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My Recent Discovery Saturdays (Part 1)

Let's take a break from Tokyo talking too much and head back home for 2 posts of what I have been up back in Penang. I guess that there's something that cannot be missed and to share with my fellow readers.

With my mom banging on the doors as usual on Saturday mornings (I guess no one likes to be waken up so abruptly in a beauty sleep), I had no choice but to crawl out of bed. I was extremely tired from the entire week of battering at work, so much tension and so much things going on. I know, congratulations... Mackinaw has finally shipped its first few thousand portable radios out to the market and yet here we go again, being dragged into the pits of hell to again endure the following few months of sheer hell, working on the next project without breaks.

Anyway, enough of all those jabbering nonsense about work. It's Saturday for pete's sake! I needed my rest when mom reminds me of the things that we will be doing for the day and it hits me instantly... time to discover some new things today. Wow! Brush teeth, shower and I totally forgotten about breakfast, got my trusty camera and off we go!

First up, the Kuan Yim See Temple, located around the Fettes Park housing area. Most probably no one will be able to tell if such place existed as it is located in a quite hidden area around Tanjung. My mom found out about this place from a friend, who lived in Balik Pulau area and yet knowing about this little place is something extraordinary. This proves that Penangites are great discoverers... Haha! As those who has known me extremely well that I can't read a tiny bit of Chinese so I didn't do much of a background check of how the place was constructed.

However, this place is extremely green, that's for sure. Lushes of trees and wild flowers flourish in this area. On an extremely hot morning and windless day, luckily we have the trees to provide lots of cover for us as we began our climb to the temple on top of the hill. Did I mentioned that the temple is located on a hill? I guess I didn't. Cars are parked at the foot of the hill and the rest of the journey requires some climbing. There's also a rail track that leads uphill which was used to transport items to the top of the hill.

The foot of the hill were eventually swamped with tortoise all range of sizes. It homes roughly around few hundreds of tortoise, which makes it incredible as some of the smaller sizes tortoise are free to roam about while the bigger ones are put into a big pond, like the one seen in Kek Lok Si Temple.

The climb uphill were steep eventhough there's a stairway walking up towards the temple. Scenery wise, there's nothing much to see as you will only pass by a few old huts along the way. As you reach the temple, you might run out of breathe (if you are fit enough, you find the walk up as easy as a stroll in the park). For me, it was nothing much... it's just that my dad started to break into sweat mode after that climb.

This place nearly resembles Kek Lok Si temple, well... almost. As soon as you walk up towards the main entrance to the main temple, it will definitely reminds you of Kek Lok Si (those who has not visited Kek Lok Si for ages, I think the last sentence that I mention are not applicable... lols!). This place is extremely quiet and it's not particularly crowded with foreign tourists. I only saw one family that came up earlier than us to make their prayers.

A look of what you could see from the main entrance of the main temple hall.

A picture of the opposite side from the main entrance of the temple hall. The view from this area is good but there's far better ones which will be revealed as you progress.

This place housed a mini pagoda and a park where a few buddha statues are being placed inside the park itself.

The Kuan Yin goddess statue were recently built according to my mom's friend who joined us later. This temple are built to worship the goddess so I guess it's good to have a big Kuan Yin goddess statue placed nicely.

The reason why I said the statue was placed nicely is because the statue overlooks the entire Tanjung area. The view are extremely breathtaking to be honest. And thank goodness the haze has eased up or else this picture will definitely go to waste.

This area are also swamped with plenty of fruit trees ranging from Rambutan's to Durian's, Nangka's to Mango's. Mom and her friends helped themselves towards the more yellowish Rambutan's as the green ones are still not really at an eatable stage yet (according to them that is).

There's another climb up to reach the "Datuk Nenek" or the hokkien people calls it the "Na Tuk Kong". I didn't manage to take any pictures of the place of worship as should I say... rather forbidden. I don't want to take a picture that might lead me to take something EXTRA inside the picture... I hope you know what I mean. The Na Tuk Kong (拿督公) is a local guardian spirit that resides in trees, ant hills, caves, riversides and in strange stone formations. Some common forms are a white tiger and the form of an old man dressed in white. A Na Tuk Kong can also be "invited" to reside outside (never indoors) a family home for spiritual protection and luck. You may say that I am such a superstituous person but I am not taking my chances out of it to take a picture. The little temple were placed under a very big tree at the end of the walk which you will definitely not miss it.

The scenery that overlooks from the Na Tuk Kong temple. Nice view isn't it?

The tour around the area came to an end a few minutes before the stroke of noon. This picture was taken as little Marcus was babbling something to his mom and his grandpa. I will continue on with the next one whereby we will head over to Balik Pulau for lunch and there's certainly plenty in store.

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