Pinang Temple Tour

  Georgetown, Malaysia
Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Buddhist Temple 01

Ben (taxi driver) arrived on time and waited while Toni made copies of our travel vouchers. 
Off to Kek Lok Si Buddhist temple.

Wow, wow, wow!

Buddhist Temple 02

How beautiful this temple is on top of one of the hills in Penang.  The temple overlooks Georgetown and the sea.  The architecture and Buddhist music, calmness, incense burning and statues are a sight not to be missed.

Kitty at Buddhist Temple

We met a cute kitty that lives at the temple - and I called him Kek Lok Si.  We then paid RM2 to walk up to a higher section of the temple.  Worth it!  It was so serene and calm I started to cry.  I filmed a bit and Mom & Toni took many photos.  We spotted a sign that stated that you would get fined RM200 if picked a flower - Good!

Goddess of Mercy

We went to the other side of the temple where we paid some money to go up their inclined lift // which took us up past the Buddhist College and Dormitories to more temple rooms and the Goddess of Mercy Statue - She is very very tall.  It started to rain - I didn't care It was a welcome 'respite' - one of Toni's wonderful sayings on this trip. They were restoring the Goddess and columns around her so we had to take pictures and film of her with the scaffolding - but she was too wonderful no too.  Mom & Toni called me as we were on a deadline to see all the temples - and as I was leaving I saw large statues of all the animals in the Chinese horoscope.  I had to take pictures of them but only managed a few.  I did manage to grab a clipping of the Monkey (my chinese sign).

HIndu Temple

All 'Zenned' out and 2 hours later we emerged from Kek Lok Si and Ben drove us into Georgetown where he stopped at a Hindu temple.  They were offering a Full Moon Lunch to all who entered.  We joined the people and sat on the floor and ate a vegetarian meal and rice with our hands.  Took some pictures and footage of the goddesses and gods and left 15 minutes later.

Poor man's Temple

Ben drove us to Ten Kong Than Temple (Chinese temple) where the people were very actively and sincerely worshiping.  This temple came across as a poor man's church.  It was rather grubby yet the exterior architecture was very interesting.  They also had large incense sticks burning outside.  These were so big that it looked as if they could burn for a whole day or even a week.

Kong's memorial

Next Ben drove us to Khoo Kongsi which is a clan temple or place of worship.  This temple was beautifully decorated in the most amazing gold ornaments with read paint and fabric nearly everywhere.  We entered the Museum on the side of the temple and there we found records of the heritage of the Khoo and Kong family trees dating back to 400BC.  Very interesting journey into history.  I pointed out the top dude on the Kong family tree to Mom & Toni and said that that must have been 'King Kong" (hee, hee).

The Chinese architecture in Pinang is very obvious.  What we discovered though is that many of the temples have a combination of Chinese and Hindu carvings and statues together within their design.

Leaning Goddess

The next stop was a the Thai Temple where there was a sleeping/leaning female Buddha.  SheHe wasn't the leaning Buddha I was expecting (which apparently is in Thailand) but she was a sight to see.  We soon realised that we were within a place of burial of ashes in urns.  Quite humbled by this I became quite in respect.  Along the sides of the temple were Buddhas representing each of the Chinese star signs.  Mine had a hand expression that I use quite frequently which gave me a sense of acknowledgement within myself.

Superman

As we turned the corner around the back of the leaning Buddha we once again saw people actively and sincerely praying/worshipping the Divas, each for a specific need in their lives.  One looked like a drag queen of Mary Magdeline and another looked like he was in a chinese superman costume.

Burmian Buddha

Across the road was the Burmese Temple - this was again a very serene temple.  There were many candles burning with family names and people's names next to them.  I could only assume that these were for the families and people marching for a non-military government up north (Burma).  Very sad - I would march with them if I were there.

Interesting art

This temple had wonderful statues, ponds of Koi, paintings of all the Buddha who had endured temptation against cruel people.  There was a Buddha that was so tall it was difficult to take a picture fitting both a human and the top of the head of the Buddha.  (pictures will come later).

My camcorder ran out of power so I grabbed my camera which I had lent to mom as hers for the holiday and took some more pictures.  This ran out of battery power very soon afterwards.

Our private Taxi

Ben then took us to see Cheong fatt Tse mansion - but unfortunately we were not there at the correct time to go on a guided tour of the mansion.  Toni took a few pictures and we left to go to the Botanical Gardens.

We stopped outside of the gardens and decided to grab something to drink.   I decided to be adventurous and get a coconut water drink.  Freshly opened in-front of me - it is delicious if you a coconut lover like I am.

Interesting tree at botanical Gardens

We walked into the gardens while drinking our water and looked at very interesting trees.  One in particular was the 'Cannon-Ball' tree.  Which has flowers that look like orchids and large round ball fruits that are as large as a human head.

The monkeys tried to steal my empty coconut water drink as they knew there would still be coconut within.  I held onto it tight as I wanted to eat the coconut.

By this time all cameras and camcorders were without power so we just walked around looking at the flowers and trees.

We then decided to go back to the hotel.

We went for a beach walk and found hundreds of undamamged shells along the beach.  I collected some to bring home to South Africa.  We came across a hut on the beach.  We tough that it was some sort of shop but it was actually some guy's house.  We had a bit of a conversation with him and he explained that the Thai Tsunami had washed away his house. 
He said that the saw a wave and had the feeling that it was dangerous and within 6 steps of trying to run away the water was shoulder height around him.  He friends came to help him collect his stuff and put it all back for him and then 40 minutes later the second wave poured in again and washed all his stuff away.  Shame man!

Further along the beach were fisherman houses (like squatter houses)  Dogs were playing on the beach and rubbing themselves in smelly fish rags - well we know how dogs like to do that.  It stunk.

We seem to be staying in a hotel in a residential area because there are many houses and apartments on the beach front.  Including a sweat little beach temple which was secluded yet you could see that the locals use it to do their prayers.

From the beach we saw the floating Mosque in the distance - but were not close enough to take a decent close up picture - but a picture we did get.

Temples, Temples, Temples are everywhere in Pinang.  Nearly every 5th building is a temple of some sort.  They come across as very spiritually active - and I think that's a good thing.

Walking back to the hotel we came across 'Fan Palms'.  At first we thought they were trimmed that way but on closer inspection you can see that the palms actually grow like a fan \\\|///. 

We went for dinner at yet another Hawkers market and on the way there we saw that the beach an see here is very muddy.  Apparently it's the mud that comes down from the hills in the rain, but we think that there is also surage in it too.  So swimming is out of the question in Pinang.

I met a cute very ifeminite cook at the hawkers market that insured me in a joking way that none of his food way made with cats or dogs - so I opted to eat fish form his Fried Lok Lok stall :-)

Went returned to the hotel tired and ready for bed.