Finally catching up on posts. That means having to sit in reception of the hotel to ensure a stable wi-fi but I’ll endure.
This posting is our final one for Penang. It starts with a parade in the streets around Georgetown, moves to a meal together with friends and ends with a few pics of the decorations at Queens Bay Mall.
This parade is all about the ‘flags’. Each ‘team’ (not sure of teams from where?) has their team flag on an incredibly long (6-8 mtr) Bamboo pole. They then ‘carry’ the flags, on their chins, on their foreheads, on their shoulders, any way they can to the finish line which from memory was about 6 kms away. There were many floats with different themes as you can see but in the end it wrapped up with Santa on a truck.
After the parade we all sat on the wall outside Maccas waiting for some Grab Cars to shoot us off for a great meal. This style of cooking/eating is called Lok Lok and is so much fun. When you get there the tables are already set up with piles of food on a stick. Sticks are different colours to denote the value of the food. The variety of the food available is incredible. Some are vegetables, rice balls, dumplings, prawns, octopus, fish, whelks, sausage, pork, won tons, bacon, quail eggs, enochi mushrooms rolled in ham strips and so much more.
In the middle of the table is a pot of boiling broth and all you do is pick the food you want, place it in the water, wait 3 – 5 minutes then extract the stick of food and eat away. So simple. There are arms going everywhere as every one chooses what they want and stretches across the table to grab it. Then once cooked the scramble is on to find your stick of food amongst the dozen or so sticks in the water. This is fun but if as often happens there are strangers at the same table you have to at least try to show some decorum in grappling over the last stick of prawns not that the food ever runs out as it is constantly being restocked.
Once you’ve eaten the food you keep the stick beside you and at the end of your meal (when you’re ready or when the proprietor decides it’s time to give the table up to someone else) the ‘boss’, who we dubbed the human abacus counts the sticks of different colours and informs you of how much you owe him. It’s impossible to argue because only he knows how much each coloured stick is worth but when our share of the meal was about $10 AUD for both Shane and I who’d be bothered arguing? If you have never been to Penang and eaten Lok Lok I suggest putting it on your bucket list.
And to wrap up our time in Penang here are some photos of Queens Bay Mall where Xmas (as in all of Malaysia) is celebrated madly. (Actually the first two are of M Mall which is part of Times Square). At QBM they had an entertainer and they even made it ‘snow’ in the centre of the mall. We love the Malay attitude of tolerance and friendship. People here are so beautiful.
Anyway, That’s it for Penang. The next posting we share our time on Lembongan Island off the east coast of Bali for Christmas. So stay tuned as we used to say. Same bat time, same bat channel!