Penang

Since Jen's parents spoke highly of their trip to Penang, we decided to add it to our itinerary and spent 7 days in the state's capital city, Georgetown.   Unfortunately, we mostly only saw the inside of our hotel room.  After our cooking class, we both caught really bad colds/flus, and later during the week we both got food poisoning!  It hindered our spirit and motivation a little, so we unfortunately didn't manage to get out and see/do all of the things that we hoped to. 

During our last couple of days here, as we were getting a bit better, we did start going out for some short walks and saw a small portion of the city near our hotel.  Here are some of the pictures of the highlights we did manage to see along the way. 

Clan Jetties
These are small neighbourhoods along the shoreline of Penang, that were built on stilts, over water, by Chinese immigrants in the 19th century.  Generally, immigrants belonging to the clan (ie. people with the same family name) were allowed to live at the jetty designated for that clan.  Several clan jetties have been taken over by modern development projects over the years, but the remaining 7 are now part of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites.


Georgetown Streets
We mostly only wandered around Chinatown, but we did manage to see a few of the famous Street Art pieces that Georgetown is home to. 


Kek Lok Si Temple
Sitting atop a hill overlooking the city, this is the largest Buddhist temple in Malaysia.  We stopped here for a quick visit after our cooking class. 


Food
Our main reason for coming to Penang was to experience the street food.  Although we were too sick to get out and try all of the dishes and hawker stalls that we wanted to, we still managed to get a good teaser of what Penang's cuisine offers and every meal we had was delicious!  We're not sure where we got food poisoning from, but here are some of the places and dishes that we tried and really enjoyed:

Bee Hwa Cafe
Probably our favourite place.  We tried Char Kway Teow (Malaysian Pad Thai) for 7 MYR (~$2.15cad) and Penang White Curry Soup for 6.5 MYR (~$2cad).  Both dishes were new to us and we really loved them!

Cintra Street Fish & Chicken Porridge 
Initially went there for the 7.50 MYR (~$2.30cad) Chicken Congee (rice porridge) because we were sick, but we returned because we  liked the food!

Laksalicious 
We love curry laksa but wanted to try some other types of laksa that Penang is known for.  We tried Asam Laksa and Laksa Lemak (11MYR/~$3.30cad) and were not disappointed! 

Hameediya
This constantly-busy restaurant serves Murtabak (Malaysian bread stuffed with a variety of fillings including meat, eggs, and vegetables) for 6-7 MYR (~$2.00cad).  We also really enjoyed the plate of Biryani rice for only 5 MYR (~$1.50cad).

Mother and Son Wan Tan Mee 
We tried Wantan Mee for only 6 MYR (~$1.80cad) for a big bowl.  We were expecting a "soup" but this is actually a "dry" version of nice chewy hand-made wonton noodles with a light sauce and delicious lean bbq pork and wontons.  Jen really enjoyed it, but Dom prefers the more typical soup version 😃.

Every Fresh Bar
At 15-20 MYR (~$4-6cad) per smoothie/oatmeal bowl, this place was relatively more expensive than other places/dishes, but it was our attempt at filling our bodies with vitamins/nutrients to try to speed up getting over our colds... and it tasted good 😂.