Our main reason for stopping off in Malaysia was to get our 60 day visas for Indonesia in Penang, but of course the fact that that same place is rated as a foodie heaven might also have had something to do with our decision. And with only 8 days in the country we wasted no time in heading straight from the airport to get on a night bus.
Penang is a pretty small island off the northwest coast of Malaysia and is a popular tourist spot, particularly because it's known as the "food paradise" of Malaysia. Obviously we needed no further encouragement. Georgetown is the capital and where most of the action is, and apart from the food scene a lot of people are attracted there for the colonial buildings and the historical area in the UNESCO Heritage Zone. There's also some pretty cool graffiti in this area, and for that alone it's worth a walk around the town.
Our first order of business was applying for our Indonesian visas. We'd read that Penang was the only place in Malaysia that still issued 60 day visas, but we weren't sure if they made it easy or not. As it turned out, we had absolutely nothing to worry about - it was the easiest, most hassle-free visa experience we've ever encountered, with the nicest woman we've ever dealt with. After telling us not to bother with several things she told us to come and pick them up the following morning. No shit, it was that easy. So with that task completed we were free to relax and gorge ourselves on the famous food on offer.
There are a few different night markets to try out and other famous local spots dotted around, so we tried our best to sample food from as many places as possible. One of the local favourites is a noodle dish called char koay teow, which is quite similar to pad thai and pretty tasty. We also tried noodle soups; pork satay sticks; a couple of different kinds of savoury pancakes; the best pork buns ever; a local dessert called ABC which was a unique mixture of shaved ice with jelly, fruit, beans, rose water and condensed milk; lunchtime buffets of assorted rice, meat and veges; and the best burger we've had in a long time. And while Malaysia isn't pretty expensive for Asia, most of the food we tried was all very reasonably priced. So you really can eat to your heart's content without breaking the bank. This, of course, made us very happy. What also made us happy was drinking cheap beers at a local bar Kurt had read about, so we were more than happy to share this important information with people we'd met on our bus so we could all get drunk together for as cheap as possible. It's all about the good things in life.
After 4 days in Penang we decided we should probably go and check out Kuala Lumpur. We're not always fans of the big capital cities, as they can often be dirty, sprawling, polluted shitholes. KL wasn't dirty, in fact it was actually quite clean (the parts we saw anyway), but we still didn't need more than the 3 days we had there. And one of those days was spent entirely at the pub watching both of our rugby games. We did take a walk over to check out the Petronas twin towers (we didn't bother paying the high price to go up them) and we feasted some more in Chinatown, but that was about it. Oh, and we also went to a big Dive Expo that was conveniently in town the day we arrived, so we took advantage of this to buy some necessary diving equipment that Kurt in particular needed for his dive master course.
With only 8 days in the country we didn't want to spread ourselves too thin and try and see too much, so splitting our time between Penang and Kuala Lumpur worked out well for us. Perhaps we'll head back one day to check out more places in the north like Langkawi and the Perhentian Islands, but for now our brief time in Malaysia was up. Time to go and utilise our 60 day visas in another island archipelago - Indonesia.
Penang is a pretty small island off the northwest coast of Malaysia and is a popular tourist spot, particularly because it's known as the "food paradise" of Malaysia. Obviously we needed no further encouragement. Georgetown is the capital and where most of the action is, and apart from the food scene a lot of people are attracted there for the colonial buildings and the historical area in the UNESCO Heritage Zone. There's also some pretty cool graffiti in this area, and for that alone it's worth a walk around the town.
Our first order of business was applying for our Indonesian visas. We'd read that Penang was the only place in Malaysia that still issued 60 day visas, but we weren't sure if they made it easy or not. As it turned out, we had absolutely nothing to worry about - it was the easiest, most hassle-free visa experience we've ever encountered, with the nicest woman we've ever dealt with. After telling us not to bother with several things she told us to come and pick them up the following morning. No shit, it was that easy. So with that task completed we were free to relax and gorge ourselves on the famous food on offer.
There are a few different night markets to try out and other famous local spots dotted around, so we tried our best to sample food from as many places as possible. One of the local favourites is a noodle dish called char koay teow, which is quite similar to pad thai and pretty tasty. We also tried noodle soups; pork satay sticks; a couple of different kinds of savoury pancakes; the best pork buns ever; a local dessert called ABC which was a unique mixture of shaved ice with jelly, fruit, beans, rose water and condensed milk; lunchtime buffets of assorted rice, meat and veges; and the best burger we've had in a long time. And while Malaysia isn't pretty expensive for Asia, most of the food we tried was all very reasonably priced. So you really can eat to your heart's content without breaking the bank. This, of course, made us very happy. What also made us happy was drinking cheap beers at a local bar Kurt had read about, so we were more than happy to share this important information with people we'd met on our bus so we could all get drunk together for as cheap as possible. It's all about the good things in life.
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| ABC dessert - it tastes better than it looks |
After 4 days in Penang we decided we should probably go and check out Kuala Lumpur. We're not always fans of the big capital cities, as they can often be dirty, sprawling, polluted shitholes. KL wasn't dirty, in fact it was actually quite clean (the parts we saw anyway), but we still didn't need more than the 3 days we had there. And one of those days was spent entirely at the pub watching both of our rugby games. We did take a walk over to check out the Petronas twin towers (we didn't bother paying the high price to go up them) and we feasted some more in Chinatown, but that was about it. Oh, and we also went to a big Dive Expo that was conveniently in town the day we arrived, so we took advantage of this to buy some necessary diving equipment that Kurt in particular needed for his dive master course.
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| Simple but tasty - cheese roti and ice tea |
With only 8 days in the country we didn't want to spread ourselves too thin and try and see too much, so splitting our time between Penang and Kuala Lumpur worked out well for us. Perhaps we'll head back one day to check out more places in the north like Langkawi and the Perhentian Islands, but for now our brief time in Malaysia was up. Time to go and utilise our 60 day visas in another island archipelago - Indonesia.
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