Malacca Town

Today, Wearn, Wearn's brother Cheng Chuan, Phyllis (Cheng Chuan's girlfriend) and I went to historic Malacca to check out the town's colonial-era history and eat some famous chicken rice.

Jonker Street: Famous for its antique furniture shops and its night market

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One thing that I've noticed about Malaysia is that each region claims a certain kind of food as their dish, and I've been very fortunate to be able to eat so many of Malaysia's famous dishes in the places where they are most famous. Malacca, it turns out, is famous for its Hainanese chicken rice, and I was yet again fortunate enough to have some. So here's a bonus, What I Ate Today: For Lunch:

Malacca serves their HCR in ball form

It's a really special kind of dish and it's pretty hard for me to explain how it tastes, but it's very soft, dense and tastes like chicken, as you might well expect. That description really doesn't do it justice. I'd recommend it, for sure. The restaurant is located just across the street from the Jonker Street sign and the queue for the place was about thirty people long or more when we got there (it's not a big shop, but the food is good and cheap). There are a lot of chicken rice shops in town, so it can be hard to know where to go, but this place was definitely good.

An example of the buildings on Jonker Street

Some of the work they do in the antique furniture shops on Jonker Street; I don't have more photos for obvious reasons

Phyllis at one of the many hawker stalls on Jonker Street

After checking out Jonker Street, we headed back to check out some of the sights.

A view of the canal

The Stadthuys: Dutch Town Hall

The history of Malacca, in many ways, mirrors the history of Malaysia. It's long and involved (historians create this complexity solely to ensure their tenured positions, I'm told), so I'll omit the details (you can read on your own on Wikipedia).

I will tell you that the red-colored buildings in the above photo date back to when the Dutch had colonized Malacca (1641-1824). This is also where you can catch...


A trishaw!!!!

Personally, I prefer the term "trickshaw", but what can do? We rode one of these bad boys over to the old Portuguese fort, A Famosa. In that sense it's a bit like a time machine (since the Portuguese controlled the area from 1511 to 1641; you don't care, I know).


In the video, our driver picked the Jordin Sparks, for the record.

Cheng Chuan, Phyllis and I, with an A Famosa cannon

The front of one of the fort buildings

Wearn and I with more cannons, St. Paul's church at the top of the hill

View from the top of the hill you just saw; Shows how the new is crowding the old in

St. Paul's Church was built by the Portuguese when A Famosa was first constructed and the Dutch later renamed it St. Paul's and turned it into a burial ground.

Inside St. Paul's, with the Dutch tombstones along the right wall

Malacca is a very special place because on a single stroll through the town you can experience hundreds of years worth of history. If you ever come to Malaysia, I'd highly recommend you pay Malacca a visit (unless you hate history and good food and fun).