That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet

Roses, strawberries, tea, golf, black framed white washed houses and walks in the wood… you would probably think you’re back in England. Well if ever there was an appropriate twinning to England, it would be the Cameron Highlands.

Located in the central hills of Malaysia, there is a getaway from the intense heat of the lowlands. Initially surveyed by Mr William Cameron in 1885, it was later developed and settled in by the Brits and locals.

The Cameron Highlands had a distinctly cooler climate than the lowlands, thus it became a niche for growing crops that favour the milder weather. Thus Roses, strawberries, tea and other vegetable crop were favoured for growth. We followed the normal touring routes and visited some of these plantations including BOH (best of highlands) tea fields that wow the mind with the carefully planted avenues of tea-bushes sweeping over the hills. You also get to see the processing machinery for Britain’s favourite beverage as well as try the branded products (with cake) in a café overlooking the fields.

The BOH tea plantation

Something you wouldn’t find in England, nor in many places in the world, is the Giant Rafflesia, the biggest flower-fungus known to man. To see one here, you have to trek an hour by foot into a dense forest (as their pollination methods are unknown thus cannot be grown by humans). Luckily we had the Asian Indiana Jones to guide us, after an off-road ride in his mean black 4x4 land rover (with chain-mail and bull horns on the front). The plant is indeed huge, takes 12-18 months to develop and at the end it only blooms for a few days…. And there happened to be one in full bloom whist we were there.

 Asian Indi

The town we stayed in, Tanah Rata, was built around one street (though it has expanded out a little recently), and as mentioned the building theme is the quaint English style of white building and black beams, because the first British settlers decided they wanted to build houses like those back home. It thus creates a surreal experience of knowing you’re 1000’s of miles from Britannia, yet you could easily fool yourself that you’ve wondered back in time to ye olde England. I loved it!

Sources:

My memory, http://mmdelrosario.hubpages.com/hub/quotations-about-roses and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cameron_Highlands