Strait Talking (page 3/3)AT the restaurant Ram explained baba-nonya. 'Baba' means male, implying father, and 'nonya' means female, implying mother, and the food is a blending of traditional Malaysian cooking (the spices), and Chinese cooking, (everything else). Popular tradition says that it evolved when Chinese settlers married local Malay women. When our food arrived, it was a delicious pork dish flavored with spices, of which the most prominent was tamarind, I think. I attempted to mitigate the spices with cups of tea. As we headed for the car after lunch, Ram ran through a list of other things to see: the Jonker Street for shopping, several temples and mosques, Chinatown and Bukit China (Chinese Hill). With no need to shop and having seen my share of temples and mosques, I chose the Chinese option. Ram dropped me off - I had an hour.
Bukit China was the center of the Chinese community in Malacca for centuries and is now the location of the largest Chinese cemetery outside China, with tombs dating back to the 1400s. I began the trek up the hill and soon spotted gravestones emerging from the grass as if being pushed up from beneath the surface. The real reward, however, was the stunning view from the top of the hill. To the west, the red tiled roofs of the city's older houses looked like a patio extending to the Straits of Malacca. St. Paul's Hill was visible and its commanding location was even more apparent. In the distance the brown/green island of Sumatra dominated the horizon, separating the delft blue of the sky from the turquoise of the Straits. On the other side of the hill pale green fields spread out until they merged with the emerald green of the forests. Ram was waiting for me when I reached the bottom. It was now late in the afternoon and although there was still much to explore, it was time to head back to Kuala Lumpur. I had barely scratched the surface of Malacca's diverse culture and history. I hadn't seen Malaysia's oldest mosque, nor the first temple built on the peninsula by the Chinese. I wanted to explore more of Chinatown and see more of the activity in the harbor. One day is not enough time to explore Malacca and I left hoping that the legend of Hang Li Poh's well is true and that my coins will do their work and send me back to Malacca.
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Further up were horseshoe-shaped tombs, large and small, scattered across the hillside. The tombs were intricate, sometimes with unique carved ornaments; one was a rock carved in the shape of a 16th century sailing vessel, another was a miniature replica of the Stadthuys, and a third was a tiny Egyptian pyramid.
