Melaka Day Trip - Part 1

Written by Dinah & Kamil

20th November 2010
Kamil:

Mama woke me up from my peaceful sleep on Saturday morning early. She said to me,"Kamil, wake up and get ready."I was confused.Half asleep,I asked her"Get ready for what??".She replied"We're going to Melaka", in a tone that was saying her answer was so obvious.


I felt very excited because I really wanted to go there. The last time I went there was on the way home from Singapore. And that was at night for only about 2 or 3 hours.Before that, I haven't gone to Melaka since I was 3....

 We got ready quickly and left for Melaka at 11:30 a.m.The journey took roughly about 1hr 30 min so we reached there at 1:00 p.m.Then we ate at a restaurant called "Baba Kopitiam'' situated next to the Melaka River and a bridge.And on the other side was the clock tower and a museum. Behind it was St. Paul's hill.We ate the famous Chicken Rice Balls,and they were deeeliiiciiooouuss!!!!

After lunch,we went to the Stadhuys Museum. "Stadhuys" actually means red building in Dutch.(it was a red museum).There were lots of dummies and mannequins that reminded me of ''The House of Wax" in the book"Night of the Living Dummy" by R.L.Stine. It was creepy, but I saw lot of stuff that was interesting but very mind boggling. Its amazing how many places the Portuguese and Dutch conquered.But even though their means were to take charge, they brought their tradition and culture here in Malaysia.



Dinah:

Then, we went out of the museum and my brother insisted that we go to the A Famosa Fort. It was awesome!!!Then we decided to go to The Cathedral. It is situated at the top of the hill called Saint Paul's hill. We climbed the hill through the stairs.It was like climbing a mini Great Wall of China.There were lots of people there. And there was a person singing James Taylor's songs.It was incredible!!But there were lots of tombstones there too.Even though they were beautiful tombstones, the stories behind them were quite sad.One of the stories was about a boy named Theodorus Herbers. He was 9 years old when he died.The exact translation that was engraved on his tombstone is 'Laid to rest here is Theodorus Herbers who breathed in his last gasp of air at the age of 9 on 18 April 1650'...Before we left ,we made a wish at the wishing well and threw a coin into it.



In front of the Cathedral is a statue of St Francis Xavier.One of the hands were missing. Haha.LOL. I researched about him online.He died on a journey to China.His body was first sent to St Paul's Cathedral at St Paul's Hill, Malacca.His body stayed there for a few years.Then they decided to move him to India.They dug up his corpse to find it still fresh.To preserve the body,they mummified him.They sent his corpse to Goa,India.His mummified body now lays above the ground in a transparent glass coffin in Goa.A mesh fence thing was built around his former grave at Malacca to mark it.The fence has coin slots for throw money down to the grave.That was the "Wishing Well" that Kak Dinah mentioned.