"Penang" Penang by tayloretc

Let me qualify “paradise” first. I was booked into the (formerly Ferringhi Beach Hotel, now known as the) Hydro Majestic Hotel. This is a tourist resort close to, but not quite in, one of the major tourist resort destinations in southeast Asia: Ferringhi Batu*. I don’t really know what to do at resorts. Hydro Majestic doesn’t boast the resort beach activities of the resorts in Ferringhi Batu proper, but I wasn’t impressed by those other resort beach activities anyway: too-thin horses available for an expensive trot up and down the beach; a few minutes of parasailing; overpriced reflexology and massage. (I was offered massage+ for a little extra.)

Resorts don’t do it for me. So. What else is there to do on Penang?

Ferringhi Batu

Well, you’ll find all levels of shopping, and restaurants absolutely everywhere. Some of the combinations are interesting (e.g., a restaurant serving both Arab [halal] and Italian, or a Tamilian hawker who specializes in English breakfasts). Those beach resort activities mentioned above and every possible water sport - jet skis, kayaks, sport fishing, etc. - are all available up and down the beach area. Even off-season the place was packed, mostly Australians and Arabs. There’s definitely a party atmosphere, and it seemed to be a hard-drinking crowd. There’s a night market that draws everyone onto the streets until late.

One of the famous five-foot ways

I ended up in Georgetown by accident; I got on the wrong shuttle. It turned out fortuitous, and interesting in a couple of ways. One, I learned that the “five-foot-way” area from the guidebooks goes on for blocks and blocks (and blocks), and there’s some very good food in unlikely places, best found by wandering. Two, I found an “interesting things” shop where the owner is a curious and enthusiastic collector who sells what he doesn’t have room to keep for himself. Three, I found out that a lot of the stores in the five-foot-way areas are closed due to lack of business, and the closures are across the board: from textiles to jewelry to electronics to home goods and beyond. I asked a few people, and they all said more or less that since the mid-80s (and something to do with rent control) shops have been closing regularly and no new tenants are coming in. I saw some beautiful old buildings that I was told hadn’t been occupied for 25 years (did I want to buy? Only RM25,000…).

If I had the money, maybe. They really are beautiful old buildings, and it’s a shame to leave them empty. It will be more of a shame when they’re torn down to build more profitable buildings.

Mind you, this is a town where luxury high-rise condominiums and huge shopping malls are being built at an alarming rate. Actually, the construction stretches from Georgetown to just past Ferringhi Batu, and includes some huge developed communities built around spa facilities. This complete lack of alignment (and priorities) made me sad.**

Off a deserted beach on the west coast

Being saddened, and having no input, say, or particularly vested interest in the future of Penang, I rented a motorbike, turned west for a bit, then south for a long bit, and left Georgetown and the tourists and the planned spa communities behind. You can do this on Penang and still go back to the tourist area to sleep, because Penang isn’t very big; and from what I can tell, the tourists and the planned-community residents don’t often leave their designated areas.

I can’t even describe the difference. A few kilometers past the last of the tourist sites (the Butterfly Farm and Teluk Bahang Recreational Forest, or, for the more hardy few, the Tropical Fruit Farm) and you’re on a narrow road winding sharply through jungle interspersed with a few farms (which are posted, but you can’t see); passing the odd fruit stand and coffee stop under a tarp (or net to catch ripe durian fruit). By the time you reach Balik Pulau, about 25 km from Ferringhi Batu, a tourist is a curiosity. Further south, the landscape is flatter, and the roads worse, but the beaches are spectacular and you’re pretty much the only one there. (And I got the distinct impression that a middle-aged white woman wrecking near-havoc on a motorbike would keep any town along the way amused for days.)

There isn’t much west and south of the tourist areas. (Or, there wasn’t much as of July, 2006.) For me, that makes the west and south of Penang paradise. Tropical beaches rising sharply into jungle, astoundingly kind and generous people (even when they’re amused at you for being on a motorbike, or cursing you for doing it badly), truly beautiful and strange flora and fauna. And the food at those roadside stands…

*“Ferengi” means “foreigner” in Hindi. Dunno whether there’s a connection, but I’m thinking there must be.

**I learned later that not all of these buildings are luxury. The Malaysian government has decreed that by 2010 there won’t be any squatters, so many of the high-rise buildings are low-income housing. They all look the same from the outside now, but I wonder what the difference will be in 10 years.