I was considering a short trip in Ramadan and somewhere I could return in time for iftar. It didn’t take much thought for me to consider Teluk Intan so last week, I bought a day return bus ticket. I was at micasa for the weekend so bought the ticket for the bus leaving Duta Bus Station at 08:50. The bus arrived on time and we left at 09:00. The trip there was uneventful although traffic was heavier as we approached Teluk Intan town. We arrived at 11:15 and after getting a physical ticket (again, why couldn’t they just accept online tickets?), I set off for the short walk into town.
My first stop was at the War Memorial stone which is situated on a traffic island (diagonally across from the Sultan Idris II Mosque). The plinth is inscribed ‘At the going down of the sun and in the morning we will remember them. 1914-1918’ and ‘1939-1945’ added after that.
My next stop was the former Court House building which was built in 1880 and used as a court until 1983. On Sundays, the building doubled up as a church until St Luke’s Church was built in 1911. It looks to have been taken over by the Army so hopefully it will be preserved. From here, one could see the previous HSBC branch on the opposite corner (now a branch of another bank). The exterior is virtually unchanged since the HSBC branch opened shortly after WW II ended.
Next door is one of the better preserved post offices in the country and next to it, the abandoned and dilapidated former police station which is one of the oldest buildings in town. The former police station started out as the Customs Office standing opposite the jetty where goods would have been loaded onto and unloaded from boats.
I walked a bit further and came upon the market and food stall which are in the shadow of the leaning tower. Teluk Intan Leaning Tower or TILT lives up to its name, i.e., it tilts! I’d been to the town before and visited the tower – I went into and up the tower – so I skipped it this time. Instead, I joined the busy Saturday Ramadan traffic and walked around.
I stopped to buy some vegetarian prawn noodles at a stall across from Nagarathar Sri Thendayuthapani temple before continuing on to Horley Methodist School which dates from 1899. Around the corner is the Roman Catholic St Anthony of Padua church which was opened on 6 May 1923. There was band practice at the St Anthony’s School across from the church and they were playing a Hari Raya song. Amazing!
I walked on and turned left at the next intersection and made my way to the ruins of Raja Muda Palace. It is believed to be haunted. There was a fence a built around it and I wondered why it hasn’t already been demolished.
I turned back and walked past a beautiful abandoned mansion. I wished the local authority had restored it and opened the building up. Sigh.
I headed for Sultan Idris II Mosque, stopping briefly outside St Luke the Evangelist Church. This church was consecrated in 1902. I didn’t spend long at the mosque and sighting the signboard for Perak River from the mosque in the distance, left the mosque and made my way to the river.
At 13:10, I headed back to the bus station. The bus arrived at 13:37 and only left at 13:49 after waiting for nine passengers who didn’t turn up. We were caught in a crawl before Rawang for about thirty minutes and only reached Duta bus station at 16:45, three hours after we left Teluk Intan!
I was glad I managed to cover almost all the sights I wanted to see in Teluk Intan in two hours. If only it wasn’t such a sweltering day and we were not caught in the traffic crawl. Alhamdulillah for the rezeki and opportunity.
