November 2013, in Taiping, on the west side of Malaysia. They have the first library, first museum, first hillstation, Maxwell Hill and other firsts. There is a study by the University of Singapore (2010) on the town, so I was able to see how it worked. There must have been dhobi lines all over the empire, and here they are still working. The ground floor of the building at the back has the laundries and now dry cleaners as well, still using the name 'dhobi'. Every morning they hang out the washing and take it in at about 1 in the afternoon.

This is because it rains almost every day in Taiping. Warm air comes in from the sea, swirls upward when it hits Maxwell Hill and then rains. The sky goes black and the humidity rises. Same view of Taiping in the afternoon and the morning of the same day. Maxwell Hill, now Bukit Larut, is in the background. There is a government landrover service to go up the hill part way, but even if you start quite early, by the time you walk to the top, there is no view at all. I was waiting for the landrover coming back, and a woman told me about the Conoration swimming pool. Which conoration? It must have been 1952, and they say it was the first public pool in Malaysia.