Am I going to Georgetown?

I took a night bus from Singapore up the Malaysian peninsular to Penang. There was some confusion about where my final destination would be on the Penang island. Every time I asked, hopefully, "Georgetown?" I would be met with the same reply, "Yes, close to". I even resorted to the pointing at a map tactic, but to no avail.
So I boarded the bus and hoped for the best. The air conditioning on the bus was turned up, past the ridiculously cold point, everyone on board looked freezing. For some reason the driver couldn't do anything about it, something trivial about making the windows impossible to see through.
We surged on through the night, I was regretting wearing shorts, but had my silk liner in my pack, so I crawled into that. However it is the flimsiest piece of material, I pulled my hood over my head and then snuggled into the liner and wrapped the top piece under my hood. My view was, I imagine the same as Micheal Jackson's children.
We made a couple of stops on route and then at 6am, we let some passengers off. I decided now was the time to ask the driver again, where would I be dropped in Penang. This time his reply was different, "Quick you get off bus". I looked at him incredulously, no one had mentioned the need to change buses. I was escorted with my bags to a bus waiting behind us.
For some reason I ended up sitting next to the driver, in his cab, on what can only be described as a piece of garden furniture. The driver was very chatty, although it took me several minutes to realise he was speaking English. I asked him "Am I going to Georgetown?" The reply "No", why would this bus be going to Georgetown, it is after all only the main city on Penang?
However the driver told me he'd drop me at the bus station just out of town (as it turned out along with the rest of the passengers) and tell me where to get a local bus into the centre. He told me taxi drivers would rip me off, he then used the international sign of a throat being slit. Reassuring.
The local bus driver thankfully let me on without paying as I had no small change. The sight of a chain smoking bus driver is still a shock.
I found a hotel in Chinatown and waited to check in. I then remembered something Sian had told me a few weeks earlier, about seeing loads of rats in some place in Malaysia and then finding one on her bed in the middle of the night. I suddenly realised where I was! I took a look at the guest book and sure enough saw Sian's name. Let's just say I didn't sleep much in Georgetown.

Rat Watch Room

Sights Around Georgetown