TAIPING: Home to Many Malaysian Firsts!

TAIPING: Home to Many Malaysian Firsts!

Welcome to another beautiful, if very hot day here in Malaysia. We are in Taiping today and Taiping is one of the most historically significant cities in all of Malaysia and it was once the capital. Taiping is so historically significant that many of Malaysia’s firsts took place right here in Taiping.

So we are setting out today to experience as many of those as we can. To answer, why is this not on tourist’s itineraries? When you look at itineraries online, this is not one of the cities that floats to the top of recommendations for

Where to visit. We want to know why. Let’s start exploring. Our first stop today is Antong. Antong is Malaysia’s oldest coffee mill and I wish it would smell tube, because it smells amazing standing in front of the coffee mill. Not only is this the home of Malaysia’s oldest coffee mill,

But there’s also a historically significant house here that you can see right behind me. That was the home of a mistress of a politician who lived in China. I don’t know a ton about Chinese history, but I’ve read that he ushered in a brief period of democracy in the early 1900s

And this is where he kept his mistress. This is inside the yellow building, which has a large front room that currently is an office and it does have a lot of period pieces in it, which is really cool. A lot of porcelain.

I see a coffee maker, but my favorite are these doors in the background. They’re beautiful. I just taught my 11-year-old niece how to use this kind of phone. I do not know what this is, but it looks really cool. Apparently this wasn’t quite the home of his mistress.

It actually was his common law wife. They have been together for a really long time. She took care of him. So just stating it for the record, since I said it incorrectly earlier, there was a little newspaper article inside that corrected me.

They have cups of coffee. You can buy if you want to try it. And I am a coffee drinker. So this is a cup of black robusta. Oh that smells very strongly of the wood fire, which it’s used to roast on. They roast their coffee beans here with butter and sugar.

So you get just a little hint of caramel notes, which I can detect, but by far the strongest flavor is the smokiness of this coffee. I’m not sure I’ve had coffee that’s ever tasted this smoky before. I really like it. It’s quite nice. There’s a bag in it. It’s coffee made like tea.

Am I supposed to remove the bag? I’ve never made coffee like tea before. Is this a thing? Is this how I should be traveling with coffee? This would be better than instant. That’s for sure. I’m just so confused. Taiping is also home to Malaysia’s very first railway station, which is not this building.

That building was dismantled and the tracks were dismantled and replaced by this one in the late 1890s. It’s still standing today, but it’s a home to a number of restaurants and a gallery we’re not able to get into. Still, it’s a really cool stop on our day of firsts for Malaysia.

Never have I ever seen sewing machines repurposed as lights before. That is so dang creative. The tables are also bottoms of sewing machines, which I’ve seen before, but the lights never. After seeing all of those food stalls at the train station, we realized it is time for lunch.

So we have come to a nearby food center that actually is described on Google maps as a hawker center. And if the number of bikes behind me are of any indication, this could be amazing. We are in search of fried kuay teow,

Which we’ve not had yet in Malaysia, but it’s a very popular dish. So we figure if there’s somewhere to find it, it’s going to be here. We had a recommendation to try kuey teow and actually our Grab driver suggested a specific booth here in the food center. Not knowing what to expect,

We showed up and we actually got a soup. It looks delicious. It’s a very fragrant broth. In addition to the noodles and the chicken, we’ve got green onion and bean sprouts all mixed in. It looks great. That’s really delicious. The noodles are nice and soft. In fact,

She made them right in front of us. It only took a few moments in boiling water, but it was just enough. The chicken’s very nice and tender and flavorful. The broth has a lot of ginger and I think either black or white pepper in it. Very fragrant and flavorful. It’s delicious.

All right. This is more what we were looking for, which is the dry noodle. This one has pork and chicken on it and there’s some dumplings and some greens and I won’t be needing any of these. So I’ll set those aside.

We may or may not have chosen the place that we were going to eat at based on the fact that they have purple chopstick. My favorite color. All right. I’m really excited to try these. They look so good. First I gotta dig some out though. Yeah.

Of course that tastes completely different than the soup dish. We’re kind of confused about the booths because they look like they have the same name, but we don’t read the Mandarin or Malay. Maybe those say more about it. The noodles themselves are delicious. These are pan fried noodles.

So the consistency of them is completely different than the flat rice noodles that we had at the first place. They taste similar to ramen noodles at home except like deep fried ones and a little bit of soy sauce. It’s really good.

What actually really surprised me about this dish is the pork, which is sweet. I don’t know why or how the pork is sweet, but it’s sweet. And the sweetness of the pork is like the perfect contrast against the saltiness of the noodles. It’s delicious. This was worth it.

