Penang during the Old Days

My Sis forwarded an email about with some pictures of old Penang and the city of Georgetown recently. It certainly brings back nostalgic memories looking at them. I also picked out several images from the attachment and want to show it to you here. If you have seen Penang Island before 80s, you'll love this pictures!


Look at this vendor selling balloons! I certainly have not seen this, probably too young. I didn't know helium balloons were sold this way. I only remember buying balloons in the Pesta Pulau Pinang at Sungai Dua and all the Pasar Malam during school holidays at Gurney Drive.

I love this picture. Who is this woman? Cool and trendy. This is the trishaw man and his passenger. Trishaws were plenty in the olden days. I remember in the 70's, many school kids were sent to school in trishaws! In the 80's there were some but not as many. Trishaws used to be King of the Road so if you happen to drive behind a trishaw, don't be surprised if they don't make way for you.

This was common sight in housing estates. We used to have the 'breadman' delivering a loaf of bread to our house on alternate days. When we weren't in, he'd just pop the bread into our large newspaper compartment. We would hear his bicycle horn/bell as early as 5am and once more at about 5pm. We always love the Sunshine's Fluted Roll. It's round loaf of bread. I wonder if anyone remembers this breadloaf.



This used to be my family's favourite Sunday place. After Sunday lunch, we'd be driving to this Cold Storage located in Georgetown to get our weekly groceries. Back then, there were only few supermarkets. One was Barkath Store near my home and Cold Storage. There were some departmental stores like Oriental, Tong Aik and if i remember correctly there was Island and one other next to it and there was Super Burmah Road, at that time the latest addition.



When I saw this picture, it was unbelievable. In general, this is the picture of Penang Road but those KDK lighted signage was something that brought so much memories to me because my cousins live on that top floor (with the open space red tiled flooring)! My cousins and I used to play 'catch' on that red tiles before and after dinner. That is the highest floor in Singapore Hotel (in Penang of course) and my uncle was an employee of that hotel, thus the family lived on the top floor. My sis and I used to visit them often every Saturday and Sundays. When there was a Chingay parade, we'd be sitting dangerously below the KDK pillars on the roof and watch Chingay. The tall flags sometimes fall against the roofs and we as kids would get excited and tried to pull the flags.