Starry starry night....

If you happen to see an indian girl waving at you excitedly by any chance, don't just ignore her cos that indian girl might be ..... ME!!!!

ArgghHHH!! I AM SO SO SOOOOOOOOooo Dark!! Tanned!!!

I am glad to be back in one piece cos the bus driver drives like Michael Shumacher who has been put in jail for 20 years and forced to watched F1 everyday. To the bus driver, brakes are there for decoration cos he sure didn't use it!

A little introduction to the people in my group:-
1. There's me, Anna, Celine & Anna's sister, Jennifer.
2. 9 Pin Hwa students
3. 3 girlfriends from Kedah.
4. Tour guide from Klang, Marcus.

On the first day (Saturday), we went to 5 points which include Pulau Perhentian Kecil and Pulau Lang Tengah.

At Pulau Lang Tengah, I saw a TURTLE!! WahHAHa. First time in my life, a real huge turtle the size of a normal kopitiam table. Of course the ones in the underwater sea aquarium are not included! According to the boat driver, usually there's a lot of turtles but once someone shouts, "HOI, THERE'S A TURTLE HERE!" and everyone starts swimming like a herd of elephant towards it, of course the turtles swim away!

Then, we went to see the coral reefs. There's so many fishes. Clown fish (known to the local people as "Nemo"), angelfish, sun fish, weird-fishes-which-their-name-i-dont-know, sea cucumbers, sea urchins and lots more *dont know the name. hahaah*

Next stop is the shark point. According to the local records, the longest shark is about 6 meter. WHOA! but dont worry, as you can see, I am still blogging cos there's no shark in sight on that day. The wave was big and we only managed to snorkelled for few minutes. By the way, the sharks at Pulau Perhentian surrounding water are mainly Black-tip sharks which are "quite" harmless.

After that, we stopped over at a place called, "Air Berani". Fresh water from the hills. Wait. VERY COLD fresh water from the hills. Darn refreshing bathing with it after the whole day in seawater.

We stayed at Pulau Perhentian Besar. The hotel i stayed in is a little bit like Moremore Cha chalet by the name of Coconut Hut . Just imagine a kampung-like house with a queen-sized bed, a bunk bed and air-cond, of course. I chose to sleep on the upper bunk cos it's nearer to the air-cond *w-eir-d*

There's about 4 hotels along the beach. the other two is nearly the same with Coconut Hut and another one is bit higher class, maybe 3 stars cos that's the only area with reception for 012 users. As usual, 016 got no transmission in rural areas. Chilaka useless Digi. This hotel, Arwana (no relations with the Awana at Genting or Awana in Langkawi. Notice the "r") is at the other end of the island. So, if we want to make phone calls, we have to walk all the way, passing through a lonely dark stretch at the beach. Thankfully, my phone 3200 model has torch-light in it. WoOhOOOo!! Let's give a round of applause to my phone!!! *clap clap clap clap clap clap*

After the walk, all of us gathered at the beach to hear ghost stories from the owner of the hotel. I was sceptical as first and thought it'll be another ghost story but he sure scared us!!! He told us some rules on the island and forest. Even atheist or other religions have to pay respects to the local protectors.

Now is my favourite part of the entire trip.

The night sky!!The stars were so bright and the sky was so clear. There's like a gizzillion of stars that night!!!
Me, Anna, Celine & Jen just laid down on the beach, looking at the stars, admiring the work of God. I just hope the night can last forever. I was so touched. Speechless. We dont have to say anything. There's so MANY stars!!!! The view is just breathtaking! How I wish I have a camera that can capture the stars in picture but all that appear on my digital camera is... a dark blue sky with a few bright stars. Can't help feeling like I'm in a fairytale!
That's what made me want to stay there..................................................

Back to the hotel room, I just realised my back hurts a lot! I've got burned! Reddish brown and it hurts alot. I think i used 1/4 of body lotion on it but doesn't help much. Ouch. Lesson 1: Never wear sleeveless! Ever. I dunno... I used half bottle of sunblock for one day itself and it doens't help much. The others didn't suffer as much as me cos they wore t-shirt. Go figure.

The next day,we supposed to wake up early to watch sunrise but overslept. Haihss... Long day ahead. Today, we went to Pulau Redang. Before that, we stopped over at Moremore Cha's Beach. There's a cut-out of Richie Ren, Ah niu and the other fella without their faces . We put of face in and snap snap snap away! Took some pictures and snorkelled at the soft coral reefs near the beach. Wonderful day for snorkelling cos the sun is bright and right at the top, acts as an lamp for us. This is where I saw 5 to 6 baby black-tip sharks, squids, and magnificent coral formations.

