VIDEO DESCRIPTION:
I planned my day around two festivals in Melaka, Malaysia — the Malaysian Games Festival and the Melaka River Festival. Turns out, neither one was actually happening. So instead of a festival video, you get something maybe better: a classic Plant Doug walk through one of Southeast Asia’s most historic cities.
What’s in this video:
🕊️ Pigeons gathering at the fountain across from my hotel
🍗 Breakfast at Hoe Kee Chicken Rice — a legendary Hainanese chicken rice shop on Jonker Street, famous for its chicken rice balls (and yes, I finally tried them)
🏛️ A quick look at the historic shop-house architecture, air wells, and wooden staircases inside Hoe Kee
☕ Chendol at Jam Besar (Big Clock Tower) — my local friend’s favorite spot, right by the river
🚶 A long walk along the Melaka River in search of the “Melaka River Festival” (spoiler: it wasn’t there either)
🌿 The secret hidden lagoon of Melaka — a spot most tourists never see, cut off by billboards and the riverside walkway
🦎 Monitor lizards basking on the mangrove roots
🏚️ Abandoned buildings, condemned structures, and the “Robo” (collapse) warning tape
🛕 Neighborhood Chinese temples tucked under trees, with the smell of incense and burn piles
🏨 The Swiss Garden Hotel, the abandoned monorail line, and Melaka’s strange hybrid architecture
🐦 The “ghost festivals” of Malaysia — and why they always seem to sneak up on me
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:
Question for you. Have you ever heard of the Malaysian Games Festival? Probably not. And until yesterday, I hadn’t either, but apparently here in Melaka this weekend, the Malaysian Games Festival is taking place. I don’t know much about it. I read a little bit online. I don’t know whether what I read was true or not, but I’m heading to the festival grounds to see what’s there. Just to see what’s going on. Here we are in Melaka. It’s a Sunday morning and right across from my hotel, there’s this little park where people have been feeding pigeons. It’s like a habit for people to come here to feed them. So, the pigeons being no dummies, well, this is where they gather. And they actually have a nice little fountain there. The pigeons have a good time cooling themselves off in that water over there. But yeah, check that out all along the hotel mill road. Hotel right there. Hotel mill road up there. All along the hydro wires. Yeah. Waiting to be fed. So somebody’s going to come here and give them their breakfast pretty soon.
I’ve had a long very odd relationship with holidays and festivals, any kind of celebration in Malaysia because they always sneak up on me. There are so many holidays, so many festivals, so many things going on. And as a foreign tourist, you know, I’m outside of the loop, I guess. Maybe if I read the local paper every day, they still have them here. Maybe if I watched Malaysian television, maybe if I just knew a lot more people who kept me informed, I wouldn’t be taken by surprise by every holiday that comes along. But I am generally and I always tell myself that I should do a regular search like every Monday or something like that. Just do a search what are the festivals, what are the holidays this week in Malaysia or in whatever city I’m in. So yeah, I met a local guy yesterday or the day before yesterday. We had a nice breakfast together and then he mentioned, “Yeah, there’s something going on this weekend you might want to check out.” Even he didn’t know. He’s a local man, lives here in Melaka, and he says, “Yeah, I just heard something something going on.” And so I went back to my hotel room, did a search online, and it turns out this entire month has been the Melaka River Festival, like a month-long Melaka River Festival, but I have no idea what the events were for that. I have seen no evidence of any kind of river festival. And then I found out that the Malaysian Games Festival is happening this weekend. And today, Sunday, is the final day of the festival. And apparently, they play a lot of traditional Malaysian games. People can enter competitions. This is what I read online. And they compete with these traditional Malaysian games. And then the winners are given their trophies today. And there are cultural performances, a parade, a procession. I honestly don’t know when it comes to these festivals. Half the time, half of my energy goes into just figuring out what’s going on. So I go to the festival not really to take part in them, but just to do reconnaissance and just figure out what is this festival all about and what is going on. So that’s what I’m doing. It’s been a very busy weekend in Melaka. Huge tour groups from China have been here and they have they seem to have a set rhythm to them. A lot of them are like wearing matching t-shirts, things like that, tour groups that identify them maybe coming from a single company and then part of their routine is to pose for a big group photo right up ahead here. I thought maybe another group was doing a group photo right now. But yeah, it’s been quite busy, quite quiet this morning. This is about quarter after 8 in the morning, so it’s still pretty quiet. Not many people out. And that’s something else I’ve learned about Malaysian festivals, like when they had the dragon boat races here in Melaka. They start early. They don’t mess around. It’s not like you roll out of bed, have a leisurely breakfast, and hang out for an hour over a cup of coffee, and then around 11:30, head towards the festival. If you do that, by the time you get there, it’s already over. You know, it starts at 8:00 in the morning, 8:30 in the morning, and they start. And I think they do that partially to start when it’s a little bit cooler. So, it’s not quite as hot. But yeah. So, anyway, I’m heading towards the festival grounds at 8:30 this morning because it’s scheduled to start at 8:30. There’s some pretty fancy wedding photography and videography going on over there. So, I have to go in a wide circle. Stay out of their stay out of their frame.
Cute.
Unless I’ve been led totally astray. This is where the festival is supposed to be taking place off in this direction. According to what I read online, there’s a staging area across from the Sultanate Palace. There’s a park over there. I thought that was the central place for the festival, but I guess they they use that as a spillover area and an area where performing groups can get ready. And then the main festival is supposed to be on this grassy square part of the Dataran Pahlawan. This mega mall. Yeah, this mall is kind of a mystery to me.
I’ve been inside it from the other side. I’ve never gone into it from this direction, but I think there might be a whole lot more to this mall than I’ve ever seen. I for the longest time I thought it was completely closed because all I ever saw was this side of it, the back, and then this performance performance center here, this ship with a theater. And as far as I know, this is completely shut down. Nothing happens here at all. But every time I come by, it just sort of looks like an abandoned mall. But if you come at it from the other side, the doors are open and inside it’s a mall. but I haven’t really explored it fully.
