Secret Bars and Street Art

Boha Glass’s The latest Asia Expedition

As some of you may possibly know, Boha is on tour in Asia at the instant, looking for up-and-coming artists, across a broad array of inventive fields.  From nearby pottery to stone-carved smiling Buddha statues, mosaic-rimmed mirrors to fantastically embroidered standard outfits, and much extra aside from.

Following arriving in Kuala Lumpur, we read about the mystery bars that dotted the town and created a approach to check out and uncover as many as doable – purely for study uses of course (cough!).

We discovered ourselves ringing doorbells in weird alleyways, slipping via backpacker hostels with sleepy, bewildered, just-off-the-airplane visitors, stood in their room doorway, pondering why well dressed men and women were being wandering the corridors exterior their space at 1 am. We climbed dim, spiral staircases – concealed at the again of hectic dining places and this a person was the ideal of all…

https://www.youtube.com/observe?v=jE9WetWSX6o

From the outside, it looked like a usual outdated road shop, with the only clue becoming the name of the bar (PS150) sprayed in black graffiti paint on the side of the wall. We walked back again and forth together the avenue, imagining Google experienced provided us duff details just before we hesitantly tried using the door for the 1st time. It went on a good deal additional than exactly where Anna was sitting and the cocktails were excellent!

We ended up stumbling house (the pavements have been in a quite poor point out of repair service 😉 ) to our lodge in the wee hrs of the morning, thoroughly feeling that we had experienced a actually adventurous evening!

Road Artwork – Penang and KL

A small more up the coastline is the great outdated UNESCO heritage metropolis of Penang. In the heart of old George City, the position is abuzz with some great avenue artwork. It all started in 2012 when Lithuanian-born area resident Ernest Zacharevic was commissioned to brighten up the city’s fading facades with art depicting the lives of locals. Considering that then, more artists have included their very own mark to create some lively street art that unquestionably enlivens the city’s outdated Stucco walls.

To see all the artwork is a bit of a schlep, in particular in the roaring heat of July, but we managed to drag ourselves close to to see a sizeable portion of the artwork (although perspiring profusely). In some cases, you would walk a couple of clicks, only to be greeted with a mural so faded that it was tough to discern what it at first was. But, most of the time it was very well really worth it, and some had been very close to a bar, so we experienced a excellent excuse to ‘cool off’ below the supporters on the shaded verandas after using up some critical shoe leather.

Which include Thailand, Bali, Singapore and Vietnam, Malaysia was not our favorite destination, but the mystery bars and the road artwork built our time there very enjoyable. 

If you are preparing your individual adventure to Malaysia, we would certainly recommend KL, Penang and Melaka. Just be confident to look at out the avenue artwork in all a few metropolitan areas and see how quite a few solution bars you can uncover in KL!