The final countdown - Final part

The holiday was drawing to a close and it was time to leave the tropical sunshine for the arctic darkness. Below a few photos from the last days.

Sam folding clothes.


Khuan-Ning.


Leong in one of his favourite positions, lying on the sofa. (And I hope that all of you follow the exhortation in the newspaper headline!)


Group photo at Penang airport.

(From left to right: Front row - Henry, Jia-Yen, Jia-Jun. Front middle - Peter, Kuan, Po-Po, Khuan-Ning, Thomas, Hwei-Ming. At the back - Sam, Leong, Jia-Qi)

Po-Po with her grandchildren. (The only one missing is Khuan-Hoong.)


The cabin crew greeting us on board the MAS flight to Frankfurt.

Tiina met us at Helsinki-Vantaa airport and brought us the winter clothes that we had left with her for safe-keeping. To welcome them back to Finland, Thomas and Henry both got new SaiPa hats.

Sporting the new headgear. (From top to bottom: Tiina, Henry, Thomas.)

The series of posts about Elk's Street's trip to Malaysia and Indonesia ends with a photo of what Elk's Street looked like on our return - quite a contrast to the tropic greens of the south-east Asian jungles!

The final countdown - Part 1

The return of Elk's Street to S.P. was on Christmas Eve, Jia-Jun's birthday, and the start of the last part of the visit to Malaysia. Below a few photos.

Jia-Qi in the kitchen getting the food ready.

The birthday boy admiring the celebration meal.

As can be seen from the photo above and the one below, there were lots of Christmas elves around.

Elf Kuan, Elf Henry, Elf Thomas, Elf Jia-Qi

The following day Elk's Street and the S.P. crowd went for a short trip to The Tree Top Walk at Sungai Sedim.

Finding it is not completely straightforward but for Malaysian standards it is surprisingly well signposted; the trick is to turn off the highway at the Kulim Hi-Tech Park, after which the signs are quite clear. Tropical jungles are not like European forests, where visitors can walk freely picking berries and mushrooms as they go (if the season is right). The undergrowth is so dense that visitors would need a machete to walk through a jungle. Oh, and not to mention all the snakes, leeches, and other creepy crawlies.

Jia-Yen and Thomas on the tree-top walk.


Some of the group on the jungle walk. But what are they looking at?


Malaysian jungle.

The following day, it was off to Georgetown, Penang to visit relatives. First stop was to visit H-M's Aunt Doris, who had just moved into a new apartment at Villa Emas, not far from the new shopping centre, Queensbay Mall.

The apartment block. Extra points if you can spot Henry!

The huge building boom and dramatic increase in high-rise buildings has been one of the changes I've seen in Penang. On my first visit, Komtar dominated the skyline of central Georgetown, and the Rifle Range flats stood out.

The way the island has been covered in concrete is not necessarily for the best - there are serious infrasture problems. This is seen most obviously in the constant traffic jams, difficulties with water - both flooding as water runs off the hills and supply of clean water - building quality problems, and issues with landslides. With Penang having been chosen as a U.N. Heritage site, I hope that more attention will be paid to sustainable development of the island.

Some of the gang in Doris's flat - Theng-Theng, Jo-Vi (boyfriend), Po-Po, Kuan, Aunt Doris.

Doris and H-M.

Jie, Doris's grandson. Jie's parents are working in Scotland and Jie is living with his grandmother.

From Bayan Lepas we then moved towards Tanjun Bungah to see the next set of relatives.

In Sungai Petani

We were met at Penang Airport by Leong, who took us to Sungai Petani, Kedah, our base for the holiday. Below a few photos.

Thomas not overly impressed with his first encounter with the local food. (Wan Tan Mee at the hawker place in Air Itam, Penang.)

The clock tower in Sungai Petani town.

One of the trucks that Uncle Leong sells. Tuah is a Chinese truck made for the Malaysian market.



On the river Petani.


Henry with the shopkeeper of the mini-market in Taman Meranti. Our regular morning trip to the mini-market was to buy The Star and 20 cents worth of sweets.

Kedah is known as the rice bowl of Malaysia. Below some evidence.

A typical rice field.

The rice close-up.

Although we didn't go there this time, Elk's Street can recommend a visit to the Muzium Padi in Alor Setar, if anyone is passing through and wants to know more about rice cultivation.

A young boy helping out selling fruit at Sungai Petani Central Market.

The final photo is for all the schoolchildren.

A Malaysian school bus.

On the topic of school and for those of you who worry about such things, the little boys missed the last 9 days of the school year but were given homework to do during the holiday. The work was duly done, although more enthusiastically by some than by others!