Day 31: Penang Day 32: Back to KL

Day 31: Food, food, and more food...... Today is the day my friend Gaylie and I commited the deadly sin of 'gluttony'. I probably should mention we had a good reason for eating so much as Penang is famous for it's food, it is the hawker capital of Malaysia, and that was our last day as we were leaving the next morning back to KL. Penang is an island to the northeast of mainland Malayasia, it lies on the Andaman sea.

First we started the day off at the national museum and learning about Penang and the differnt ethnic groups that make up Penang, the Malays, Chinese, Indians, and the Baba Nonya (a mix of Malay and Chinese). There were also some Armenians, peple of Jewish background, and Arabs that had settled in Penang many generations ago, as it was part of the Dutch East Indian Trade company. Then we headed for some shopping and eating. We tried some food from the local hawkers on Gurnie Drive, which is right by the beach. We tried cendol, pasembur, rojak, poh piah, asam laksa, and satays. We even were able to find Baba Nonya cakes, which is made from rice and covered with peanut sauce.

Day 32: We headed back to KL from Penang. Gaylie went back to Singapore, so I was pretty much solo, I met a nice lady named Grace, at the hotel, who was from Penang who invited me to dinner with her and her brother. We ended up going to Chinatown for dinner and had a great meal of shark fin and prawns in chili sauce. Grace is a real estate agent in Penang and told me alot of Europeans like to retire in Penang as it is so culturally diverse and open. We tried the local beer 'Tiger' beer which was really good. It is from the same company as Guiness Stout. We had the beer while watching one of stall owners put away and then put back his collection of fake watches. He had a walkie talkie in hand and his accomplace was around the corner watchin out for the policemen. We were thinking he was probably an illegal immigrant (probably of Nepalese descent), as there were many stalls, aside from his that were selling fake items.