Penang Again - the light, the color, the texture. LIFE.

These little bats dangle outside of my room on the porch, and when I went outside to look closely, they had their little eyes wide open on me, the one on the right wiggling his ears at me.  I didn't scream.  The Chinese believe that bats are auspicious and foretell good things; this American believes they leave nasty excretions on the porch floor!

Pearly is SO busy with her cooking and giving tours that I am thinking that I will go to KL; she gave a very thorough tour today to the crew from Veg Voyages.
These are turmeric roots, and I never realized where that delectable powder came from so thought I ought to post this in case others felt similarly uninformed.  It's rather gorgeous, isn't it?

This is the Blue Mansion, the Cheong Fatt Tze mansion which is also run as a hotel, and although I was not supposed to photograph the inside of it, I did - rather flagrantly.  I liked the blue looking over the table and reflecting the blue pot on the floor.

These lovely egrets or herons in a bas relief were on a wall outside of one of the temples we saw today; it being Guan Yew's birthday, the temples were swamped, the air dense with incense and birds freed from their little cages.  More on that later...

These iron wall designs are new, giving iron workers some jobs and eliminating (or imitating) graffiti on blank walls in the Penang UNESCO Heritate Site areas.  








                                                                                 
This is the last incense maker in Penang, so everybody lined up to buy his sandalwood and other kinds of incense for longevity, happiness, good fortune, etc...  Not to be outdone, I bought three measly stubs of sandalwood incense because Chandra kept telling me that each stick would burn for TWO hours!  I kept telling him that I hated incense, but I like the idea of supporting the local craftsmen.  Let's hope they don't take away my incense at the borders!                                      




This is the REALLY big stuff that was burning like a house afire today in celebration of Quan Yew's birthday (I'm never quite sure if it's Kwan Yew, Guan Yew or Quan Yew, so bear with me).








Here is a woman releasing birds from a cage bought from the bird lady; however, this little guy teetered at the edge and didn't seem too enthusiastic about flying away.  I watched as she shook and shook until the recalcitrant bird finally swooped down  and then rose up into the sky.  I felt awfully happy for him but wondered if the birds were trained to come right back and have it done all over again!  Cynic that I am...




Despite the sticker's still being on the orange, I still liked this little arrangement at the temple and the shadows cast on the wall behind it and on the table on which it rested.  Maybe I was drawn to his spare simplicity in the midst of the frenzy of color, motion, smoke, prayer and fire.






Here is another little scene that evoked serenity for me.

I cannot really say why, but I am fascinated by the laundry hanging everywhere; this is a rather bland display, but...

THIS one is picture perfect with the pink motorbike juxtaposed with the pink dress.  Love it.

The black cat I have added for my sister, Lisa, who will kill me for mentioning that she is a cat woman, but there you have it.

The rest of these images I add for color, texture and design - in other words, they just spoke to me.

Tomorrow is another day and another opportunity to capture the light, the color and the liveliness of Penang's facade; then, perhaps I shall move into a larger sphere in Kuala Lumpur.