Clan Jetties and more street art.

Wednesday 24^th Feb 2016.

The evil demon that inhabited my body during the night had taken it’s leave by mid morning and I am left to ponder at which point yesterday I adopted it. I’m thinking lunch………….. 

The Clan Jetties seem like an interesting place to visit, they’re 6 jetties where the early Chinese settlers in Penang took up residence and then the plan is to venture up Armenian Street where we’re going to check out some of the street art that George Town is famous for. We head over to the bus stop that the traffic heading towards the Jetty travels along and as it’s hot, we jump on the first bus that comes along. Doesn’t really matter if it’s right or not, we’ve got the tourist bus pass. Well, of course it’s not the right bus……. It does a blocky and heads back past our hotel and all the way to Komtar, the shopping centre and bus terminal. All roads lead to Komtar! With more helpful locals, we’re soon on the right bus and after a little more sightseeing, we arrive at the Jetty. This is a broad term for the place where the car and passenger ferry arrives from the mainland, cruise ships dock and buses use as another hub. It’s a large area.

The first jetty we come to is the Lim Jetty, quiet, then Chew Jetty, very commercialized, every house had a little stand selling stuff out the front. Then Lee Jetty, looking like where the richer ones live, or put more money into their infrastructure. All had a/c and looked very comfy. Then took a stroll along Lebuh Armenian, a narrower and quieter area with more street art. Walked past a hawker stall where I could see a sign for fried oysters, another local iconic dish that I’d like to try, but not hungry so keep walking. 

The Penang base of Sun Yat Sen is just up the road, and as we are always willing to pay a small price for a cool break and a clean toilet, we pay our 5MYR each and go in and find to our surprise, there’s complimentary cool drinks included. Now, I’ve heard the name, but didn’t really know much about the man or what he did, but man o man, did we learn all that we wanted to know and more. We got talking to the man who took our admission fee and then we couldn’t get away!! But most of it was interesting and I was sitting in the cool, so what the heck! Sun Yat Sen was born in China in 1866 and spent some of his youth in Hawai’i where he absorbed many Christian ideals. For Sun Yat-sen, becoming Christian was a symbol of his embrace of "modern," or Western, knowledge and ideas. It was a revolutionary statement at a time when the Qing Dynasty was trying desperately to fend off westernization. He gave up his medical practice to contribute to the transformation of China into a western style constitutional power. Long story short, he became the ‘Father of Modern China’, having used the shophouse in Penang to hold the meeting where the Canton Uprising of 1911 was planned, leading to China becoming a republic in 1912.

After we extracted ourselves and went back out in the heat, we walked back the way we came until we came to Lebuh Cannon (Cannon Square) to search for more street art. Then being relatively close to another couple of fabric shops we ( I ) had to go for a look. Boon Wah at 59-61 Lebuh Campbell had some nice fabrics but nothing I loved, same for FA Karim a bit further down the road, and same for another one across the street. One was a bit pricey, but I can’t remember now which one. So I’m left a bit disappointed by the fabric shopping this trip.

We didn’t really eat lunch because we weren’t hungry but we had worked up a thirst and even though we’d been keeping an eye out, we couldn’t find anywhere that sold beer. Then we realised we were in a Muslim area!! Keep on walkin!! We turned a corner, and I swear I’m not making this up, there was a Carlsberg sign and above it, the name of the hawker stall – Ho Ping!! Seriously, I couldn’t make that up! So, there we were, hoping that the sign was true, and it was!! Cold beer never tasted so good! 

Why on earth we decided to walk home I’ll never know, I think street art had something to do with it, but we walked home. We found another little quiet backwater area, not that far from home, around Lorong Stewart and Love Lane. Bit of a backpacker area too we noticed.

We’ve been upstairs to the Premier Lounge every afternoon for afternoon tea since we got here and today was no exception. It’s been very nice, and we’ve never done anything like it anywhere we’ve stayed. We are really being a bit spoilt! 

Dinner – back to Sup Hameed around the corner. Beef Murtabak, fried chicken and 2 lime juices 12.80 MYR.