Secluded Johor Bharu - Part 4

9 - 12 Dec 2012

JB’s Places of Interest – those that we checked out

Sultan Ibrahim Building

In the morning of Day 2, as we parked for breakfast in JB town, we were awestruck by a huge British colonial building perched mightily on Timbalan Hill. This is the Sultan Ibrahim State Secretariat Building. 

A towering structure-too bad it hasn't been converted into a museum yet

We entered the compound to check out and learnt that the current state secretariat has moved premises to Kota Iskandar and so this is basically an empty structure. What a waste. Hope the state govt does something creative to maintain this gigantic structure as a national heritage. 

Giant windows

We did speak to a guard who showed us some remnants of war on the structure i.e. cannons fired onto the building. During the 1940s, the Japanese used the building as its fortress and command centre. 

See the holes - those are a result of canon balls!

The building is open to public and admission is free. We didn’t get a chance to enter the premises as some refurbishing work was going on but I would recommend a visit as the grandiose architecture is so impressive. 

The Glass Temple

The Arulmigu Sri Kaliamman Temple is located close to Tebrau Road next to the railway tracks. It was built in 2010 using 300,000 pieces of coloured glass imported from Thailand, Myanmar, Nepal and Belgium. Wow, that's a lot of hard work. 

The glass temple as you enter

A closer shot 

Unfortunately, we missed the opening hours by half an hour. So, we just took pictures from the outside. 

Some of the glass on the main door

The temple is heavily promoted as a place of interest in JB but I didn't see any road signage directing tourists to the temple. 

the only signage just before u enter

And the area surrounding the temple need better maintenance - the Johor Tourism Board should invest some funds into landscaping the place a bit. What is the point of marketing the place so much when money is not invested to better maintain the area. Some landscaping and tiling up the area will go a long way. 

All photos are copyrighted. Do tell if you need to use them. I can be reached at sivakay2009@gmail.com.