Georgetown
Food in Penang
Jewish Cemetery in Penang
Driving to Penang Hill
Penang Botanical Garden
Penang by Night

The plaque at the Jewish Cemetery of Penang

Malaysia is a country that is jam-packed with diversity including many cultures, environments, foods, terrain and foreign influences throughout its rich history. With all of those great things going for it the question arises as to why Tamar didn’t join me on this visit to Malaysia since we all know she loves these things as much as I do. Well, unfortunately Israel citizens are not permitted to enter Malaysia and Malaysians are not allowed to visit Israel, in fact it even says so in their passports! That’s really too bad for everyone since I’m sure Israelis would have a blast adding Malaysia to their Southeast Asia itineraries and, from some of the young Malaysians I spoke to, there seems to be a fair amount of interest and curiosity about visiting Israel as well.

I started to dig a bit deeper into the current state of Israeli-Malaysian relations and I came across an interesting article written by an Israel professor for whom an exception may have been made (or he holds another passport) since he recently spoke at a conference in Kuala Lumpur. You can read about his impressions of Malaysia and its cultural diversity as well as his experiences with colleagues and conference attendees.

As with anything related to Internet research one thing led to another and I found myself looking into whether there is or ever was a Jewish community in Malaysia. After all, there are thousands of Jews in Iran and nobody from Israel is hopping on a plane to vacation in Iran these days or vice-versa. It turns out that there is a very small Jewish community in Malaysia although it was larger in the past. That past is now represented by the Jewish cemetery that still exists today in the middle of Georgetown on the island of Penang. There were a couple of articles written about this cemetery and they gave me the idea that I could just rent a motorbike and drive around looking for it myself.

The cemetery previously existed on Jalan Yahudi which is Malay for “Jewish Street”. However, the street has since been renamed Jalan Zainal Abidin. I asked a couple of people working at my guesthouse if they knew where that street is or if they’ve even heard of the Jewish Cemetery there but only one person knew the location of the currently named street but he wasn’t familiar with the cemetery. I set out on my motorbike to find Jalan Zainal Abidin and, although it would’ve been a far walk, it only took me about ten minutes to find the cemetery.

The clearly marked gate to the Jewish Cemetery

The gated entrance was clearly marked, “Jewish Cemeter” so I knew I was in the right place. The gate appeared locked with a padlock but there was a man on the other side who told me to just open it up myself but to be sure to not let his dog run out (the key was in the padlock). Aside from that man I didn’t see anyone else in the cemetery so it was just me and the tombstones, at least at first.

The oldest grave that is clearly marked

I wandered around trying to make out whatever I could which was challenging because of the poor condition of some of the inscriptions on the tombs as well as the Hebrew which wasn’t always the modern, newspaper text I’m more used to reading. However, after about five minutes of going it alone I was joined by an older man and his young son who came out to greet me. The man’s name was Raju and he was the caretaker of the premises. He took me around to several areas of the cemetery pointing out various tombs and explaining a bit about each one. He pointed out the oldest grave as well as the most recent. He showed me where a father and son were buried next to each other and also where a fallen Lieutenant in the British India Army was buried during WWII. Overall, the cemetery was very well preserved and there was no visible sign of any intentional destruction. The members of the community are truly resting in peace.

Tombstone of a fallen WWII soldier

He told me that his parents and grandparents knew many people in Penang’s Jewish community and that he maintains the grounds in honor of his family’s relationship and for no real compensation (although he accepts small, individual donations from visitors). Over the years he’s met many of the deceased’s family members who come from the UK or other countries to visit the graves and he actually gathers many clues about the people buried there from the families themselves even if he or his family never knew all of the individuals personally. He said there are very few Jews still in Penang, if any at all. The residents of the streets surrounding the cemetery continue to reflect Malaysia’s current mix of cultures: Malays, Chinese and Indians but there are no longer Jews on what was once Jalan Yahudi.

View my photos from the Jewish Cemetery in Penang.

From reading a bit about Malaysia’s Jewish Community and the Jewish Cemetery on Wikipedia, I’ve discovered that many of the descendants of the community are actually in New York!

Hainan Association and Temple

Today was my first day in Penang, Malaysia. I actually started my visit to Malaysia over the weekend but I’ll have to write more about that exciting weekend in another post.

