TESTING COLOURS: Keeping Visual Information to Minimum

How do you paint water? How do you know that what you are painting is water? Using three primaries again, I did a quick sketch of a tethered dinghy on calm water. How do you know there is water? 

Well, the reflection is one dead giveaway. But the second clue is the boat itself - what do you think when you see a boat? Unless indicated otherwise, chances are that you mind will be looking for the boat's support - the water that it is usually sitting in. Whether it is a lake or a river, or even the sea. And when you find a reflection beneath the boat, your mind will confirm what you are seeing is a boat on water that you are seeing. 

So in sketching, the trick is to keep your pieces simple, with just enough information to let the viewer fill in the rest.

TESTING COLOURS: The Power of Primaries

Although it is well known that the three primaries of yellow, red and blue make up a host of other colours in the spectrum, few of us prefer to have premixed secondary colours because it is easier to get the colours right every time. I feel that if we are to learn to use only the three primaries, we can train our minds to pick out the right mix every time too.

This cluster of vegetables, a cauliflower, two tomatoes, a cucumber and two chillies were painted using only three colours - yellow, blue and red - which are the known primaries. When mixed in varied proportions, primaries give a stunning variety of colours under the rainbow.

The cauliflower was created using blue + yellow and a tinge of red; the tomatoes using red + yellow and a trace of blue; and the cucumber two shaded of green using blue + yellow and overlapped; while the red chillies were created using red + yellow with a bias towards yellow. The shine on the tomatoes and chillies were created by lifting off. The patterns/texture on the cauliflower were created by natural pigmentation - happy accidents, watercolourists call it.

WHY IT WORKS: In strict sense, you dont need a full set of colours in a 12 or 16-plate palette to do a good representation of your subjects. Understanding the power of primaries can give you that advantage of creating harmonious compositions as can be seen here. Every single colour placed shares a component colour of the other. How can that be not harmonious?

National Monument @ Kuala Lumpur

I was in a hurry to get away from the tourists that I forgot to sign this work!

I have always wanted to sketch the National Monument but had always been intimidated by the figures, the sheer size of them and the various poses that make up this bronze structure which marked the nation's struggle towards Independence. Finally today, armed with a simple Kokuyo watercolour set and a Rotring sketch pen, I decided to grab the bull by its horns. This above is the result.

The drawing took me
 less than 15 min

The National Monument is located within the Lake Gardens area, just behind the monolothic Cenotaph. It is surrounded by a moat and fenced up. I decided to only keep to the monument because of the challenging conditions - getting the proportions of the figures right and deal with foreshortening. Instead of trying to draw what I knew, I decided to allow my experience in countour drawing to take over. And this drawing technique came to my rescue.

Colouring was much easier, with two layers of paint to depict the different tones and a combination of earth colours and blues aided in showing the greenish-brown disposition of the oxidised bronze statues. The flag was simply painted with stripes of red across the white paper. It would have been great if the day had been windy as I could capture the flag full blown.

He was preparing to shoot
when my photographer snapped
his picture first. He left.

Not making it any easier were the hordes of tourists who were there. Some just looked over my shoulder without commenting; others complimented. There was one Chinese tourist who decided he wanted a close look over my shoulders when my photographer decided to take a snap of him, and when he realised this, he decided to keep his camera and walk away.

Capturing the icon of Alang Sedayu

This red bridge was built across the Alang Sedayu's Sungai Pisang to link the main road to the Jungle Lodge side of the forest reserve. The water level of the river is low even though it had been raining almost every evening. I arrived here this morning and managed to get down to one of the large boulders in the middle of the river to paint this scene. Usually it will be waist deep and there is no way to place my stuff.

Surprisingly this river is still clean. It's beginning is from the Sungai Pisang waterfalls, a couple of kilometres away, across the Karak Highway. This recreational forest north of Selangor, on the Gombak-Bentong main road, was opened in the 1990s and despite its proximity to the city, it is still not much frequented by locals. Only groups here are those doing their team building and school events.

Rail knowledge at Kluang railway station

Kluang Station, a view from Platform 2, showing the location marker
and a tamping machine on the tracks.

