Pewter Skies. Lake Garden, Taman Tasik, Taiping, Perak, Malaysia
Wonderfully peaceful, the Lake Gardens, Taman Tasik, of Taiping, the wettest town of Peninsular Malaysia. But this tranquillity was not always so, nor was it as beautiful as this picture shows.
Taiping was the premier tin-mining town of Perak in the nineteenth century. Soon after the discovery of tin here in 1844, mining was started. When the mining ended, the former pits were converted into this marvellous park with many lakes and very fine landscaping. Included is the very fine Taiping Zoo, probably the best and cleanest zoo I've visited anywhere in Southeast Asia.
Today there is calm, but in one's mind's ear you can overlay this peaceful pewter scene with the trumpetting of elephants used to transport the tin ore to Port Weld, not far away; with the cries of the hard-working miners; the sounds of a working mine. But all this has been washed away by history; yet this new view - even with the sound of cars on the circling road - enchants even more if you know something of the past!
I hurried back to my hotel before I'd be washed away myself...
Pewter Skies. Lake Garden, Taman Tasik, Taiping, Perak, Malaysia
Wonderfully peaceful, the Lake Gardens, Taman Tasik, of Taiping, the wettest town of Peninsular Malaysia. But this tranquillity was not always so, nor was it as beautiful as this picture shows.
Taiping was the premier tin-mining town of Perak in the nineteenth century. Soon after the discovery of tin here in 1844, mining was started. When the mining ended, the former pits were converted into this marvellous park with many lakes and very fine landscaping. Included is the very fine Taiping Zoo, probably the best and cleanest zoo I've visited anywhere in Southeast Asia.
Today there is calm, but in one's mind's ear you can overlay this peaceful pewter scene with the trumpetting of elephants used to transport the tin ore to Port Weld, not far away; with the cries of the hard-working miners; the sounds of a working mine. But all this has been washed away by history; yet this new view - even with the sound of cars on the circling road - enchants even more if you know something of the past!
I hurried back to my hotel before I'd be washed away myself...