Lily C. Fen / Story and photo
I was searching for a Malaya that no longer existed in the speed of 21st-century Kuala Lumpur, so I headed straight for the historical port of Melaka in western Malaysia.
At the Baba & Nyonya Heritage Museum in this town, I gazed at the great divider of this rich Peranakan home fronting the gates. It was made out of dark wood and delicately carved into sophisticated symbols that these Chinese merchants had brought to their Malay households.
I saw the peepholes through which the nyonyas (unmarried females of Peranakan families) looked through whenever male visitors came to call on business. The young maidens were not allowed out of the house, so I learned, and were dressed in the finest Chinese-Malay ensembles.
I heard about their lifestyle, even saw the traditional Peranakan kitchen and how these families once-a-upon-a-time dined. I was able to imagine how meals were prepared in a massive kitchen in the back of the house, with a mill ready to make rice paste for finer dishes that required it.
Six generations ago, the museum I was in had been purchased by a wealthy Chinese merchant. The Dutch occupation had left behind a slew of long and winding homes that men like himself plucked up with finances from the rubber-tree plant trade at the time, and it was in homes such as these that the Peranakan culture of Chinese husbands and Malay wives began. This social fusion would prove to be so rich, that it also gave birth to nyonya cuisine, which is a mixture of Malay and Chinese ways of cooking and eating.
Declared a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization World Heritage Site in 2008, Melaka lay only about 130 kilometers southeast of Kuala Lumpur by land. It was a successful trading post in the 8th century.
I was left in awe, as I traversed historically preserved Heeren Street during the day, and soaked in all the madness that was the Jonker Walk Night Market as twilight swept over the city.
Heeren Street was characterized by its fantastic windows and awnings. It left me feeling as if I had been transported back in time to an era when the Chinese-Malay families ruled the district, and the white gold (the rubber industry, or white latex from the rubber-tree plant) wealth of the Peranakans was what kept the streets vibrant.
Heading to George Town in Penang was also worth the trip, some 360 km north of Kuala Lumpur.
Even the drive across the bridge that connected the mainland to Penang Island was a sight worth seeing. The infrastructure was put up in 1985. The island has seen a major boom in development since then.
I expected charming colonial architecture all throughout, but post colonial countries have a way of hurriedly building up, and a sight of skyscrapers greeted us as we rode into town.
George Town was also given the Unesco World Heritage listing in 2008, and though it takes work to traverse the modern-day massive boulevards, it is well worth the effort to look for the street art that dot several corners of the map, livening up the historical district.
There were several clan houses that captured my imagination: Khoo Kongsi was the grandest of them all. The Khoos are a Chinese family able to trace their lineage back 25 generations.
Expect a walk through a smorgasbord of opulent chinoiserie, replete with symbolisms of carp turning into dragons, images of unicorns that are a sign of good luck, and other visual invitations for an influx of wealth and prosperity.
For those interested in Chinese culture and folklore, this is a wonderful place to gaze at fine examples of their art and beliefs. I was even impressed to discover an entire room full of gold plaques labeled with each family member’s educational achievements.
Several cartoon steel pieces (by Sculpture At Work Studio) are part of George Town’s thoroughfares: part of a 2010 governmental effort to have the streets pop with occasional bits of informational and humorous art about local customs of the country. What really melted my butter was the artwork of Lithuanian artist Ernest Zacharevic, who in 2012 was part of George Town Festival’s feature for breathing new life into the historic avenues of George Town.
Make sure to grab a map from your hotel and walk around town to search for Zacharevic’s art: They are such a hit that dozens of visitors line up to take photographs of and with the artwork. They are also quite imaginative, as he sometimes utilizes three-dimensional objects from life (a motorbike, for example, or a children’s swing) and paints human figures interacting with these objects. Hunting for his images through the streets of Penang makes for a fantastic art escapade.
The Pinang Peranakan Museum, Dr. Sun Yat Sen’s Penang Base and the magnificent, unmistakably blue Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion were more of what made George Town for me a fanciful trip to a time long gone.
Just imagine the sheer significance of walking through the very rooms that Sun Yat Sen once sat in and delivered speeches, or see where wealthy Peranakan families lived, married and conducted their business.
Pinang Peranakan Museum was a grander version of the Baba & Nyonya Museum in Melaka. These two foundations proved to be a perfect complement to each other during my cultural heritage trip. Seeing both of these museums in towns that were related in history (Melaka had been a natural port of trade for centuries when the British came and wanted to develop Penang as a new area for commerce) further solidified my knowledge of Peranakan culture, and I left Malaysia completely enamoured with its fusion of Chinese and Malay ways.
It was at the Pinang Peranakan Museum, in particular, that I witnessed history and architecture so delicately preserved in the heat of Southeast Asia. It was on a par with all the castles I had toured in Central Europe, when it came to the art of structural conservation. The finery of clothing from centuries past was completely intact, the furniture seemingly alive and breathing, as if each seat and table were waiting for the madam of the house to come in and sweep through the room.
It was in Melaka and George Town that my quest for a long-lost Malaya leaped from the pages of my favorite books into reality.
I had found a lost Malaya revived.