Well, we couldn’t actually dock in Penang, we had to sit in the water and take a tender boat back and forth. So by the time we got off the ship it was later, so Andrew and I just walked around, explored a little and chatted. We sat on the boardwalk and soon enough I had to be back on the ship for the University Welcome Reception. We went to University Sains Malaysia and saw a student performance. The big thing to do is Shadow Puppets. It was so cute – and funny. Afterwards we attempted to play the instruments and then had dinner with the students. They are so quiet and polite. The next day a bunch of us went to see a healer. A man who was parallelized walked up to the front of the room and told us about HEAL. Read that again… a parallelized man WALKED! Seriously. He was a little awkward and crooked but he was still walking. It was really cool, the healer was really cool as well. It seems so new age and strange, but it works. Then he taught us some exercises. We had to choose what hand was heavier then do these moments. Soon enough, our hand was lighter. Then he helped us focus our energy on our fingers, and I swear to God – all of our fingers were longer.
The next day we went to go walk around temples. It was cool, Buddhist temples are so colorful and bold compared to some churches at home. Hindu temples are the same. Then we went to mosque, where there are no paintings or pictures or anything. The President of the Muslim Assoc. took us around and then gave us free books on Islam! It was so sweet! Then we went to the top of Penang Hill to see the biggest Buddhist temple. It was a gorgeous view. I broke away from everyone and just sat next to Buddha and reflected. It was beautiful and relaxing. Then I hear behind me “Don’t move.” It was our shipboard photographer. Mica He said the way I was positioned was a great shot. I was leaning on a balcony looking out onto the city. He shot my back for 15 minutes and we chatted about everything. It was really cool. Then I walked down Penang and ran into our video editor. He’s really young, and only graduated from college last year so we got some spring rolls and chatted for an hour then realized we were late for the bus. John’s super cool, we had some deep conversations.
That night I went to Global Nomads; which is a non-profit organization that broadcasts between America and other countries. I went with one of my professors, Rocky, and my group partners for a project. It was at the university and the schools in the US were in NJ, MI, and OK. The topic was Islam, which is so good because American students need to learn what Islam is really about. For those who don’t know, Malaysia is predominantly Muslim and the government is basically run as an Islamic nation. The dialogue went pretty well, I was a little disappointed with some of the US students, but some I loved. The Malay students were adorable, so sweet and intelligent. The feed was a little scratchy so I was helping translate the Americans to the head of GN (Marc who is German and beautiful.) After the feed was done, we had a chance to talk to the students. Cait and I introduced ourselves to two girls and we had a good conversation. Cait, myself, Jen and Diana have a project for our education class and needed some information. I decided to be bold and ask these girls if they could drive us around the next day. The girls, Wani and Alia, said yes. It’s study week because finals were the next week so they have no classes. They were picking us up the next day…
And it was the greatest day ever! We met them and they took us around the University campus. Alia was driving and she decided to drive down the wrong way on a one way street. She turned us and said “It’s okay, I am a student ambassador.” She is so cute but crazy. We walked around their university museum and played with shadow puppets. Then we drove around Penang, looking for a local primary and secondary school. After almost driving into a wall and getting hit by a truck (Alia is a horrible but hilarious driver!!) we found a secondary school. We drove in and the principal came out. We thought he was mad at us but he welcomed us into his office and talked to us about the school. After a little while he said that he was late for a meeting so he had to leave but feel free to walk around. So nice! We walked around and talked to some kids. Then we drove across the street to the primary school. The principal there took us in as well and talked to us about the school. I have so much cool information, so much that it would take forever to write. We toured the school. All of this took four hours because they were so excited to show us around the school. They had a great special education program and we had so much information for our presentation.
After, the girls took us to lunch on our campus and we talked about Islam, the hijab, and boys. They are such cool, genuine, sweet girls. It was so welcoming of them to take four strange crazy American girls around their city. Afterwards we went to the internet then to get dinner. We passed some shoe stores… and I’m sorry Mommy but I couldn’t help myself – I had to buy shoes. Three pairs. Opps. Cait and I wore them home because we loved then so much. We took a tut-tut back to the ship. Because of the tender boat business, the line was 2 hours long. We made it back just in time.
Malaysia was simple yet so profound. Hanging out with Alia and Wani was the highlight; it was what I was looking for this whole trip, to make connections with students around the world. And I loved observing the school, it felt so right. I have so much to think about when I get back…
Infinite xo amandapanda
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