We stopped over for two nights in Melaka (Melacca) (after returning from Japan and staying in KL for 4 nights) and it was nice to get back into traveller mode again.
Melaka is a smaller version of Georgetown in Penang in many ways with a very similar historical background and influence. There’s Portuguese, Dutch and British colonial era architecture and a China town too with some street art added in for good measure.
Only a couple of hours away from KL, it could easily be visited in a day but we stopped for two to take it all in.
What it does have that Georgetown didn’t was a pleasant river side walk with pretty decorated houses complete with a replica Portuguese Ship at the end of the walk.
The whole town is not too big so it’s easily walked around.
The Stadhuys the old Dutch governor’s office is a bright salmon pink building (originally white but was repainted after Malaysian independence) and the main landmark of Melaka, believed to be the oldest surviving Dutch building in the east. It houses a museum re-telling Melaka’s history from when it was founded by a Hindu prince called Parameswara in the 12th Century to present day.
Outside of it there are loads of trishaws waiting to take you around the place but these are trishaws with a twist, most of them are garishly decorated in Hello Kitty or Disney’s Frozen colours complete with cuddly toys and they play the loudest cheesy music too, quite bizarre but as usual the Chinese and even the Malay can’t get enough of this sort of tacky fun and you can’t help but smile when you see them come past.
Other sites to see are the ruins of and old church and fort of which little remains in truth.
The ruined church also has a statue outside of it of St Francis Xavier, which was a name we recognised and after about 20 minutes, the penny dropped, it turns out we saw a bit of him from afar when we were in Old Goa (his embalmed body was brought out on display for a few weeks which happens every ten years and there were huge queues of Indian christians lining up to see him).
Apparently, St Paul’s Church in Melaka was regularly visited by him and after he died in China his body was temporarily interred at St Paul’s for nine months before being transferred to Goa.
In Chinatown, the colonial architecture remains and there are streets filled with pretty buildings.
We enjoyed some good Chinese food including some very good pork filled Tai Pao as well as some very tasty rice balls. One does have to enjoy ones food early however, the sellers start to shut up shop around 7.30pm, well the local food eateries do anyway which of course is what we were after. Indeed some are just open for breakfast or just for lunch. They take it easy around here.
Well, a good couple of days then back to the airport for the second time in a week, this time though just the domestic airplane to Kuching, the stepping stone into the wilds of Borneo, let’s hope we see some Orangutans!
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| You go all the way to Japan and Totoro is here anyway! |
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| Tai Pao |
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