Entry: The Budak Bandar Spends A Weekend In A Penang Kampung Monday, February 20, 2006



I thought it'd be fun to follow Lie Yuen to her grandma's kampung in Pematang Pauh for the weekend for some excitement. Yes, anything but spending a weekend in Kedah. Unless there's an exam to study for during the weekend, weekends in Kedah will just suck the soul out of you.

Lie Yuen's grandma's house is situated in a kampung-ish area right next to a padi field and there are loads of chickens around! Imagine my jakun-ness.


Her grandma runs a small business selling really retro candies and tidbits to the neighbourhood children.


Anybody remember these bubble gums? I used to buy them for 10cents each from the ice-cream man outside my primary school. If you're lucky, there might be a tattoo inside!


Lie Yuen's grandma traps a chicken every now and then to be sold off to the friendly neighbourhood chicken chopper.


Hear the chicken clucking as it runs around. Love em' authentic chicken clucks.


I love em fried. But then again it's not often I see so many chickens in one place! Do forgive me!


Lie Yuen trying to act like a Heong Ha Mui(Village Girl)


I have not climbed a tree since 1996. Back in the days when I attended taekwando classes in primary school, I'd spend some time climbing the trees in the school compound with my brother(who was in standard one) before my mum came to fetch us. I'm older now, Can't climb so high. Don't want to break my head for nothing, do I? Maybe next time I'll climb higher:)


There's an old well outside Lie Yuen's grandma's house. Lie Yuen said that she and her cousins once tied a rafia string and see how deep it was...and once, a cat jumped in and died. :(




Lie Yuen was kind enough to belanja me some good ol' authentic ice-cream man ice cream! Hehe.


MMmmmm.... nothing beats slurping a 40 cents ice-cream cone on a hot day like this.


Her grandma kept feeding us almost every other hour. Thank god I was only there for the weekend or else I'd have to go bulimic. Red Bean Soup! Chilled! Mmm!


After watching There's Something About Mary(I know, I know, 8 years later, yea.) on Lie Yuen's laptop and a 45 minute afternoon nap, we decided to take a stroll around the neighbourhood.


What do you know? Even lalangs are nice to photograph!


God Of The Padi Field?


Would you look at that! Wild sugarcanes!


A nice wooden bench under a nice wooden hut. So kampung-ey!




Wohoo.. that's a dilapidated zinc and wooden house. This is the chinese version of a ghetto. Not all the houses there look like this one, like Lie Yuen's grandma's place is a proper concrete house.


Stray dogs almost everywhere.. and very friendly little buggers too! They come to see what you're having for dinner as well!


We ventured further to check out the padi fields. Apparently there's a drought going on now. I suppose it is a nice place to come to clear your head abit. Not so much the fresh air, but the vastness of the land.


Looking for fishies in vain..


I thought this one made a nice photo composition while I was bending down looking into the drain.


Oooh! Rustic living!


A BALSAM PLANT!! I've not seen this in ages ever since I grew it excessively in my backyard about 10 years ago due to an obsession with "pokok keembung" and its reproductive mechanism(the seeds burst out to spread far and wide) as was stated in my standard five science books!


Every once in awhile, it's nice to get a macro shot of a pretty flower along the way.


The evening sun had a pretty good lighting effect for a new style of camwhoring: Shadows!


How often can you come to such dense greeneries to just lay back and chill?


The tarzan like vines that cascade down from the higher branches.


Oh look at that!! We actually found bamboos.


An oriental feel to the quiet Pematang Pauh village.




There was a hut nearby and apparently it was once a gambling den where old men gathered and ate dog meat together.


Ooof.. really really kampung. I like!!


Now this is something that I've always wanted, a hand made swing in my courtyard. I think the swing is meant to be for two people. So nice!


The swing hangs from a wax apple(Jambu air) tree. An old Indian uncle asked us to use the galah to take some to eat. We declined politely but it's nice to know that people around here are so friendly!


My turn! My turn!


One of the bigger drains that runs alongside the padi field. There were fishes jumping up and down and they looked like Ikan Tenggiri. I don't know, maybe I'm just too Bandar(city) to know.


Fluffy dandylions with a ladybird.


Heyyy!! Pink flowers growing wild!


Lie Yuen and her posies..!


Sometimes beauty can be found in the simplest of things. Don't you agree?


