Penang Weekend Trip: Khoo Kongsi Temple Georgetown
Upon my random wandering around Lebuh Armenian in Georgetown, my travel buddy and I chanced upon a small alley which somehow passed by a lot of travellers. Fueled by mainly curiousity and lured by the sound of the liondance's drum from a distance, we followed the small pathway which led to an open space filled with crowd. Walking closer to the source of the drum sound, we saw that there was a performance going on in front of a temple named Khoo Kongsi Temple.
Khoo Kongsi Temple is situated at Lebuh Cannon in Georgetown. The temple itself is quite special because it is actually an old Chinese clan house which is also functioning as temple and meeting hall. A performance like lion dance and drum show are usually held on a weekend at the temple's square. The performance is free to watch and it was quite fun to see the lion dance and the puppets teasing one visitor to another.
If you love to check out the history of clan house in Penang, you may want to pay the temple a visit for an admission fee of RM 10. However, if your surname is Khoo, you can visit the temple for free (since this is supposedly your ancestral clan house). Interestingly, the temple cannot be seen from the street as it is blocked by other building in the vicinity. We were kinda amazed by the beautiful clouds forming on top of the temple too that day. But since it's already way past 5PM, we did not manage to go inside the temple. Too bad. The temple opens from 9AM to 5PM everyday if you would like to visit.
The weather has become nicer around this timing and perfect for wandering around. However, the sun will set soon and we were getting tired from our Saturday adventure, so we decided to go back to our hotel, Merchant Hotel, by using a rickshaw. We kinda had a small discussion on what kind of driver should we choose to pedal our rickshaw because after all, we are not as slim as K-Pop idols you see. I was quite skeptical about asking old men to pedal but my friend thinking otherwise. However, at the end we decided to go with the younger guy to pedal our rickshaw.
The rickshaw driver will quote you a price and ask for your agreement before you can ride the rickshaw. The quoted fee from Lebuh Armenian to Merchant Hotel is around RM 15, which we thought was quite reasonable so we did not bother to bargain. To be honest with you, the rickshaw feels kinda cramped with our two butts sit next to each other. Oh my gawd, are we really that fat?
Oh right, space issue aside, be prepared with your camera because the route taken by the rickshaw is usually filled with many interesting thing to take picture with. One area that you must be prepared to take picture is definitely the mosque at Lebuh Buckingham. I am not even a Moslem and yet, I could feel the amazing vibe from this beautiful mosque.
When we are getting nearer to our hotel, we could feel that the rickshaw driver really utilized his brute strength to the max because the rickshaw feels heavier and heavier. At some point, he even coughed pretty badly we kinda prayed he could last and not fainted or vomited blood prior reaching to our hotel. And woots, he made it! I shall repent and eat lesser now that I am back in Singapore, I promise.