Ah, the quietness of night.

I feel like a slob. Have been leaving clothes all over my room and my stuff scattered all around the house, and I don't feel like clearing up after myself. Feel. absolutely. lazy. and oily. and restless. and zapped out of all my creative juices. Does essay-writing do this to you? Don't have recollection of anything like this. Maybe it's essay-writing in Singapore that's doing this... And I haven't even actually started, oh boy. At least I've got some nebulous concept of what I want to write about. Exhilirating sense of "yessssss....." when I looked at my neatly-written paragraph points just before I headed for some nice hot bak kut teh at the coffeeshop downstairs.

Argh, the heat.

I was waiting for more pics of Perhentian to come before I blog away, but I decided it'll be too long before I get all of them (including the underwater ones) so I decided to type a post about it with a few pics, then upload more pics when they all arrive.

Perhentian!! *_* Ahhhh. The sun, the sand, the sea (so cliche right, hurhur). But honestly!! It was beautiful! Beautiful! Beautiful! The sun was reallllly shining down on us, and there were moments of rain threats but God blessed us with such beautiful weather, with rain at the right times when we weren't intending to head outdoors. Cocohut - we stayed in a hut with various other friends with the general name of 'creepy crawlies', but nah it wasn't that bad, just occasional moths in the bathroom. But the idea of staying in a hut was so quaint; it brought me back to memories at Sarimbun camp and OBS, though OBS huts were far larger and less cosy than the ones at Cocohut.



Cocohut has this restaurant built just above sand, next to the sea - wooden everything, including wooden planks for floors, big weird red Chinese lanterns, straw roofs, and such proximity to the blue hues of sky and sea. The green of the trees and mountains went so well with the blues; you can practically draw a box around a certain set of parameters, Select > Copy > Paste and that'll make such a beautiful realist painting (too much influence from my essay material on hyperrealism).



Plenty of opportunities to soak in the sun. Maybe too many - I got so chao ta (burnt) that after I came back practically everyone I met gave me an exclamation of shock and amusement. Yes ok, maybe I overdid it, but I wasn't trying to get a tan as much as I was trying to get an even tan. I failed, but through that I understood a bit more about vanity and its silly futility. -_- We were so blessed to meet this guy called Korie who was working part-time at Cocohut; he used to work at Redang and is really knowledgeable about beach-life, underwater wildlife, sea activities, and, it turns out, about much more beyond the sea. He slashed and prepared for us 2 coconuts - one old and one young - to eat/drink; it was quite an amazing sight 'cuz the only coconuts I've seen prepared for me are the ones in coffeeshops and hawker centres. Fresh coconuts by the sea, whee!



Korie brought us jungle trekking (a wee bit) but, mainly, snorkelling. It was my first time snorkelling so at the first sight of fish underwater I squealed and smiled, forgetting I was half-submerged in water, and consequently swallowed a gulp of brackish water. Ah! The fish! The corals! (they looked mainly dead. but there were nicer ones on the 2nd day) The water was so clear! And I felt I was flyinggg flyinggg.... I didn't know that you could float absolutely in seawater if you didn't move at all, though of course you had to be floating horizontally. Korie showed us Nemos, swimming about their anenomenamonmanoneme. After swimming about for an hour-ish, we waded nearer to shore and sat in the shallow waters talking, playing with sand (Grey sand, Matt, grey sand!) and soaking in the sun. Korie was fascinating because of his lame humour, how he carries it off so well, and also because even though his English wasn't good he had confidence expressing his views and opinions on various things. Really honest guy, really sincere, and to a large extent, I felt, really quite wise.



We went for more snorkelling on the 2nd day, but with a different guide. Lots of swimming. Tried to find turtles and sharks but they were all in a parliament meeting or something. Apparently one shark escaped and Matt and Heng Chin saw it, but Shiao En and I disappointedly missed it. The turtles, however, were entirely evasive and indifferent to the huffs and puffs of wandering, aggressive ang-moh (Caucasian) swimmers and 4 Asian snorkellers. Nope, no turtles. We gave it another try later in the night, when during dinner Korie so kindly invited us to wait for turtles to come upshore in the night. We walked around, waded in water, waited and talked for 2 hours-ish, but the turtles made a no-show. Shiao En was so disappointed that she dreamt of them. So did the chef who went with us.



The next day was our last, but we went kayakking in the morning after breakfast. Wow I really loved it, and it was such a different experience from kayakking in, say, Sentosa or Pulau Ubin. The waters there were so beautiful I felt like I was sliding across deep green glass floors. I shared a kayak with Heng Chin and we rowed across the peaceful (thankfully) sea, happily happily talking and soaking up more of the sun, splashing water into our canoes and on ourselves so we wouldn't be too hot...... after we returned our kayaks, Heng Chin and I waded in the shallows awhile more and talked...



The company, needless to say, was fab. Heng Chin and Shiao En have always been close sisters of mine, and Matt was always a bro with whom I can have conversations about many things. I haven't met them for quite some time and it's nice to re-live abit of York in a place so totally unlike York, to re-live the randomness, the lame jokes, the stories, random discussions, the fellowship. Interestingly, on the 2nd day I was struggling in my heart about a certain issue and I prayed, "God, send me a sister to talk about it." That night when we were waiting for turtles it popped up in the conversation between Shiao En and myself, so it was such a godsend. :) The other acquaintances we've made have rendered this trip particularly valuable too. Korie's a very special guy, and my heart went out to him when he was telling me about his heartbreak on the first day; we met this other guy called Harlim who's there on the island for 3-4 days for some diving rescue practice; the chef who brought us turtle-awaiting was very nice, tho I didn't understand a word he was saying; the Chinese waiter who served us from Day 1 was incredibly... smiley... and kind. The food, the food was awesome. It was a package tour, so we had 2 lunches, 2 breakfasts and 2 dinners, and each meal provided was smackingly yummers and filling.

Ah, so here I've returned to Singapore, trying to work on my essay, saying my last goodbyes to friends during dinners and various appointments in these couple of weeks... but it's so obvious that part of my heart's been left behind in Perhentian just as part of it's floating somewhere in York, just as another part's attached to various people and places. It's somewhere buried in the sand, washed into the seas, hidden with the hues of green and blues... and part of that with Heng Chin, Shiao En, Matt, and the pictures we all took, with the smiling Chinese waiter, with Korie, his heartbreak, all on the little sunny island of Pulau Perhentian. And with the turtles we never saw.

Thanks to all you darlings for making it lovely. -hugs-




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