The Star: Celebrate Malaysia! Part 2: The North

The second article appeared in The Star today (18 December 2007). Here is the unabridged version.
Back on the road again After a break of a few days in PJ, I returned by car to Pulau Carey to set off from Kampung Sg Judah, an Orang Asli kampung. After setting up the bike, I had a cup of Teh-O at a stall by a school. The Malay Lady who ran the stall was busy but we chatted as she worked, watched by her 3 kids.

Her modest stall served the usual menu of gerai fare but I noted with surprise an XBox connected to large speakers and a TV. 'The kids like to play on it in the evenings' she smiled. I made a mental note not to presume that kampungs are bereft of such modernities. When I eventually got up to pay she refused to accept money, saying it was a small thing - she'd obviously enjoyed our little chat.

The same thing happened when I was later caught in a heavy squall and had to shelter in another gerai. Despite enjoying yet another Teh-O and some exquisite thinly sliced Goreng Pisang, the owner refused to accept my money. What's with these Pulau Carey people? Their generosity and kindness was indeed heartwarming.

Not just a lot of hot air
I stayed a night in Kelang and another in the Nature Park in Kuala Selangor. Leaving very early that morning, I elected to avoid the mosquitoes and made the mistake of not checking the tyres. A heavy bike, insufficient air in the rear and a few kilometres from Sungai Besar, on the way to Sabak Bernam, the sidewall tore and the rear tyre blew. I had spare tubes and patches but no replacement tyre so pushed the bike to a motorcycle bengkel up the road where I met two very kind souls who made a tremendous impression on me.

Supriani is a simple man who has been through some tough times. A failed partnership in a motor workshop left him bankrupt. He worked for someone else while paying off his debts, and honing his skills, then eventually set up his little workshop beside his house. He kindly drove me around to find new tyres and I was touched by his patience and selflessness.

His brother in law, Hamzah, turned out to be one of the most profound people I've had the pleasure to meet. We spoke for hours - by the time the bike was fixed, it was too hot to ride so I hung around for awhile. Hamzah has an honest outlook on life. In his trade he has turned down work when he felt he didn't have the skills or experience to complete the job satisfactorily. He feels that if he is paid to do something, he should do it well.

He spoke evenly of how he feels the values in kampungs are slowly being supplanted by less honourable ones. 'When kampungs become pekans and pekans become bandars, the people change too'. I agreed totally with his idea that in kampungs, there is a sense of 'Us' which slowly mutates into a self-serving sense of 'Me' in larger towns.

We both lamented the gradual loss of that easy going togetherness which underpins kampung life. His stories filled me with hope - here, away from the 'me first' mentality of the towns and cities was a moral, principled way of life we would do well to revive.

Sabak Bernam was the last town in Selangor and I had the pleasure of meeting yet another principled character: Ridzwan who played club football for PKNS. He once played for a state team, stayed 3 months then left when he realised some of his teammates were not chosen just on merit. After retiring through injury, he now worked at his father's gerai where I met him.

And so I left Selangor, my home state, bedazzling in its modernity, yet almost rotting at the core through disrepair and poor maintenance. Still, I discovered there is much to admire in the people. Just perhaps not so much in the cities.

Teluk Intan is one of my favourite towns in Malaysia and my 3 days there were pleasurable ones. The Anson Hotel was cheap, clean and cheerful. And I met Amir who ran a bike shop. I was lucky to meet him on Friday when he normally shut the shop and he opened it specially for me after his Friday prayers. I got proper tyres fitted (the ones we found in Sg Besar being a temporary measure) and felt more confident about the tyres lasting the rest of the journey.

I like the easy pace of Teluk Intan. A town almost bypassed by progress with the construction of the highway, it has since found some resurgence in tourism. Not too much to spoil it though.