I woke up much later than I usually do in Asia because the guesthouse I’m staying in has no windows. It turns out that windows in guesthouses in the center of Georgetown, in Penang, are somewhat of a rarity. I’m staying at the Banana guesthouse and besides the windows situation it’s very clean and conveniently located in the middle of the backpacker strip, complete with a travel agency, cafe and free WIFI.

For breakfast I picked up a steamed bun with vegetables in the middle. I’m not sure what they call them here but they’re called bun bao in Vietnam. I was still hungry but I didn’t want to delay my walk around Georgetown since the day was already hot and was rapidly getting even hotter. I walked down a small street called Love Lane which leads into Chinatown and I passed several other guesthouses and homes. My first stop was to the Hainan Cultural Center where I was the only soul to be found. Even the person tending the desk at the entrance was off on a break somewhere. It’s always nice when you can wander into a place, snap some photos and hear the sound of silence around you.

Cheong Fat Tze Mansion

I then walked over to the Cheong Fat Tze Mansion which is a beautifully designed and decorated mansion turned hotel that was originally commissioned by a wealthy Chinese entrepreneur in the 1880s. I considered spending a few nights there (they have windows) but I think I’ll just take the tour they offer at 11am and 3pm each day.

Re-creation of lodging at the Kota Cornwallis

From there I passed many colonial buildings leading to the waterfront on the Straits of Malacca including two churches, a school, the Supreme Court, Town Hall and City Hall. It’s amazing to see these impressive European structures just minutes from equally impressive mosques and temples and from Asian cultures. On the waterfront I spent a good hour at least hanging out at Kota Cornwallis (kota means fort) which was built by Captain Francis Light in 1786 for the East India Company. The fort features a chapel, gunpowder magazine, lighthouse and an historic gallery. What I enjoyed the most was the recreation of two tents under a huge tree where I sat for a while to rest and read up on the other sites in Penang.

I went to lunch at a typical eatery between Chinatown and Little India where I ate char kway teow, a sort of stir fry with rice noodles, egg, veggies, shrimp and Chinese sausage. I shared my table with an older Chinese man, a lawyer born and raised in Penang (educated in London), who had some encouraging things to say about inter-ethnic relations and tolerance in Malaysia. In contrast, he held a less positive view towards the current education system offered to students today, particularly the level of English which, in his view, is quickly going downhill. I really enjoyed our casual chat and his particular insight into Malaysian society.

I then walked through Little India passed the garment shops and food stalls and snapped a few more photos. I stopped at the Kapitan Keling Mosque where I received a very nice tour and explanation from one of the administrators there. Read all about my visit to this beautiful mosque in my other post: A Tour and a Talk at Penang’s Kapitan Keling Mosque. I then picked up a SIM card for my phone and I was intrigued by the fact that the store owners recorded my name and passport number in order to register me with the phone number. When I returned to the Banana Guesthouse I took advantage of my air conditioned room and rested there to check email and offload my photos.

Wanton Mee with roast pork

That night I went for a walk and I was lured into a small restaurant by the smell of roasted pork. I ate a very nice wanton mee soup which is a noodle soup with wantons and roasted pork, something I’ve had at least 3 or 4 times already since arriving in Malaysia last weekend (sometimes I get it dry on a plate as opposed to in a soup). But that’s not enough food! I kept on walking until I realized I was already sweating again from the humidity, only 1/2 hour after taking my last shower. I stopped off at the fancy Cititel Hotel for an upscale sushi dinner at Kirishima. I was actually on the way to a seafood restaurant in the back of the hotel but, since it was still Thaipusam, this and several other restaurants were closed that day. The sushi, although at New York prices, was great and it was a nice break from fried food and pork.

On the way back to the guesthouse I walked down the lovely Lebuh Campbell which was a street lit up with red lanterns all along the way. It was a beautiful sight and I’ve since returned to that same street to eat dim sum for this morning’s breakfast.

Some of you may have noticed that we had a technical problem with the video we shot at Koh Mak Seafood and included in our post, Koh Mak Seafood: A Taste of the Island and Its History. The problem was due to YouTube not processing the video we uploaded and the video appeared to be unavailable.

We’ve re-uploaded the video which includes a feline friend who helped us to pick out a crab for lunch and eat it too!

