When I was in Turkey last year, the call to prayer’s haunting melodies sank into my mind, often telling me what time of day it was without once looking at my watch. It was my first visit to a predominantly Muslim country and it felt eerily quiet when I didn’t hear it anymore.
But Malaysia seemed different. Sure, I saw mosques dot the skyline of every place I visited, but rarely heard the call over the city sounds of Kuala Lumpur.
And like Istanbul has the Blue Mosque, Putrajaya, the government capital, has the Pink Mosque, known better as Masjid Putra.
We stopped in the city for a few hours en route to Melaka, where Frankie told us about how the city was created for the running of the government (think Washington DC and Canberra originally) but has now become a place people want to visit. The group was given the option of walking around, but once we saw the pink domes, we wanted to explore the mosque.
Masjid Putra is a Sunni mosque built in 1997 on the banks of the manmade Putrajaya Lake, next to the home and offices of the Prime Minister of Malaysia. The rose-tinted granite gives the mosque its signature color and stands out against the grays and blacks of the rest of the city.
While some of the ladies in our group were dressed appropriately, I wasn’t one of them and we were all handed robes to wear inside the mosque. The hooded red robes made the humidity slightly more unbearable, trapping in the heat. But we admittedly looked pretty cool.
We went our separate ways, taking off our shoes and entering the mosque to indulge in the peace and quiet on our own. The mosque can hold 15,000 worshippers at a time and certainly does so during high holidays. It’s not the largest mosque in Malaysia but is certainly one of the most beautiful.
If You Go
Putrajaya is a fairly easy day trip from Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur, located near the airport not quite two hours from the city. You can take the ERL Train from Sentral Station, which runs every half hour, or take a local bus. Driving is the easiest option, as it gives you more flexibility, but also more expensive.
Women should have their knees and shoulders covered and clothing can’t be tight or revealing. You can rent robes from the counter and I recommend wearing shoes that are easy to slip on and off. Schedule your visit around the daily prayers. The mosque is free to visit.
My visit to Putrajaya was arranged by Tourism Malaysia.
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