姐姐, 哥哥 & 弟弟: School trip to Perak - Taiping, Kuala Kangsar, Kuala Sepetang

姐姐 and I join her one-day school trip to Perak's Taiping, Kuala Kangsar and Kuala Sepetang. She was so excited from beginning of the year when she heard the Year 1, 2 and 3 students get to go on school trip. Last year, only Year 2 and 3 get to go Penang Hill.

When she bring back the memo, it's all in Mandarin, so I'm not even sure where some of the places are. Itinerary is: Take ferry to Butterworth, from there take train to Taiping. Then go to Taiping Museum and Taiping Zoo. After that visit Kuala Kangsar. Then 太平瓜拉十八丁 - we don't even know where is that place? Then off to Bukit Tambun for seafood dinner and back. Anyway it will be a good educational trip for children.

We have to gather at the school canteen at 5:45AM. What luck, it rained! Boarded bus around 6:15am. When we reach the Penang ferry terminal, it's still quite dark. The children get to take the ferry for free (this is what our tour guide told us later)!

姐姐 and her friends on the ferry

When we reach Butterworth, it was still raining. We had to use an umbrella as there are uncovered sections walking to the train station. The most difficult part is avoiding puddles - big and small, the uneven sections of the walk to train terminal turn into puddles with the rain. It's about 2.5 hours train ride to Taiping. Yesterday, 姐姐 was telling us the train is air-conditioned (as 爸爸 scared her that he rode on train cabin without air-condition).

On the train

At Taiping, the first stop is Perak Museum. There's a display of antique fighter jet, railway carriage, vehicles, cannons etc outside. Inside they have display of Malay, Chinese and Indian cultural things like food, wedding ceremony things on ground floor. Mostly the display are Malay traditional games like congkak, wau, gasing, Malay traditional music instruments, traditional tenunan and anyaman, Orang Asli traditional tools, tembikar, labu etc.

Sliding across the smooth plank floor. They were scolded by teacher for playing the fool haha

After that, it's a visit to the Taiping Zoo. It must be good day for school field trip, as we're not the only school group there. Our group queued quite long to board the tram, which brings us around the zoo grounds. We saw orang utans, chimpanzees, camels, otters, owls, bats, crocodiles, sun bears, tigers, lions, black panther, giraffes, zebras, ostrich, swans, flamingos, flying foxes, wild boars, deers, seladang, rhinos, hippo, elephants etc. As it's near noon, it's very hot there. But do visit in the morning or near noon, as Taiping is prone to rain showers in the afternoon and evening. After all it is known also as 雨城 (rain town). Lots of kids went to buy ice-cream during the 30 minutes free time we have there. 姐姐 and I went around looking for the porcupine she missed seeing on the tram (but couldn't find them). It's too hot to be walking around and we're getting tired, so we just went back to the waiting area before departing with the group.

Next is lunch around 1pm! Everyone is super hungry by now as we were up since about 5am. We had lunch at a restaurant called BBQ something near Taiping Lake. We had fried chicken in orange sauce, something that looked like fried tofu skin with ham, tofu with 蛋花 sauce, 芙蓉蛋, sweet and sour pork with tomatoes, cucumber, onions, and longan dessert. Kids love the longan dessert best :) After that, the adults and kids went shopping for local products a few shops away. Everyone must have bought a lorry-load of local products and earned the tour guides good commissions as the tour guide even distributed peanut sweets to all the children later.

After Taiping, we visited Kuala Kangsar. First we go to see the oldest rubber tree planted which is from Brazil (南美). Just see-see look-look from the bus. The area near the istana is very clean, spick-and-span as it's Royal Residence of Sultan Perak. The Istana Kenangan is closed for visiting by public (indefinitely until maintenance is completed) and we only took one photo outside. Istana Kenangan is the previous royal residence which is build without a single nail. We passed by Masjid Ubudiah and Istana Iskandariah (also see-see look-look, this is the usual way of touring by bus) before visiting Sultan Azlan Shah Gallery. The grounds at Sultan Azlan Shah Gallery is very picturesque, and the building is colonial style. It housed display of many "cenderamata" from various countries and organizations, the Sultan's barrister-at-law and chancellor robes, His Royal Highness' keris and many other collections. Children were going "ooohh.... aaaahhhh" over the jewels, crystals and precious stones on the momentos. There is a public toilet outside which collects 30 sen for each use and we rushed there upon reaching as many children need to go to toilet. The teachers really go beyond their call of duty and responsibility as they rushed the children there and even helped to pay for them. Oh I love this school's teachers, they are so kind.

Unfortunately some of the photos taken outside Perak Museum, at Taiping Zoo (only one), Istana Kenangan (also known as Perak Royal Museum) and Sultan Azlan Shah Gallery were lost. Our photos were somehow lost after the camera dial was shifted during power on. Beats me why it is the cause. So sad.. :( as the Sultan Azlan Shah Gallery is really pretty with the fountains outside, even though we cannot take any photo inside. Hope to plan a visit to Kuala Kangsar again on our own as I can't bear that photos are lost :(

Late afternoon, it's off to Kuala Sepetang (previously known as Port Weld). Seems like the first railway track is build at Taiping linking Port Weld according to this website. This is where we will see the Kuala Sepetang Mangrove Park 红树林保护区。The children are shown the oldest bakau tree in the area, which is 65 years old as of 2012~ grandfather of a tree. There are wooden walkways along the way, so it's bearable. However we were warned not to touch the rope as there are insects and 毛毛虫 hiding there, haha. That kept the children's hands off!

The 65 year-old bakau tree

After the nature trail, it's off to nearby charcoal factory. What a sunset industry, and a uncomfortable working condition for me who spent 12 years of sitting in air-conditioned factory/office :) 姐姐 asked to go out ASAP, as it's mighty hot and stuffy inside with some of the furnaces working. The guide shared with us it took ~40 days for the wood to be turned to good quality charcoal.

It was so hot near furnace, I asked her to quickly move and that's why the photo turned out blurry

It's already late evening by then, and we turn back to Taiping for the ones who ordered mee koo. Not sure what's special about Taiping mee koo, since everyone ordered I also ordered one of each flavour :) We were taken to a stall at a market complex. It costs RM3 for each mee koo. There are so many people huddling around from our group that I immediately slink back to the tour bus after getting mine.

This caused our dinner to be late, and lots of growling tummies to Bukit Tambun for seafood dinner. Dinner consists of fried egg, tofu, mayonnaise prawn, sweet and sour fish, steamed and spicy lala, spicy veggie, fried squid. Other than fried egg, tofu and mayonnaise prawn, most children didn't take the rest. Oh too bad I didn't have enough time to eat my dinner peacefully as I was busy helping the children at my table, and also bringing some of the girls to the toilet. Some brave kids actually came on their own with friends only and their parents didn't accompany them.

Our bus reached the school only around 10:15pm, and many parents were already outside waiting for their kids. Traffic jam outside the school when the bus reached. Anyway it's not our fault that we're late, if they could just speed up or skip the buying mee koo and buying local products part, then we will have dinner on time. So tired! But 姐姐 still want to go for school trip and wants me there too, as she said she feel safer. Ok la..... after all the manja'ing, I probably will go with her or 弟弟 again even though it's very tiring.
One final photo of the mee koo from Taiping :) 姐姐 and 弟弟 say it's quite delicious.