Sending my daughter to her friend's home in Kundang Ulu yesterday took me south to Johor and my wife and I visited Pagoh, Yong Peng, and finally ending up in Kluang. I had been to Kluang before many years ago but had never put up the night there. I remember, the only thing that attracted me to the town, was the famous railway canteen whose nasi lemak, coffee and toast were one of the best in the country.

This time we arrived on Thursday, and unfortunately for me, the canteen was closed. Since I could not do much there, with the station less crowded, I was able to sit and sketch from Platform 2 of this station. This is a major stop for the KTM trains heading to Singapore or the Northern regions.

Since the station building was crowded with cars parked haphazardly, I decided to paint the scenery across the tracks, of the location marker and the locomotive-like machine on its tracks. This is actually a Unimat-Compact universal tamping machine by Plasser-Theurer used to maintain railway tracks. It helps to raise the rails, compact the gravel beneath, and levels the rail off mechanically.

Finding coal in Kuala Sepetang

This was done in the kiln shed, which houses several other igloo-shaped kilns. This kiln has been
sealed at the end stage of charcoal baking. The pungent air within, although not captured on camera,
makes the eye teary. I had to quickly finish this under low-light conditions.

IN the days before cooking gas was available, charcoal and wood were the preferred fuels for cooking. There were two types of charcoal sold in sundry shops – soft charcoal, which is cheaper and usually made from any type of wood, and the hard charcoal, made from mangrove logs. The latter is denser and much more preferred as it produces fire that burns hotter and longer than the soft charcoals.

Located in Kuala Sepetang (or Port Weld as it was originally known) along the coast of Perak, some 17km from Taiping, the charcoal factory owned by Khay Hor Holdings is one of the few remaining ones in the Peninsula that produces the higher quality mangrove log charcoal.

I was fortunate enough to be allowed into the factory to sketch one of the igloo shaped kilns made of bricks. Unfortunately the charcoal was still being made and not ready to be removed, so I did not get to go into the kiln.

Khay Hor Holdings business development manager K.Y. Chuah informed me that the entire process of making charcoal takes about 30 days. Mangrove or bakau logs are stripped of their bark, cut into approximately 1.6m lengths, and arranged upright along the walls of the seven-metre high kiln.  A fire is lit and the entrance to the kiln, which is about the height of a man, is gradually sealed over a period of time.

Heat control through gradual sealing of the aperture is very important so that the charcoal is not reduced to ashes because of too high temperature. The heat had to be built up to produce a high quality charcoal that burns efficiently.

“There are two stages of fire which we create. The first stage is the ‘big fire’ and the second, we call ‘small fire’. From the ‘big fire’, we will partially seal the entrance to create a ‘small fire’.

A group UTAR students who were visiting
asked to see my sketches. 

“During the first stage, the ‘big fire’ will be allowed to run for approximately ten days. The temperature is raised until it reaches 85-degree Celcius,” added Chuah.

“Subsequently, this ‘big fire’ is converted to ‘small fire’ and this is kept going approximately for 14 days. The temperature would now be between 230- and 250-degree Celcius, after which the fire is extinguished by sealing all the apertures of the kiln.

“Once the fire is extinguished, it takes about a week for the charcoal to cool down before they can be removed from the kiln,” he added. The job is done manually.

 

During the process of firing, steam is released from the mangrove trunks escapes from the kiln through a vent on the roof. This steam condenses into a smoke-smelling dark brown liquid which is believed to have antibacterial properties and is sought after for medicinal application. In the past, kiln workers collect this black liquid to treat skin diseases and remove odour from shoes and old socks.

Today, this charcoal maker has taken a step further to refine the extraction of this liquid by a filtration process, with the end product marketed as mangrove vinegar. According to Chuah, the vinegar can be used to freshen up stale air in a room, as mosquito repellent, and even used to treat certain infections of the skin.

“Because it has strong anti-bacterial properties, you can use it to remove the odour from your shoes. Just spray it into the shoes and leave them overnight to make your shoes smell like brand new.

Mangrove vinegar bottled as
a spray to be used as
insect repellent.

“Since this is an organic product, you can also spray it on your pets, like dogs and cats, to repel ticks and fleas,” he added.

