Motorcycle Explorer December 2014 Issue 3 | Page 72

Want to know more?
Finding your way around:
This is complicated by the fact that George Town has been the venue for a battle
of the street signs. At one time the majority of the roads had British colonial
names such as Beach Street, Brick Kiln Road and Boundary Road. After
independence many of the streets were renamed with Malaysian names or
translations of the original British name. Very few of the locals used the Malay
translation though and continued to use the original British name – street signs
therefore don’t match directions you might be given. To complicate matters
further, an element of the majority Chinese population started to illegally
change street names to Chinese, stating that doing this would attract more
Chinese tourists! On occasion they actually changed the name of the street – not
just making a translation. So Brick Kiln Road could be also known as Jalan
Gurdwara, Bakar Bata and Hong-chhia-l?? , which actually means winnowing
machine! Now, many of the street signs have at least the English and Malay
names but often the Chinese as well. But there appears to be little rhyme nor
reason as to when this happens. Don’t be surprised if you see a Tamil translation
here and there too. All part of the adventure and the mystery of the city! Don’t
worry though, the main tourist streets tend to have both the English and the
Malay translation signed.