Malaysia's Tourism Ambassador
In Parit Buntar I met David Munusamy who wold get my vote as Tourism Ambassador if there were such a post. I'd come across David on the internet. Near retirement age, he now hosts cyclists and backpackers from all around the world. A kind, affable character, it would seem he knew anyone and everyone in the area. And what an area! We visited prawn farms, fishing villages, dried fish factories, toddy plantations, shipyards, even a herbal sauna set in a padi field! And through it all, the kind hospitality of a genial host. Oh did I mention his wife's food is delicious too?

Penang, Buttwerworth, Sungai Petani, Alor Setar all passed quickly. I'd spent a few days with my wife, Mei, in Penang (she'd flown up to join me as we attended a friend's wedding in Batu Feringghi) then continued relentlessly up north. I stopped at the Lembah Bujang Archeological Museum and marvelled at how an empire was here as much as 1500 years before. I survived the steep hills around Gunung Jerai and was constantly wowed by the beauty of morning light playing on verdant green padi fields.

And in the end...
Then, finally, Kangar. And a day trip out to Padang Besar. On the way, I stopped at a yet another gerai, this one opposite the Pusat Serenti Bukit Chabang, a drug rehab centre. The stall owner lamented the fact we have more of these than we do universities and that insightful remark once again reinforced my marvelling at the wisdom I was encountering.

A 14-hour bus ride home from Kangar allowed me time to ponder what I'd seen in the previous 5 weeks. I'd seen some stunning scenery of course. But more importantly, I'd met some stunning people too. Honest in their philosophies. Wise in their observations. Thought provoking in their insights.

And always, warm and kind. The heart of Malaysia still beats strongly and proudly. But it's not in the centre, it's in the edges, the periphery. In the kampungs and villages. And it had been my pleasure and honour to feel that pulse.

My mum who often greets my misadventures and transgressions with the exclamation 'You're mad!' was right not to question my mental state when I turned up in PJ. This ride wasn't mad. It was necessary. And the results were spectacular.

(Celebrate Malaysia! is not quite done. More is being planned to give fellow Malaysians a chance to feel that pulse for themselves. Log in to John's blog at www.john-budakkampung.blogspot.com to ride along.)

Day 19 - 21 Nov 2 - 4 Teluk Intan Part 1

Teluk Intan is not a very large town. It is also a few kilometres off the route to Lumut/Pantai Remis which meant I would have to backtrack when I left. No matter - although I'd only been once previously, I'd liked the town immediately.

I found my way in with no problem, and rode around town looking for a hotel. I saw a couple of walk-ups in the mould of the Kim Heng in Pontian and the Hotel Kingdom in Muar. I knew I could find better and continued to roam the streets.

There are a number of one way streets in Teluk Intan and all the streets are wide and well trafficked by motorbikes, bicycles and cars in equal measure. Still, I found the roads easy to navigate - it seemed perhaps that traffic was going more slowly than I'd expect.

Having circumnavigated almost the entire town, I finally saw a large building in the distance, with tall letters facing the other way, spelling 'Hotel'. I made for it and that's how I found myself at the Anson Hotel. A well-designed lobby was visible through the glass frontage and I parked the bike at the front, noted there was no doorman a la Legend Water Chalets in PD, walked and asked if they had a room. Not only did they, they also said my bike would fit in the lift, no problem.

Great! I checked in, unpacked and hit the shower. Only to find there were no towels... Nevermind, I used my mosquito-coil smelling one and was happy enough. There was also a flask in the room, but no water in it and no kettle to be seen. Hmmmm... Still, the room was neat and comfortable and I noticed 3.5G on my mobile phone so my hopes for good internet access were raised significantly. All in all I was in pretty good cheer.

When I'd done, I popped downstairs and asked about towels - turned out they'd forgotten to pass them to me when I checked in. As for the flask, there was filtered water available in the lobby and I could help myself. The staff were extremely polite and friendly and I was still in good cheer when I went upstairs to try getting online.

Laptop on, mobile hooked up, connected, no problem. Email downloaded, blog logged into, then I tried to send an email reply. No go. Hmmm... Strange... And the blog's stopped responding too. Nevermind, I'll check it out later.

