Penang Hakka People

Penang Hakka People has always been a minority dialect group among the Chinese in Penang. Nonetheless they are the group with the most number of millionnaires, especially during the period of tin mining growth from the 1870's to the Second World War.

Among the famous Hakkas in Penang includes Cheong Fatt Tze, Leong Fee, Foo Tye Sin, and in more recent times, Jimmy Choo.

The wealthy Hakkas of the early 20th century bought over come of the choicest properties in George Town, along Light Street, Leith Street and Northam Road. They donated generously to the building of major places of worship such as the Kek Lok Si Temple, as well as schools for the locals.

The Hakka people are called the "Khek" or "guest" by the other Chinese groups. This is because they resettled in the southern Chinese provinces of Guangdong, Jiangxi and Fujian, from their ancestral homeland in central China during the reign of the Manchu Emperor Kangxi (1654-1722) of the Qing Dynasty, when the emperor issued an edict to "clean up" the coastal areas, to prevent the people there from helping Ming Dynasty loyalies that have fled to Taiwan. This was around the time that the Hokkien people arrived in the Malay peninsula.

When the coastal areas were once again open to resettlement, the Hakkas moved in to populate the area. However, they encounter resentment and friction from the traditional people of the area. To protect themselves, they built circular communal houses, called tulou which you can see today in the Fujian province. The Fujian tulou is today recognised as one of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of China.

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About this website

Dear visitor, thank you so much for reading this page. My name is Timothy Tye and my hobby is to find out about places, write about them and share the information with you on this website. I have been writing this site since 5 January 2003. Originally (from 2003 until 2009, the site was called AsiaExplorers. I changed the name to Penang Travel Tips in 2009, even though I describe more than just Penang but everywhere I go (I often need to tell people that "Penang Travel Tips" is not just information about Penang, but information written in Penang), especially places in Malaysia and Singapore, and in all the years since 2003, I have described over 20,000 places.

While I try my best to provide you information as accurate as I can get it to be, I do apologize for any errors and for outdated information which I am unaware. Nevertheless, I hope that what I have described here will be useful to you.