The tiny town of Tronoh (sometimes spelt Teronoh) is about 30km south of Ipoh, Perak.
Like the rest of the Kinta Valley, Tronoh is a former tin mining settlement and 100 years ago it was the site of the largest open cast tin mine in the world.
In those days a railway line linked Tronoh to Ipoh but it was dismantled by the Japanese during the war for scrap and never rebuilt.
Today it is a very sleepy town comprising two or three streets of decaying old Chinese shophouses and some newer suburbs. There are a couple of restaurants but no hotels. Even the main Ipoh to Lumut highway now bypasses the town, leaving its quiet streets to slumber in peace. A university campus has been opened nearby but its impact on the old town centre appears negligible.
The town has had a few moments of fame. Tronoh starred in a couple of films – it was used in the 1981 Hong Kong movie called Father & Son and more recently was the setting for a Malaysian romantic comedy called Ice Kacang Puppy Love (2010). You can see the latter’s movie trailer (in Chinese) if you are interested:
There’s not a lot more I can say about Tronoh. Here are a few more photos from my visit in April 2013.
Singer advertising boards can be found in nearly every Malaysian town but how many people buy their sewing machines these days?