{"id":765,"date":"2017-02-23T16:02:32","date_gmt":"2017-02-23T16:02:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thenomadicyear.com\/blog\/?p=765"},"modified":"2017-03-03T11:32:13","modified_gmt":"2017-03-03T11:32:13","slug":"hello-malaysia-penang","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thenomadicyear.com\/blog\/hello-malaysia-penang\/","title":{"rendered":"Hello, Malaysia!"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Getting from Koh Phangan<\/strong> (Thailand) to Penang\u00a0<\/strong>(Malaysia) was a pain in the ass<\/strong>: I had to take a slow ferry, a golden minivan and two\u00a0flights.<\/p>\n

Oh yeah, a golden minivan which was\u00a0a big WTF moment: after disembarking the ferry, people going to the airport were boarded into an Orthodox church on wheels, with random design elements covered in\u00a0gold, ceiling with mosaic decorations, because why not, whilst a brand new Justin Bieber song was smoothing the atmosphere in the background. Such a sweet ride.<\/p>\n

After 3 hours on one of the slowest ferry I’ve ever seen, 1 hour trip with the cool golden T minivan, a 3 hours flight to Kuala Lumpur, followed by a 3 hours layover, and then an 1 hour flight to Penang, what seemed a trip around the world was finally over. This was definitely the most exhausting trip so far.\u00a0So tired, man..<\/p>\n

If on Phangan island the only transport options were walking, or walking and hoping to meet songthaew, or riding with a moto-taxi and hope for the best, in Penang I was suddenly overwhelmed with the multitude of choices, some of which were literally throwing themselves at you (ie. pushing cab drivers, transfer service flyers flying around like confetti, etc).<\/p>\n

So I spent the next 2 hours in the airport trying to decide how should I get to my place in the suburbs of Georgetown: should I get a taxi? An Uber? A GrabCar? Maybe a bus? Or the subway? Do they even have a subway? Nope, they don’t, but I looked for one for 30 minutes. So tired, man..
\nAfter cleverly weighting my choices, I finally decided and took the first damn random cab I found, which resulted in a pretty expensive cab ride, but I didn’t cared anymore.<\/p>\n

What was left of that night I slept in a “hotel”, in a box.
\nOkay, it wasn’t literally a box, but without lifting my head off the pillow and with very little effort, I could touch the\u00a0toilet bowl with my toe. Or I could’ve easily watched the news on the TV while taking a poo while answering the door to the food delivery guy. Which I did not!<\/p>\n

Accommodation in Penang<\/h3>\n

The next morning I met with the real estate agent with whom I was in contact for a couple of weeks and she showed me the apartment I’m currently living in. It was love at first sight. Or maybe it was the appropriate distance between the toilet bowl and the bed. Also\u00a0the apartment is pretty decent:<\/p>\n