Apart from the mangrove vinegar, his company has also produces charcoal soaps for bathing and cleansing purposes. “This black soap is most effective in removing blackheads and cleaning the skin,” he said.

Mangrove charcoal blocks too are sold at the factory grounds for use as an air purifier as well as décor for the home.  

Papan in peaceful slumber

One of the old houses that remind visitors of Papan's rich past.

Located about 17km from Ipoh off the Ipoh Lumut highway, about three kilometres from Pusing, Papan used to be a bustling town in the late 1800s. It is believed that the Chinese had named it “ka-pan”, which means wooden plank. Word has it that in the past, the “cengal” hardwood that were harvested from the neighbouring jungles had to be brought to the town to be sawn into planks. Incidentally, its new name, Papan, also meant plank in Malay.

However, Papan did not owe its fame to timber but rather tin, according to an elder who saw me painting this old house at the entrance to the town. He said Papan prospered during the glory years of tin mining and when the industry collapsed, the town’s relevance was reduced to only a soon-to-be-forgotten mention in the history books.

During the Japanese Occupation, when Ipoh was bombed, people from the town sought refuge in Papan and its population grew. It was also during this period that Papan earned its “black area” reputation for insurgent activities against the Japanese, and later for communist activities during the Emergency. In 1984, Papan was again thrown into the limelight when its residents staged protests against the storage of radioactive waste in the hills not far from the town.

On the right is the temple, behind which is the cemetary.

Today, Papan is a sleepy hollow that only comes to life only during the Qing Ming Festival or Tomb Sweeping Day when families who used to live there come to the cemetery just outside town to pay their respects to their dearly departed. Many of the old buildings that lined the main street have been abandoned and are slowly inhabited by wild vegetation. There is very little visible economic activity here as most of the younger generation have moved to nearer towns in search of better prospects.

Many descendant families of the early settlers here have also moved to the new Kampung Papan Baru, located a kilometre just outside the old town where there are better facilities. If there was any sign of activity, it would be in the mornings and the area near the community hall or Balai Raya Papan, and at the two old coffeeshops along the main road. Locals meet here to have a cuppa, a meal or just to catch up.

The most modern structure must be the SJKC Papan Chinese primary school which has only 80 pupils comprising 45 boys and 35 girls. This school sits by the main road next to house No. 74, a prominent landmark which once housed the clinic of Sybil Kathigasu, the Malayan-Eurasian nurse who worked with her doctor husband to support the resistance during the Japanese Occupation. Sybil received the George Medal for Gallantry, instituted by King George VI in 1940. The GM was presented to those performing acts of bravery meriting recognition by the United Kingdom and Sybil is said to be the only Malayan woman to have awarded the medal. There is a Jalan Sybil Kathigasu in Ipoh, named after Independence, to commemorate Sybil’s bravery.

The historical edifice that was once Sybil Kathigasu's clinic,
left to the mercy of the weather and time. Newspaper cuttings
pasted on the doors tell a little about its history.

Another historical structure in Papan is the Istana Raja Billah, a stately mansion which is also the town’s largest building in its heydays. Slowly being swallowed by tall grass but still visible from the main road, this mansion belonged to Raja Billah, a Mendailing nobleman from West Sumatera who settled in Papan with his family in the late 1800s. A merchant and tin miner, Raja Billah was also the headman for Papan at the time.

Istana Raja Billah is a pale shade of itself today although it was once refurbished and turned into a museum. It was even used as location for the movie Anna and the King, according to a local who lived nearby. However, neglect in the recent years, he added, had reduced this stately edifice to its derelict self, with parts of the wooden panellings and tiles having been stolen or vandalised.

Just a stone’s throw away from the Istana is the Masjid Papan. Completed in 1888, the mosque sits on land donated by Raja Billah. The structure is made of local hardwood such as cengal, merbau and damar laut. It was designed with one pyramid-shaped zinc-sheet roof sitting on top of another, separated by air vents. The entire structure rests on brick-cement piers. The mosque also did not have a tower and calls to prayer those days were made by hitting a drum known as a taboh.