And then over here, the mall has an underground section and they kept a grassy park on top of it and the festival is supposed to be taking place over here. I’m starting to have my doubts because I’m not seeing a whole lot of activity. Got some cars parked over here. Couple of police officers. No, he I thought I saw a couple of police officers on scooters going by. And just to get oriented, there is the Independence Memorial. Actually, quite a nice interesting museum in an interesting building. There’s Porta de Santiago, the last remaining gate of the original fortress. And of course, St. Paul’s Church up on the hill.
and the soundtrack of Malaysia. Leaf blowers, angle grinders.
So, it’s supposed to be up here. Not exactly a wide open pedestrian access, but I’m starting to feel like nothing is happening. So,
If I come around the corner here. Yeah, there’s nothing here.
So, I guess I have a bone to pick with the festival organizers. They got me out here pretty early in the morning. Yeah, according to what I read, the festival, as I said, it’s a games festival and traditional games of Malaysia. I can’t remember the Malaysian names for them, but there was a tug-of-war competition, spinning tops, all kinds of stuff is supposed to be happening right here.
And I guess I guess not
unless I’ve entered an alternate this I am living on planet Doug. Let’s never forget that. Maybe in an alternate universe, people are enjoying this amazing festival, but on Planet Doug, it was cancelled. So, it’s either not happening or I’ve got the location wrong and it’s actually happening maybe in this other park across from the Sultanate Palace. So, let’s walk over there. If nothing else, I get a little bit of a stroll this morning. before the full heat of the day arrives. If you’ve been keeping track of my small adventures, you know that because of the Independence Day weekend, I had to move out of my hotel and I moved into the Discovery Youth Hostel. I spent one night there and then thanks to a friend of mine, Matthew, I spent two nights at the Estadia Hotel. very nice, very comfortable, you know, all the modern luxuries, beautiful room. And then after two nights there, I moved back to the hostel. And then after I moved back to the hostel, the old wheezing, rumbling, crashing, banging air conditioner in my room there just died. They just stopped working. So I I’ve had no air conditioning at all since I moved back. And when that happens all the time, places I’ve been, and I always have to go through this mental game of like, what do I do because it’s annoying that the air conditioner doesn’t work? But it’s equally annoying to get it repaired because trying to get it fixed, like going to the hotel owners and telling them, “Oh, you know, the hotel the air conditioner in my room broke. Can you fix it, please?” Well, your entire life can be upended because now they have to maybe do the repairs and that could lead to days of interactions, people banging on your door. They have to come in and look at the air conditioner and they kick you out of the room and then they didn’t they never you never know when they’re going to show up and then they might look it over and then they come back and they try to fix it but they don’t have the right tools so they leave again. And this could go on for days and your whole life is completely turned upside down. So quite often it’s easier just to live without an air conditioner while you’re there. And I’ll tell them that it’s not working. But I’m not that worried about it. I figured out that if I leave the door to my room wide open and there is a window in my room, but it’s one of those weird places where for some reason they built the room with a window that opens onto the hallway. I never know why they make that decision. But anyway, my room does have a window that opens onto internally. It’s an internal window opens onto the hallway. So, if I open the door, leave it wide open, open the window. The window actually has screens on it, which is kind of cool. Keep out mosquitoes. Though, mosquitoes have not been a problem. And then I get a little bit of a cross breeze through the room. And I just take tons and tons and tons of cold showers. I have a bucket in the bathroom now that fills up from cuz the water just drips out of the tap there. And I leave a bucket there and it fills up over time. So, like every hour or two, I’m sitting there on my bed, my laptop on my on my knees, just sitting there in a pair of shorts, just sweating to death. And then when it gets unbearable, I pad down the hallway, you know, quick bucket bath. I leave myself soaking wet. I don’t towel off at all. I just go back to my room, sit down nice and wet, and I let the water evaporate, cool me down. And then two hours later back another bucket bath. So that’s that’s what I’ve been doing lately. Anyway, there is the Sultanate Palace behind me. And I was told that the Malaysian games festival would be happening right here in this area. But as you can see, there’s nothing going on. I mean, you could say maybe it’s just too early, but there’s no way. like a festival on the scale of what I was expecting. They can’t just set it up in 10 minutes. They would this would have to be completely set up with tents and things. So anyway, all of my information is wrong. Yeah, that happens quite a bit. So maybe I can go get some breakfast. Yeah, it’s good timing for breakfast. I mentioned that I met a local man who told me there was something happening this weekend. He if he’s there at this restaurant this morning, maybe I can tell him, “Hey, you led me astray.” But anyway, I met him for breakfast the other day at his favorite spot, Hoe Kee Chicken Rice. That was yesterday morning. I met him for breakfast and yeah, he goes there every morning and yeah, so I met him there for breakfast. So maybe I’ll just go there right now, have a breakfast since I’m already out and I can show you quite an interesting building. It’s an old shop house on Jonker Street and has all of the elements on the inside of the traditional, you know, design architecture here with the air wells and the second story with the stairs going up. Yeah, it’s quite a beautiful spot and it appears to be very very popular. has a reputation for making very good Hainanese chicken rice and they make rice balls, chicken rice balls. And my new friend wanted me to try those. That’s why he wanted to take me there. And I was expecting them to be rice balls with chicken in the middle, but I guess it’s just rice, but they’re cooked in a chicken broth. And again, I don’t know whether this story is accurate or not, but this man was telling me that that restaurant invented the Melaka, the famous Melaka chicken rice balls. And he said they were invented because there used to be men pushing boats up and down the river with poles, right? like barges like you see in the Netherlands and places like that where they walk alongside the river with this long pole tucked into their shoulder and they push boats up and down the river shore. He said they used to do that here. He even has a photograph of this happening that he said won an award in a photography competition. I haven’t seen the photograph myself cuz I’ve never I haven’t seen any photos of this type of pushing barges up and down the river in any of the museums here, but maybe that’s part of Melaka history. And while they’re pushing the barges with this long pole, they would take these rice balls and eat them because they were so convenient. They could have like a bunch of rice balls in their pocket and then while they’re pushing, you know, they they can’t sit. They can’t eat a complicated meal. So, they just like they grab these rice balls and pop them in their mouth and they would eat chicken rice balls while they’re working. And that’s how they came about. At least that was the story he told me. So, anyway, yeah, let’s head over there and I can show you this place. It is nice to be out in the morning before the day really gets underway. You feel like you have most of the city to yourself. Most of the people that are out right now are exercising or part of tour groups that get an early start. So you don’t have any of the trishaws with their music blaring. So there’s the Islam Museum there. the architecture museum right here.
