Emulating the Colonial Brits in the Cameron Highlands!

During our world circumnavigation, while our catamaran Pacific Bliss was docked at Langkawi Island, we took a short flight to Penang and stayed at the Blue Mansion there. Then we fled the coast to cool off in the Cameron Highlands like the colonial Brits of yore. South of Brinchang, Malaysia near the town of Ringlet, we checked into a 25-room, Tudor-style inn called The Lakehouse. Its manicured gardens sit atop a hill overlooking rolling hills, lush woodlands and tea plantations. The lobby is filled with English antiquities that could have come straight out of a storybook! We checked in and were supplied with one old-fashioned turnkey that opened the massive door to room number 15. A wooden four-poster bed was weighed down by a thick ivory-and-white brocaded spread and surrounded with a filmy ivory mosquito net. Although the room was dark and heavy with its high beamed ceilings and period furniture, white painted walls and a pale mauve leaf-print carpet lightened the room somewhat.

After unpacking, I sighed with relief and sat opposite Gunter in a matching wingtip chair at the lone, draped window. A bouquet of fresh pink and white roses graced the table between us. This is just the escape from the boat we needed. I updated my journal while Gunter continued to read Somerset Maugham’s Up at the Villa. How appropriate!

Later we explored the gardens and then hiked toward the mountains behind the inn. It wasn’t long before we were huffing and puffing and looking forward to cocktail hour in the bar area, hoping to run into some interesting fellow travelers. That didn’t happen. We were disappointed to find the bar and restaurant largely deserted.

After dinner though, Gunter and I struck up a conversation in the lounge area with a couple sitting on a sofa near the fireplace. We plopped into another set of wing-backed chairs and ordered Tia Marias. They ordered brandy. We introduced ourselves. Edward is Swedish but left home at age eighteen to attend college in Los Angeles. His father, deceased, had been a neurosurgeon in Dubai; Edward left the U.S. to live with him there. His mother lives in Sweden. Natasha is Malaysian, a flight attendant for Emirates Air.

“It’s British organized and run,” she said.

“If it were run by the Arabs,” Edward interrupted, “it would never work.”

They both laugh. The couple lives and works in Dubai, has a summer home in Sweden, and spends holidays in Malaysia. Edward converted to the Muslim faith; he had no religion before.

“But you drink?” Gunter chided, as he ordered another brandy.

“Touché. I’m not that religious,” he answered. “Did you have sex before marriage?” he joked.

“Touché. This is not my first wife.”

One subject flowed into another, as good conversations often do. Our waitress—looking like a French maid in a starched white apron with a white hat perched on her drawn-back hair—appeared again and we ordered another round of brandies and coffees. Afterwards, we four exchanged e-mails and called it a night. We had made new friends.

Lois on an overlook to the Lakehouse property.

The Lakehouse,Cameron Highlands, Malaysia

Cozy Fireplace Lounge, Colonial style

Our room at The Lakehouse, with Gunter reflected in the mirror

Named in honor of William Cameron, a British surveyor who traveled the area in 1885, Cameron Highlands, at 6000 feet, is awkwardly called the “Green Bowl of the Country.” This area of rolling hills is one of the largest producers of fruits, vegetables and tea in the country. Over the next two days we toured a rose garden, a butterfly farm, a strawberry farm, and of course, numerous tea plantations.

Log Fence with multicolor flowers, Cameron Highlands

The Robertson Rose Garden was our first stop. We climbed level after level of stunning roses until we came to a spectacular view at the top overlooking terraced tea plantations. We took a different path down that passed by every type of flower one can imagine: hibiscus trees of salmon, yellow and red; sunflowers standing like sentinels on a ledge overlooking the valley below; and “blue butterfly”—a variety of flower I’d never seen—hanging upside down on a vine swinging in the breeze.

Next we toured a butterfly farm with thousands of screen-caged, stick-like caterpillars and frogs that barely moved. Perhaps they were all at the end of their life cycles.

