Monday, February 11, 2008

"Pekan Rabu" or Wednesday Market @ Alor Setar, Kedah

Every time I went back to my hometown at Perlis, I must visit this place, Pekan Rabu. This is one of the popular places in Kedah. Pekan Rabu is located at the centre of Alor Setar town. The place is well known for their traditional items such as foods, clothes, etc. and is very popular among both local people and also tourists from all over the countries.

Traditional foods (Kuih tradisional) such as dodol, kuih karas, peneram, bahulu, etc. are among the hot items sold here. With the new business complexes built surrounding the Pekan Rabu, the variety of items sold increased. Now, there are plenty of shops selling different kind of textiles, tudung, songkok, traditional clothes such as baju kurung and baju melayu. It’s more or less like Jalan Tunku Abdul Rahman, Kuala Lumpur, which is also known as the Heaven of Textiles.

So, now, people who live nearby, for example, Perlis and Penang, they may choose to go to Kuala Lumpur or just shop at Alor Setar, which is nearer to their places.

Pekan Rabu will become more busy during public holidays, festive seasons such Hari Raya Puasa and Hari Raya, and weekends. You can see that many outsiders, from other states went back to their hometown, and shop their things at Pekan Rabu. This is the place where they come to get their materials for the preparation for Hari Raya.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

Trishaw Ride Around the City of Malacca

Trishaw Ride? I love it so much!

Suddenly, I feel like I wanna have a ride on a trishaw. So, my husband took me to the City of Malacca on the Chinese New Year Holiday. Wow, there were so many people in town. Most of them are tourists. Our first destination was the Maritim Museum, which I had written about it before. Then, we had a tour on a trishaw. Tour around the City of Malacca. What is so special about the trishaw ride at Malacca? Here, you can see many beautifully decorated trishaw with different theme. Just choose which one you like the most. The tour become more meaningful when the trishaw ride includes a tour guide given by the trishaw’s owner. They were all well-trained by a tourism body to deliver the tour guide to the tourists.

We were brought to the Ethnics Museum, Dataran Pahlawan, Kota A Famosa, etc. What a wonderful moment I had on that day. With the beautiful decorated trishaw, riding with your loved one…you’ll feel really great! I wish I can be there again in the future.

Of course there are many other places of attraction around Malacca, but we straight away go to the city because we want to have our lunch at Umbai after that. As usual, love the “Ikan Bakar @ Umbai” grilled fish together with other seafood such as prawns, crabs and cuttlefish. The sea foods here are fresh…and delicious…and one more thing, the price is also reasonable as compared to seafood in KL.

Due to heavy traffic on that day, we didn’t have enough time to go to Mini Asian, Malacca Zoo, Crocodile Park, etc. Even though I had already been there a few years back, still wanna see if there is a change or new attraction available at those places. Hope we’ll find some other time to go there.