While we were eating a guy came up to us with many moon cakes that he had for sale. We insisted that we only buy one for two ringgit, which is how we ended up with two for four ringgit. Whatever. We don’t know what moon cakes are. And when we asked what they were,

He just said moon cakes, they’re moon cakes. This one’s shaped like a crab, which is kind of fun. Does that mean there’s crab in it? Probably not. So I think these are filled with bean paste. It’s kind of a nice treat. It’s really filling.

And I’m glad we did this at the end of the meal because it’s kind of a little bit sweet, like a dessert. I tried a bite of the moon cake and I really liked it. And actually it’s, it’s got a little bit more of a gingerbread flavor,

I think to the outside of the cookie part. Also I couldn’t help getting a coconut shake because I liked it so much in Malacca. It’s delicious. Behind me is the Malay mosque. This is the oldest mosque in Taiping. It’s not the oldest in Malaysia,

But we’re walking right by it and it is the oldest in Taiping. So we wanted to include it. We’re not going to go in today cause I’m not dressed appropriately. And honestly I am not accustomed to wearing that many clothes in this heat.

I look a little bit different and don’t think I could handle it. So we’re just looking at it from the outside. Hello! Hello! Behind me is Sri Mariamman temple. This is a Hindu temple and we are just passing by it. It’s actually closed right now. As you can see the gates behind me.

This is a Hindu temple still used for worship today. It dates back to 1879, but I can’t find any record of it being like the oldest in Taiping or anything like that, which kind of surprises me because most of the buildings that we’re passing today are from the 1890s or the early 1900s.

What I really like about this temple is that it shows the passage of time. The colors are a bit faded and cracked and many of the other Hindu temples that we visited are extremely vibrant, fresh paint. And I think that this one it’s kind of nice that they’re letting it age gracefully.

I kind of hope they don’t paint it. As we continue walking along the same street, we come across another temple. This one again is not necessarily the oldest in Taiping, but it’s one of the oldest and it has a really cool story. This is Hosian Temple. As the story goes,

There was a young woman who wanted to become a nun so badly, but nobody would let her in. Thankfully, her father was a very, very rich businessman. And so he donated a significant sum of money for this temple to be built and she

Became the temple’s first nun. I kind of love that story. The love of a father and a daughter and a young woman who wanted to do something so badly that she didn’t let societal norms stand in her way. Okay. That was really cool. That was really special.

We were just filming the outside of it and the temple was closed, but I could see some people on the other side and one of the women went ahead and let us in. It’s not normally open. So we were able to film a little bit on the

Inside, chatting with them for awhile. It was only females that I saw, which was amazing. I loved it. This was really a special stop for us today. Locally here, there’s a huge amount of mining business, specifically tin and a significant number of the workers are from China’s

Fujian province. A little over a hundred years ago, that group of people needed a group to advocate for them. And so they started the Hokkien Association. That building is behind me. It was built in 1928. The original plan was to do these buildings in the opposite order that you’ve

Just seen them. But unfortunately we got hungry. So if you’re watching this, they’re all we’d recommend is from the train station, then pick up the temples that we’ve just done along the street and do them in the opposite order that we visited them. And it’ll make much more sense for you.

We’re having to backtrack about 10 minutes on a super hot day to get to the clock tower, which is our next destination. And then we still have some more historical sites to see before we make it to a museum, which please, please, please better be air conditioned. It’s just a lazy day.

The clock tower that you can see behind me, here on the corner, is from the late 1800s. It originally was a timber building, but they replaced it with this stone and brick one, probably so that the wooden one would not burn down, as wood has a habit of doing.

And then this served as the first police station in Taiping, not the first in Malaysia, but definitely the first in Taiping. Also, there’s a cool red phone booth on the outside of it, but there are no handles and no phone. It’s just sort of a outside of a phone booth.

I just got pooped on, narrowly missing my face. By a bird. The locals are very nice. As soon as it hit me, I knew that it was bird poop. I’ve been hit. Oh, this is in my hair. This is not good. Man down! Yeah. I think I got it mostly.

All right, you guys make sure that he gets it all. I think I got it all by the way. If you appreciate the risks that we take in order to bring you YouTube travel videos, hit the thumbs up button below and subscribe

To be notified of more videos where hopefully I am not getting pooped on by birds. Don’t stand so close over there. You’re at the scene of the crime. Come on. No, we are not at another railway station. We are in fact, at our next stop, which is the telegraph office and museum.

And they have just outside that museum, they have relocated some original pieces that were at the first railway station here in Taiping. Now we’ve already visited the site of the second railway station. The first one actually terminated not far from the telegraph office.

So they have this engine behind me to commemorate it along with this amazing footbridge that used to go over the original tracks that ran from Taiping to Port Weld. I did not know these were here and I am delighted.

