Rickshaws + Yam Cha = China Town!

Goodbye green hills..hello sun and sea!! After a 6 hour bus ride and a ferry crossing I arrived on the island of Palau Penang, which is on the western coast of Malaysia. I was thinking of giving the place a miss and moving on to another island nearby right away, but i changed my mind and i'm glad about that. The main town on this island is mostly a China-town...i thought it would be a tacky China-town but actually i was surprised to find that it's very Beijing style. After a 30min walk from the pier i located one of the hostels recommended on my guide book... and as i peeped through the door to check if they had any available rooms i was immediately greeted by a old,toothless chinese man who said ''Hellooooooooooo'' with a huge toothless smile. I was instantly charmed. He said ''my name is lo.. not high but lo!'' hahahaha ok it's lame but you just had to hear him say it! So adorable! :-)

The hostel is actually like a huge old chinese house transformed into a hostel... it has a huge wooden door with a ledge so you have to step over it when you walk in, and really high ceilings and wooden floorboards. Its really authentic. Anyway the old chinese man Lo was trying to guess where i am from and when i said it is a small island in the Mediterranean he said ''aaaah malta!'' and told me that somebody from Malta had visited his hostel about 1 year ago. The reception desk had a glass top beneath which were paper notes from various countries, so i gave him a Lm2 note for the collection and he was over the moon and found place for it with the others. I'm sure if any other maltese walk in there in the future they will be pretty surprised to see it there!

So today I had a bit of a sleep in and then wandered the streets. The main town is quite small so you can get around easily on foot. I was walking through the streets taking some pictures and just enjoying the bustling streets when an old chinese man on a bicycle stopped to speak to me. He asked me where i was going and told me to be careful and always take care of my bag and never take a taxi alone. Then he shook my hand and told me his name and waved and rode away! Ha... so sweet! I walked another block and heard someone calling out to me. It was the same chinese man waving to me from a street stall on the opposite side of the street. I crossed and he told me to sit with him and ordered a glass of tea with ice and chatted with me for a while, telling me about his family and his life and asking about mine. We talked for about half an hour and it was so interesting. Then he shook my hand and got on his rickety-rackety bike and rode away! hahahahaha You just had to see him... this frail 80yr old man with 1 tooth left riding on a bike (yes theyre all toothless it seems!) :-P

After that i got a bus to the centre of the island where there is a tram that takes you up to the highest point on the island where there are spectacular views and some very crazy monkeys too. The plan was to walk to these botanic gardens but because its holiday season there were queues for the tram and i got up there too late. On the way back istopped for some dinner at this chinese stall and the food was so delicious! I think i will go back tomorrow and have some 'yam cha' which are these steamed buns with various fillings. They eat them at any time of day (kind of like our pastizzi) :-P

Tomorrow i'm heading for a beach in the north of the island, because the one near this town is actually like a port so its not good for swimming. Think about me... i'll be working on my tan! ;-) XXX