Still very curious about that building there. That is Aldy Hotel, I think, but I’m pretty sure it’s not actually open anymore. I keep intending to do a do some research into the history. It’s a very interesting looking building. You can see the roof up there is torn open. Yeah, I think it’s abandoned, but and of course this police station that I’ve pointed out before right dead center in the middle of historic Melaka and it’s completely abandoned and empty. And I did some reading about this and I I did see some discussion online about like what to do with this space. And there was some talk about turning it into a you know heritage site, a museum, a police museum of Melaka rather than tearing it down. That would be kind of cool.
Yeah, Melaka is a hybrid city now. It really is. There’s so many different sides to the city. Of course, there’s the side that I’m interested in, that of the history going back to the 1300s and 1400s with the Melaka Sultanate and the arrival of the Portuguese and then the Dutch and then the British. That’s the side of Melaka that interests me and all of the remains of that time. all of these historic buildings, but then you also get things like this, you know, the Aldy Hotel. I see a lot of quite large apparently abandoned buildings. And again, I’m I’m always curious about that because you would think real estate in a city like Melaka would be very expensive, very valuable, and yet a lot of buildings just are left for very long periods of time to do nothing. And I often there’s my first my first try shot of the day playing children’s songs. But yeah, I often wonder about the finances of that. I mean, who can afford to own something that big and that elaborate and just do nothing with it? I mean, yeah, I guess they have very deep pockets, whatever corporation owns that building and can just let it sit there for years and years and do nothing with it. But there’s a new side of Melaka that I don’t know that I entirely like. I mean, it doesn’t bother me, but there is this more crass element creeping into Melaka. So, on the street that leads to my new youth hostel, there are things like a snow room, like it’s an actual like it’s a tourist attraction where you can pay, you know, it’s mainly meant for children. You can go inside the snow room and play on the snow. So, they have winter boots, winter coats, winter jackets, winter like gloves that you can put on and they have a big room filled with artificial snow and ice. So, if you’ve never experienced snow, you’re not from Canada, well, here you can go in and pay and your kids can run around and slide on the ice and throw snowballs. I I haven’t gone inside. I’ve only seen it from the outside, but it looks like a kind of a like a tourist trap kind of attraction. Something you would see in Las Vegas or I think of Niagara Falls in Canada. When I was a kid, Niagara Falls was known for being filled with those sorts of attractions like the upside down house and the house of mirrors and the haunted house. I even have a classic photograph of me with a Frankenstein monster in front of like a Frankenstein house kind of thing. And there’s another another attraction like the snow house is over here. And then right beside it is another one like a escape room. And then beside it or maybe part of the escape room there’s a the floor is lava attraction. And I don’t know what it is but I guess you go in there and the floor is lava and you just have fun with people running around trying to stay off the ground because it’s lava. But from the outside they look they don’t look like this. They look a little bit cheap, like tacked on tourist attractions. And yeah, I mean that’s another side to Melaka that you see. As I said, it’s kind of a a hybrid city. And then the main attraction for most people is what I’ve pointed out many many times, the river itself, but not really the river as a part of history. The river has an opportunity to get on a cruise boat, another kind of modern tourist attraction. And then all the food all up and down Jonker Street. All the restaurants.
Yeah, the soundtrack of Malaysia.
This isn’t the place I’m going to, but you can see right here there’s the Famosa Chicken Rice Ball restaurant. That’s the the type of food that I’m thinking of.
And this Hoe Kee, I think it’s Hoe Kee restaurant is right up here just on the right hand side. Again, I think it’s quite a popular place during busy periods. They get a quite a large lineup outside. They have an area like set aside where people can queue to go in. But this time in the morning, it’s not crowded at all. Little bit busier. When I was here yesterday, it was almost completely empty. But yeah, so this is where I had breakfast yesterday. And they make Hainanese chicken rice ball. So this is their main dish, Chinese steamed chicken. So I’ll be getting that. The portion I had yesterday was huge. It was really quite something. This is what my new friend had cuz it also has offal. You can get it with chicken and offal or just the chicken. And then you can get the chicken rice balls, stir fried Beijing cabbage, and then I guess they also make asam fish head, fish tail, fish meat. I think I could smell this yesterday. So I think they do they do make it still. So I asked them if they’d mind if I shot a little bit of video and they said it would be fine. So yeah, you can see some of the decorations on the outside.
And then as you go in, you can start to see elements of the the classic shop house here where this would be this would have been the front the front room reception of the house. And then right here the very first air well looking up. So you can see the air well up there.
really high ceilings, which I find fascinating, like very high ceiling. And then the second floor up there, wooden wooden stairwell heading up to rooms up there. Oh,
and then heading into heading into the back.
So, you’re going through another set of rooms here from the original house, and then it opens up onto a another courtyard and an airwell back here.
Yeah, the upstairs is probably where a lot of the the restaurant staff are right now. I mean, living here, I think a lot of the the staff are from Myanmar, but yeah. So, there’s the wooden wooden staircase going up.
And it’s one of these restaurants that is famous in the sense of being covered by the local newspapers. So they tell the history of the of the family that founded it and runs the place, the the family recipe. I haven’t seen any of this in English. So I don’t know what the story is, but yeah.