Pulau Redang is a great place for snorkelling cos there's so many fishes there. Celine and I know how to swim whereas Anna and her sis can't swim. Lesson 2: Knowledge in swimming is hell important if you want to snorkel or at least, know how to float.

Celine and I went ahead of them with 2 bags of expired bread (fermentated, a little bit greenish grey = fish food larh). THe fishes there were very, very, VERY hungry cos they even bit our fingers. Lesson 3: Throw the bread far away, sink, observe, swim fast if you're near to the bread. Why? cos fishes will bit anything other than their own species.

After that, another spot for coral reefs observation. More fishes, bigger sea cucumbers and more colourful corals.

Along the jouney from one place to another, we kept ourselves occupied with riddles and knowing each other. The most memorable part is on the way back, about 15 -20 minutes, the Pin Hwa folks, Anna, Celine and Jennifer sang songs from Moremorecha movie. Two of them. One is Ah Niu's song (Dui Men The Ni Hai Can Kuo Lai).. I can only hymn cos dunno how to sing. I really like the feeling cos we were really enjoying ourselves.

That night, the sky is not as nice as the day before but there still lots of stars. Me, Anna, Celine and Jen went for a walk -with my phone of course- Then, on way dark stretch as mentioned above, four of us walked hand by hand with me in the middle holding my phone/torchlight, we met Marcus and his bunch of friends (there's girls also lerh) who are also out for a walk. They asked us to join them and they noticed my torchlight. Only then they realised it's a handphone. They were so excited bout it and ask me where I'm from, alien or something. I said,"YUP. There's my home."- Pointing at the brightest star-. We walked together under the starry sky and dunno why, out of a sudden, Marcus sang my favourite song, Better Man by Robbie Williams.Not to me but just suddenly. Even Celine was shocked cos she knows I like the song a lot. Hmmphhh... No special meaning. It's just very nice to hear the song under the beautiful sky.

After the walk, I wanted to sit at the beach and enjoy the sea breeze under the night sky but Jennifer wanted to go back and play cards *SIgh*. Luckily, Celine and Anna managed to get her lazy ass out of the room and we did sat on the beach. AhhhHH. The life. The night was still young. Jennifer forged a very good relationship with the PinHwa students (They call her ," Pau Chuk Poh", the landlady from Kungfu Hustle? so happens we watched the movie on the bus) We went and looked for them for entertainment. We played Heart attack together. Anna always loses cos she never play the game before. The loser have to choose between truth or dare. One of her dare was to find any guy on the beach and tell him, he is handsome. She made a malay guy very happy that night! Another Pin Hwa guy was dared to perform a pole dance. Gosh. They were pretty open-minded with their dares. One of the PinHwa girls reminded me of Shin Fei cos she's the one with all the bizarre dares. Very friendly bunch of people! One more thing, I think nearly everyone in the group thinks I am there to search for caucasian guys. No thanks to my big-mouth friend, Celine. It was supposed to be a joke!!

Oh btw, after two days of fun and joy, my "auntie" dropped by to visit. Somehow, I feel thankful not being shark bait and managed to enjoy myself for the past 2 days.

On Monday, we have a whole entire day for ourselves. Anna, Celine, Jennifer and me walked all the wya to Arwana for buffet breakfast which cost only RM10 but we managed to eat for free!!! As a revenge for their poor service and bad quality of food. After breakfast, Jennifer went to the room to sleep. Anna, Celine and I went to a nearby big tree with 3 hammocks, laid down, enjoyed the sea breeze and wonderful sea view.

We have a brief chat with Marcus. How I envy him to be able to go diving and do the things he like. He asked me to learned diving and I told him, "Yeah, maybe next 5 years." He said, "Oh k. You'll only see bones by then." Ah-ha. Oh, he calls me "doctor" too cos of Anna and Celine's big-mouth.

Yah. I spent the whole Monday at the beach, sleeping on the hammock. Jealous?? DOnt be. Cos I'm freaking DARK now!!!

All good things have to end. How I miss the islands so much. I really miss the starry sky. I want to learn diving!. Then I'll return.

Only 4 days but the memories are there. Real good ones. Fate brought us together. All of us are from Klang but we never meet before. It is really fated to be friends.

In the meantime, I am trying very hard to return to the once "fair" leech.

I am so DARK!!!!!!...