The Rose Centre, Cameron Highlands

Frog in Butterfly Garden

The colors of the butterflies are wonderfully vibrant

Hanging blue butterfly flowers

The tour guide rushed us to our appointed tea time at the Boh Tea Estate, south of Tanah Ra ta, eight kilometers off the main road. The drive into the estate was lined with tea planted in 1929. “They will last another 100 years,” our guide told us. “They harvest the new shoots every three weeks.” Indians were brought in during Colonial times to harvest the tea; now their descendants live here and the process is mechanized. Five kilograms of leaves make just one kilogram of tea. Roller machines crush and stir the leaves, then they are “withered,” a process in which fans blow across the leaves to reduce the moisture content. Leaves are then heated to boiling and rolled to release juices for fermentation. Fine leaves are separated out and longer ones are rolled again. These are used in the special varieties of “garden teas.” The next higher grade is Boh Gold, and after that, Cameron Boh tea. Tea dust is used to “pull” tea, pouring it back and forth, Malaysian- style.

Tea Plantations in Cameron Highlands

Tea Leaf Crushing machine

The last stop on the tour, a strawberry farm, was nothing like my grandmother’s! These strawberries are mounted on waist-high beds picked year-round. At a stand on the way out, we resisted offers of strawberry sundaes and instead, purchased a tray of delicate, crimson berries dusted with powdered sugar.

Back at the Lakehouse, we enjoyed a good-bye dinner served by an Indian waiter dressed in a white shirt and spotless black vest, trousers, and shoes. Then it was time to rejoin Pacific Bliss and our simple cruising lifestyle.

 

Historic Melaka: Discovering the Soul of Malaysia

During our circumnavigation, with our yacht Pacific Bliss safely docked near Port Dickson, we were told that we should see historic Melaka, the birthplace of Malaysia. “If you go there, you will discover the soul of the nation.” Of course, I had to go!

Reportedly, Melaka is the Malaysia of yesteryear, the one broadcast to the western world by writers such as Conrad, Kipling and Maugham. Somerset Maugham describes this city-state best in Far Eastern Tales:

“A long line of rickshaws and little men running between the shafts…running with dogged steps…the sampans wedged up against each other like sardines in a tin…Chinese shops where strange medicines are sold…Bombay merchants, fat and exuberant, standing at their shop doors selling silk and tinseled jewellery…Tamils, pensive and forlorn, walking with a sinister grace…bearded Arabs in white skull caps, bearing themselves with scornful dignity…a multi-colored and excessive world.”

I wanted to gain a feel for those times gone by so we planned a tour. Gunter hired a car and driver—all day for 160 ringgits (about $43 US) and we departed, backtracking south along the coast for two-hour ride past massive industrial and land reclamation projects, condo developments, and businesses—many of them abandoned since the thwarted economic boom of the 1990s.

After we arrived, we instructed our driver to pick us up at 5 p.m. and we set off to take the Lonely Planet walking tour of old-town Melaka. The tour began at a charming town square featuring a garden with a working windmill. My Scandinavian mother would have loved this! A row of bicycle-driven rickshaws decorated with colorful plastic flowers and delicate parasols waited for passengers alongside the garden. Tourist stalls nearby overflowed with goods from all over Southeast Asia. We continued walking past an ancient cathedral and the old town hall with a massive clock tower, both built in the traditional Dutch architectural style. This city has a most intriguing multicultural heritage, from Southeast Asian sultanates to European traders—the beginning of modern Malaysia.

Dutch-themed town square, Melaka

Dutch windmill at Melaka Town Square

Waiting rickshaws, Melaka, Malaysia

Back in the 14th century, Melaka was just another lazy fishing village. That was before it attracted the attention of Parameswara, a Hindu pirate/priest from Sumatra, Indonesia. In 1398, the rogue priest fled to Singapore. Later, he sailed to Melaka and set up new headquarters. Under Parameswara, Melaka flourished. It became a favored port for waiting out monsoons and resupplying trading ships plying the Selat Melaka, the current Malacca Strait. This port, strategically located between India and China with easy access to the Spice Islands of Indonesia, attracted merchants from all over the east. In 1405, the famed Chinese Admiral Cheng Ho arrived in Melaka bearing gifts from the Ming emperor as well as a promise of protection from Siamese enemies approaching from the north (now Thailand). Based on these early contacts with China, settlers followed and became known as the Baba or Nonya (Straits Chinese). They are the longest settled Chinese people in Malaysia and over the centuries mixed Malaysian customs with their own. The port experienced the inevitable squabbles and intrigues, but by the time of Parameswara’s death in 1414, Melaka was already a powerful trading state.