Okay. There we are. And yeah, this is the friend that I met yesterday. He comes here every morning for breakfast. So, I think I’ll join him. Oh, yeah. One great thing about places like this that specialize in one dish, they’re ready to go at a moment’s notice. I mean, all the food is prepared long in advance. So, you know, I just sat down with my new friend here and within a minute of sitting down there, I got I got the the food. So, there’s the chicken. I mean, technically, it’s Hainan chicken rice, but there is no rice in this. It’s that’s all chicken, so it’s actually a very large portion. And then these are the chicken balls here. And they have it set up in sets like right here. You can see they you know for two people the price you get chicken rice, how many chicken balls you get and you can just pick your set from here. Yeah. For me it be it’d be nice if they had photographs. I always like menus for us dumb foreigners. So we can see a picture of it along with the price beside it, you know. Yeah. They have it on the wall here, of course. Yeah, that’s what I showed on the outside. And then you can see here on the wall they have like two two person set and 10 rice balls and so that and rice and then chicken for a total of 25 for two people. So a complete meal of rice and chicken balls and the chicken comes to 25 ringgit for two people. So, that’s a really good deal.
And they have a hot sauce for your meal right there. It’s pretty spicy. And you get a little little tray here. And Whoops.
There we go. My little bowl blew off because of the fan. That’s in hot climates when you live with fans. It’s nice to cool down, but then it always blows things off your table. So, they did this for me yesterday where you get a little bit of this. And then you get a little bit of this.
Pour that on there. And I’m not sure. It’s probably meant for both the chicken and the chicken rice balls.
And there you are. Now you’re all set to all set to eat. So this is the typical breakfast you get here. You can get the Chinese tea, this and all of this together. 13 ringgit. In local people, they often say they say dollars as well. So sometimes they’ll say like $13, but the local currency of course is ringgit.
So there’s, as you can see, that’s all chicken in there. So it’s a very large portion. I’m really surprised.
More or less boneless. Yeah, pretty much boneless. You might find a little piece in there somewhere, but it’s basically all all chicken and very light brothy flavor. So, I think most people if they want a little bit more spice, you know, they would have to dip it in here. And I’ve seen people here add the hot sauce, like six or seven spoonfuls of it, like just on the rice, you know? Yeah. so much. I just need a little bit of a I’ve been eating since 1962. When they had a shop, they used to operate a kopi. Oh, they did? At the corner and then you had to book in advance if you want chicken thigh as bones as as flesh one week in advance. My my brother used to want them and my my dad used to book them. That was in 1962. 62. Yeah. Wow. So this same business but a different location. That’s right. And they move here. They next door to an Indian guy who open up the window and then sell newspaper. Oh
yeah. My my guide, my friend here was just telling me that this place, he used to go to this same restaurant for chicken rice back in 1962, but they were at a different location, a kopi up the street. And they don’t have so many workers. No, smaller place back then. Yeah. Yeah. These chicken balls, like I said, there’s no actual chicken on the inside. It’s just rice, but it’s cooked in a chicken broth, so it has chicken flavor.
Mhm.
Yeah, this is a lot. I had the same meal yesterday. I’m such a slow eater. I could be here all morning, you know, working my way through this. So, pretty casual, relaxed meal. So yeah, that’s it. That’s my breakfast this morning. Can dessert chendol place again. Oh yeah. Yesterday we had dessert after this. We went to a riverside chendol place. That was also really good. It’s known as a big clock tower. Chendol. Oh yeah. In Malay they wrote the t-shirt they wear jam besar. Jam besar means big. Oh okay. Big clock tower. Mhm. Mhm. He was just telling me the place we went to is called Jam Besar. Jam Besar Chendol. It’s right across from the clock tower. And Jam means hour. Yeah. Besar is big. Oh, okay. Big clock tower. Chendol. But all the people working there, you said they were from Bangladesh. Yes. Yeah. And the owner is an Indian Muslim. Indian. I know the grandfather too. and the father. They’ve been selling chendol since 1962 as well.
And we had an interesting conversation yesterday because I had just shot my video about riding on bus M100. And this man, local man that I met, he actually rides on bus M100 himself. And he knows all about it. He knows how to get on, has the the local bus card, beeps on and off. He’s He’s got the whole thing figured out. That’s a concession card. Concession card. Yeah. You can use it for more than buses or you can use it for other things. Only for buses. Only for the buses. Like someone mentioned on your blog, he says you can buy one ND for ND1. You can go all over the state. Every state. Okay. I haven’t looked at the comments yet. I I haven’t had time. So,
I just learned a couple of interesting things about this neighborhood because I was always curious about this building right here. It’s such a big one. And if we move over here, this is the beginning of Jonker Street, by the way, Jonker Walk. And then when you approach it from the bridge, you see this building. And it’s like five stories high for Melaka. This is huge. And my friend just told me this used to be the Tongcha Bank. That was a banking building. And this used to be the banking. He he’s been here, you know, he grew up here. He lived here for until he was 16 and he’s in his 70s now. So he was here long before modern times. And he remembers this as a bank. And this one over here was also a bank, the overseas Chinese bank building. So this was the the banking district. So that kind of solves a mystery of what that building used to be. Yeah. Bank building. Though the Malaysian games festival is happening in Kuala Lumpur, not Melaka. But I was doing a bit more reading and the Melaka River Festival is happening. And I read something about how if you go up the river towards the main jetty where the river cruise boats end and start their trips, there might be activity up there. So after we have chendol, I might go for another walk up the river since it’s such a beautiful day. But yeah, we’re repeating what we did yesterday and coming here for chendol. And I mentioned that this chendol place here is Jam Besar. Basically the big clock tower. Yeah. Right there.
Yeah. I keep checking the time and it’s always right. So that clock is maintained. It actually works and gives the correct time. Yeah. And you can get chendol all over the place in Melaka. And this is the one that my friend it’s his favorite one. So he comes here all the time. Chendol Jam Besar. And he said, “Yeah, the workers here are Yeah. from Bangladesh for the most part.
There’s the the machine that gives you the shaved ice, fills the bowl.
The the name of the sauce, I can’t quite remember now. It’s like a sweet sauce there that he puts on something. Gula
and some beans and then some
noodles. There you are. Restaurant
Melaka. Chendol Melaka. Melaka. Very good. There it is.
Yeah,
have these nice tables right by the river.