Back downstairs and out the front to look for dinner. Right next door to the hotel are two old double-storey bungalows with signboards marking them as hotels. The further one might well be, but the one next door is a restaurant with a number of stalls downstairs. I wandered over to this one.

Part of the area on the ground floor was a seating area and more tables and chairs were placed outdoors and this is where I sat. It was a cool evening, and to celebrate, I ordered a Carlsberg (I know, what you're going to say, Tony...) and from the same gentleman, a Curry Mee. He seemed to be one of the owners of the place.

The noodles were very nice indeed and the beer refreshing.

Back at the hotel, I tried getting online again. It needed a restart of both the phone and the laptop, and when I started getting into the intensive stuff - the blog and slide.com - things went into a hang again. I couldn't even make or receive calls on the phone.

I'd noticed a Celcom shop across the road so decided to check that out the next day. Meanwhile, I used the room phone for dialup - at 16,800 kbps! Still, things were working...

The next morning I went down to look for breakfast, walked quite a distance but failed to find any Chinese shops of note. It was not until the next day that I realised there was a Chinese part of town. So I walked back to the hotel and cross the road to where I'd noticed a small shop set back aways. This turned out to be a nice little place and I had a wanton mee. The style is unusual as they give you all the stuff you;d normally have to order as separate dishes - the roast pork, the wanton, the shredded chicken. It was very nice and I washed it down with a Teh O (less sugar, please) which the waitress seemed to find amusing.

Celcom was open and I tried to get my problem sorted out. A bit of useless questioning almost resulted in me getting upset, but I held myself in check. They had no 3G phone I could try my SIM on so I could not verify if the phone was the problem. I had tried to surf the net using the phone and it was fine - until I logged on to heavy sites like this blog. Then the phone hanged.

Well, Celcom had a 3G phone but the battery was flat apparently. I borrowed a 3G SIM, put that in my phone and it worked great. Now I reckon the SIM was not a 3G SIM as when I put it in, the phone didn't have '3G' in the display, just the normal GPRS. The staff insisted it was though and said they used it for demos. Now just how they do demos without a 3G phone is beyond me, but I let that go.

Celcom changed the SIM for me (after a lot of hassle) and I went off hoping that would have solved the problem. Well, hours later, it obviously hadn't and I had to visit the shop again the next morning. I even reset the phone, but to no avail. I think there really is an issue with the phone but I have no way of verifying this without a doubt.

So it was to be dialup for the next day.

I asked at the hotel if they knew of a laundry nearby as I had quite a bit to wash. They offered to send it out for me and to collect it that evening as I told them I needed to leave the next day at 6. Well, as things turned out, they forgot. I guess the earlier episode with the towels and the flask should have warned me. As a result, I had no choice but to stay another night. To their credit, when the receptionist realised they'd forgotten, she despatched one of the staff to the shop but it was already closed.

Anyway, as things were, I was beginning to enjoy myself in Teluk Intan so the extra day, although putting a bit of pressure on me to get as far as possible in the next cycling day, was really not such a problem.

At about lunch time, I wandered out again and walked around the leaning tower. Teluk Intan is really quite a pretty town with many old buildings and in generally decent shape. The Swallows' Nesting areas were all over - including right next door to the hotel though on the opposite side from my room - and one old building was even converted in its entirety for that purpose. The strange thing is that there actually seemed to be quite a few of the birds about. In other towns, I could hear the bird song (from speakers, mainly, as I discovered) but could hardly see any. Here, I could see them flinging themselves around the sky in carefree loops and swirls and spirals.

I asked at a bike shop if they had any tyres and he referred me to one further up the road so I walked over and found that the shop in question was indeed a stockist of better bikes. There were a couple of people inside, just readying to go off to the mosque so I arranged to come back later. Strange thing is that they were actually closed on Fridays, but he'd come in specially to wait for a particular customer. My good luck then...
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