Batu Maung 峇都矛, Penang

Batu Maung (10 June 2006)


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Batu Maung (GPS: 5.28491, 100.2875; Traditional/Simplified Chinese: 峇都矛; Pinyin: Bādōu Máo; Penang Hokkien: Ba3tu1 Mau2) is a small fishing village on the southeast tip of Penang Island. The Penang Island end of the Second Penang Bridge is located here. Until the arrival of the bridge, Batu Maung is just a small, quiet fishing village with a rocky promontory.

I grew up in Batu Maung, albeit a very different Batu Maung from what it is today. I remember it as a small village where my father used to take me to to buy fish directly from the fishermen as their boats arrived at shore. Our house is on a hill where I suffered a lot of mosquito bites when I was growing up.

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Location of Batu Maung

Measured from the Batu Maung Roundabout (GPS: 5.285066, 100.287680), Batu Maung is 16.0 km to Komtar, 9.5 km to the Penang Bridge, 1.3 km to the Second Penang Bridge and 7.9 km to the Penang International Airport.

About Batu Maung

Within Batu Maung are several small villages including the Batu Maung village (called Pekan), Kampung Seronok, Kampung Binjai, Permatang Damar Laut, Teluk Tempoyak and Jalan Baru.

Today Batu Maung is very different from what I remember it. The site where my house was located is now a big housing estate. Double-storey link houses fill the land that was once holding just our house and a huge compound. More development is expected to take place in Batu Maung, now that the Second Penang Bridge will be built here.

The two main roads in Batu Maung, namely Jalan Batu Maung and Jalan Permatang Damar Laut, are also seeing rapid changes. Jalan Batu Maung, in particular, has become an industrial main road, lined with warehouses of freight companies. Jalan Permatang Damar Laut, once a windy rural road, is being developed with housing estates.

Batu Maung is where the deep sea fishing port is located. It is not surprising therefore that Batu Maung is famous for seafood. In the sixties and early seventies, there was a famous seafood restaurant here called Ocean Inn. Ocean Inn as a Penang version of Har Par Villa, with its cement statues of Chinese mythology.

By the eighties and nineties, Ocean Inn has been replaced by newer seafood establishments. There was one called "Beginning of the World", named after the tip of the promontory known as the Beginning of the World, at the southernmost part of Batu Maung. The restaurant used to be located in the middle of the sea, and accessible by a plankway. It has since moved inland to the Batu Maung village centre, near the crossroads.

Batu Maung is also famous for having a temple dedicated to Admiral Cheng Ho (Zhenghe). The Sam Poh Footprint Temple, which initially was just an altar built over a rock right at the shoreline, has since been developed into a proper temple. It enshrines what appears to be a giant footprint - the footprint of Sam Poh, the local name given to Cheng Ho.

In the hills above Batu Maung are war relics from the Second World War. These were built by the British who had expected the Japanese to invade from the sea, and had stationed the arms southwards. As it happened, the Japanese invaded from the north, ande the artileries were unused. Today the war relics are now part of the Penang War Museum.

The Malaysian Fisheries Research Institute occupies a piece of land in Batu Maung. This is where the Penang Aquarium is located. It showcases a small collection of marine life. Next door to it is the WorldFish Centre, a Unesco-funded research institute which operates in Batu Maung after moving from the Philippines in 2000.

A great part of Batu Maung consisted of mangrove swamp. In the recent decade, the mangrove had been cleared - to the chagrin of environmentalists, as it caused a loss of habitat for the wildlife such as the birds and monkeys. The land was reclaimed to form Phase 4 of the Bayan Lepas Industrial Zone.

As Batu Maung is located at the southernmost end of the Tun Dr Lim Chong Eu Expressway, it has become a choice site for property development. Several new housing estates have sprouted here. Development of Batu Maung is expected to further accelerate now that it has been identified as the end-point of the second bridge to link Penang island to Batu Kawan on the mainland.

Getting to Batu Maung by public transport

Batu Maung is served by Rapid Penang bus 302, 305 and 307.

Sam Poh Footprint Temple

Batu Maung, with the new Jalan Permatang Damar Laut viaduct in the foreground, and high-rises of Sungai Ara in the distance. (7 February 2018)


Batu Maung, Penang, as seen from the Second Penang Bridge construction site (20 October 2012)


Businesses in Batu Maung (15 September 2012)


Fishing boats in Batu Maung (10 June 2006)

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