Who would've thought these corn-like weeds can be so fun? You know, if you put these pink flower-weeds and corn-like weeds in a tall slim vase, it would actually look nice. A one of a kind ornament, don't you think?


Morning glory. Lie Yuen's grandmother uses this to make natural colouring for her cakes and pastries.


A view of the padi field at dusk.


See how our shadows stretch across the padi field?


These pink flower lalangs look best when the setting sun casts an orange flow upon it.


A lone centipede crawls along.


Of all the places to camwhore...but then again, I do strange things.


I think this mutt's pretty cute even though it looks disease ridden and has patches of hair missing.


A nice array of homecook food to end our evening walk. Have not had a home cooked meal in ages. :(


*sigh*


Even chickens know how to visit their fallen friends.


So many chickens!


A lone moth amidst the dried leaves on the ground.

Once in awhile it is nice to take a stroll around an old quiet neighbourhood. At least something different from the internet and books and books of anatomy, physiology, biochemistry and dentistry. Bleh.

   13 comments

Jayelle
February 26, 2006   11:07 AM PST
 
yeewei: part of being a malaysian

amanda: hahaha.. loads of mozzies one wor!:) heyy! maybe u go camwhore with the kampungs there too!
AmAndAserAph
February 25, 2006   09:11 PM PST
 
nice pics jo! i wanna go to kampung too. passed the melbourne kampung last week on the way to lotus farm, saw bales of hay, horses, cows and eucalyptus trees. no koalas though =(
Yee Wei
February 23, 2006   12:29 AM PST
 
Cringe

Damn mosquitoes.
Jayelle
February 22, 2006   01:45 AM PST
 
c.ho: ahhaha yes, i realised.:)

yeewei: lol thanks! that's one of my favourite too. i made sure there were no other shrubs in the way of the picture..! i bet rubber and oil palm ones harbour loads of mozzies

kaggom: ahah.. if it's breeze you're talking back, the best one we felt was by the swing.. just brilliant:) wahh! got difference one?
kaggom
February 22, 2006   12:03 AM PST
 
Nice pics! Can almost feel the breeze and the smell of the kampung from them.. :-)

Btw, that's a millipede, not centipede...
Yee Wei
February 21, 2006   10:02 PM PST
 
Ohh I love the 'God of the Paddy Field' shot. Haven't been to a paddy kampung; sure looks much better than a rubber and palm plantation kampung.
c.ho
February 21, 2006   06:12 PM PST
 
it's interesting to be in a kampung isn't it? hahah.. you see all sorts of different things.
Jayelle
February 21, 2006   05:57 PM PST
 
liz: :) haha yes, but i always thought morning glories were a little bigger..:) brokeback mountain huh! maybe the whole cowboy feel to it;P :) just look around..maybe you'll see something you enjoy!

lilian: ahhaha that's true..that's true..but there's no lake around the place..:P

luzzio: ne ne ni bu bu;P

slinky: ahahha NATIOnal Service?!!.. well admitedly i kinda miss national service too..those morning mist..ahh;\ ..almost as if it was of a different era huh!

qiki: ahaha.. wooden eh! lol, it's just me and my camera having fun:)
Qiki
February 21, 2006   02:56 PM PST
 
Wow. thats even more kampung than my kampung !!(though you can try stayin in my grandmas wooden house lolz)^^

its amazing how you can see joy in everything~i realy like the hut : )

Slinky
February 21, 2006   01:00 AM PST
 
*sobs*

Somehow the pictures reminded me of National Service days. Afar from the hustles and bustles in city life..

Especially those vast plains! I so miss Kelantan for certain reasons :(

And er... the well also... reminded me of The Ring.. dead cat crawling out the well when u turn on the TV..
luzzio
February 21, 2006   12:39 AM PST
 
im hating you for the lovely photographs. >:(
lilian
February 21, 2006   12:01 AM PST
 
Wah...nice pics and nice place. People nowadays have to pay big money to go to some kampung resort like Pedu Lake and you got them free!
Liz
February 20, 2006   11:30 PM PST
 
Ooh, I never knew a morning glory looked like that. My knowledge of plants and animals are rather bad, heh...

The pictures looked so pretty(especially the rice fields ones)! I had no idea why, but it reminds me of the scenery in Brokeback Mountain...

Make me feel a bit malu myself...Most of the time I go to a kampung, it's always too hot, smelly or boring for me...time to change my attitude...

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