Sun, sand, dive! - Day 1

DAY 1 : 18-May-2006

I couldn't sleep. For some reasons, I just could not fall asleep. Perhaps I'm missing my blanket. Perhaps the bed's too small. Or maybe the room's too dark. Whatever it is, I just can't fall asleep. Dear let me have the bed and slept on the floor, with only her blanket separating her body from the hard floor. I think I did doze off for a few moments but most of the time, I was awake. She didn't sleep a wink either, with the harsh floor wrecking havoc with her back. In the end, none of us had any proper sleep. Before we know it, it was 5am - time to wake up.

Two zombies stumbled out of the bedroom, not seeking human flesh but trudging purposefully to the toilet to wash up. They then proceeded to change and carry their backpacks and made their way to a nearby gathering point where many humans often congregate to consume food, or what many know as a "hawker centre". The human food seller did not seem fazed by the zombies and instead took their orders.

After eating, the zombies dragged their feets to the road, where they hailed a cab. The cab driver, like the food seller, did not seem to mind ferrying two zombies. The female zombie muttered "Golden Mile Complex" while the male one stared blankly into space.

En route to the destination, the male zombie's mobile rang. He answered and a chirpy voice at the other end said, "Hi, Mr Wee. I'm calling from Enjoy Holidays. I'm calling to remind you that you have a trip to Mersing today." The male zombie mustered his wits momentarily and replied as humanly as possible, "Yeah, I know. I'm on my way there. I'm in a cab." "OK then!" and the line went dead.

By the time the two zombies reached their destination, the curse has been lifted. They are human once more. Well, it takes a little time to slowly be more awake, you know?

Anyway, we made our way to the tour agency who aranged the trip to Mersing, Johor, Malaysia, where we would take a speedboat to Tioman. It turns out that we are the only ones onboard the 44-seater coach. Whoa~ It was almost like we booked the entire coach ourselves. The coach was scheduled to leave at 6.45am but as the only passengers were us, it could leave as soon as we arrived. That was why the tour agency called me to check if we could reach there earlier, as the coach driver was already waiting there. We boarded the coach hastily at 6.20am and off we go.

We took this while we were on the coach. See? A wide toothy grin is enough to erase all signs of a sleepless night. Bear that in mind when you take pictures the next time.

The journey to the Woodlands checkpoint was fast and furious. Given the light traffic conditions, the coach sped its way to alogn the expressway. Dear was trying to catch 40 winks and I guess she was successful. Me? I just sat in my seat and tried not to move.



I took this picture just to demonstrate how empty the coach was. It was taken shortly after we cleared the Singapore Customs.

And guess what? We were the FIRST coach-travelling tourists to clear the Malaysia Customs! When the coach reached the Malaysia Customs, their gate was still closed and we had to wait for about 10mins before they opened shop.

After clearing the Malaysia Customs, the driver asked if we needed any breaks along the way. We said "No" and he was OK with it. The trip to Mersing was fast, shorter than what we expected. We reached there at about 9.15am, earlier than the 9.45am that we were expecting. Dear managed to nap along the way but my body just simply refused to sleep. The only parts that fell asleep were my legs and arms. Anyway, the driver attributed the fast journey to light traffic conditions. Personally, I think he went pretty fast, for I could feel a strong centrifugal force on the bends he took.

When we reached Mersing, we got to know a Chinese man in his late 30s. He seemed to be working for one of the tour agencies there and knew the way around. He was friendly and brought us around to get the necessary things done. With his help, we bought the return coach tickets as well as the tickets for the speedboat trips to Tioman. He passed me his namecard and I vaguely remembered his surname as "Lee". Hence, I referred him as "the Lee chap" from that point onwards.

While waiting for our speedboat scheduled at 11.30am, we explored the surrounding area. While exploring, I heard a faint mew. From my experiences, I knew it had to be a kitten. Looking around, Dear spotted not one, but two, kittens hiding under a bush.

They appeared to be siblings, though differing in appearances. Their mother came running along when we went closer to look at the kittens. She was fine with us and just wanted to make sure that we aren't hostile or anything.

Dear tried hard to attract the kittens' attention but the kittens didn't seemed interested. Her efforts did not go unnoticed though. Another grey adolescent cat which was nearby seemed interested in her and went near her repeatedly. Alas! She is no cat lover and as far as cats is concerned, she will only go near kittens. Failing to elicit any favourable response from the kittens, we went to a nearby eatery to while our time away.

When the time neared 11.30am, we made our way to the jetty. Lee did tell us that the speedboat will not be on time but we decided to wait there just in case. Several speedboats came and left but ours was not to be seen. As the seconds passed, bits and pieces of our patience was chipped away too. Well, I'm not so much affected, for I was more sleepy/tired than impatient.

Dear, on the other hand, had some rest on the coach journey and had become restless. You don't want to talk to her when she looks like that. "So many boats and none of them is ours? Just now not ours, now also not ours. Just how long must we wait?!", she complained.

A trip to the toilet at the jetty did not lighten her mood. "It was so smelly! Did you see how fast I took? Next time, you should time my visits", she exclaimed, upon returning from the toilet.

