One of the details one has to remember when travelling around Malaysia is avoiding points of interest on a Friday. The state-run museums all seemed to open on Fridays, but they closed earlier and longer at lunchtime, and often earlier in the evening too to allow for Friday prayers. Our goal today (7th August 2020) was to visit the Kompleks Pasir Salak site to learn more about the assassination of the first British Resident in Perak, J.W.W. Birch. This location was a couple of hours south of Taiping, so we needed an early start today. We had loved our room in the Novotel Taiping, but it was time to move on.
The museum area was quite large and confusing. We did eventually find this signpost but not until we had spent too much time inside the museum building looking at historical dioramas and weaponry cabinets. We were not allowed to take photos of any of this, and a guard kept following us to make sure! I can note that the dioramas covered a long period of Malaysian history, but it was very Malay-centric, had little reference to the Chinese and Indian communities, and a vile hatred of the British!
On the right is the Birch Monument, built by the British government around 1900. The path leads to the Perak River by which he was killed.
On the left, Lawrence is standing near the spot marking where Birch was killed. His death 1875 led to the Perak War and ultimately to the extension of British political influence over the Malay peninsula. By all accounts, Birch was not particularly diplomatic. There seems to be several explanations for why he was killed, but most likely was his arrogance, and his disrespect of local customs and traditions which brought him into conflict with the local Malay chiefs. His fate was to be speared to death while taking his bath in the nearby river in Pasir Salak.
The photo on the right shows the Warriors’ Monument, also erected in 1990. This represents the bravery, courage and pride of the Malay warriors who fought against the British forces in the 1875 rebellion.. The Malay sword (sundang) in the middle of the monument would have been the kind used by the warriors at that time.
There were several other buildings on this site, but we could not access them, nor determine their relevance.
We were told to leave the complex as it was closing, so wandered around the street outside. Plenty of interesting ruins here too! This village area was very quiet and only seemed to exist for this memorial site.
Opposite the Kompleks area was a large graveyard housing the grave of Raja Lela; it was he who said he would kill Birch himself which ultimately led to Birch’s death. You can read more about this incident in Lawrence’s blog on his website (www.lawrencegray.net).
Next it was a relatively short drive further south to Teluk Intan, to see its leaning tower. We weren’t the only people sightseeing today, and we had to wait a long time for these bikers to finish taking photos. I was impressed that a large open space had been preserved around the tower so one could appreciate it better. Its official name is Menara Condong Teluk Intan, built in 1885 as a water tank, a clock, and a beacon to guide ships into Teluk Anson Port. Its ‘lean’ isn’t too obvious in this photo though.
Teluk Intan is the third largest town in Perak and was where the Perak rulers held court from 1528 until Kuala Kangsar became the Royal Town in 1877.
As we walked around the square, I noticed a stall in a side street and discovered it was selling hot boiled peanuts. I think they must have using turmeric in the cooking process as these peanuts were very yellow. I thought we should buy some but the smallest size was 500g, and that’s a very large number of peanuts! Still, it only cost RM5, that’s peanuts too!
Finally back in the car and a three hour drive to Janda Baik, I had thought we would be driving over Genting Highlands, but my navigator took us through Kuala Lumpur, so this was a longer and more stressful drive. It also started to rain and that always makes driving harder as its much harder to see the road markings. We were staying at Cherentin Hills Resort which sits on a hill looking over Janda Baik. We took some photos and then it rained even harder and we got soaked getting into the hotel. We were too tired to drive out for dinner so had it in the hotel. We were the only diners and sadly the food was blah.
Here is a slide show of the photos taken on Day 17:
Click here to return to The Great Malaysian Road Trip.
Click here to learn from Lawrence Gray About the assassination of James Birch and the Perak War.
Click here to return to Travels in Malaysia 2020.
Click here to return to Helen Gray’s homepage.