Melaka came into contact with Islam through traders from India, and in 1424, the third ruler of Melaka converted to Islam. Then his son, Mudzaffer Shah, took the title of Sultan and made Islam the state religion. From Melaka, he disseminated Islam through all of the Indonesian archipelago. He attracted Muslim Indian merchants from competing Sumatran ports and consolidated his area of control. Eventually, the Melaka sultans ruled over the greatest empire in Malaysia’s history and successfully repelled Siamese (Thai) attacks. The Malay language became the lingua franca of trade in the region, and Melaka produced the first major piece of Malay literature, the Malay Annals, the history of the Sultanate.

But all this glory ended when Europeans came on the scene. Melaka entered a period of steady and inevitable decline. It is a typical story of European conquest: the Portuguese arrived in 1509 seeking the wealth of spice and trade with China, but after an initial friendly reception, the Malaccans attacked and took Portuguese prisoners. This prompted an assault, and in 1511 Alfonso de Albuquerque took the city, causing the Sultan to flee to Johor, where he re-established his kingdom. Missionaries came and Catholicism was implanted. But while cannons could conquer, the Portuguese could not force Muslim merchants from Arabia and India to continue trading there. Other ports such as Java overshadowed Melaka.

The port city suffered attacks from neighboring Johor and Sembilan, as well as from the Islamic power of Aceh in Sumatra. Dutch influence grew throughout Indonesia; Batavia (modern Jakarta) developed as the key European port of the region. In 1641, Melaka passed into Dutch hands after an eight-month siege. They ruled for 150 years, and Melaka was again a center for peninsular trade. The Dutch, however, put more emphasis into their possessions in the Indonesian archipelago.

By 1795, back in Europe, the French Revolution was raging and the French had occupied Holland. Britain was an ally of the Dutch and offered to take over administration of the Dutch colonies to prevent their falling into French hands. The British administration was principally focused on enhancing trade, so they abolished the monopolistic trading policies of the Dutch. The Brits also feared rivalry with the Dutch traders, so they forcibly removed the Dutch population up the coast to Penang. They wanted to weaken Melaka, so that if it were ever returned to the Dutch, it could not rival their own Malayan ports! Fortunately, the farsighted Sir Thomas Raffles stepped in to propose a win-win compromise: Melaka was permanently ceded to the British in 1824 in exchange for another Sumatran port. Now the British had control of Singapore, Melaka, and Penang, called the Strait Settlements, the basis for further expansion into the Malay Peninsula. Under the British, it was Singapore that became the preferred seaport while the importance of Melaka declined. Today, the port of Singapore handles 50% of the world’s shipping and 90% of Japan’s oil.

A River Runs through it, Melaka, Malaysia

My favorite stop on the tour was the Baba Nyonya Heritage Museum: across the river from the town square. The house has been converted into a private museum by the descendants of a wealthy Baba-Nonya family. (Baba-Nonya is a common term here for ethnic Chinese-Malays.) These Chinese immigrant-traders intermarried with the local Malays and adopted many of their customs. This particular museum, though, is even more multicultural: it depicts the lifestyle and furnishings of the marriage of a European trader with a wealthy Chinese woman of class—a fascinating east-meets-west story. The exhibit includes Victoria-patterned china for entertaining western guests as well as sets of “Nyonya-ware,” multi-colored ceramic designs from Jiangxi and Guangdong provinces in China, made specifically for the Straits Chinese. I learned that the traditional blue-and-white Chinese china with which we are familiar was used only for special occasions such as funerals. Pastel china was for every-day use.

