Melaka, Sailing Through Time on a Sea of Information

A Maze of Museums

            Partly due to its historical importance, Melaka has a wealth of museums to visit. Two were of particular interest to us : the Baba and Nyonya House Museum, and the Zheng He Museum (Cheng Ho Museum). The first was alluring because I knew nothing of the Baba and Nyonya community, while the second promised to teach me more about one of the most fascinating characters in history : the man who could have made China a naval power to rival Europe. Both museums offer important insight into Melaka’s storied past. But there is also the Sultan’s Palace, which has been converted into a museum, a replica of a galleon which houses the naval museum and many more, not to mention the oldest Dutch building in Asia (the Statdhuys) and other colonial relics. If you’re looking to overdose on historical information, Melaka has your poison.

The Nyonyas and the Babas

            The Peranakan Chinese are a community descended from Chinese traders and local women. The men are Babas, and the women Nyonyas. Although the community arose from mixed marriages, new generations of Babas and Nyonyas were forbidden to find spouses from outside their community. All marriages were arranged by matchmakers, a practice that is sometimes followed even today. They did this to preserve their language (a Fujian patois), and their culture. Paradoxically, they preferred to send their children to English schools, so there are no Baba and Nyonya schools. This sadly means that, with new generations often marrying outside the community and no schools to reinforce the Baba and Nyonya culture, it might not survive. The Baba and Nyonya Museum was the house of a wealthy family that lived there for four generations until the 1980s, thriving on the trade of spices first, then rubber and now palm oil.

The house was built by the Dutch, who liked to build narrow houses to avoid residential taxes, but made them very long to compensate. Courtyards were included to allow light to enter all rooms in the house. When the Dutch made way for the English in Melaka, wealthy Babas moved into the houses that had until then been reserved for the upper echelon of the Dutch community. They remodeled the houses to give them a more Chinese air, but they also borrowed from the new colonial power, the English. The furniture in the house could be Dutch, Chinese or English, or a mix of all three. Their food was Malay or Chinese or a mix of both. The first rooms were particularly luxurious, with gold, silver and mother of pearl prominently displayed around carvings of deer (prosperity), bats (happiness) and cranes (longevity), or special marble that resembled ink wash landscape paintings. These rooms were to welcome business associates and make deals, hence their extravagant displays. It was a fascinating glimpse into the habits and customs of a family, from clothing to marriage and funeral ceremonies, from decorations to Mahjong. The guide spoke so fast, and laid so much information on us that I wished I’d had enough time to visit it again. At 16RM per person for a guided tour (every hour), a second visit is well within even a penny-pinching traveler’s means.

Zheng He Museum

So This is What it’s Like to Be a Timelord

            The Zheng He Museum was 10RM. I grumbled inwardly while paying because I’d read that it was much cheaper, and there were other museums to visit that day. However, it was more than worth the price of admission, as we didn’t even have time to finish it in 4 hours, not even by running through some of the exhibits. The best way to describe it is to say it is like the TARDIS. It’s bigger on the inside, and it can transport you to different times and places. Like the Baba and Nyonya House, this museum connects a few Dutch houses that hide rooms lengthwise behind small façades, giving the impression of a neverending museum. 

The museum is somewhere in here, probably everywhere.

            














          Zheng He was a Muslim eunuch who rose to prominence in the early Ming court, supporting Emperor Yongle (third emperor of the Ming Dynasty) in his ascension to the throne. Being from a Muslim family, Zheng He was inspired as a child by his grandfather’s stories of the Hajj, the pilgrimage all Muslims must make to Mecca, and his desire to travel grew from there. When Yongle decided to build a fleet to open and protect trade routes and bring peace to the South Sea where Islam was spreading quickly, Zheng He, with his natural language abilities, military acumen and Muslim heritage, became an obvious choice to lead it. He made seven journeys with enough men and ships to intimidate Agamemnon’s fleet, to lands as far away as the horn of Africa. If you wish to believe the theories in the book 1421 : the year China discovered America, he went even further. The museum not only recounts the life of Zheng He, it also provides crash courses on all the places Zheng He visited. One of those places was obviously Melaka. Caught between the Kingdom of Ayutthaya and the Majapahit Empire, the newly converted to Islam Sultan of Melaka was eager to count China as an ally. He was lucky to find the leader of the most powerful fleet in the region to be someone sharing his new faith.

  Zheng He returned many times to the city. Under China’s protection, Melaka’s influence grew, its borders extending into an empire. The city became the center of trade and the base of the dissemination of Islam in the region. In Zheng He’s time, China also reached the height of its power. Yongle not only built Zheng He’s fleet, he also built the Forbidden Palace in Beijing, and strengthened and extended the Great Wall. However the « Treasure Fleet » was an expensive project, and Yongle was facing increasing pressure to put an end to it. When he died, the excursions became a casualty of power struggles between eunuchs and bureaucrats in the court. The new emperor, Hongxi, sided with the bureaucrats and burned the fleet. Zheng He was allowed one more expedition when Xuande succeeded Hongxi, but when he in turn died, his successor let the ships rot. More devastatingly, he burned the log books and navigation maps. China turned inward, halting trade missions and abandoning its role as Asia’s policeman.

