I discovered it quite by accident last year... I simply noticed it as the bus I was riding in happened to pass by it. Now part of the cemetery is being worked on by the CWGC.
My next stop was All Saints Church, which happens to be Malaysia's oldest Anglican church. I heard in the news not long ago that an attempt to firebomb the church was made by angry Islamic fundamentalists after the Malaysian Supreme Court ruled that non-Muslims had the right to use the word "Allah" to refer to their god. Thankfully the plot was foiled, but it made it even more urgent for me to visit the place lest any damage be done before I see it.
I photographed as many of the legible gravestones as I could, and then had a quiet little picnic on the cool, shaded steps at the church doorway. It was Sunday, but nary a soul was around.
Then I took the local bus back to the bus station. As I was waiting for the bus to leave, an Indian woman who was quite overweight struggled to board the bus. The two Malay teen boys in front of me (the very first row) started laughing at her, and she launched into a tirade at them. I gave up my seat to her, with the double benefit of giving her an easy plce to sit, plus she ended up sitting right behind the kids for the entire busride, berating them! The kids deserved it! I ended up sitting next to a man who sat with a wide stance and who would start laughing unprovoked (he had no headphones on, so he wasn't listening to comedy). Then when the bus came to the terminus, he stayed on board. Methinks he was a little bonkers.
After that short but hellish local busride, I boarded the intercity bus back to Penang.
Then at night, there was a Lantern Festival parade. It was 14 days after Chinese New Year, which is when the most festive CNY events usually take place. In the parade, the gods from different temples around the island were being paraded around. The gods Fude (the god of the earth) and Matsu (goddess of the sea) were highly represented. Tigers were a major theme too, it being the Year of the Tiger.
At one point, it became Night of the Dueling Gods. During the parade, the Muslim call to prayer rang out from the mosques around the city. The goddess Matsu with her blinking lights and banging drums was passing right in front of the mosque next door as that happened! I gotta say: diversity makes things interesting!
Here you can see a winged tiger, behind which, sitting on a small throne under an ornate roof, is Fude.
And what better way to celebrate the Year of the Tiger than a Tiger Beer?
