Ah Quee Street

The short street runs from Beach Street to Pitt Street, connecting two old commercial arteries of George Town. Behind the facades ran Lorong Takia, a lane of Kampung Takia; it ended amid the buildings and did not link the district’s two streets for horse-drawn transport. At the beginning of the passage hangs a metal caricature: a European merchant struggles to pronounce the name that remains on the street sign, and the joke grew out of several ways of writing the Chinese name.

At the point where Ah Quee Street opens onto Beach Street once stood the house of Chung Keng Kwee. In George Town, he was more often called Ah Quee. He owned tin mines in Larut, on the mainland, and the British administration appointed him Kapitan Cina of Perak—an intermediary between officials and Chinese communities. He invested his earnings from tin in urban real estate; one of his houses occupied this very plot.

Behind the house ran Lorong Takia, a lane of Kampung Takia. But carts could not pass straight through from Beach Street, today’s Beach Street, to Pitt Street, which is now called Pitt Street. Chung Keng Kwee gave the municipality his house on Beach Street. The house was demolished, the road was extended through the cleared plot, and the former lane became a through city passage.

For Chung, the donation amounted to an entire building on one of the main commercial streets. The municipality received land and a passage, and named the new street after the donor. A guidebook from the end of the nineteenth century already explained the name in one sentence: Kapitan Ah Quee gave this street to the municipality.

On the metal caricature at the beginning of the street, a European merchant tries to pronounce “Ah Quee” correctly. The joke arose from several ways of writing the Chinese name. The sign retained the short name by which Chung was known to his contemporaries. His house is gone; where it once stood, Ah Quee Street now opens onto Beach Street.