Zheng He died a little before this in 1433, while accompanying the ambassador of Hormuz on his journey home. Thankfully he did not have to see his life’s work turned to ash. Without China’s backing, the Sultanate fell to the Portuguese in 1511, announcing Europe’s rise in Asia and China’s eventual downfall. I wonder if Zheng He’s fleet could have changed that narrative.

Plan an entire day to visit this museum, pack a lunch and a snack, then come back the next day because that might still not be enough time to complete it.

Melaka, the Spice Must Flow

Peeking Through the Haze

            An aerial view of Melaka (or Malacca) would currently show you nothing at all, as the city is shrouded in the haze of burning fields and forests in Indonesia (for palm oil mostly. The fires produce more greenhouse gases than the entire US does in a year (avoid products with palm oil !). After a couple of days, I could feel my lungs burdened by the pollution, but the haze had an unexpected benefit. The town was comfortably wrapped in wadding.

Melaka’s famous red buildings, the Stadthuys and Christ Church, stuck out from this featureless white mass, but from a distance the haze gave them a faded look, as if they might not really be there. The same could be said for other tourists, mere specters from afar.

       

  After dusk, when the otherworldly has a stronger grasp on the mind, the haze blurred and softened city lights, creating halos around them. The streets of Melaka’s old town are lined with lanterns, which simply added to the arcane ambience. In the cautionary red glow of the lanterns, we padded through the narrow lanes, half expecting the centuries old Baba and Nyonya shops to be hiding a Mogwai or two. Only the busy Jonker Street, with its tourist filled night market, belonged to a more ordinary world. But with its rich history, its mix of cultures and its beauty, Melaka, the city that once ruled the South Sea and the Spice Route is not at all ordinary.

The Deer that Founded an Empire

            According to the Sultan Palace Museum, the story goes that Parameswara, ruler of Temasik (Singapore), was inept. He was irresponsible and ruled on a whim. He was more concerned with partying than with affairs of state. Having fallen on the wrong side of the powerful Majapahit and Ayatthuya empires which dominated the region, he was forced to flee his homeland. He and his remaining followers wandered through forests and over hills. One day during this exile, he sat under a melaka tree and observed his hunting dogs corner a mouse deer along the steep river bank. Suddenly, the tiny deer kicked a dog into the river and dashed away. Seeing the deer as a symbol of the weak overcoming the strong, he thought it a good omen and saw in it a reversal of his fortunes. There, he founded a new kingdom. He named it after the tree he had sat under to rest that day. Converting to Islam, he became wise and astute, and Melaka was on its way to becoming the heart of an empire.

            An ideal port located in one of the the narrowest parts of the strait to which it gave its name, Melaka attracted traders from Persia, Gujarat, Bengal, Java, Sumatra, Thailand, China, Aceh, and more (see dioramas for each in the Sultan Palace Museum). Spice flowed, and Melaka's power grew. The wealth of Melaka soon caught the eye of the Portuguese, who believed capturing it would make them a power unrivaled in Europe. One Portuguese claimed: "Whoever holds Melaka, holds his hands on Venice's throat". Europe had grown dependent on the Spice. Once China's tributary, Melaka was now in European hands. The ascendancy of Europe over China in the South China Sea was sealed.
Melaka was not just a center of trade, but a melting pot of cultures that created new communities such as the Chitty (Indian and Malay), the Peranakan Chinese (Chinese and Malay) and Peranakan Portuguese (Portuguese and Malay).

Under the takeovers of the Dutch and the British, Melaka added two more European flavours to its unique blend of Asian cultures, making it beyond doubt one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the world. Simply visiting its places of worship could be a trip in itself, taking you to mosques, Chinese temples, Hindu temples, and Catholic and Protestant churches, with each having different incarnations within the main religions, according to the people who built them and the era of construction. Melaka’s rich history is also on display for visitors in the city’s innumerable museums, but the best part of Melaka is that its cultural heritage is not confined to its museums. Its heritage is still alive in its people and in its delectable restaurants. Getting around to tasting all of their special dishes would have you rolling down Jonker Street by the end of it.

                                                                                                                                                               Ye Gods, the Food

          

Local night market.

             Squid may as well have died and gone to that nice place people sometimes believe they go to after death. Between the chicken with small riceballs (better than it sounds), the satay fondue (no idea how they make money) and the local nightmarket (not the Jonker Street nightmarket), we were counting the time until we were hungry again. Our travels have brought us to places with great food before but once again, it’s Melaka’s strange brew of influences that makes it remarkable. If you have time between the museums and the restaurants (you won’t), the old town is also dotted with pleasant-looking cafés overlooking the river or hidden in the alleys. We had the opportunity to set foot in one, and we were amazed by the ambience and the diversity and creativity of the drinks, making Melaka pretty much perfect in all ways.




Three days was far too little time to fully appreciate the city, and I would return in a heartbeat for a month of Sundays.

Extravagantly decorated rikshaws.