Contrasts of the old and the new in Langkawi

I was in Langkawi recently and after seeing so much development there, I began to wonder how building materials, scoefically cement and concrete, were brought to the island. Well, my curiosity was soon answered when I rented a car and drove all over this resort island.

Located on the northern side of Langkawi was a huge structure that looked like the space launch pad of Cape Canaveral. Rising over 10 stories high at least, this structure in green and grey turned out to be the Lafarge Kedah Cement Quarry. I decided to stop by and do a piece on it because I had not done one on a cement quarry/factory before.

Since there were no security outposts like most factories in Klang valley, I invited myself into the compound and parked my car along the drive way so that I could get a good view of the factory complex. I had to station myself quite far away to get this main complex into the piece and I had to also work fast because it was almost lunch hour and my presence could attract unnecessary attention.

The Kedah Cement Quarry/Factory owned by Lafarge, located north of the Langkawi Island.

Despite the wave of concreted buildings sweeping across this resort island, I am pleased to be able to find some very beautiful traditional houses in Langkawi.

One such house - there are many more as I have spotted, especially along the non-touristy areas of the island - is at Padang Matsirat, where the Padang Beras Terbakar or Field of Burnt Rice is located. This house (photo below, inset) belongs to Ku Halim Ku Hassan and is a fine looking timber structure built raised on stilts. It has a lovely concrete staircase.

This is a lovely timber house that is also well taken care of. I like the clean surroundings and
 the beautiful Malacca-style concrete staircase leading into the serambi (sitting area) of the house.

Morning's Glory in Kampung Hailam

MORNING GLORY - 304X458MM

This piece was inspired by my trip to a recent traditional village in Malacca that is facing demolition. The village is in Kampung Hailam, off the coastal road north of historic city Malacca. This was one of the houses built in the 1970s, I believe, which is reminiscent of many such houses in traditional villages that are now history. Living in such houses is an experience of few equals like waking up to the chirp of bird in the trees around one's home and listening to the patter of raindrops. Nights are also cooler here than in concrete homes.

Stopping over in Rantau

This is the only zinc-roofed timber-built shop along the main road of Rantau. How long it will be here, I do not know.
Occupied by a fledgling sundry shop business, it will not be long before development erases it to just a memory
 and that is whyI chose to record this in my visual journal.

CONTRARY to what I thought, the name Rantau, a small town not far from Seremban, in Negri Sembilan, did not come from the Malay word rantau (to travel).

Instead, I was told it was derived from the name of a village called Kampung Orang Rantau Panjang Kelang. The village was believed to have been set up by Bugis immigrants who fled the civil unrest in Rantau Panjang in Klang during the mid-1800s and what began as Kampung Orang Rantau Panjang Kelang, had over the years lost its mouthful of a name.

Today, it is known simply as Rantau. The main bustling area in this sleepy hollow is along the main road, Jalan Besar, which is also part of the trunk road linking Seremban, off the expressway, to Linggi and other smaller towns. With a population of 9,000, Rantau was once surrounded by rubber and oil palm plantations but these have made way for housing estates.

I painted this house because it appeared to be the only zinc-roofed timber building that had withstood the ravages of time and development. Known simply as 38 Jalan Besar, it is the premises of Tamilan Store, a small Indian sundry shop. It is two doors away from Sri Bala Thandayuthabani Temple along the main road.

According to a villager who saw me painting from across the street, a huge fire decades ago razed the upper reaches of Rantau town.

“Most of the buildings you see here today are modern ones,”she said. “Most of the shop operators here are Indians and Chinese, but as it’s a small town, many shops are barely surviving.”

This uncle at left was amused that
I chose to paint this small town. 

In the morning until late afternoon, the hawker centre on the main road is a hive of activity, Villagers gather here for a meal and to chat with each other. By evening, there is not much activity. Although the town itself does not have much to offer tourists except a chance to stretch their legs and have a drink, there are several back-to-nature holidays in the Rantau district. They include Rantau Ecopark in Kuala Sawah and Rantau Agro Park in Kampung Seri Lalang.

Anglers may want to check out Kampungstay Haji Sulaiman in Kuala Sawah which offers not only accommodation but also a chance to hook up a whopper at its freshwater lake.
Rantau has produced a few prominent Malaysians such as Maha Sinnathamby, the man behind Greater Springfield, Australia’s largest master-planned development, and the former soccer great, the late Ghani Minhat.

