A visit to Gemas, Malaysia's very own rail crossroad...

OK... Now that the story-telling on the continuation journey to Negeri Sembilan followed by the latest trip to Pulau Besar, Melaka is done, I should get back to remembering and the story-telling on my college days under the 'A' Level programme starting 1988. The last time I did that more than a month ago, resulting in the article Remembering the "A" Level college days. Damansara Utama where the cool days started! However I still couldn't find the right feel nor rythm, not even the right starting point to continue the story. So let me just pass the time with something else OK... Here it is.

Last Friday, a girlfriend asked me to accompany her to a certain place in Negeri Sembilan. So I did that but later took the time to go elsewhere, the town of Gemas at the southern-eastern tip of the state...

The last time I was in Gemas was sometime in 2005. Then again as far as I remember, I never spend any significant time in Gemas. I was only passing through to get somewhere else, the last time was on the way to Segamat through Tampin.

So I spent more time in this visit. In fact I actually stayed and lodged at a cheap hotel for 2 nights! Oh, don't get the wrong idea. I left my girlfriend somewhere else... She had her own business to attend to while I wanted to be on my own.

So what is great about Gemas? Well, you could say it is just another regular Malaysian town except for one thing... It is Malaysia's main rail crossroad!

Counting East Malaysia, Sabah and Sarawak aside, Malaysia's main rail network, that is the one on Peninsular Malaysia could be divided into 3 sections. The northern (or rather northern West-Coast) route, the East-Coast and the South. Coincidently, that's also the way the Peninsular is often described and divided geographically....

You see, Peninsular Malaysia's main range of mountains, the Banjaran Titiwangsa created a long stretch of natural obstacle not favourable to railroads. So the connection point between the 3 sections has to lie just outside the obstacle...

Gemas practically lies at the southern end of Banjaran Titiwangsa. Thus that's where the northern line of railroad starting from Perlis in the north going down through the states of Kedah, Pulau Pinang, Perak, Selangor, the federal territory of Kuala Lumpur and Negeri Sembilan meets the East-Coast line leading to Pahang and Kelantan... Thus a train from KL to Kelantan have to go down more than 100km to Gemas before heading north-east to Kelantan.

Oh, by the way the rail-road don't go through the state of Terengganu... And both the northern and East-Coast lines do meet elsewhere up north but that is the sovereign state of Thailand, so it does not count. Here in Malaysia, both lines continue down south to meet the southerbound railroad passing through Johor all the way to another sovereign state, Singapore. So Gemas is the focal point where all paths meet...

A picture of town from the front of the train station. Somehow I always like to visit train stations and have a drink or two at the canteen...

The main mosque of Gemas some 500 meters away...

From the mosque I head back toward the town centre and decided to take this picture. It was around 6pm and the afternoon sun was bright. I don't know much about setting my camera, I just snapped a picture...

Suprisingly this is what I got... Somehow the signboard showing the miles to the next major towns stood out as if it was something on an LCD computer screen! What's more surprising, when I checked the picture inside the computer, the board somehow aligns perfectly with the screen's horizontal edges. Is this just simple coincidence or did I somehow turned into a superb cameraman that time? Enough... :]