Crab with garlic and pepper

When we arrived on the small island of Koh Mak we were already hungry from the long but beautiful ride by “slow boat” from Koh Chang. After checking into our resort, Monkey Island, we asked the receptionist for a recommendation for local seafood. He said he knew of a restaurant that was open and after one phone call they were on their way to pick us up from the resort!

After about 20 minutes we were picked up by a middle aged Thai woman in a taxi which on these islands is always a covered pickup truck with 2 benches to sit on in the back. She drove us to the restaurant and the ride turned out to be a freebie (to and from the resort). Not only that, but after bringing us to the restaurant the driver then put on a smock and went back to cooking for the other customers already seated at the restaurant.

The restaurant was right on the waterfront and the views were stunning. I was surprised by how clean the water looked just off of the restaurant’s pier since usually water tends to be pretty disgusting around docks and piers. There were only a few other people eating lunch there at that time so it was a really quiet place to eat and chill.

A friendly man came to take our order and we later learned that his family owned the restaurant and his wife was the chef/driver. Since this was a seafood place we decided to just point to whatever looked good by name or in photos, some crab, squid and fried fish and some refreshing watermelon shakes (always request “no sugar”) to wash it all down. I got see the assistant chef pick out my crab for me from a cage submerged in the water beneath the restaurant. These crabs are pre-caught and the cage serves as a sort of refrigerator for fresh seafood. The fried fish came with shredded young mango and the garlic and pepper on the crab was both crispy and chewy. The squid was the least interesting but BBQ squid always seems to be about the sauce you put on it (and this sauce was really spicy). All of this was topped off by a roti for dessert, a thin pancake with condensed milk dribbled over it. The food was amazing and we decided right then and there to return to Koh Mak Seafood the next day.

The waiter gave us a big black guestbook to browse and to sign. We noticed that people from all over the world had already endorsed Koh Mak Seafood with glowing reviews in many languages (Thai, German and English standing out) and also creative illustrations and so we added our praise in English and Hebrew. Most people were in agreement that this was “the best seafood on Koh Mak”. The restaurant has only been open for three months and the book was already nearly full.

The next day we ordered freshly squeezed orange juice shakes to start. We got the yellow curry crab and the fried scallops with chili sauce based on recommendations from others in the guestbook and we love the garlic and pepper sauce so much that we got some huge tiger shrimp with that. This second feast was a worthy sequel to that of the previous day and I’m talking Godfather II, not Temple of Doom! I don’t have to go on about the food since I was sure to take photos of all of the great dishes.

This time we had a nice visitor, one who was equally an expert in the consumption of fine seafood and he even helped us to pick out our crab this time (the crab tried to make a getaway). This cat didn’t have a name but he was not at all shy about sitting in our laps as we ate and being very vocal in his requests for scraps from the table. Since our cat, Cuggits, also dines with us, Tamar and I are used to paying our taxes when it comes to meals and so this cat ended up as full as the rest of us.

As we were about to leave the restaurant, we asked the waiter a question about some of the plants they were growing. That explanation led to more information about the restaurant and the pier we were standing on and before we knew it, we were taken inside of the family’s museum just next to the restaurant. This museum was an amazing little find and it detailed the family’s history and participation in the island’s formation and its community. The family was the first to bring tourism to the island by setting up the very first resort, a series of cabins on stilts in the water, the remains of which are still visible from the restaurant. Koh Mak used to belong to Cambodia and once it changed into Thai hands, the family was there to welcome the very first visit to the island by the Thai royal family.

Ake (our waiter) told us how he was just an eight year old boy during a period of hostilities between Thailand and Cambodia. One day a Cambodian naval ship docked at the Ao Nid Pier near the family’s resort but the enemy soldiers dismissed this little boy paying him no mind. However, what they didn’t know was that young Ake was actually the one tasked with calling the Thai government in the case of any emergency or any trouble from the Cambodians on Koh Mak!

8yr old Ake manning the radio to notify the Thai government of Cambodian Incursions

Our knowledge of the island and its history expanded as quickly as our stomachs that day and we walked away from Koh Mak Seafood knowing that this was a special place that we’d always remember. Hopefully we’ll have the chance to go back and visit again one day!

Click here to view all photos from Koh Mak Seafood!