I’m walking very carefully so I don’t spill my chendol too much. When one hand is occupied with your GoPro, life becomes challenging. So there you have it. That’s where I had the chendol just back there across from the clock tower. Melaka is starting to wake up slowly but surely.
And as I said, I was thinking about just going for a walk along the river, mainly for the experience. It’s been a while since I’ve gone up and down the river, but I was reading about this river festival and how there might be some activities up river. And then if I walk along the river, I might run into a few things. So to be honest, I doubt it. I I think I’m just chasing another ghost festival, the ghost festivals of Malaysia. But it’s a really nice day. And I haven’t been along the river for a while. So yeah, I might do that. Just go for a walk and keep my eyes open for new things that I’ve never noticed before. I haven’t seen the otter for a while. When I first came to Melaka, I would see these river otter frequently. A lot of other people never saw them, but I think they’re just moving too fast. You have to kind of take your time and look around carefully, pay attention, and then you’ll see these otter. And once you see one of them, suddenly, oh, there’s another and another. You see one, you see the whole family. But I haven’t seen them for a while, so I don’t know what’s going on.
That’s the second bridge along the river. And like if you consider the main bridge that goes to Jonker Street is the first one. That’s the second Jambatan Chan Kun Chang. And that’s where my hotel is, my youth hostel. It’s right over there, just on the other side of that bridge. And here the remains of some of the fortress walls. One thing I noticed here kind of interesting I mean of course this is the story this illustrates the story of Hang Tuah and Hang Jebat the famous battle between these two warriors. But what I noticed when I was looking at this mural is that neither one of them is holding a weapon. And yet in their famous battle, they were fighting with a traditional kris, a famous one, a historic kris with almost magical powers known as the Taming Sari. And I mean that was a key element to their battle. And yet in this mural, they’re fighting, but neither one of them is holding a kris. It looks like they’re holding them in their hand, right? Their fist is clenched as if it’s holding onto a dagger, but they decided not to include it in the mural. I wonder if they did that on purpose just to remove sort of that element of violence from it. Like it it looks like two men fighting, you know, using silat, the traditional Malaysian martial art. But they decided not to give them weapons just to make it more tourist friendly perhaps. I wonder if that was like a a conscious decision or just an oversight. And yet the Taming Sari the kris is such an important part of the story and yet it’s not there at all.
It all happened so fast. I don’t have any video of it, but that big boisterous group back there, they’re all Melakans and I don’t know whether they’re like a social club, church-based, company based, school-based, some sort of a group and they’re all embarking on a competitive scavenger hunt. And one of their tasks was to take a picture with their group and a foreigner. And just as they were starting their scavenger hunt, I showed up. I don’t know if they were cheating or not, but one group took a picture with me. They’re all very excited like, “Ah, we already got our first foreigner.” But maybe whoever set up the rules maybe wasn’t specific enough because while I’m standing there, the next group just says, “Well, they took a picture with me.” Then another group of, so I took a picture with every single group. They all used me to fulfill their task. Have a picture with a foreigner. Somehow it feels like that’s bending the rules. Should always be a different foreigner. You would think the first group used me up already. They shouldn’t be able to use me again. But I had a picture taken with every group. Yeah. So, yeah, I’m going to walk along the river, but I’m just going to pop into my hotel for a minute just to take a cold shower and relax after after breakfast. And then yeah, there’s my the name of my place, Discovery Cafe and Guest House. And then I’ll continue my walk.
After a lukewarm bucket bath, I’m feeling somewhat refreshed. This is the the door to my hostel right behind me. Yeah, same day, same morning, different shirt. Yeah, my red Canada shirt was just soaked through with sweat. I mean, honestly, I could go through 10 shirt if it’s a 10-hour day. I could go through 10 shirts, one shirt per hour, and I have to take it off cuz it’s soaked through with sweat. That’s just a Yeah, it’s just how it works. But yeah, I don’t think I’m going to find this river festival. I don’t think it exists, but yeah, why not go for a walk along the river? The the river is right down there. And then you turn there. But I’ve gone up and down that section of the river a million times. So, I thought what I’d do is follow my road where my my guest house is located right here, Discovery Guest House, and just sort of take a look at my neighborhood. I mean, check out the the building across the street there. I I read somewhere that it’s over a century old, but look at the balcony up at the top. Okay. Well, maybe not quite a century. There there’s a date I noticed. 1937.
So, yeah, just shy of 100 years old. Very interesting building, though. Be very curious who lives in all of these places. I never see people sitting outside on their balconies. Like, never. It’s just not a thing that people do. You know, they wash and hang laundry out there, stuff like that. But yeah, I never see people just hanging out on the balcony having a cup of coffee or cold drink.
The the man that I met over breakfast two mornings in a row. Now, when I first met him, he was actually just sitting just sort of over here. There was a chair over there. He was sitting there and then he called out to me. He recognized me from YouTube. So, he called out, “Hey, Doug.” And I came over and had a chat with him. I’d actually seen him once before during the the Dragon Boat Festival. Oh, wow. Look at the side of the building here. That big flat expanse and all of those shuttered windows. That’s really nice. Very weathered. Very Yeah, very interesting. But, he said he was sitting down there to rest cuz he just had like three or four big meals all in a row. He’s a real eater. And he said he walked up and down the street and he had all he listed all the meals that he had, but I I lost track of them. But he said yeah, this was a it’s a very famous in the past very famous street for restaurants and eating. 1825 gallery and hotel. Look at that. very colonial looking with the white pillars and the facade. Now this 1927 on that building as well. You can see the date. So it’s the 1825 Gallery Hotel and Atas restaurant.
It’s got a nice historic feeling to it this whole street.
And you get a lot of local shops like this one here.
It’s one of the many like neighborhood canals feeding the water into the river. Slow moving, but I can see it is moving.
So, it’s draining water from inside the city over there crossing underneath. And then and then crossing yeah going between those two buildings and it just continues down to the river
Fruity Corner Cafe. Hainanese chicken shop. Nice little Yeah, it’s a quaint quaint little place. The time cafe.
