Hakka Lei Cha @ Volcano Coffee House, Kelapa Sawit, Kulai, Johor, Malaysia

In my previous post, I mentioned that we were at Kelapa Sawit checking out the wall murals. Before that, however, we had our breakfast at the local coffeeshop. 

There were a couple of very old coffeeshops offering the usual wanton noodle and porridge fare but, we were actually on the prowl for a very special dish associated with this Hakka neighborhood - the Hakka lei cha.

The word "Lei" （擂） refers to the action of grinding the tea but it sounds the same as the word "Thunder" （雷） so this dish is also known as the Thunder Tea.

My Mum is a Hakka so she got to have her bowl of lei cha which is actually a bowl of plain or brown rice topped with different vegetables and a bowl of soup made by grinding different types of herbs and tea leaves together. 

Wall Murals @ Kelapa Sawit, Johor, Malaysia!

Last week, the folks and I made a trip to Kelapa Sawit (otherwise known as 26 miles) which is a small village located at the north of Kulai. The name, meaning Palm Oil in Malay, is in reference to the plantation nearby that the villagers depended on for their livelihood in the early days.

The village used to be called "Chang An Village" and had a population of about ten thousand people made up predominantly by the Hakka community.

In 1949, the British, who are the Colonial master of Malaya at that time, relocated everyone living between 24 miles and 27 miles to 26 miles which is heavily guarded and barricaded with barbed wires. 

The move is to cut off any form of aid that the villagers might have been giving to the guerrillas who are hiding in the jungle. And that, is how the Kelapa Sawit New Village came about.

Back to the topic, we were there to visit the wall murals which is an initiative started by a local art group as part of Malaysia's birthday celebration in 2014.  

Actually, this is just one of the "attraction" for our one day tour to Johor. The other places, like Stingless Bee Farm, YOYO, Fuzhou noodle and biscuit factory have been blogged before in my earlier travel posts so I will not talk about them again.

You may read more about my previous day trip to Muar and Kluang.