maurizio caduto M a l a y s i a

Melaka

Melaka is a very nice laid back, relaxing little city. The old town is small and compact, easy to visit on foot and a great place to wander around. Beside the obvious Portuguese ruins and the red buildings of Dutch heritage, the shop houses lining up on the two main streets are a prime attraction. Some Guesthouses are very nice old shop houses beautifully restored and decently priced at about 100 Ringit. You do have cheaper options and outside the old area some very cheep ones. To get the best of the city take a walk in the old area stopping here and there at the many cafe, climb up the hill for a nice view from the top, get lost in the many tiny roads around the old center and don't miss a tour and the boat in the channel, Malaka is one of the many Venice outside of Italy.

You might want to pop into one of the many antiquities shops - or just holes in the wall packed with old stuff and memorabilia. Lots of crap of course but loads of very nice surprises. Although a favorite among Singaporean and affluent Malaysians week-enders, the prices are still affordable and bargains can be fund at any corner, just cut down the price ruthlessly. The area where to look for antiquities is in the chinese district and basically concentrated in two main streets parallel to each other starting from the little Mill monument.

As typical to Chinese culture - and Malacca has plenty of it, to the extend that sometimes you look around and ask yourself where have all the Malay people gone - the urban landscape displays a "messy order" where shops almost run one into an other and foodstalls pop up everywhere unespectedly.

Malacca's unique style lays in it's tasty, simple character that doesn't seem to share the same "modernity fever" that you'll see in other cities in the country starting with KL. Over the week end I used to go there on my motorbike from Singapore and that is a very nice ride. The road is great - large and smooth, very well built. From time to time it would rain for few minutes but then the sun would dry up up in a blink. since the bikers population in Malaysia is a large one, they would build protected areas on the highway for bikers to recover from the rain. You'll notice here and there a road sign that shows a man on a bike and an umbrella! and you wander: do they advice me to take the umbrella on my bike?

The next funny thing - funny to me European, that is - about being a biker in South East Asia is the following. When it's rainy season in Europe we all take our rainproof outfits with us, wear boots, gloves. Here, well they wear as little as possible so as it takes less time to dry up - no boots but thongs! Isn't it great?