Skip to content. I can assure you my friends, that if you want to open your mind and your senses, you have to travel. A trip to the east is always rejuvenating, and in our case it involved over three countries and a travel itinerary covering some 22 days. As my wife and I spent the days moving through land and air between Malaysia, Cambodia and Indonesia, I could only marvel at the ways the trading Indians had established bases at Malacca, Pinang, Bali and at Siem reap amongst other places in the far east.
These early South Indians stamped their practices and their varying religious ways at all these port cities starting roughly from the 9 th century. Today the astounding temples, mosques and buildings in many of these places are testament to their varying fates and glorious lives and we had the good fortunes to see so many of them. This time I will use less words and more pictures for each of these places for the stories of their connections to India would take separate articles, perhaps better attempted in future and so this will serve only to make a quick intro.
Malaysia is a veritable delight and there is so much to see and experience there, and it was our second visit after more than a decade and a half. The country is very accessible though I must mention that vegetarians would find the search for something to suit their appetite a little tiring while others would find the use of anchovies or Natholi in most dishes a little overpowering, but the amount of sights one can see there is a large number.
You have the very important medieval port of Malacca which was founded in the early 15 th century and frequented by the famous Chinese admiral Zheng He, enroute Calicut and later overpowered and colonized by the Portuguese and the Dutch. Eventually it went on to become part of the English Crown colony and provided many a consignment of spices to the peoples of the West and the upper east.
The bars in Bukit Bintang, the shops in the Little India and China town areas provide an interesting aside while the restaurants that abound cover virtually every cuisine you can imagine.
