Leading the wild into the ways of the man…
This is Rene. It is one of the two photos she has allowed me to post. She’s the same Rene that baked me homemade cookies [sixthseal.com] several days ago and sent it from Singapore. I met her at JB airport before we took a taxi straight to Genting. I won RM 100 out of two games of baccarat (hey, at least it paid for the theme park access) before leaving the casino.
Choonie, Rene says hi. 🙂
…and I think her hair looks great. 😉
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Hello, I’ve arrived in Melbourne yesterday or the day before, I
really can’t gather my scattered thoughts right now, The outdoor doof
was very cold. More about that later, got back yesterday and slept for
more than 24 hours (what a waste) to recover from my non sleep in the
day before I left and the non sleep in the plane. Anyway, I’m going off
now, I’ll do a day by day run through when I reach home, it will be
sporadic posts like this until I get back. Later!
I went out at 8 am this morning to get some breakfast with Diana. Picked up Daniel too and headed off to Sugarbun to get something to eat, partly because it’s air-conditioned and partly because we haven’t eaten there in a while.
Me and Diana
Hung around there for an hour before Ah Chan joined us. We had to leave at 10 am though, to meet up with Yi Ching and Justina to go to Sarikei. We went to the city bus terminal to catch the bus, but the buses leaves in 2 hour intervals and we just missed the 10 am bus. We decided to take the express boat to Paradom and catch a bus from there. The bus fare from Paradom to Sarikei is RM 5.40, the most I’ve paid for a bus ticket in Sibu. Heh.
Me and Daniel
An hour later, we were in Sarikei and got some lunch while waiting for Jonas to pick us up.
Lunch at Sarikei
Obligatory picture with Sarikei signboard to show I was there
The pineapple replica in Sarikei town
After lunch, we walked to the tallest building in Sarikei (some government building) because it was air-conditioned. It was really hot today. We walked to Courts Mammoth after that to pretend to try the couches there. Another thinly veiled attempt to enjoy their air-conditioned premises, of course. I saw this interestingly named coffee shop besides Courts Mammoth. It’s named Ma Li Cafe which cracked me up.
Ma Li
If you speak Foochow, the words “ma li” will no doubt elicit chuckles. For those of you who don’t, it sounds like a mild profanity in Foochow. After that, we walked to SMB St Anthony (a high school), who seems to produce several individuals of high caliber.
St Anthony High School
Jonas picked us up from St Anthony’s and we headed to get some ABC special to cool down and headed off to Ngiu Kee to get a large bottle of cold mineral water.
Eating ABC special (an iced dessert)
We went to this new park in Sarikei after that, it’s called the Water Tower Park, if I’m not mistaken. The main feature is an old water tower.
Water Tower Park
The Water Tower
Jonas dropped us off at the government building again after that and we got visitor’s passes to go to the top floor. The top floor is the 10th floor (what did you expect?) and there is nothing much there, except a good view of the river and some exceptionally cool air conditioning.
View of the river with ferry in dock
A friend of Justina’s picked us up after that and took us to Sebangkoi, a nature reserve about 30 minutes away from Sarikei town. Took heaps of pics there and Yi Ching had cramps and was trailing us all through the reserve. =D
Bridge over a waterfall
Rapids
Arrrggghhhhh…the croc got me!!!!!!!!!!!
We headed to Daniel’s uncle’s orchard after that, where I was promptly bitten 1000 times by 1000 mosquitoes.
The orchard
Managed to walk though most of the orchard, which contains ‘landmines’ in the form of holes (some going down as far as 1 feet) which are covered by shrubbery.
Landmine
Tr navigation. I also managed to drive this mini tractor thing, which has no gas pedal, but only a lever to move faster. The gear shift is in between the legs too, and the tractor jittered all the time, which makes an interesting experience.
Mini tractor
We drove Daniel’s uncle’s car to Jakar (har har…sounds like penis in Malay) to get something to eat. Headed back to the orchard after that and hi uncle drove us back to Sibu at around 8:15 pm. Interesting day, but I managed to get mild heat stroke from the obscene heat. Poor Yi Ching was struck by heat stroke too, we’re both sensitive that way. Now where did I put my Poh Chi Kit pills?
From left: Huai Bin (me), Yi Ching, Justina, Daniel
I’m heading down to
Sarikei [sarawaktourism.com] tomorrow with Daniel, Yi Ching and
Justina for Part III of my Rural AdventuresTM. Heh. We’ll be
taking either the express boat or bus there, depending on which one leaves
first. I was also surprised to receive a call from Diana today, who is in
Sibu for only two days. She’ll be leaving tomorrow evening, so I’m going
to grab some breakfast with her tomorrow morning and catch up on things.
I have finally arrived in Sibu at 10:10 am today. I couldn’t take the
Sunday flight out coz the fog grounded all of the incoming planes, which
were routed to Sydney. After a 2 hour wait, the airport cancelled all
remaining flights and put us up at the
Rydges with dinner and breakfast
vouchers and a cabcharge coupon (lets you get on a cab for free). The
hotel is in corner Exhibition St. and Lt. Bourke Street. Right in the
middle of the city…I would have thought they will put us up at the
Hilton opposite the airport. Heh. Rydges is not a bad hotel nevertheless,
I think its a layby hotel for cabin crew coz there are heaps of them
walking around. I got a suite with a king sized bed all to myself. Not bad
at all, although I would have preferred to fly out on Sunday. Well, there
were two flights out of Melbourne on Monday, the 3 pm and the 11:50 pm.
The MAS people said they will try their best to put us on one of those two
flights. I didn’t get to go on the 3pm coz I have a connecting flight that
couldn’t be made with the 3pm, so they assigned me to the 11:50 pm one. Oh
well. I didn’t do much though, just slept through the night and woke up at
9:30 am to line up at the MAS counter and grabbed some breakfast after
that. I slept most of the afternoon as well. Heh. MAS paid for two nights
at the hotel, but I had to check out at 9 pm to catch my flight back. The
flight was overbooked so good thing I was there earlier. Anyway, I
couldn’t get the pics up coz I don’t have image editing software at my
home computer. Will pick up a warez CD of Photoshop on my way back later.
Feeling tired now…nearly had an accident just now too. Those damn brakes
need to be changed.
