Melaka - it was very hot
Our final destination in Malaysia was Melaka, a small port town that lies on the west coast, 3 hours south of Kuala Lumpur. Thanks to its history and its close proximity to Singapore Melaka has become a true tourist-town - this meant that that arriving on a Saturday was a bad idea as the place practically floods with Singaporeans on weekends. It was at least refreshing not to be the main targets of the tourist touts and agencies for once.Most of Melaka's attractions are based on its history which we now know very well, having learnt about it several times over. It can be very briefly summarized as: sultanate, Chinese traders, 16th century Portugese invasion, Dutch take over, British colonial years. All of this has created quite a strange collection of architecture, such as a bright red Dutch church, the ruins of a 16th century Portugese church and fort, a full-size replica Sultanate palace, a replica windmill in the town square, and a re-creation of a Portugese saling ship. When this is combined with the well preserved China town and Little India, it produces quite a bizarre place that was enjoyable to walk round.
The museums in Melaka were well organized if a little tedious. One of the more interesting museums we visited had an exhibition on kites on one floor and beauty on another. The latter exhibition explored the ways that different cultures mutilate themselves in the name of looking good - it was a bit freaky, but did at least provide a change from learning about the town's trading history!
Other than the museums there wasn't a great deal to do so we spent a lot of our time relaxing at our guesthouse; we spent most afternoons reading on the roof-top garden and we watched movies there in the evenings. Another good thing about the guesthouse was the communal kitchen, which we have not had anywhere before. Naturally, we had coco pops several times a day and made 3 minute noodles when we wanted to eat in.
Not put off by Emily's experience in KL, I had my own memorable hair cut in a barber shop (read shack, see below) in Chinatown. Within minutes of settling into the old fashioned chair the Indian barber (complete with handle-bar moustache) had shaved off most of my hair. I think my mistake was using the word "short", as I think this must have been one of the few english words that he had understood, and he didn't seem to pay much attention to my suggested lengths and hand signals - he was probably too busy sniggering to his friend watching closely from the corner. He did leave me with quite a substantial fringe on my shaved head because otherwise he said I would look like a convict - as far as I was concerned, I already did! It may not have been the hair cut I had asked for, but I could not question the guy's precision - after shaving about 95% of my hair off within 3 minutes, he then spent about half an hour perfecting my hairline with his razor blade. Besides, for less than a pound, you can't really complain.
On our last afternoon in Melaka we once again bumped into Donell and Deidre, the Irish couple we had first met all the way back in China. Even though we hadn't seen them since Cambodia it was an almost inevitable meeting, as we were taking a similar route through Asia and they were flying out of Singapore on the same day as us. We met them later for a very enjoyable drink (just one though as alcohol is expensive in Malaysia, especially compared to Thailand and Cambodia). They made fun of our respective haircuts.
Chris
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