Cintra 100 - Heritage Hostel

Since this is our 1st time travelling as married couple, we decided to sleep at different places each night so we get to try and taste various hotel. Most of the hotels were full as we are going to be there during peak season - Christmas. So we missed some cool hotels like e&o, Northam and Batu Feringghi area.

Feeling a bit adventerous, I searched for some cheap and old hostel for us to sleep on the 2nd night and that's when I found this online and it looks lovely and alright, so I decided to give it a try.

I was thinking, 'Ok, bila lagi nak try, when we have kids, no way we will gamble like this'.

So I called them up and placed a booking for 26th.

We arrived Penang on 25th and staying at Cititel that night. Apparently they are near to each other so we decided to visit Cintra first and see how the place is. If it is very bad, we might cancel and continue staying in Cititel.

We were greeted by a very friendly old man named Kenny. Surprisingly, my name is not in his booking sheet and I was pretty mad because I really want to try the place out as it looks clean and pretty okay on general glances.

According to him, we are the first Muslim (I don't know why he mentioned Muslim but I guess what he really meant was Malay ;) ) to sleep there in that year and this is because the stopped accepting local years ago as most of them always causing incident and messiness such as light prostitution, noise, steal things, etc etc. So now they only cater foreigners.

So actually he canceled my name fromt the booking after hearing 'Hanani' (a muslim name) or maybe he didn't even write the booking. Gahhhhhh!

Anyway, after a long chat, he decided to give us a room for tomorrow. Maybe he saw us as normal people and will bring the place no harm.

We got a double room and were welcomed with two thin mattresses on 'pankin' with mosquito net and a table fan. There are also an old wooden closet with some hangers. I was very relieved as the the room is very clean but it's a bit scary as everything is very old. The wall is made from bricks and you can see cement patches. I also notice some bugs crawling at the end of my matresses, that are about ladybird size with round shape exactly like ladybird only they are in totally black. So I guess it is a normal bug (and I call them ladybug) so I just snapped them off with my finger. Later (as in dayss later) baru lah I tahu that it is actually bed bugs!! And that's how I got this! Hmmmppphhh!!

The bed, it's a bit messy as I took this picture during the morning after being feasted by the bed bugs

The 'lounge'. One of inmates using the wifi.

Cintra 100 is considered as heritage building as it also hosting a small museum that consist of antiques left by the some people. It used to be a local spot where the top man like doctors and engineers gathered for tea and share their favourite things there, for display and also to be sold. However, it is lacked of maintenance when most of them are away, some migrates and stuff, so they decided to open it as a hostel to help the backpackers. You can get more stories here.

The museum is on top of our room but we didn't manage to enter it as we have to leave it early in the morning. But we did climb the stairs and peek the rooms through broken door and windows to snap few pics.

Open at 11

Some of the antiques

Our room - the first steel door right after the stair

The shared TV area

Common bathroom for everybody. They have heater though

Our reflection from a shabby mirror

It is located at Cintra street, right in the middle of the town, near to Chowrasta and Komtar.

RM40 for double room, RM15 for dormitory

After we checked out the next morning, we found out that it is also situated next to a funeral service shop.

Nirvana

And opposite of fortune teller's shop

For RM40, you'll get a double room, shared bathroom with heater and free wifi.

It's indeed an interesting place, very cultural, historical and colorful. But my advise is, DO NOT stay there, unless you are okay with bed bugs!

Another lesson that I learnt is be prepared for any possibilities when u want something different. That's why I can't really blame this 100 over years old building for the incident. It was me who cari pasal first right? ;)