All i wanted to do this morning was curl up and cry. I was feeling very vulnerable after the events of last night. I couldn’t believe that it had happened, at the end of the one of my favourite days of the trip so far as well. It was so much of a shock and it really knocked my confidence. I am however very stubborn (stop laughing people at home!) and refuse to let this incident get the better of me and this adventure. So i went down for breakfast with the very cheery and enthusiastic Chinese girls that are staying there too. Their good humour was infectious and it buoyed me for the day ahead.
I was under strict instructions to be back by 4pm as well for the afternoon tea that the hotel owner was hosting for us. I don’t want to miss out on more Nonya treats, so planned a day close to the hotel to get me on my feet again. Actually being out and about on my own was another story, i was hyper alert and jumpy and intermittently crying for no apparent reason. Which is not like me at all, the fact that it’s not like me was making me even more cross and anxious. Every man that looked vaguely like that guy was making me jump out of my skin, i felt sorry for one guy that walked towards me in a 5 foot walkway and i visibly winced when he caught me unawares. There was a lot of stopping and starting as i tried to regain my composure each time. There was also quite a lot coaxing & coaching from some very kind and patient friends back home. I was doing what i needed to do to get my independence back, but it was much harder than i thought it would be.
I powered through and did a very slow loop of The Blue (Cheong Fatt Tze) Mansion, Little Penang Market, a harbour side stroll, Fort Cornwallis, The Victoria Monument before heading back to the hotel for Afternoon tea.
Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion, Penang
The Blue Mansion was absolutely stunning, it was built by an incredibly wealthy Baba Nyonya man called Cheong Fatt Tze for his seventh and apparently favourite wife. It was lived in by the family for several generations then left to go to rack and ruin while being let to various tenants before being refurbished very recently. It’s well worth the wait for one of the scheduled tours. The guides are so knowledgable and enthusiastic about what they do. The lady that did mine had written a book about the house and it’s former owners so knew the whole story inside out. Including all sorts of fun anecdotes about the inhabitants as well as things about the culture embellished from her own experience of growing up in Penang as well. Fascinating little snippets like the Feng Shui that was considered in the design & build of the mansion itself. Dictating it’s position relevant to the mountains and water as well as how water is managed within the house. It was really interesting and engaging, as well as the beauty of the house itself. It has elements of Chinese architecture as well as British Victorian tweaks, such as Glaswegian steel pillars and and coving that looks similar to those that can be found at Cake Towers!
The house is in the UNESCO listed zone and has won several awards for it’s stature and preservation including UNESCO’s
Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion, Penang
Most Excellent Project Asia Pacific Heritage Awards in 2000 and Lonely Planet ranked it one of the best mansions in the world (whatever weight that carries!) After a mesmerising walk around the house i popped around the corner to Little Penang Market that happens on the last Sunday of every month on Penang street up across the road from the Eastern & Oriental hotel. It’s a celebration of all things created and designed on Penang Island. It was here that i scored my very first
taste of the much maligned Durian fruit in a piece of cake. Not something that i will be doing again in a hurry! It was awful, and such a horrid aftertaste. I also had the joy of picking up my very first Christmas decoration for my travels so i now have a lowly magnet, nothing compared to the 4 Christmas trees and assorted lights that adorned Cake Towers last year. I must work on that in the next few
This is currently Christmas…
weeks! As i don’t feel Christmassy in the slightest at the moment. There was an array of local food on offer at the market, as well as entertainment from local international schools singing and dancing etc. I picked up a very pretty drawing of a house from Lorong Love in Georgetown, created by a very talented and modest architect called Kate who does these watercolours in her spare time. It will have pride of place on the travel wall in the homestead when i get there.
Next stop was a walk round to the Esplanade by the harbour where i picked up
Harbourside walk in Georgetown, Penang
some iced watermelon juice and people watched the coach loads of Chinese tourists that had just arrived taking some nice natural shots by the seaside…
Fort Cornwallis was next on the list. A bit of a folly build by all accounts as it was never actually used to defend Penang and turned into a very expensive
The famous Sri Rambai cannon at Port Cornwallis
meeting venue hundreds of years ago. It’s now being redeveloped to tell the story of Penang and it’s melting pot of cultures, so i would be interested to see what thats like in a few months time. There are various cannons on display including one that has mystical powers called Sri Rambai, according to folklore it mysteriously resurfaced from a sunken ship many years after being lost at sea. It’s said to have powers to increase fertility, bodes well for the future! ha ha
The Victoria monument is right next door to Fort Cornwallis and was built by a wealthy Penang businessman to celebrate the diamond jubilee of Queen Victoria. Followed by
Queen Victoria Clock tower, Penang
some of the ubiquitous street art on the way. The iron work pieces are being updated constantly and have really great humour i particularly liked the docks one close by to where the huge cruise ships off load and pick up their tenders.
I hurried back for Afternoon tea, tired emotionally and physically from being out in the sun. This is the most amount of sun this cake lady has ever had in her life time and my English Rose skin won’t thank me for it if i’m out for too long. So i got back early to settle in for tea. And what a delight it was. We were treated to a full on Nyonya afternoon tea. Which included Black Ceylon tea, which is surprisingly fruity, and never having been an English tea drinker myself have quickly developed a taste for. I actually found the milky tea that i was served the other day quite revolting, not all English people like tea that way you know. i’m clearly not a “normal” English person!
The tea was accompanied by an assortment of nyonya cakes and sweet treats or “kuih” which were very similar to some of the cakes the Chinese girls get at home but nothing like
Nyonya Afternoon tea in Georgetown Penang
anything i have ever seen in a British afternoon tea. We had potato samosas (slight Indian influence) Kuih Kochi, Kuih Talam, Kuih Taitai and Kuih Onde-onde. They are an acquired taste as the texture is quite smooth, but made of all sorts of ingredients that you can only get locally. The Kuih kochi for example is made from a flour that’s ground from a plant that only grows in Penang. My favourite was the Kuih Kochi that had toasted coconut on the inside. Such a kind and generous treat for a Sunday afternoon.
It was after tea that i plucked up the courage to tell the hotel owner what had happened last night. It was getting close to evening and i was worried about going out to get dinner
My favourite nyonya afternoon tea treats!
in the dark. He was very kind, listening to what happened and offering to go and get me some food from a friends house. You don’t get that at chain hotels. He did ask if i wanted to go out with some of his friends to a local coffee shop with his partner. But it was all a bit too much and i had been crying too much to look respectable soI retired to my room early to recharge and have a bit of FaceTime with Europe. The perfect tonic to a very trying day.
A shattered and emotional cake lady signing off for some sleep
Baci a tutti
x x x x
