1.7: Lost in KOMTAR

Location: On the road & KOMTAR.

We had heard a lot about KOMTAR. Aina described KOMTAR like it was her childhood superhero. She told us that KOMTAR used to be Penang’s main attraction. The building is tall and handsome and very intriguing even from afar. We were all excited to be there and on Day 1 in Penang; here we are. Aina totally oversell the place -__-

We’re actually ahead of ourselves.  We want to reverse back the story and told the tale of how we actually arrived in KOMTAR. It was sad, actually. There we were, stranded at the bus station near Fort Cornwallis with absolutely no idea where we wanted to go nor where we exactly were. The local there told us to just wait at the bus station and in no time, the bus will appear!  30 minutes, and there was no sign of bus or whatsoever. However, we being the cool travellers, used our time wisely and no need to stress up over the bus ladies!  Camera time!

That’s how we kill our 40-HOT-minutes waiting for the bus. Oh, we forgot to mention! The weather in Penang was extremely hot and we were practically steaming in our clothes. We have no idea why Penang was a lot hotter than KL. It might be because it was so near to the beach. You know, all those bayu laut, bayu darat thing that we learned in Kajian Tempatan back in primary school. It totally makes sense right?

The hop-on bus that is free all the time was at last arrived.

The bus was packed with tourists and needless to mention, the smell in there was horrible. We needed to hold our breath and it sounded funny when we tried to speak with each other. It sounded nasalized. Do you actually get what we meant?

Actually, we decided to go to Chow Rasta. For once, since we got to Penang, we were very sure of where we want to go. We got to say that we relied on Aina ,who is the so-called Penang born, wayyyy too much. The plan was she would press the button when she saw Chow Rasta but instead, she expected us to press the button! I mean how the hell we, who never went to Penang know how Chow Rasta actually looks like? It could be a pub or a long, narrow street, or a shop that is filled with memoirs of Bob Marley.. well, you get our point; we have no idea of what Chow Rasta looks like.

After like fifteen minutes in the bus, and a series of ohh-ing and ahh-ing at practically everything we saw, Aina came to us and told us calmly; “You know, we had missed Chowrasta actually” 

Then, we looked at each other and it went crazy :

Rabab : Press the button, press the button!

Dayang : We cant be that far. Please. Someone. Press the freaking button.!

Kiko : Where’s the button?! I could not see it! (apparently, later, it happened to be behind the  matsalleh guy.)

Aina : *silent mode on* ( we suspected that she was enjoying all of this.)

Akmar : Pakcik, stop sini, can ah?

Thank God, there was Akmar savior of the day.

We descended from the bus at the God-knows-where place, and then Aina announced with that air of arrogance and pride everytime she talked about the building; “GIRLS, HERE WE ARE. KOMTAR!”

So we all screamed out loud! We were so excited looking around the building and could not wait to start our ‘real’ journey. (We forgot about Chow Rasta instantly!)

“So, Aina! Tell us! Where are the great, interesting places in Komtar?”

And readers, brace yourselves for the most INTERESTING place there is in KOMTAR. She brought us to……PO…(wait-for-it) PULAR! POPULAR! SHE BROUGHT US TO POPULAR! We went all the way from Gombak to Penang, and there we were in Popular bookstore where we can find the branches nationwide (needless to mention in Gombak too)

But the funny thing was, at that particular moment, we all had no objection against her ideas. We were all just as excited as she was. We thought that KOMTAR was pretty amazing actually. There was an air of urgency and diversity that roamed the place and we were mesmerized just by looking at the life that the streets around KOMTAR have. It must be obvious to anyone that encountered us on the streets that we were all perky, innocent travelers who had no idea what we are in for.

Location: Popular Bookstore

We sat on the floor, all the five of us and an uncle approached us and said “baca tahlil ke dik?” (reciting the tahlil?) we were so tired on our journey to reach KOMTAR  our feet could not hold us any longer. So, there we were five girls (or should we say women?) close to sprawling on the floor, reading some interesting books that we found on the shelves. There were ‘1000 Songs That You Must Hear During Your Lifetime’, ‘1000 Books That You Must Read’,and so many 1000-thingies that we found there. ‘It is all in the mindset’, so they said. That day, we realized that was totally true. 


We were sitting there pathetically to many of the passersby but we were actually having fun! We were so mesmerized by the books and kept showing each other what we found and when some of us had heard the song or read the books that were listed we screamed with joy and clapped our hands.

This went on for like 1 hour and to be honest, we did not realize at all how time flies. Then, Aina said Kak Dee was waiting for us below. We had no idea at all that she wanted to give a ride back home for us. That was such a pleasant surprise! We had not yet had any plan on how we were going to go back to our penthouse. (we suspected we might once again get lost if we ever try to) 


Thanks Kak Dee. You saved us :’)