Barack Obama's Inauguration 2009

This is my first post that I am writing from Asia on this trip. Last night Tamar and I stayed up late, fully absorbed by the TV coverage of the inauguration of the first African-American president of the USA. These two firsts coincided to remind us of another, that of the very first time we traveled to Asia in September 2001.

Seven years ago we were on a beautiful island in Thailand, Koh Lanta. This predominantly Muslim inhabited island of fishing, beautiful beaches and scenic, green interior hills was our first experience with paradise in Asia. Having arrived directly from Israel, in the time of the second Intifada, we had traveled far to find peace and seclusion and managed to escape the demonstrations, bombs, killing and news coverage for a full week. But that escape ended on the night of September 11 (Thai time zone) when it was announced by one of the locals that “a plane hit a building in NY” and Tamar and I watched the twin towers fall on satellite TV, beamed live to the island. In the wake of those terrible events I remember feeling both proud and helpless at the same time. I felt helpless because I couldn’t have been farther from American life at that time. However, like other Americans, I felt proud of the way that citizens and heroes responded to crisis back home and proud of the American instinct to coalesce in search of unity despite inherent diversity.

So, now I’m writing from Koh Chang, another idyllic corner of the earth and after watching the day’s events on TV I’m again filled with pride even though I’m far from home. I’m proud of the American system of government and proud to have voted. I’m proud to be a member of a generation to witness such a major step forward for the country. The feeling of helplessness has now been replaced by an imperative of participation and a sense of empowerment. That only eight years ago I never expected to see America under the leadership and inspiration of a black president is reason enough to give me hope for the next eight years.

It is during President Obama’s first term in office that Tamar will be allowed to apply for US citizenship. She is patient and her patience is to be rewarded. I’m very proud that this is the America that she can now be a part of should she choose to accept, in the words of our president, “the price and promise of citizenship”. In the meantime, as we continue to travel together, we’re proud to see the rest of the world celebrating along with us and it’s so good to be on the road again!

At the same time that Tamar was on a business call with her client in Ho Chi Minh City, I was watching a documentary on National Geographic about the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington DC. The memorial was designed by Maya Lin and I saw another documentary about the preparation and construction of the monument several years ago. This documentary, however, was equally fascinating and in some ways even more touching to watch.

There are 58,260 names listed on the wall of the memorial. The only criteria is that the names be of men or women who were either killed or remained missing in the war.

What I found the most interesting was the in depth discussion of all of the many items left at the wall by visitors to the site. These items include flowers, notes, flags, and photographs and other items that we’ve now come to expect at similar memorial sites. Seeing these immediately reminded me of the items left after the September 11 attacks and even at some sites following terror attacks in Israel. The narrator explained that this tradition has largely been shaped over the years by the practice of thousands of visitors to the Vietnam Veteran’s Memoral, the second most visited site in Washington D.C. after the White House.

However, beyond the usual items, people have left and continue to leave much much more. There were personal items as well as military items, especially medals for service. There were collectible items such as memorabilia, sports items, clothing, etc. I remember seeing a cigarette that was “not wet”, something that meant a whole lot more to a soldier fighting in the tropical forests of Vietnam than it ever would to an average person today. The most popular alcohol left is a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. There was also a bullet that killed a particular soldier. Many of these military items were brought by fellow soldiers and left for the memory of their fallen comrades. In one instance a letter was left by a man who was then a young soldier at the time offering an apology for taking the life of the very soldier the letter was left for. The largest single item left was a custom made motorcycle assembled by veterans of Wisconsin made of donated parts and artistically crafted and painted in memory of missing POWs from that state.

At first these items were simply picked up and discarded but their importance was soon realized. They are now collected and stored safely and they make up a museum collection where they are prominently displayed. These items are like those in a time capsule representing an entire era in American history, a generation of war and those people who have lived on but with wounds unhealed. This museum collection is unlike any other in that it has been collated and offered up by ordinary people and has been given meaning by them because it truly has meaning for them.

Without a doubt it is to the thousands of soldiers whose names are carved into the black granite that the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, also known as The Wall, is dedicated. However, it is the constant stream of visitors who keep alive their memory and the memory of such a sad time in America’s past. On this Veterans Day, as is the case every year, I’m most reminded of the war in which I was born but in which so many others lost their lives. Whether through visits to the Wall, items left behind for loved ones, or trips to Asia for business or pleasure, Americans will surely continue to visit Vietnam over and over again for many years to come.