East Coast Day 3 - Kelantan State Museum, Kebun Sultan Foodcourt, Istana Jahar, Istana Balai Besar, Siti Khadijah Market

Early morning we went for breakfast, again, at Chinatown. We had Hakka Broad Noodle (客家板麵). The food is nice and comes with a really affordable price.

We reached Kota Bahru around 10 a.m.. Our first stop is Kelantan Museum. We parked our car at the road behind the museum, near Kota Bharu Clock Tower.

Entrance fee is RM 2 per person. Please note all Kelantan governmental museums use the same ticket. But you cannot use the same ticket for other sites and have to pay for each entry.

Old Kelantan flag before 1900. Imagine if kids are asked to draw State flag in their class. 😂

Some pre-modern artifacts.

Wayang Kulit. The art style is really intriguing seeing close up.

Mak Yong again.

Next we went to Balai Seni Lukis behind Museum Kelantan as it's on the way to our parked car.

Opening hour and entrance fee.

The museum held a series of artworks based on songket motif created by local artist. Didn't took any photo though.

Next we went to Kebun Sultan Foodcourt for lunch as most if not all Malay eateries are still closed during puasa.

A typical Chinese styled foodcourt beside a busy road. I had 龍記 pork burger and it's nice. 🍔

Next we come to this place near Jalan Sultan that have a few archways, where Istana Jahar and Istana Balai Besar are situated nearby.

Istana Balai Besar is not open for visit so we only snap a few photos outside. Is Sultan staying inside btw? Just curious.

Formally a royal residence, Istana Jahar is now functioning as a museum. It is located just in opposite to Istana Balai Besar. The building style is quite unique, something you do not see from southern Malay structures.

This museum exhibit tools used by Sultan in daily life and ceremonial events. Photography is not allowed inside.

Just nearby is a small structure called Bank Pitis. It was used to store money in the past. I can imagine during the old times this area is heavily guarded and is out of reach for the commoners as the royalties are residing here and valuables are stored here too.

Next we head to Siti Khadijah Market. The market is known as the biggest market in the city. Not only tourists come here, locals too. The market is held in a multi-level building, with the lower floor selling fruits, upper floor cloths and others. But since it's puasa period, not much stalls opened. We bought some fresh orange and imported dates. The price is reasonable. Some of these food are imported from Thailand.

We headed back to hotel to rest and came out again at 7p.m. for dinner. We had our dinner at SIAM food stall beside CIMB bank. Since we're at Kota Bharu, we're expecting "near authentic" Thai food. We ordered a somtam, ikan bakar, kerang kerabu, and beef noodle. Menu was provided but we still had problem communicating with the waiter as his Kelantanese Malay accent is so strong.

The beef noodle is very nice. The somtam had stale peanut. Ikan bakar is decent. Kerang was not processed thoroughly. All in all I rate the food 6/10.