This is the coolest footbridge and to know that it’s well over 130 years old is incredible. I’ve never seen a picture of Mr. Morse. Look at him. If we have any millennials watching, I just want to give you this little history lesson here. Before the internet, there was a time before the internet,

There was the fax machine. Before that, the telephone, and before that, the telegraph. And this museum pretty much covers it all. It was a fun museum, and it was completely free. It’s also air conditioned, which in case you can’t tell we really needed that break today. In fact,

We are trying to hit one more museum, but they close in 45 minutes. This town is full of just fantastic old colonial buildings. Here’s one. We didn’t even know what it is. We are heading to our next stop, which is actually a church, but across the road is another first for Malaysia.

And that is the first British colonial officer’s mess hall. It’s a beautiful building. They knew how to do architecture in a very unique way. But we are at the site of what is reportedly the oldest Anglican church in all of Malaysia, except that it appears to be closed. Those gates are locked.

It’s kind of a bummer that we can’t go in because we thought we have visited the oldest Anglican church in all of Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur. But maybe that was just the oldest Anglican church in KL. I’m so glad that we made the walk out here because the rooftop and this outer

Structure of this church is beautiful. I love it. It’s a little bit of a touch up home. Well, as you may be able to tell from more closed gates behind me, our next stop is also closed. I’m genuinely disappointed about this one.

This is the first museum in Malaysia and we missed its air conditioning. I mean, and we missed the museum. Perak Museum is supposed to be a wonderful museum. So be better than us. If you come to Taiping and make sure that you’re here before they close,

It is just after 5pm. So we missed it by like an hour, hour and a half. On second thought, Bill has just waved me in and he’s just walked in. Maybe the grounds are still open after they close, which would be cool. Here I go.

Yup, he just walked in the exit. That works for me. These were fire extinguishers. Wow. I didn’t even know that this was a thing, but this is the longest joint bicycle. Here’s the building from the other side of the gate, which now we are walking through again. Well, that was unexpected.

That was fun. File that under ask for forgiveness later. How hot is it? Oh my gosh. Is my face that red? It is really hot. Do not adjust your dial. I just found out that my face really is this beet red. I’m not sunburned. It’s just that hot today.

It’s like a hundred degrees outside and like a hundred percent humidity and a hundred percent dew point, a hundred percent, all the things. It’s a hundred percent hot. This tree right behind me is raining or snowing purple blossoms on flowers. The ground is sort of covered in this light purple carpet.

I’ve never seen something like this. This is really cool. I’m just standing among all the purple flowers. Look, look at all the purple. Goes really well with my red face. Seriously, it’s beautiful. For another in our tour of Taiping’s and Malaysia’s firsts, we are at Malaysia’s very first public park.

It’s a huge park with so many things to do. And it is a Saturday evening and there are so many people here. It really is a lot of fun. I’m so glad we’re here on a weekend and not a weekday. That way we can see it with so many people out and about.

This is probably super hard to see but there’s a wall right back there and that is the backside of Taiping Zoo which is the first zoo in Malaysia. I think it’s also the first night safari in Malaysia but it might also be the only night

Safari so I’m not sure whether that counts. First, only, last. We are not going there because we are absolutely beat from the day but while Bill was flying the drone I was also listening to elephants, tigers, lions, oh my. Something, something was making a lot of noise back there.

Gotta give props to Malaysia for not mowing over this tree and just making it part of the landscape. Oh, he ducked. Should you visit Taiping? Our humble opinion is yes, you should. Come to Taiping to experience where many of Malaysia’s first began. It’s an easy day

Trip on the way between Ipoh and Penang or like we did, you can stay a couple days. Thanks so much for watching. See you next time. Bye!

Taiping caught our attention on a map. After looking into Taiping and discovering how historically significant it was, we were really surprised we hadn’t heard of it. Why isn’t it on tourist lists for visiting, and SHOULD it be? We stayed there to find out. Join us as we explore the Malaysian city that’s home to many of Malaysia’s “firsts”!

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In case you like skipping around:
00:00 Taiping!
00:35 Malaysia’s oldest coffee mill
03:51 Taiping Old Station
04:48 Taiping Hawker Center?
08:08 Mini Moon Cakes
09:10 Oldest mosque in Taiping
10:22 BEST temple story
12:56 Taiping Clock Tower
13:25 I was hit!
14:18 Rail relics
15:05 Telegraph Museum
16:30 (Another) Oldest Anglican Church?
17:04 Perak Museum
19:10 Malaysia’s FIRST public park
21:34 Should you visit?

#malaysia #taiping #malaysiavlog
#travel #travelvlog

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