Hey there fellow travelers and friends. I hope you all enjoyed my first full day in Melaka. I know that I certainly did.
Despite the generally pervasive heat I discovered this morning at 8:15 AM that it can actually be very pleasant earlier in the day. At 8:00 AM with the windows open I could hear the soft sound of popular Arabic language music in the background which accompanied the cool breeze through the window.
Then at 8:23 AM we headed out for the day in search of an ATM. This was actually more difficult than you might think, which is odd, because many smaller shops and eateries seem to only want cash. Fortunately, there were some interesting things to see along the way.
Finally at 9:00 AM we were able to locate two banks with open ATMs, which were ironically right next to each other. Fortunately there was a simple eating joint nearby called Sisbuay Delight, right in front of the Grand Star Hotel. The cost of breakfast for two people was 25 RM ($5.29 USD).
While simple, the food was good. However we were not inclined to hang around a lot longer, so at 9:24 AM we finished up and continued exploring.
While within easy enough walking distance, this was clearly not a tourism sector of the city. However, the temperature was quickly rising, so at 10:10 PM we decided to duck into the Melaka Mega Mall. At first we thought it was another one of those oddly abandoned shopping centers, since there was almost nothing nor anybody on the first three floors of the building, but as we were exiting, we decided to go through a non-descript entryway into the lower ground floor where we discovered an entire small city of vibrant shops, albeit still with few customers. It’s hard to tell in the pictures, but the partially underground area really was huge.
At 10:40 PM we went out the other end of the mall, emerging back into the land of neverending museums. We initially weren’t particularly keen to visit the Independence Memorial Museum, but entrance was free, so we figured we may as well check it out. Once more, the air-conditioning was going full blast with doors and even some windows open throughout. I can only assume that electricity here is incredibly cheap.
Then at 11:40 AM we walked across the little plaza access headed into the People’s Museum. The cost per adult was 10 RM. ($2.11 USD). There were actually several different sections here. the first one had lots of stuff about kites and traditional games.
By 12:10 PM we were ready to head upstairs to the beauty museum. This seemed less about beauty than it was about showing off cultural practices that most of the mainstream world would find to be ugly. They seemed to be especially interested in lip, nose and very large ear plugs.
Of course more time could have been spent here, but at 12:43 PM we started down the stairs and almost immediately came across a very engaging stamp and coin collectors shop.
These seemed to be mostly geared to the casual collector, since prices tended to be between 10 and 50 RM. Nevertheless, they did a good job of presenting things, but I just didn’t want to buy anything.
Back down on the ground floor was the Meteor gallery. This was mostly like an upper elementary school science class, but with the important distinction that they actually had several meteorites on display, some of which you could even touch and pick up; that was new for me! They also of course sold jewelry made with meteorites and even meteor cologne; who even knew that existed?
After leaving the building at 1:07 PM we headed back to the nearby Megamall where we had earlier seen a nice looking Thai food place called Johnny’s Restaurant.
The food was very satisfying, and the total cost for both of us was only 71 RM ($15.15 USD. The robot delivery of the food was a bit silly, but an interesting gimmick. We finished up here at 2:29 PM and decided to go across the aisle to check out “Brands Outlet”. There are no pictures because the clothing was just plain horrible. We did however finally find a bathroom in the mall; for some reason these are very few and far between.
By 3:03 PM we were back to museum land, this time the Melaka Heritage Museum. Entry here was free.
While pretty much everything covered here had earlier been seen in other museums, I felt that they had done a decent job here. My only criticism would be that they were way too detailed with some of the information. I felt that even a serious history student would at times have been overwhelmed.
3:50 PM came and we rushed over next door to the final museum, Stadthuys. It had a cost of 20 RM ($4.22 USD) per adult, but we would have to finish and be out by 4:45 PM.
This museum had a lot more actual artifacts than the others, but there were also a lot of recreations. I would have liked to spend more time here, but I know I also would have quickly gotten overloaded. Thus, it was probably for the best that I had to just rush through. We were pushed out of the museum at 4:40 PM, and then we immediately went to a traditional Malaysian Chinese coffee shop at 4:45 PM.
Despite having no signage of any sort, this place was very busy. I was the only non-ethic Chinese person in the place. It was 18 RM ($3.81 USD) for a cold, long coffee and a tiny piece of tasty cheesecake. We stayed here at 5:20 PM and were once more out on the street.
While this had not been planned, at 5:40 PM, we found ourselves outside the Malaysian knife gallery, and they had the largest knife in Malaysia right in front of the shop!
This place was actually way cooler than it sounds, so I would highly recommend that you stop in. We stayed walking around inside until 6:18 PM and even bought a few items. The lighting outside was amazing when we exited.
Next, at 6:54 PM we went into this vegetarian Chinese restaurant called Chin Hua vegetarian food. The absolutely delicious food was 30 RM ( $6.35) for two (including two coconuts). They even cut open the coconut for me afterwards AND scooped all the coconut off the husk so I could easily eat it; what a bargain!
Departing at 7:33 PM, it was then an easy 30 minute stroll back to the hotel.
And then my last full day in Melaka was finished!
If it was tiring for you to read all that, just imagine what it was like for me to actually do it. Still, I’m glad I packed in as much as possible, since while I might come back to Malaysia, it’s rather unlikely that I’ll ever be back to Melaka. Yes, it was a very nice place to visit, but the world just has so many other amazing places waiting to be discovered.
As always, I hope you’ve enjoyed following along, and I look forward to seeing your comments and questions in the space provided below. For now goodbye to all of you faithful readers, family members and friends.
Travels with Jay 