George Town

Oh my god!!!
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We get to Butterworth for the car ferry around 1PM and cross the bay seeing the most enormous jellyfish we've ever seen on the way.  Once dropped we haul our packs up the hill to where the good hotels are, we find a real nice one The Cititel which has a beautiful room which is $60 but ...........if you book over the internet only $40.  All we have to do then, is tramp around town find an ATM to get cash to pay for some web time then find an internet cafe then book the room on the web then come back.......

Fear and loathing on the canopy walkway
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"Look we've been up since 05:00 ....we're bloody knackered why don't you just give me the sodding room for the internet price and lets stop wasting all our f***ing time?"

"Velly Solly this internet price"

"But you have an empty room, I want it, just hand the bloody key over"

"Velly solly"

Penang hill
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On the way to the ATM we wander into the Continental, bigger room, includes breakfast, has swimming pool, is $8 cheaper than the Cititel internet rate....we go back to the Cititel and tell them to get stuffed.

"no pwobwem" they chirrup.

Georgetown lights up
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To The Chief Executive Cititel Hotels Inc

Dear Sir

Are you stark raving bloody mad?

I remain sir

Your obedient  etc etc

Colonel Blandflord Fly

On first sight George Town is a really very lovely a wonderful mix of modern and colonial architecture.  The Chinese and Indian influence is everywhere as is of course the British. The people are amongst the friendliest we have yet met we are very much looking forward to exploring over the next few days which we will start to do if we can just get away from this sodding PC.............

AaaaaaH that's better.  George town really is very nice if a little "sleazy" at the edges.  There are really cool indian and Chinese quarters and we had our first Indian since India which was very nice thank you very much. The town is a strange mix of typical Chinese and Indian shop houses cheek by jowl with modern high rise and new infrastructure.  It's a great city to walk despite the incredible heat as all is hustle and bustle and the shop houses spill out across the sidewalks filling the air with all the smells of the spice shops and incense. There are also a lot of open drains to catch the unwary which fill the air with a whole other bunch of smells particularly when the heat gets up.

There are a huge number of cheap guest and tea houses here which are fronts for knocking shops (steady Ms Harding) and watching the girls work the passers by is an entertainment in itself.  One establishment seems to provide part time employment for the waiting staff from our Ko Lip-eh accommodation as they are all built surprisingly like popeye and teeter about precariously on their high heels.

One particularly fetching young "thing" has taken the (unedifying in my view)  fashion of exposing ones thong above the jeans waistline to horrible extremes.  It appears to be tightly fixed around chest level and the "rear string" nestles, under quite terrifying strain, amongst the hairs on her back for around 10 inches before disappearing into the peekaboo builders bike store.  It looks like it must cut off the circulation to something or other and she walks in a very extraordinary manner.

Like at Ko Lipeh I'm just glad there are no "dimly lit discos" as I wake screaming from nightmares where I cut my chosen beaut from the herd, and ask her hand for a smooch only to end up with a stubble burn on my ear, a handful of nuts and bolts and the memory of "Waby im web" murmured in my ear in a voice like Lee Marvin singing wandrin' star.

Above George Town is the fantastic Penang Hill an old Brit hillstation.  It's a straight up cable run funicular to get to the top but the reward is that it is 5-10 degrees cooler.  On the downside for Kim in particular is that the place is inhabited by some huge "Ox" spiders which she is drawn to in much the same way as the vertiginous to long drops, hence the photos.

The view from here of George Town is stunning and after we have had a good walk around including a death and vertigo defying trip around a raised canopy walk way we settle down for a couple of cool beers to watch the darkness come down over the City.

We can see clear across the Mallaca straits and watch a lit up liner nudge into the harbour by the longest bridge in South Asia.  As the city lights up it's a really wonderful sight, below us as well as all the multi floor modern stuff and the roads and harbours we have the majestic Kek Lok si temple the largest Chinese temple in the South East the lights of which you just have to see to believe.  Across the straits on the mainland some burning is going on, land clearance maybe the smoke seems to hit some warm air which traps ity in a thin layer and it spreads across our line of sight as far inland as the eye can see till it washes up like a tide on some distant mountains.  Caught in the sun setting behind us it turns every kind of colour, very lovely but disturbing. As we're enjoying the sights a waiter approaches.  "Have you seen the snakes" he asks.  "My dear old thing", we reply, "if we'd have seen a snake we'd be in Brighton by now"  he gleefullly shows us three pit vipers "they can be deadly you know" nestled in the vines above our heads.  It's the best version of "Time gentleman please" we have ever heard. Food here is great.  We get to eat in food courts.  About the size of a football pitch it is surrounded by food stalls, each specializing in a meal, Fish Bladder Soup, Fish Head curry (I'm not making these up) Herbal Pig Hand, etc.  You wander round and decide who you'll patronise.  Maybe a few Dim sum from here, some Chicken Kebab from there a soup from those.  Then waiters from each place bring all the munch while a dedicated group of beer servers sort out your alcohol needs.  All the time you're entertained by a duo in the middle singing hits of the day in Chinese whilst a group of dancers do their ballroom and line dance moves with that particular grim faced concentration so beloved of the Chinese when out for some serious fun.  It's great. On the day we head out to the botanic gardens (next to the rifle range) the heat builds all day it is just too hot to move, some huge lizards (dragons the locals call 'em) and a few monkeys are the only thing moving.  Eventually as evening falls and we're back in central George town the heavens open and it's like a continuous bucket of water being pored into the street, the temperature doesn't seem to drop at all,  Eventually the rain stops, but dry lightening sheets through the sky for the rest of the evening in the sticky heat.