Trip to Penang

View from the top at Kek Lok Si

On 29th October 2010, we took night bus from Malacca to Penang Island. Since that the bus we took will move at 9.30pm, we wait for it to arrive. It was a trip that can't be forgotten. When we reach Penang Island's bus station at Sg Nibong. It was 30th October 2010 at 5.05 am in the morning. Gosh! So early! Anyway, we waited for about 2 hour before my friend come to fetch us. We do understand that it really early for any trip.

Kuan Ying Statue, Kek Lok Si

First destination that we went was at Air Itam, Penang. We had our breakfast before we venture to the top of the hill. I ate mee soup while my parent ate wantan mee. After breakfast, off we go for adventure. The road taken was longer than my previous visit. Only vehicles that usually use the road. Anyway, it really a great adventure as we get to warm up and enjoy the mother nature. After about half an hour, we reach to the top! Pheww! What a sweat we gone thru and all pay of when we reached there.

Nice view indeed!

After have a look around the place, we took a lift or could be say a cable car down to other place. It cost us Rm 2 per one way trip. Then we took the staircase down where by we reach to the Tortoise Garden ( I name it myself as there lot of tortoise in the it with cage around ). I bought vegetable for them to eat. Soon, we went down again and pass by few stall selling clothes and souvenirs.

Cute ?

The next destination we went to was Ghee Hiang. We bought tau sar pheah that quite nice indeed. It cost Rm 6 per box which contain 12 tau sar. I took the picture above as it seem cute. Their mascot. You should try their biscuits it when come to Penang!

Declining Buddha

The next destination was at Burma Lane. It was a tourist attraction due to the unique statues of Buddha. Isn't it great, beauty, weird and interesting? Anyway, it was a great journey to venture. :) Thanks to my friend or could say a brother called Kevin for being our tour guide and driver on that time.

Hatyai

30 July

We gather at Changlun to wait for the vans to come. We depart in the morning and reach there by morning, 10a.m. I don’t really remember what time we reach as I am a bit confused at first when we went there. Moreover, we can’t phone to Malaysia as it will cost us Rm2per sms and Rm3per call (for the Maxis user). We then check in the hotel before we went out. As it is our first time at Hatyai, we walk to the place using the map that was given by the group leader. The first mission that I know is to have lunch before we do other thing. Guess what, we had dim sum for breakfast. We ate together. For dim sum, it cost us about 30 bucks per person, which include Chinese tea and chrysanthemum.

In the van before depart

Dim sum...


After the breakfast we went back to hotel. The next thing we do is went out and walk to the place that was called shopping center. We went to the entire shopping complex around the place near by our hotel. One thing that we saw is Mc Donald. How could I miss trying the burger pork! We had our lunch there. It cost us 103 buck per set. There is no medium small or large size compare to our Mc D and it had included taxes (my friend told me). The rest, at night we have fun.

pork burger




me and frns with the food for 7 people



31 July

We wake up early. As we need to go to Songkhla. Before that, we had our breakfast. We depart and the tour guide took us around to a nearby beach. The scenery was nice as always when we go to a beach. I love the feeling when I step on the sand. It feels smooth. I feel like building a sand castle there but we are rushing and just able to take pictures. The weather was hot and I bought a coconut sea drink (if I did not hear wrongly what the hawker said). It is not like a usual coconut. Then we cross to songkhla by ferry. We have to wait for few minutes in the van before the ferry will move. When we reach there, we went to have our lunch. The tom yam there tastes better than before and we also have otak-otak kelapa.

Then we move to a place called Tang Kuan Hill. Before we went to the hill, we could see many monkeys around. We were thinking whether the monkey behave well than the monkey at our university. We went to the hill by lift. First time experience of going up hill by lift that is air-conditioned. As we reach the hill we need to climb up. There we saw the Prathat Chedi Luang, the royal pagoda at the top of the Tang Kuan Hill, which is the symbol of songkhla city. It was stated at the lift ticket that it is an ancient Davaravati art constructed in Nakorn Si Thammarat period surrounded by a cloister. Since 1886, it was restored under the command of King Rama IV and in 1996; King Rama IX gave the Lord Buddha relic for filling the pagoda. We then found a road, path going down to a building that look like ‘red house’ in Malacca since the building we found look a like. There still path going down but we choose not to go further down as the stair is unbalance and can easily slip down if not careful.

at Tang Kuan Hill

Red house?

We then proceed to go down the hill used the lift. When we were going to enter the van, a funny incident happen. I saw many birds crowding around the seed and suddenly the monkey nearby went to snatch banana from one of the seller. Then the monkey run away with it threat and causing a stir as the crowd of birds flying away when the monkey running away. That the picture I took without notice.

the monkey


The next thing when arrive at hotel, we went out to the night market where we can find lots of stall selling thing such as food, clothes and shoes. If you want to buy sport shoe then you may come here as the are variety of them. You will have hard time to choose! Anyway, the price is cheaper than in Malaysia for sure. I went to find shirt to wear for next day. Here you can bargain to the lowest price for Rm10. However, not all of the clothes will fit as they seem small. But I manage to find the clothes I like. Mean while, my friends found a stall that sell nice and lovely food. Guess what. The other way round actually. If you want to try to eat fried grasshopper, worm and bugs, you also can find it in the night market. I took the picture from my friend to display it here as a prove. I think it is okay.

The next thing we finish shopping, we proceed to a 7 eleven. Why do we go there? Well of course because we find out of something different from here. Inside 7 eleven, I found out that we can actually make own burger and eat the frozen food as there is an oven. As compare here with there, the 7 eleven had a variety of drinks. You can choose whatever flavor you want and the cute thing we saw is a small bottle of coke.

cute? very small

1ogos

It is time for us to go back to our place. We need to go through the custom and get our beg check. Of course nothing there that is illegal. We are good people. Haha… Erm. I remember 31 July is my brother birthday but I am unable to phone him. So I phone him as I reach here.

Thailand

This just introduction of getting to know the place.

A place that is quite near to the border of Malaysia, called Hatyai. It is under Thailand country. When you wants to go to a place, do you ever think of what kind of life the citizen of Hatyai? I never know till I saw it by my own eyes. Different culture as I may say. Before I went there, I had heard from my friends who had gone there. It is a holy place for the shoppers. You will not know till you bid the price. We do boarder pass before we go to Hatyai and change our money to buck. 200 buck means Rm 20, ten times smaller from our Malaysia ringgit. The next thing I know is that their time is different than ours that is late by one hour. Meaning if your watch is 1p.m then their time will be 12 noon. What will you expect? I had given the hints and I will write on the place I went.