Today was our last full day in Malaysia, and it was still really packed with lots of places to see! We started the day with a visit to the beautiful Kek Lok Si Temple. We took the funicular down and then hopped on a bus. Our tour guide, Sam, took us around, and we wandered through many of the smaller individual temples, each complete with several Buddha statues and extravagant designs. The view at the top of the hill was so beautiful—we could see the entire city from the gardens and gates throughout the grounds of the temple.

After we finished walking through the temple, we made a quick stop at the Eastern & Oriental Hotel, where the opening scene of Crazy Rich Asians was filmed! We were all really excited to see some of the locations, especially because we had watched it all together a few nights ago during our overnight stay at the hotel in Kuala Tahan.

Once everyone had finished taking their photos, we drove over to Little India in George Town, where we were greeted by our tour guide, Teresa. We walked through a bit of Little India and visited a supermarket, a fabric store, and even saw a Hindu wedding taking place. We also had lunch at a vegetarian restaurant called Woodlands in Little India, where we tried chapati and rice sets that came with various sauces, vegetables, curries, and dal, and drank sweet lassi and mango lassi. 


After lunch, we drove to the famous Blue Mansion—another location where a scene from Crazy Rich Asians was filmed; this time, it was the mahjong scene at the end of the movie. We learned about the history of the mansion, including the backstory of the original builder, Cheong Fatt Tze, whose personal journey from humble origins to a philanthropic tycoon was recognized by many during his time. One thing that surprised me was that the mansion had been in bad condition until it was bought by a group of people who wanted to restore it, eventually allowing it to become one of the top ten mansions in the world. Ms. Buxton’s friend, Alexis, gave us an incredible tour of the mansion, weaving together historical facts with the fascinating story of his life and times.





We then walked to Sam’s Batik, a clothing store special to Ms. Buxton, where many of us found clothes we liked and spent our last bit of Malaysian ringgit, since that money won't be useful once we get home! After that quick stop, I walked to a bookstore called Gerakbudaya with Ananya, Neil, and Benjamin on our way to the iconic Armenian Street. The walk was as fun as it was yesterday, when we walked across George Town to get from Armenian Street to Anita’s house. We ended up meeting almost the entire rest of the group at a shop on Armenian Street to try locally made ice cream before walking over to Chew Jetty nearby for dinner. 


We took a quick walk down the jetty to see the Strait of Malacca and the coastline of Penang Island. The Clan Jetties are boardwalks on which Hokkien Chinese families have lived for over a century, where we could view the front rooms with Buddhist shrines, and many had little shops in front.




We then had dinner at the Jetty Food Court, where we were all able to try whichever foods we wanted—I ordered clay pot rice and pork with Ella. After dinner, we got back by bus and funicular to the top of Penang Hill, where we are staying. We had a final discussion about the sights, sounds, tastes, feels, and smells of Penang and the differences between the three places in Malaysia we’ve been to and our favorite moments of the trip. Tomorrow, we will spend a few hours around George Town riding on trishaws before we go to the Penang Airport for the long journey home. See you all soon!


-Lya

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