Kelly's unfinished labour of love

This piece was done on a larger sheet, an A3, when I ran out of pages on my sketchpad.

Kellie's Castle, also known as Kellie's Folly, is an incomplete castle located in the Batu Gajah district in Perak. This unfinished mansion, now a ruins, was built by a Scottish planter named William Kellie Smith. It was believed to be a gift for his wife, built beside the Sungai Raya, a tributary of the Kinta River. Some people say that it was for Kelly's son, however.

Today, this tourist attract has received another refurbishment in preparation for the Visit Perak Year 2017. This sketch was made during my recent walkabout up north the state of Perak.

Batu Arang's Coal-aful Past

One of the two mine entrances that lead into the tunnels but they have both been closed. 

BATU ARANG, about 50km north of Kuala Lumpur, derived its name from the Malay word for coal, which is arang batu. After coal was discovered here in the early 1900s, British coal miner John Archibald Russell set up Malayan Collieries Ltd (MCL) to start mining operations in 1913. 

Five thousand miners were employed and they worked around the clock in three shifts to meet the high demand for coal in the region. At the height of its prosperity in the 1930s, Batu Arang was believed to bethe most developed town in Selangor and locals even nicknamed it Mini Gold Hill. It had even its own airstrip which allowed salaries of miners to be air-dropped into the town. 

The Federated Malay States Railways (FMSR) built a railway line to connect Batu Arang to Kuang and within the coal mining township, MCL built its own network of tracks linking the various gantry points of the open cast mines and other subsidiary industries, including its own brick factory. 

The decline in demand for coal began in the 1950s when industries and the railways switched to using diesel. The coal mining era in Batu Arang ended in 1960. In the span of 47 years, 15 million tonnes of coal were believed to have been mined from the deep earth and open cast mines. 

Today, all the entrances to the deep earth mines have been sealed. The open cast mines, located on the hillock behind the police station, are filled with water and turned into a huge lake. Access to the lake has also been fenced up but a worker manning the gates allowed me to enter to take pictures. He claimed that the lake was very popular with anglers. At its deepest point, the lake is at least 200m deep, he said. He showed me bits of coal still embedded in the ground. 

At a coffeeshop near the market in town, I asked some old men why Batu Arang had no high-rise buildings. One of them explained that there was a huge network of mining tunnels running underneath the township. Many of these tunnels had collapsed and damaged the buildings on ground level, so for that reason, building highrises which required heavy piling had been prohibited.

On March 15, 1992, the New Sunday Times carried a feature on the dangers that Batu Arang townfolk faced from sinkholes that had appeared over the years due to the collapse of subterranean mining tunnels. 

The open cast mine is now a lake, visible from the hillock behind the
Police Station.

This painting is of one of the entries to the deep earth mines. This tourist attraction is a few hundred metres from the SKJC Chap Khuan, along a laterite path. There is a signboard that marks its location but you have to walk down a 100m path to get to the entrance which is almost swallowed by undergrowth.

While painting this scene, I had to fend off not only mosquitoes but also some suspicious looking characters who had gone into the bushes in front of me. I later found out that these were drug addicts getting their daily fix. Visitors should also watch out for snakes.

Batu Arang was declared a Heritage Town by the State government some years back and today, remnants of its colourful past include a coal miners' settlement comprising dilapidated brick houses, a row of two-storey shophouses believed to be built in the late 1920s, the police station grounds (which once housed the Gurkha forces barracks and were the premises of the Malayan Collieries Ltd), and an abandoned brick kiln.

CITY SKETCHING: Jalan Ampang

The AIA Building of today. 

Raintrees used to dot the entire of Jalan Ampang but today, not many are left.
These four magnificent trees are not the original inhabitants along
the riverside. They have been planted in the 1980s or 90s, if I am not mistaken.

I spotted a lone street sweeper along the road opposite the AIA Building
and decided to capture it in a sketch.

