lives on, it’s amazing.

It’s a ramshackle maze of streets and laneways full of interesting old buildings, temples, businesses, restaurants and cafés, with loads of street art, little markets, food stalls, and all sorts of interesting things. So much character in this place.

Again, it’s a healthy mix of Chinese Indian and Malay culture, accompanied by all the different places of worship, eateries, shops, businesses and residences that are unique to each of those groups.

It’s really an amazingly fun place to explore, super photogenic, with an old school aesthetic that seems to be alive and well.

Here’s a bit of a taster of the vibe of the place:

The China vibe:

The Malay vibe:

Boy mosque

Girl mosque

Big Little India:

Packed delicious vegetarian eatery. One of many.

My hotel

So much street action

Stickin Around

I like it so much here in Georgetown I’ve decided to stay longer. It's sooo good.

Unexpectedly getting that 90 day Malaysian visa means I have plenty of time to spare.

I’d also like to maybe visit some other places here in the north before I cross the border into Southern Thailand.

I’ve discovered that I may be able to pick up a 90 day Thai visa at the consulate here in Georgetown, which would be super helpful for me, as I plan on being in Thailand for awhile, probably.

Btw, I've gotta tell you something.

Something’s changed.

And it changed without me really noticing it. It sorta crept up on me.

I feel different.

I no longer feel like I’m travelling around Asia.

I feel like I’m living in Asia.

It may sound like a moot point to you, given that I'm still travelling. But for me it’s quite different.

I feel like I’ve really settled back in to the whole lifestyle here again, after all those years of living in Oz.

It’s familiar here, it’s comfortable, I sorta know how to do what I have to do pretty easily. I don’t really miss much from Oz, materially. Well not yet anyway.

Of course I miss my friends and family sometimes, but they’re only a call or message away, not like the pre-internet days.

Or a potential Asia-visit away.

These days I don’t have the desire to see everything, go everywhere, do everything here. Well, not like when I was a younger traveller.

When I come to a new place now I don’t need to see all the sights. Sure, I’ll see the ones that interest me, but I’ll always weigh it up with how I’m feeling at a particular time.

It’s a really good feeling. I’m into being here and soaking up the vibe and meeting people and going with the flow. Definitely not ticking boxes. I’ve failed at that one, there’s far far too many of them.

So, next up in my adventure chronicle from my new home, you'll see loads of cool stuff from here in Penang, there's a lot of it, as well as interesting things from some other new places in northern Malaysia.

Thaipusam is coming up here, a big Hindu religious festival. They're expecting 1.2 million worshippers. It's gonna be a blast!❤️