You hear the crow up above me? The crows of Melaka.
Yeah. Let’s duck down here like one of these side alleyways though. to do that. I have to wait for a There’s a little break in the traffic. Got to make sure when you do that, you keep an eye out for the scooters and motorcycles. They’ll come zipping along, threading the traffic lanes. Yeah, like I said, right down here is the the river. Yeah. I never never walked down this alleyway before.
Oh.
It’s funny. I actually I know this alleyway quite well. I just didn’t recognize it coming from the other direction. This is where Sinap Hin is located. And I tracked this place down to get a I got the last remaining shot of 53% samsu. The particular type of samsu I was looking for. I found it here. It’s quite a well-known spot. So yeah, I’ve been up and down this alley a few times. I just didn’t recognize it from the other end.
Coffee roaster and bakery. It’s another little spot right here. Oh, look at that. Smells good. I can smell the coffee aroma. Looks popular. Can’t even move in there. So crowded.
Jawa Town stay Ohana House.
Yeah, I remember walking down that street once before and we’re right back at the river.
But my goal was to walk along this other street. So, let’s finish that before I go to the river. I missed our So, I’m back on that street. Ah, you can get some rojak over there. Rojak and a chendol. I’m a big I’m a big fan of rojak. Another one. The luster. Look at that dessert tea cafe. They’re open open air. Oh, there’s the cafe over there. And then they have seating out here. It’s a nice breeze coming through this open area.
I had a funny experience this morning with like some of this Chinese writing. You know, as a foreigner, I see these Chinese symbols, the writing everywhere, and I just automatically associate them with something very deep and philosophical. meaning, you know, some sort of philosophical phrase. And the Chinese sign that I saw was in the restaurant where we were having breakfast, the Chinese chicken rice place with the chicken balls. And they had some wooden signs on the wall with very elaborate, very artistic Chinese characters carved on them. And since I was having breakfast with a local man, I asked him like, “Oh, what does that mean? can you translate the deep philosophical meaning?” And he was reading through some of the characters. And then just to make sure, he called over the owner or the manager of the restaurant and asked her like, “Okay, so what what does this mean?” And then he turned to me and he says, “Um, it means many more customers.” So it was like, “Okay, yeah, well, yeah, that makes sense.” So, but it looks like a piece of art. like it’s a piece. It’s an artwork that looks like it should have been Chinese poetry from a thousand years ago, but in fact, all it said was some sort of phrasing that was calling for good luck in the future, good fortune, and let’s have many more customers come to our restaurant. Okay. Yeah, that tracks. That tracks. But yeah, I was looking for that deep philosophical poetic meaning, but it was very practical. In fact, yeah, this is quite cool. This long walkway right beside all these buildings. See just how far ahead of me it goes.
Hotel Ba 50 ringgit it says over there.
One street over is very much Little India. So, and there is a little bit of an Indian flavor here, but not much. I thought this would be part of Little India as well, but it looks more more Chinese than than Indian.
Oh yeah,
sugarcane juice.
I’ve mentioned many times I drink a lot of sugar cane juice, but I’m always a little bit a little bit wary because at one point in the past I drank some and immediately afterward got so sick, like one of the most sick I’ve ever been in my life. So, it kind of had a psychological impact on me. And I associate sugarcane juice with getting ill. So, I always hesitate a little bit.
Again, very cool building over there. I don’t see a date on it, but yeah, it’s probably from the same time period. Just looks the same. 1927, probably 37.
Yes, definitely not not little India.
There’s such tight quarters on the sidewalk. I walked right by this mosque without even realizing it was there. It wasn’t until I got Few feet away from it. I could look back and I saw the dome and the minaret.
Yeah, from the front here doesn’t look like a mosque at all. I walked right by it. I wonder if it’s identified here somewhere. Madrasah As-Siddiq al-Makab. All right. Yeah. So this would be the entrance, huh? Yeah. The narrow streets of Melaka really hammers home the the theme of Planet Doug, which is always look up. Cuz unless you stop and look up, look around you, you just don’t notice things. You really have to stop and look around. In particular, look up. Yeah, really interesting buildings. Look at that one there. Old architecture.
BB Sports Center.
Kingston Hotel over here. More of a modern building.
and back into the some of the period buildings over here. It’s been a long time since a lot of these buildings saw a coat of paint, right?
I like them this way. Gives them a weathered look. And those shutters up there haven’t been painted in a long time.
I often wonder what what’s going on with all the top floors. You see all the shops, of course, at street level and above them there’s always these apartments, but I I don’t know how many are occupied and how many are just sitting empty. So, I always end up wondering what’s up there, who’s up there. You don’t get much hints from the windows or the shutters.
I spotted this seafood sign right here. Capital seafood at the back. Check out this alleyway. That’s very cool.
I’m sure the local Melakans could tell you all about this place. I can smell the fish and the oysters already.
Check out the spiral staircase heading up there.
Reminds me just a touch of Montreal.
Montreal is a special city in Canada in terms of its architecture. Like apartments that have back sections like this with spiral like usually metal but metal circular staircases heading up to the top.
Look at that current. All the different currencies.
I really like that staircase there. Just look how steep it is. I would like I mean how tight it is going around that pole.
Yeah, this has got to be a famous place that Melakans would know all about. Oh, got a YouTuber posing for a picture. Oh, another YouTuber. Wonder if there’s any foreign YouTubers here. Yeah. Eat, travel, live. That’s probably a YouTube channel. So, this must be very well known. And people come here and make a video here. Yeah, they’ve got the newspaper articles framed. Always tells you it’s a famous place. Capital Seafood since 1967.
and it looks like they have a bunch more back here. Little seafood restaurants. Sate otak-otak which if I remember right otak-otak is quite well known down in Muar just a little bit south of here. I think that maybe is where otak-otak comes from nearby Melaka.
Look at that side by side spiral staircases. That’s very cool.
I’m seeing a lot of signs. Look very like vintage style signs for this place. Tongbi since 1959.
This one in particular definitely is from decades ago. The first stall, Hong B.