Jalan Ampang is an old street in the heart of Kuala Lumpur, stretching right from Jalan Tun Razak in the north to Lebuh Ampang in the south. In the 70s, Jalan Ampang was thrown into the limelight because of the hostage-taking drama in the AIA Building by the Japanese Red Army. On Aug 4 1975, a group of the JRA stormed the AIA building which housed the Swedish and American embassies and took 53 employees of the embassies hostage. I decided to sketch this area from the side of the road just after the Chinese New Year period when the traffic is less busy.  In the 70s and 80s, there were no tall buildings in this area except the AIA Building. Today, there are several tall buildings in this stretch, offering shelter from the sun for a good part of the day.

Kiln-ing time in Batu Arang

One of the remaining smokestacks of the abandoned brick kiln.

Did you know that apart from coal, Batu Arang town was also famous for its red firebricks? In fact, the first thing a visitor sees when arriving in Batu Arang is monument built in 2013 in the centre of the town’s roundabout dedicated to this industry. It takes the form of a miniature smokestack, with a black base, another reminder of the township’s coal-mining past. Smaller replicas of similar smokestacks holding up Batu Arang’s nameplates also greet visitors at several entry points into the heritage town.

According to a local, this brick factory employed many staff and the firebricks produced here ranked among the best in Southeast Asia at the time and tonnes from this factory were exported via Singapore port.

 

This smokestack greets visitors to Batu Arang at the roundabout
 in the town centre. The black bottom half represents coal that
was mined from the town's famous open cast mines decades ago.

I drew this smokestack of the abandoned brick kiln from the grounds of the St Michael’s Chapel, about 100 metres away. Although I wanted to trek through the undergrowth to get nearer to the structure, a concerned chapel’s caretaker cautioned me against it because of the presence of poisonous snakes there. There used to be at least five smokestacks in this brick factory, I was told, with the tallest rising over 20 metres.

The Malayan Collieries Ltd (MCL), which operated the coal mines of Batu Arang for 47 years since 1913, was possibly the earliest to produce red facing bricks at this factory for building construction in the township. In the MCL’s Brief Description of the Plant and Activities at Batu Arang as a Guide to Visitors, written in the 1930s, an entry recorded that the clay needed for its brick factory was supplied from earth stripped from the open cast coal mines.

Today, if you drive around Batu Arang, you can still see many of the older buildings sport this firebrick façade, including that of Chap Khuan Chinese Primary School, the old clubhouse building by the town’s padang, the miners’ quarters, as well as some of the houses here.

Reminder of the brick making years of Batu Arang.

One of the houses in the Coal Miners' Settlement, made entirely
of red bricks.

Artists' Colony @ Jalan Conlay, Kuala Lumpur

Ink and wash of the huts at the eastern end of the colony. You can check out the actual scene below,
together with my outdoor set-up.

This is my first outdoor work of 2016. Had been busy with some work and today, being the eve of the City Day, I decided to visit the Artists Colony in Jalan Conlay. This originally started with a colony of traditional wooden huts for artists to work in but over the years, the number of huts dwindled. A car park came up in the middle instead. You could still artists at work here, on weekdays, 9am to 5pm daily. 

The several huts which captured by attention.

This is the west end of the colony. Lots of greenery but as you can see, the colony is hemmed in by development. This is prime land, and I hope the powers-that-be will reserve it for artists to work at. It's the only artistic attraction left in KL.

Quaint Village in Malacca

The Machap Baru Village is a well known for its many home operated restaurants serving
a variety of Chinese dishes, particularly game meats.

 MACHAP BARU is a traditional village of about 1,000 homes located in the district of Alor Gajah in Malacca. Populated mostly by the Chinese of Hakka descent, Machap Baru is located on high ground overlooking the upper reaches of the famous Durian Tunggal dam which dried up in 1991.

I painted this archway across the Machap Baru-Ayer Pasir state road that passes by the village. This archway marks the entrance to the village and from here you could see part of the Durian Tunggal dam. According to villagers here, no farming or animal husbandry activities are allowed near to the dam for fear of polluting the water.

