Speeding over the 8km bridge that links Penang to the Malaysian peninsula, staring in awe at the bright lights and skyscrapers, we felt like total country bumpkins. Travelling from Thailand to Malaysia is like leaping forward in time 50 years. One minute you're on a dirt road lined by open markets: durian fruit, flies on meat and kids dancing with no shoes, the next you're cruising down a freeway wondering where your next Starbucks is coming from.

Aside from the guilty excitement at finding a Starbucks, we were also excited about arriving in Penang as we would be meeting our friend Todd who was joining us for a holiday. We met him at our strangely named Hotel Mingood on our first afternoon, and soon found ourselves celebrating in what turned out to be a 7 hour drinking binge in a nearby pub. Todd drank me under the table. I blame J'had the bar owner, who joined us and insisted on gifting us a number of completely unnecessary but much appreciated pints of Guinness.

Penang is being remodelled as the Silicon Valley of the East - hence the skyscrapers and neon – but for most tourists the main interest lies in Georgetown in the north east corner of the island. This is where the British East India Company established a settlement in 1786 having been invited in by the government in exchange for help fighting off the encroaching Siamese and Burmese of the North. In a fine example of colonial negotiation, no contracts were ever signed by the British, and they did virtually nothing to help when Siam did push south into their territory.

The British were there for the same reason that the Indians, Portuguese, Arabs and Chinese were there before them – trade. Penang was the northern entry point to the Straits of Malacca that link the Indian and Pacific Oceans, and the island provided safe harbour against the monsoons and pirates that plagued the Straits. Nowadays there are less pirates, but 50,000 vessels a year and ¼ of the world's traded goods still travel past Penang.

The historical cross-cultural appeal of Penang has created an incredibly diverse population and a wonderful variety of architectural styles. In one furious day of sight-seeing we visited pretty much all of Georgetown's sights, and as we raced between colonial forts, mosques, Chinese clan houses and Hindu temples we heard Malay, Tamil, Cantonese and English being spoken.

Of this plethora of sights our two favourite buildings were the Khoo Kongsi (Khoo clanhouse) and the mansion of Chong Fatt Tze, 'The Rockefeller of the East'.

The Khoo were one of many Southern Chinese families that came to Malaysia to seek their fortune. Each family kept themselves to themselves, and the town is littered with temples, each built for a specific Chinese clan. As one of the more successful clans, in 1851 the Khoo constructed a large temple, around which the clan members built their homes and businesses, forming a large walled community in the centre of Georgetown, kind of like the Corleone compound in The Godfather. The temple and clanhouse / clubhouse is a grand building dripping with gold leaf and porcelain dragons, magnificent even in the rain as when we visited. Donations from Khoo around the world keep the temple gleaming, and these donations are recognised on plaques that line the walls of an anteroom off the main shrine. Reading the names on the walls we spotted a fair few who had become London barristers – apparently a traditional occupation for the Khoo family since the early 1900s!

Chong Fatt Tze was another immigrant from Southern China. Born to a poor Hakka family in Guandong province in South China in 1840, he eventually died a billionaire in 1916 having built a vast empire that included agricultural commodities, banking and even cruise ships (He got into cruise ships after being denied a first class ticket on a European liner on account of his race – he responded by buying his own fleet of ships). He built his home in Penang in what was at the time an unpopular traditional Chinese-style just so that his children wouldn't be able to sell it to anyone outside the family. We had a great tour of the building, and the guide explained many interesting Feng Shui features that we would otherwise never have noticed, including the energy centre of the building in an open central courtyard – stretch your hands out over it and feel your fingers tingle...