Tip: this website has a useful text description, plus google maps, of all the bus routes on the island. I wish I had seen that before someone sent me to wait on the wrong street for a bus!
Misc notes:
- Penang is both an island and a chunk on the mainland (most people don’t know about the latter)
- The core of Georgetown is a World Heritage Site
- Penang is multi-cultural, with a noticeable South Indian and Chinese population, and you see churches, Buddhist temples, Chinese temples and of course mosques.
- At Penang airport, there is no separation of arriving and departing passengers in the gate area, presumably because it’s a smaller airport (undergoing some renovation and/or expansion)
- Staff at the inn/hostel were all local and smiling and friendly/polite (yes, noticeably so, compared to my previous hotels/hostels on this trip)
- Taxis have meters but never use them (the one I took even had an ironic sign on the door that says “insist on using the meter”). Besides the fixed fares at airport, you bargain the fare when you get in. Still, they’re pretty cheap compared to big cities.
- There are lots of scooters and motorcycles, and they all wear helmets (and jackets on backwards, so that their arms are still covered). They also drive on sidewalks (when there are some)
- I saw a number of cards with “McDon@ld’s drive thru VIP” stickers in the windshield. Now that’s scary.
- 7-11 seems to be staffed exclusively by Muslim women wearing western clothes with a head scarf (and the store may or may not sell alcohol)
- A number of bus drivers were small Muslim women
- Some buses have free wi-fi, and they are testing smart transit cards on a few lines
- Passed a “World Red Swastika Society – Penang Branch” building on way to airport from Penang Hill, a Taoist religious charity organization, similar to Red Cross and Red Crescent, founded in China in 1922
- Saw buildings (factories) for AMD, Western Digital, Bosch and Blaupunkt near the airport