Machap Baru is well known for its many home-operated restaurants that serve wild game dishes. For this reason, I was told, the Wildlife Department keeps a close eye on these home-run enterprises. Lately, tourists are arriving in droves three days each week, from Fridays to Sundays, to visit Machap Walk, a night market which features a wide range of gastronomic delights. Apart from Machap Walk, there is also a beautiful temple located at the hilltop of Machap Baru, which is said to be very popular during Chinese New Year when devotees come to pay homage to a deity.

This is the start of the Durian Tunggal Dam in Malacca,
the biggest dam in the state.

  

Opposite the Machap Baru archway is a stall that sells local agricultural produce like young coconuts, pumpkins and pineapples sourced from around the area. If you happen to be here, ask the stall owner for the red dragon fruits which are planted at his small plot of land just behind the stall. These sweet juicy fruits are affordably priced at RM6 a kilo for large ones. 

Bridge into Kuala Terengganu's past

The bridge was mentioned in the travel journal of Munsyi Abdullah

Kampung Cina, in Kuala Terengganu, is believed to have been set up by Chinese settlers in the 1700s or even earlier. Some of the traditional houses that lined the main street, Jalan Kampung Cina, are believed to be old as the town itself. This part of town is known as Teng Lang Po in the local Hokkien lingo, which means "Chinatown".

During my recent trip there, I found that the local community is also quite active in preserving a piece of the tow’s history. As a result, several alleys have been turned into "living museums" to display any artefact found or saved from the wave of development.

I chose to sketch this bridge because of its historical significance. From my conversations with the township's elders, this bridge that was built from bricks could be as old as the town itself. About two cars wide, the bridge has parapet walls about 1.5 m high, flanked by square shaped columns. They are adorned with floral motifs. I am not sure if the current colour scheme was the original one, however. 

Grim reminder of selfish motorists -
good thing that this was repaired the day
 I painted the piece.

The bridge spans across Alor Lorong Jamil, a stream that feeds directly into the Terengganu river before part of the river was reclaimed and turned into the present-day Pulau Warisan, a piece of land that now sits on what used to be the middle of the Terengganu river.

According to local history researcher Lorenz Law, 54, the bridge had been mentioned by Munsyi Abdullah in the travel journal recording his voyage from Singapore to Kelantan. In his account of his stopover in Kuala Terengganu in 1838, Munsyi Abdullah wrote that he came across a bridge “one dupa wide and six dupa long (an ancient linear measurement unit equivalent to two yards)” when he visited Kampung China. He also mentioned two rows of brick shophouses on both sides of the main street that were owned by Chinese families who spoke fluent Terengganu-Malay.

The weight of vehicles being illegally parked on the bridge had caused the left parapet wall to crack recently. However, maintenance staff from the local personnel had repaired it on the afternoon that I painted this scene.

Hot Springs Therapy in Hulu Tami

Hulu Tamu Hotsprings lies in the Batang Kali forest, off the main road.

DEEP in the heart of Bantang Kali, some six kilometres off the old road to Kuala Kubu Baru, lies the Hulu Tamu Hotsprings. The hotsprings is a popular haunt among locals and weekenders who know how to get there. It was rumoured that the hotsprings’ waters have medicinal value.

The Hulu Tamu hotsprings, which is believed to have undergone a RM100,000 upgrade early this year, has three  shaded gazebos and three pools. The waters in the two smaller pools are very hot, especially towards noon, while the biggest one is lukewarm. There is a canteen at the far end of the pool but choices are limited to bottle drinks and some food.

The pebbled path for those who want some foot reflexology.

The hotsprings area is surrounded by tall trees with thick foliage, making it shady spot for picnickers. There are also short pebbled paths beside the main gazebo that visitors use for foot massage or reflexology after soaking their feet. There is a small car park at the entrance to the hotsprings and a few more parking lots beside the canteen.

According to a local I met there, the hotsprings area has been fenced up and rumours have it that the local council would soon be charging a fee for entrance. It is not known if the pool is open 24 hours as there was no signboard or a security post.

Adjacent to the hotspring is the Cholo-cholo Resort and Restaurant, a privately operated establishment that is also quite popular with holiday makers.

I found Hulu Tamu hotsprings by accident while heading to Kuala Kubu Bharu to escape the recent haze. Having spotted the signboard near Batang Kali, on the KL-Ipoh old road, I decided to take a detour to seek it out. My GPS device did not show its location but you may use Waze as there is an entry of the location. Network connection in the area is erratic, however.

