Kuala Terengganu

The mouth of the Terengganu River has been a trading and fishing settlement for centuries. The Terengganu Inscription Stone, a slab carved in Jawi script and generally dated to the 14th century, was found upriver at Kuala Berang and is among the earliest evidence of Islamic law in the Malay world. Terengganu itself emerged as a sultanate in the early 18th century, tied by marriage and politics to Johor, and its rulers made the river mouth their seat, building the fort on Bukit Puteri above the estuary.

Chinese traders settled along the riverbank from the 18th century, creating the shophouse street still called Kampung Cina, and the port exported pepper, gold and, above all, textiles: Terengganu songket and batik were known across the peninsula. Like Kelantan, the state paid tribute to Siam until the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909 brought it under British influence, and a British adviser was accepted in 1919. Taxes and land rules provoked the Terengganu rebellion of 1928, led by Haji Abdul Rahman Limbong.

The discovery of oil and gas off the Terengganu coast from the 1970s transformed the state's finances and the city with them, bringing government offices, housing estates, a university and a new airport, while fishing and boatbuilding continued on Pulau Duyong. Kuala Terengganu was granted city status in 2008, the first town on the peninsula's east coast to gain it, and the years since have brought the Crystal Mosque, the museum complex, the island park and the drawbridge across the river mouth, alongside arguments about what the old town has lost.

The city is strongly Malay and Muslim, and religious observance shapes public life: the call to prayer, Friday closures, modest dress, the Friday-Saturday weekend. Terengganu Malay is a distinct dialect, closer to Kelantanese than to standard Malay and just as puzzling to outsiders, with its own vowels and vocabulary.

Craft traditions run deep. Terengganu songket, silk woven with gold and silver thread, was a court textile and is still made by hand; batik is printed and painted in workshops around the city; and brassware, silver and wood carving are sold in the markets. The boatyards of Pulau Duyong are the best-known inheritance of all — builders working from memory and eye rather than drawings, producing fishing boats and, in recent decades, yachts. Kite flying with the crescent-tailed wau bulan, top spinning and silat all belong here as they do in Kelantan.

Chinese Terengganu families, many of them settled for two centuries and speaking the local Malay dialect at home, keep temples, associations and cookery of their own along Kampung Cina, a visible counterpoint to the Malay city around them. The sea sets much of the rhythm: fishing communities across the river at Seberang Takir, boats hauled up for the monsoon, and turtle conservation, a long-running local cause after the collapse of the leatherback nesting population on the state's beaches.

Around 375,000 people live in the area covered by the city council, the great majority Malay, with a Chinese community concentrated around the old town and smaller Indian and migrant populations. It is the administrative capital of Terengganu, and government employment, the state university and the health service account for a large share of local jobs.

Oil and gas underpin the wider economy, processed and serviced further down the coast around Kerteh and Kemaman, with the revenue and the federal-state argument over royalties a permanent feature of local politics. In the city itself the visible trades are retail, transport, construction, fishing, boatbuilding and tourism, the last concentrated on the island trade to Redang, Lang Tengah and Kapas from spring to autumn.

Life follows the prayer times and the heat: markets and offices open early, things slow in the early afternoon, and the waterfront at Batu Buruk fills towards sunset with families, stalls and kites. Friday morning is quiet, with the state weekend running Friday and Saturday. In the monsoon months the seasonal tourism economy stops, boats stay ashore, and flooding in low-lying districts is a regular disruption. Housing costs, jobs for graduates and the state of the old shophouses are the usual subjects of debate.

Terengganu's kitchen is close to Kelantan's — sweet, coconut-rich and built on fish — with a few dishes of its own. Keropok lekor is the state's emblem: fish pounded with sago into a pale sausage, then either boiled and sliced or deep-fried until chewy, and dipped in a sweet chilli sauce; stalls sell it along the coast road, and the version from Losong is the one people name. Nasi dagang here is made with a reddish unpolished rice steamed in coconut milk and served with tuna curry for breakfast.

Nasi kerabu, laksam and ayam percik cross over from Kelantan, and the markets sell sata, spiced fish paste wrapped in banana leaf and grilled over charcoal, and otak-otak in the same style. Sweet cakes are everywhere: akok, baked in small moulds from eggs, palm sugar and coconut milk; kuih lapis in coloured layers; and the various rice-flour and pandan cakes sold by the tray at Pasar Payang.

Chinatown adds Chinese coffee-shop food — noodle soups, roast pork, wonton noodles and kopi — and the fish landed at Seberang Takir and Kuala Ibai is grilled or fried plainly with rice, sambal and raw vegetables. Alcohol plays no part in public life outside a few Chinese-run premises; teh tarik, iced coffee, coconut water and sweetened cordials do the work instead.