this is an entry i never got around to composing. in an attempt to revitalize the blog, i thought it apt to start with this trip up north to the Pearl of the Orient about a year ago.
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George Town oozes with heritage, and the locals are proud to commemorate them. walk down a random alley and a mural painted on old peeling walls greet you. there is this charm to be found in these old dilapidated buildings - maybe it is the urban dweller's recoil from all the new shiny anonymous buildings that loom above the Kuala Lumpur skyline. lanes, alleyways, old peranakan mansions, and dingy shophouses stake their claim to the glorious splendour that is old George Town. i wander about trying to absorb the antiquity and the authenticity, like a tourist in a foreign land. frozen in time, yet moving forward with the times. seventy-five years down the road, will the shiny buildings of Kuala Lumpur be gazetted as heritage sites? will microcosms like George Town be able to resist the tidal wave of development? will the murals painstakingly crafted by Ernest Zacharevich stand proudly as they once did?
but we move along - from Armenian Street, to the Esplanade, to Bishop's Lane, and back. like the passage of time, George Town and its people feels like it will move with the times. a new generation will venerate the heritage and fight to preserve it for more people to experience and appreciate. as long as people come back and tell their loved ones the beauty of this piece of history, so it shall remain in the collective consciousness that we are nothing without our roots.
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