Pottery in a Melakan gift shop

Furniture in the home is magnificent and massive: Chinese hardwoods are used in a mixture of Chinese, Victorian, and Dutch design with mother-of-pearl inlay. Marble surfaces have been imported from Italy. The staircase to the upper bedroom levels was carved by craftsmen brought in from China. The ceramic tile is Nyonya style: a blend of pink, yellow, dark-blue, and green. An open courtyard in the center of the combined townhouses allows light and fresh air. I’m impressed with the tiled drain—surrounded by potted plants—built to catch the rainfall. Our Chinese guide clarified displays depicting funeral and wedding customs and attire, the entertainment of guests, and how parlor games were played.

We continued to walk along Jalan Tun Tan Cheng Lock, a street also known as “Millionaires Row,” filled with more luxurious town homes of this style. Then we walked past numerous narrow long townhouses that had been converted into shops; they displayed goods for sale at the street entrances, but their private back yards were replete with traditional courtyards and fountains.

The highlight of Melaka’s Chinatown for me was the Cheng Hoon Teng Temple, dedicated to the goddess of mercy. It is the oldest Chinese temple in Malaysia, dating back to 1646. All of the building materials—and the artisans to build it—were imported from China. The temple’s interior is an explosion of black, red and gold. I watched, fascinated, as Chinese worshippers lit incense sticks and candles and presented their offerings.

Temple Street, Melaka

Lighting incense at the temple

After we returned to Pacific Bliss, I asked myself, “Did we discover Malaysia’s soul?” For sure, this visit to Melaka was a good beginning. I now understand more about the country’s culture and heritage. As was the case with most countries we sailed through, we needed to pause and stay for a while, observe, and interact. Discovery is always a process; it is never a quick fix.

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The Blue Mansion in Penang, Malaysia

Now that I’ve cleared the deck and installed a new computer with dual monitors (Yay!), I’ve been writing about Southeast Asia during the past couple of weeks for that section of my forthcoming book, The Long Way Back. One of the pleasures during my 8-year sailing circumnavigation was to get off the boat for a few days. While Pacific Bliss was berthed in Langkawi Island, my husband and I rewarded ourselves with a trip to the mainland of Malaysia. Our first stop was Georgetown, Penang where we stayed for three days in the Blue Mansion, the winner of the 2000 UNESCO Most Excellent Heritage award.  It is still possible to stay in this heritage hotel; in fact, it won a Best of Malaysia Travel award in 2008, so you might want to include this on your personal Bucket List. For those tourists who do not stay there, the hotel provides daily tours of the non-resident areas.

The Blue Mansion

I became quite interested in the Chinese history of this Malay Peninsula, which experienced a thriving trade between India and China in centuries past. This famous indigo mansion was built by Cheong Fatt Tze, an influential trader, businessman, and philanthropist. Constructed over a seven-year period between 1896 and 1904 by a team of master craftsmen from China, the mansion consists of 38 rooms, 5 granite-paved courtyards, 7 staircases and 220 windows. Servant quarters built in front of the mansion have been converted into restaurants and a bar. It was built according to Feng Shui, Chinese geometric principles and decorated with intricate carvings, stained glass, rare mosaics and Chinese latticework.

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By staying in the mansion-museum, I got a feeling how the Chinese traders lived. Cheong eventually had eight wives. The wife in favor slept in the main chamber, while the wives out of favor slept across the courtyard or in the other wing, or if really out of favor, in the servant’s quarters across the street. Imagine running into another wife when crossing the courtyard! Gunter joked about how, living in a catamaran, he could have a wife in each hull. Of course, I said “No way!”

The distinctive blue color of the mansion is obtained by mixing lime with natural blue dye made from the indigo plant. This lime-wash is very effective in tropical weather because it absorbs moisture and cools the house while protecting wall integrity. The courtyard is open to the rain, which falls directly to the pool below. The rain onto the roofs is collected through a network of pipes that begins on the eaves, is channeled through the ceilings and down the walls to cool the structure. Of course, that process, while great for the courtyard greenery, makes the courtyard quite tropical. The rented rooms do have window air conditioners. The house has been the setting for numerous films and features, including The Red Kebaya.

Lois finishes breakfast in the courtyard.

Gunter with hostess of Blue Mansion