I painted this scene from the canteen parking lot, armed with mosquito repellent to keep the big variety of insect at bay.  

Raub - a town gold made famous

This rest house lies on the hillock overlooking the padang.

ACCORDING to a local who saw me painting the Raub Rest House at Jalan Dato Abdullah recently, the name of the township came from the Malay term “raup”, which means a scoop. The 70-something pakcik told me that his grandfather had related to him a story about a farmer and his two sons who had ventured to set up farm in the wilderness.

After having cleared and ploughed the land, the farmer and his son went to the river to get water to irrigate the plots. Upon reaching the river, they were not only attracted by the crystal-clear waters but also the glitter on the riverbed. Curious, they took a scoop of sand from the bottom of riverbed to see what the glitter was and were surprised to find gold nuggets among the grains of sand.

The news of their finding spread quickly and prospectors came from near and far to look for gold. There was so much gold in the river that every dulang of sand washed would yield a “raup” or a scoop of gold. Hence, the township became known as “Raup” or Raub today. It is said that the area where the padang is now located used to be a waterlogged piece of land that yielded the highest amount of gold deposits.

Another story told was that Raub received its name from the Rao (or Rawo) immigrant community who lived in the area who were mostly farmers and miners. The area, then known as the Rao Valley, became Raub in later years.

I painted his colonial-style rest house seated beneath an old raintree on the south-eastern end. This old rest house is located on top of a hillock which offers it a commanding view of Raub town. The rest house was built in 1908 and had been described as one of the finest in Pahang and Selangor in an old newspaper cutting of the 1930s. Back those days, whenever there was a major event in town, its premises were reserved for the accommodation of VIPs and top government officials.

Today, the rest house is still popular with tourists, especially those who want to experience a little bit of nostalgia in the bustling town centre.  On the walls of the rest house’s high ceiling lobby are old photographs and newspaper cuttings that mark the various milestone events in the town that gold made famous.

An old clock greets visitors on the ground floor.

The padang as seen from the arched doorway of the rest house.

Guardian of Nation's heritage

Badan Warisan Malaysia is housed in an old colonial-style building

This colonial-style bungalow, at No 2 Jalan Stonor, within walking distance from the Kuala Lumpur City Centre was built in 1925. Having passed through many owners, it was restored for reuse by Badan Warisan Malaysia in 1995. The century-old building today houses an exhibition area, the Heritage Centre’s premises, and a gift shop. It is also a popular venue for art exhibitions, product launches and meetings.

The building is built raised floors and faces a huge garden. I was here recently during an exhibition by Malaysian Heritage and History Club to mark the nation’s Independence and thought that it would be a good subject to paint. After all, there are not many such magnificent buildings left in the city centre that mark a chapter of our colourful history.

 

Rumah  Penghulu Abu Seman, one of the
oldest traditional Malay houses in the country
that have been saved from the ravages of time.

Just a stone’s throw away from the bungalow is the Rumah Penghulu Abu Seman, one of the oldest traditional Malay houses in the country that have been saved from the ravages of time. Believed to be built between 1910 and 1930 in stages, this all-timber abode was once owned by Mukim Bagan Semak, Bandar Baharu, in Kedah. Badan Warisan relocated and restored the house in 1996 from its original site in Kampung Sungai Kechil, also in Kedah.

In its silence presence beneath looming sky scrapers, this traditional house is no less grand than the colonial bungalow for it reflects the ingenuity of Malay builders of old, who have masterly incorporated functional use and environment-friendliness into its design. The floors have been raised to keep the structure airy and cool in hot weather. The house also has carved panelling that not only beautiful the walls but also allow good ventilation.

This is a traditional Kukur Nyiur
or a coconut scraper.

For those who wondered what guardians of the kitchen use in time of old, check out antique kitchen appliances here, which included a granite millstone (batu giling), lesong (pestle and mortar), and coconut scraper (kukur nyiur).

Guided tours are available daily from 11am and 3pm, except Sundays, with a minimum of donation RM10 per person. Call 03-2144 9273 for details or email info@badanwarisan.org.my