Penang

We decided to get the hell out of KL and head to Penang which I understand to be the food capital of Malaysia.  We got off the bus and as per usual set about looking for somewhere to live.

I do believe we met our first Malaysian stoner.  He owned one of the guesthouses we looked at and was just sat in a chair looking red eyed surrounded by similarly red eyed people with a familiar stench in the air.  We decided against staying there because although it might have been cheap and fun, I don't know...  We eventually got a place on Love Lane that was run by a very friendly Chinese man who had silver white hair and looked a bit like the Master/Sensei from Kill Bill 2. In short he looked like a legend.

Gorging myself at Jaya.

On first impressions Penang seemed to have a friendly and easy going vibe about it.  There are restaurants everywhere serving a mix of Indian, Thai and Malaysian food.  You can walk around and get around fairly easily and it seemed to have a lot of life to it as a city but at the same time wasn't crazy-mental.

We chose George Town as a base because it seemed to have a good range of cheap accommodation.

We moved out of Love Lane because although great was a bit too alluring for the mosquitoes and we'd found a place with a window around the corner.

Apparently  Jimmy Choo got his first apprenticeship around here somewhere.  Not sure if it's true but there's a random fact for you to mull over.

Our 2nd guesthouse.

Our road at night.

Fooooood.

I loved this graffiti.  It almost looked real at night.















We mostly ate and rode around on local buses doing a little sightseeing.  We didn't really smash it up though at night because I guess we're too old for that.

There was a place called Jaya round the corner which did cheap but tasty Indian food  and Nasi Kandar which is basically like a buffet affair.  We ate there a lot, possibly too much.

 Botanical Gardens.

Beware of aggressive monkeys!  Poor show-  they didn't
even look at me.

Butterfly and insect Farm