This is the the alleyway right there, right in right below these buildings. Kind of a hidden gem, I guess. Particularly if you like seafood, someone with a good camera knows what they’re doing. could probably do some classic photography with these buildings.
I was trying to cut back towards the river and there was like an alleyway I wanted to reach but I got stuck in this long alleyway so I where I want to go is over there. I thought I could cut through but this whole area is barricaded. Looks like yeah some sort of a abandoned plot. It’s behind that mosque that I mentioned, but that’s where I want to go. But I either have to return where I came from or continue continue down here. Let’s let’s keep going this way. See what’s in this back alley
and then see if I can cut over to the right somewhere. Looks like a classic Malaysian abandoned building right up there.
Either abandoned or not completed.
Yeah. Closer up. It looks abandoned.
Condemned, more like.
Yeah. You see a surprising number of structures like this in the cities of Malaysia.
though I hear sounds. Maybe one of these air conditioners is still running. But anyway, I found a little alleyway here I can cut through. It was one of the restaurants that I saw. Little alleyway eery.
So, I think I can cut through here. I guess is where they had the sugar cane juice.
Yes. Hello. Hello.
And right through there, I think maybe I can cut down there. I spotted some breaded pork being cut up and served there. It’s probably what they’re known for. Looked good.
Is this a dead end or let’s find out. Once again, I know exactly where I am. I just didn’t recognize it because I’ve always come from the other direction. I’ve never I don’t think I’ve ever entered the alleyway from that direction. But now that I came further down, I’ve gotten to this curve in the road and I recognize this. I’ve been here before
and I’m right back where I started it from. There’s the bridge over the river and that place with the samsu it’s just around the corner. So, I went for a little detour and came all the way back. So, I’m just about ready for another shirt. I could already change my shirt from this wet one into a dry one. Doesn’t take long for my shirt to get all sweaty.
I’m back on the Melaka River. And if you haven’t seen this before, you’ll probably find it interesting. If you’ve seen my previous videos of Melaka, you’ve probably seen this already. But
every time I walk along here, I come across something new.
Ice kacang.
I’m keeping my eyes peeled for the river otter. I would see them here, but I haven’t seen any for a long time. And so far, none of the giant monitor lizards either. Not today. It’s the middle of the day. It’s probably too hot for them. And right up there on the right, there’s a kind of a lagoon formed by the walkway. And I just noticed there’s looks like a little pathway over here. I’ I’ve never gone down there, I don’t think. So, I’m actually going to circle back around and instead of following the river right here, I’m just going to try and see if I can get to that and maybe I can get to the back side of this lagoon. So, yeah, let’s backtrack a little bit.
Seems to be very popular place. Line clear kampong Jawa. A lot of people coming here.
And this is the little laneway. Just curious what it looked like and where it went.
That’s where I was. That’s where the river is right there. And I was looking down this little lane on this waterway.
Looks like they use this area for parking. People can just like an old warehouse here. A home furnishing. Yeah, I think I saw the front of this warehouse on the river and from the riverside it actually looks quite old. So I was wondering what it could be.
And this might be the the back of the lagoon that I was talking about. These houses here maybe right through here. I’m not sure. Looks like a little residential dead end.
Abandoned house over here.
Yeah. I don’t know what this could be. And this right here is the the lagoon that I was talking about. Pretty sure the trees and I think the river riverside is right here.
Yeah, this is what I was trying to find. Look at this. Yeah, it’s interesting the the walkway that follows the river. I can just see it right through there. It it’s on stilts and goes through the river itself. Like it’s over the river, but then you can’t actually see back here because they put up a solid wall of advertisements. You see those big signs right there? So tourists like me, when we walk along the river, this whole area right here is actually hidden from view. Check out that tree. That is something else.
Looks like there’s a little bit of a a temple thing going on here, you know, shrine. And then over there as well. Looks like this is used for gatherings. And then another shrine over here by the river. And it was down here that I saw a family of river otter and big monitor lizards, but you have to kind of come around the signs over here in order to see them.
As I said, this is the the hidden lagoon of Melaka. Yeah, it’s completely cut off from the the tourist side of the river that everybody sees. You have to come back here in order to see anything.
Looking for lizards and river otter, but yeah, I don’t see any at all.
It’s interesting that they made the decision to do that. Like I said, there’s the walkway right there and then there’s the signs kind of blocking everybody’s view. Most people Yeah. You just walk right on past. Look at this.
Like how old does this little structure have to be for all of this growth to like grow around? around. It looks a little bit like the temples at Angkor Wat. The way that the the root structure is probably holding up the building.
Yeah. You don’t you probably don’t want to go in there,
huh?
So, you can see the the river boat going by out there.
And these waves coming in are from the boat.
So, it’s part of this lagoon is actually just the shore of the river, but this walkway turns it into a a hidden lagoon.
There’s definitely some history here. with this massive tree and then the small structures with the trees growing over top of them. And there’s another kind of warehousy building here. It’s all been sealed off with this warning tape, the red and white tape. And it has robo written all over it. At first, I thought it was some sort of a like graffiti tag or gang sign or something like that, but it could mean just like unsafe or condemned. I’m going to look that word up right now and see what it means. Yeah, it’s definitely a warning of some kind on Google Translate. That word comes up as collapse. So, it’s a derelict building, a collapsing building. So, like keep out. What’s the There’s a word in English I’m looking for saying that a building is you know about is too dangerous to go into. Yeah, it’s got it written all along. Robo. Robo. Robo. Robo all the way around in case you didn’t get the message. Stay out. A condemned building.
Oh yeah. All the way to the other side. So this whole structure is completely condemned.
Yeah, I’m sure it has some history. Ensun Lee. Oh, it says over there.
I like having these old buildings still around. Gives the city some character, gives it some flavor.
And then if you come around here, this is what I was talking about. Now we’re back in the exposed Melaka that everybody sees right on the river. And this is the walkway. It’s built on stilts above the river.
And the whole thing is lined with these giant advertisements, giant billboards. But if you come to the end and you peek around, that’s when you see this lagoon. So this is what I saw originally. I was out here before and I saw the otter and the monitor lizards. So I wanted to come in from the other side. So that’s what it looks like from here.
