Chilling in Penang

May – June 2016 in Penang, Malaysia

Penang was on my must-visit-list for some three, four years now. Not only that, I was also seriously considering following the footsteps of my friends and moving to the island. Apparently, Penang is (or at least was) THE place for expats, or so they claimed. One of the best places in the world to retire. They went, I stayed. The timing wasn’t quite right. Not then.

To travel slowly was a motto of my South East Asian reconnaissance. I was in no hurry to get anywhere so what’s the rush. I’d take the whatever time I needed. If I found a place I liked, I’d stay there for as long as I liked – or could. No rush, no stress. I’d take it as it came.

Well, things didn’t quite work out that way. They seldom do. For even though I wasn’t in a hurry – I didn’t have all the time in the world. There was a ‘deadline’ lurking in the background or rather an interruption of my travel flow. I had to be back in Dubai to attend the Swedish Photo Crew summit in October. And that ‘deadline’ was in the back of my mind at all times. I didn’t quite have the luxury of ‘take it as it comes’.

Whether I liked it or whether I planned it the truth of the matter was – I was rushing. Not only was I rushing to be done with the SEA by October but also to be done with touristy things asap so I could park myself somewhere long term and just enjoy the life. Therefore, spending more time than necessary in one location wasn’t an option. I wanted to see things I wanted to see so I wouldn’t feel the need to come back to ‘finish the job’. And quite frankly, I didn’t really find a place where I wanted to stay for much longer than I actually stayed. So no problem. I was moving on. I was looking for that special place where the time has no meaning. 

Rushing is one thing. Living off a suitcase is another. I haven’t unpacked since I left Dubai. Unpacking for two or three days and then packing it all up again seemed like a waste of time. I couldn’t be bothered.

Changing hotels every two, three days also took its tow not to mention the never-ending task of looking for them on booking sites and then making sure I was getting the room I booked and paid for as more often than not there was an issue with one thing or the other. (This is why I never book now for more than two nights at a time. Most of the times one night only.)

Then there was the blog. I need inner peace to write. I need to settle down which takes three days.  Touristy things and shooting first then writing. Leaving the place after 3-4 days never gave me a chance to reach my creative stage. 

I needed to stop for a while. I needed to stay put in one place for a month or two, unpack, take every single item out of my suitcase and hang them all up on hangers, do laundry, maybe even cook something or at least have a takeout at home and eat it with fork and knife, catch up on my blog, check out on the life I left behind and take care of whatever needed my attention, chill. Live a ‘normal’ life. I was ready for Penang. 

I arrived in the middle of May. My spirit was high and so were the anticipations and even expectations. All I needed to do was find a place to stay long term and then just chill.

It started bumpily but then it always does. Nothing new. Some nonsense with an airport taxi. Then the room I booked not available, so the hotel was trying to upgrade me at my expense. I demanded the room I booked and paid for or an upgrade at their expense – which I got. Stuff like that although extremely annoying is a routine to me these days. I know how to handle it. The major problem was humidity. It was unbearable.

George Town is a lovely place to visit for a couple of days. Foodies should give it a week. The food is great; the variety is endless. But George Town is a place to visit and not to live in, I was told. Most expats live in Batu Ferringhi, 40 minutes up the coast. This is also a location of most hotels and resorts. And this is where I went. My friends also lived there, and I was so looking forward to meeting them again and having someone ‘local’ who could introduce me around. Imagine my disappointment when I found out they’d left the island and Malaysia before I arrived. They couldn’t stand the humidity.

My hotel room turned out to be a two-bedroom apartment in a residential building. Not what I booked, but it worked. The view was amazing. There were pots and pans. There were a washing machine and an iron. I looked forward to getting something cooked and washed. There was only one tiny problem – there was nothing to cook. Chips and sodas were pretty much all that local stores offered. To get food one could have for dinner required a 30-minute bus ride to Tesco which was the closest shopping center and 10 more minutes to other supermarkets.

Batu Ferringhi, as the whole of Penang, was a real disappointment. Tiny, bad beaches, dirty sea, no grocery stores, ‘exhausted-looking’ residential buildings begging for maintenance, nothing to do. And as humid as anywhere else. Far cry from the expat paradise I thought I was coming to. In addition, a two-week-long public holiday was coming and my smart landlord wanted to double the rent.

Public holiday? Oh no. Not again!!! I didn’t want to take any part of yet another public holiday when the entire country shuts down nor was I interested in paying double for a place I didn’t even like. So I packed up my stuff once again and moved to a hotel right on the beach – next to Tesco. 

Excruciating pain woke me up in the middle of the night and kept me awake for hours and hours. I felt similar pain on two different occasions a couple of weeks earlier in Laos but nothing of that magnitude. Eventually, things got better – I went to see a doctor. 

Long story short. I had an operation 24 hours later, spend 5 days in a hospital. USD 5.000. Acute, severe gallbladder inflammation.

For the whole following month, I stayed in my hotel on the beach, next to Tesco, trying to get it together. Due to the two week public holiday, all Malaysian expats and their two million kids were back home to celebrate. The hotel was jam-packed with screaming and running kids, and so was the pool. Glad I couldn’t use it. I felt fragile and stayed in my room most of the time out of fear that someone would bump into me. The convalescence took longer than expected due to a mental block – my first operation ever. But once I got mobile, I bought a first-class bus ticket and left for Kuala Lumpur. I needed a change. I was so done with chilling in Penang as I could ever be.

Batu Ferringhi

Hotel neighborhood

People and their friends