Melaka

Melaka is a UNESCO world heritage town, like Quebec and Lunenburg. It was actually made one three years ago at an event in Quebec. The Portugese, Dutch and British all once considered it theirs over the last 500 years. The importance of the town was its location on the Malacca straight (Malacca being how it was once known) and the control over shipping it provided to whosever flag was flown. Now it is a nice little town but has that distinctive feeling that it is a bit of a disney world construct. For instance, there's a giant water wheel in the river, it is actually only a few years old having been built in the 90's. There's also a replica of a Portuguese galleon which serves the purposes of a museum and yet the inside isn't the same as a galleon. There's a huge shopping district with big malls, big stores, and remnants of churches and forts built by the various colonizers. Yet, away from all that there is the old town and Little India. The old town is full of small shops, antique dealers, galleries and restaurants. Little India is similar yet its stores are not tourist specific but places where a kilo of golden dates cost $2. They may make you sick so be careful which ones you eat.

I took lots of photos here but mostly at night. This is a type of transport you can get here, I've never seen anyone but a tourist in one though. They're lit up like a christmas tree and have speakers and sound system to make any Honda Civic driver jealous.

The fake water wheel with the fake Portugese Galleon

These sorts of fire escapes were popular in Singapore too.

The predominate religions here are Islam, Christianity, Hindu and Buddhist with some Taoism and Confucianism. There is a street here known as Harmony Road owning to the different religions having a place of worship there. Malaysia puts forward this idea of One Malaysia, that there aren't divides based on race or religion. Yet when we left here we couldn't get to Kuala Lumpur. Due to a planned demonstration by the opposition government they canceled public transport into the city to try and keep the numbers of participants down. While the two times we took a taxi the driver took his time to point out the lack of religious and cultural harmony. I'm not passing judgement here, just sharing the slice of life we witnessed.

Outside a Chinese temple, I say Chinese rather than Buddhist as it seems to be the place of worship for more than Buddhists alone.

As night falls all the birds in the area congregate in a couple trees along the river and the noise is deafening. One making his approach.

The fake water wheel and the tourist trap transit speaker and light show bike in the distance.

Just chillin'

All the rickshawesque guys hang out here at night waiting for tourists.

Old town.

A few shots of a mosque in old town.

There is a stark differences in the state of some buildings. This one looks perfectly kept.

This one, not so much. But more beautiful maybe.

This dog looked calm and happy till I bent down to take a photo, then all that was between me and a mouthful of teeth were some thin and, thankfully, metal bars.