Yeah. One of Melaka’s secrets.
One of the cruise boats.
This is the the market bridge, Jambatan Pasar.
I knew I’d see one of my monitor lizard buddies along here. Look at that tail.
Yeah, you see them all the time. They climb up onto these root structures, get out of the water.
Yeah, I’ve talked about these in the past. I had to look it up and I found out that all of these little roots coming up from the ground, they’re actually part of this tree because the roots can’t actually get any oxygen from below. So the roots go down into the mud which is completely dead and then they have to turn around and they come back up and then they kind of pull in nutrients and oxygen from here and then into the tree. So this whole island is part of the root structure of this tree and it’s a perfect home for these monitor lizards. They like to Oh, there’s another one there. Smaller one. Yeah, they’re very camouflaged in there. They Yeah, it’s hard to see them if they’re not moving and they know that, of course. So, they spend most of their lives still. It’s only when they start to move around that you see them.
It’s a beautiful one, a young one.
talking about Melaka being a hybrid city. Here’s one part of the city, the Riverside Park. Melaka River Park, I guess. I thought that ferris wheel was out of commission. I didn’t think it worked at all, but it’s going around in a circle. But most of the compartments have the doors open. But who knows? Maybe that’s being worked on or I don’t know. And this is the a bridge from the abandoned monorail system that’s still you know they built it but it never really ran but we still have the tracks and then the traffic bridge over there.
giant hotel. And I noticed just beside the river here was another sort of small shrine Chinese center.
Quite often when you find one of these clusters of trees and bush behind a building and then tucked away will be a shrine of some kind.
Yeah, it’s interesting here too that the the walkway was built on stilts in the river rather than following the shoreline. It’s actually above the river there. Another kopi there. And then here, like I said, is a another Chinese temple, a shrine. you you know you’re near them quite often because you can actually smell them. They burn a lot of things like offerings and then a lot of fireworks. So you end up with these burn piles. There’s one here and look like they had a fire over here as well. And as you’re walking along, you can smell the smoke and then as soon as you smell the smoke, it’s like aha Chinese temple. usually underneath a cluster of trees like this. And it’s always very nice spots. Temples can be pretty rough around the edges. You know, these are very lived-in community neighborhood temples. They’re not polished tourist temples, but they find them. They find really nice spots in the trees to set them up just tucked away like that all over the place. And these metal contraptions are for setting up, you know, incense sticks, big ones. Stick inside each one of those holes.
A hybrid city. Many different faces to Melaka.
And there’s a another face to the city. Massive luxury hotel complexes like that.
There’s probably not much point to doing it. You won’t get the scale on the GoPro screen, but there’s quite a large monitor lizard down here.
5 ft long, maybe nose to tail. See it down there resting. I wonder what it feels like to be sitting on top of all those roots. He’s like getting a good belly scratch if he moves around. I don’t know whether it’s comfortable or uncomfortable,
but it’s one way they can get up out of the water during the day or at night.
It’s a big It’s the biggest one I’ve seen today.
The the monorail line goes right by here by this hotel. I always get the name of this hotel wrong. The Swiss Grand Hotel, Swiss Garden Hotel, something like that. I always get it wrong.
Here’s a mystery to solve. I found myself a toy right here on the walkway. The mystery is how did it get here?
How did somebody lose it? Did they you know drop it off a a balcony from way up there? Swiss garden. There it is. the Swiss Garden Hotel. But yeah, I’ve been kicking it along for fun.
Who knows? Maybe it was out in the river and someone tossed it up here to get it out of the river.
Still having fun with my beach ball.
And I’m right across the river from Kampong Morten
over there. I don’t think I’ll be going over there today. Just stop, take a look at it from across the river.
Interesting neighborhood. Classic Malay architecture. A little kampong. Again, adding to the hybrid nature of Melaka. It’s got a little bit of everything, even beach balls.
End of the line. And yeah, there is no Melaka River Festival. I’m at the final cruise boat point jetty, I guess. I for I keep I always forget the name of this jetty. Jetty Rampa or something like that. But this is where the boats come from when they start down near Dutch Square and they come up here and then turn around and go back. And yeah, I don’t know where I was reading it now. To be honest, I must have just been dreaming, but I was reading that there was this Melaka River festival going on this whole for a whole month and that there were going to be all kinds of activities up here around this jetty, but there’s nothing here. So, I must have gotten my information from a dream or something. Yeah. So, anyway, it was a nice walk to get out here regardless, even if there is no festival, no Malaysian games festival, no river festival. I’m trying to track down the the ghost festivals of Melaka and I’m not finding anything.
But at least I got a bit of a walk and some exercise at the same time to come out all the way here. So yeah, to go back I think I’m I’m just going to cross over that bridge. It’s on the other side of the jetty and then I can follow the river all the way back on the other side. pass through Kampong Morten, but I don’t think I’m going to be recording anything on that side. I’ve done that walk and I’ve done that same route by bicycle, so I’m pretty familiar with it. So, that is it shutting down for this morning or this afternoon, I guess. Thanks for hanging out with me. We saw a couple of interesting things. The the mystery lagoon, the secret lagoon of Melaka. I quite enjoyed seeing that from that side. And of course, Hainanese chicken rice that was really good. And Chendol, things like that. Saw some more interesting alleyways, other parts of Melaka I hadn’t seen before. So, that’s it. Time to turn around and start walking back. Shout out to the Crunch Club, watching the video all the way to the end. Put CC in the comments to let me know. And, shout out to everybody supporting the Planet Doug Adventures and video productions currently here in Melaka, Malaysia, whether through Touch and Go. Everyone supporting me through the Planet Doug Patreon. Shout out to you guys. Think about you guys every day. You get a big thank you from me every single day. and my coffee posse supporting Planet Doug Adventures through the buy me a coffee platform. That’s it. Shutting down. I’m going to be putting a 3D flyover map at the very end of this video. You can see exactly where I walked today along with a few pictures. And with that, shutting down. See you in the next video.