Well, I must agree; this is her record-breaking toilet visit since I knew her. She took like 30sec! You see, ladies can be swift too and the notion that ladies need to spend more time in toilet need not necessary be true. Makes you wonder what are the extra things that they do in there when the restroom is all nice and dainty, anin't it?

At about 12.30pm, our wait came to an end when we heard someone shouting, "Bluewater!" That was the boat operator that we had engaged. I rushed to ask if the boat was leaving for Japamala Resorts and the person confirmed it. We grabbed our belongings and boarded the speedboat gleefully.

I've read that the speedboat ride was going to be choppy. Frankly, it wasn't too bad at all. It's similar to a ride in a car without suspension, with the car slamming itself on the road frequently. I even managed to take this shot of this seemingly uninhabited island.

As with the coach ride, I didn't manage to sleep. I was so close to falling asleep when Dear hit my arm and pointed excitedly to the window, "Look! Seagulls!" I opened my groggy eyes and looked in the direction that she pointed. There it was - a pair of birds circling near the surface of the water. I muttered a soft "Hmmm", closed my eyes and the roars of the speedboat engines became fainter and fainter.

Eventually, I did fall asleep. When I opened my eyes for the second time, I saw an island with a tall hill looming across the horizon. There was a mild fog in the air and it made the island looked somewhat mysterious. I strained my eyes and saw what seems like a jetty in the horizon. We have reached Tioman. I woke Dear up and within minutes, the speedboat had reached the jetty and the captain yelled, "Japamala! Japamala!" We took our backpacks and alighted the speedboat. There were just the two of us.

At the jetty, one of the staff from the resort had to the jetty to receive us. From the sea end of the jetty to the land end, was about 150m or so; I'm quite bad at estimating distances. We were ushered to the front desk, which is located directly at the other end of the jetty. While the receptionist checked us in, we were each served with a glass of ice, cold ginger tea. Talk about service! It sure was a nice reprieve from the hot afternoon sun.

As it was 1.30pm then, there was still half an hour before the check-in time. Thus, I had lunch at the restaurant. The seafood fried rice was delicious and very different from the usual ones that I had in Singapore. The restuarant is located behind the front desk and had a seating capacity for about 20. Other than a table that was meant for 4, the rest of the tables had only 2 chairs each.

In this picture, you can get a glimpse of how the restuarant looked like. It's just a small area with table and chairs. Simple setting but yet cozy. As it was near the beach, it was very possible to take "wind-in-hair" shot like this.

By the time I had finished the food, our room was ready. One of the staff showed us the way there. We booked a Sea Cliff Chalet, which means we get to have a great view of the sea. After carefully navigating along a winding wooden pathway with steps going up and down, we arrived.

"Dear! Look at the view here! It's amazing!", I gushed, as I went to the verandah. From my vantage point, I could see the clear waves washing up against the beach. The waves glistened under the sublight and it made the whole beach looked so movie-like, almost surreal. Pardon my awe, for I can never get to see such a beautiful scene in Uniquely Singapore. So much for the uniqueness, huh?

This is how the room actually looked like. And yeah, the apple and grapes were real fruits, not ornaments. For more pictures, check out Japamala's website. It is exactly the same as the pictures there, so I did not bother taking many pictures of the room.

I lazed around in the open-air bathtub, which was actually a depression filled with rocks and kept constantly full by a running pipe. Again, check out Japamala's website, as they have the pictures there.

We went to the beach later in the afternoon and explored the surrounding areas. There was another jetty, one that seemed sturdier than the one that we came from. At the end of this new jetty, there is some sort of a shelter with seats. On both sides of the wooden gangway were white rectangluar boxes, as shown below.

I suppose they are to light up the gangway at night and I think it will look really nice when night falls. Sadly, the jetty was not fully completed yet and the gangway simply melted into the darkness when night came.

Oh yeah, the birds? They are the focus of this picture, not the white lights. I just used this picture to illustrate my point.

After our brief exploration, we spent the rest of the afternoon playing in the clear waters. Excessive amounts of sunblock lotion and occasion breaks in the shade of coconut trees were all that was needed to avoid the nasty sunburns.

Swimming or floating in the water is OK but try not to walk, especially bare-footed. Below the surface, lies a wide variety of debris, both blunt and sharp, that could potentially cause unnecessary grazes and cuts. When I say debris, I don't mean rubbish. They are more like pebbles and oddly-shaped, hard, white pieces of porous bone-like material that is washed up along the shore. If anyone out there who knows what I'm referring to and knows the exact term used to describe them, please drop me an email. Thanks!

Before the sunset, we went back to our room to get a quick shower to wash off the brine and sand. An important point to note here. It is pertinent to wash every nook and cranny on the body, especially the ears, to get rid of the salt. Otherwise, you will end up with ears that taste salty. How do I know? Well... Let's just say I learnt it the "hard" way and leave it at that.

We proceeded to the restuarant for dinner after showering. As it turned out, we were the only couple there. There's more to it. We were the only Asian couple in the entire resort, for the rest of the guests were all Caucasians. So, does it feel weird to be the smallest and shortest ones around with black hair? Not at all. Unlike some shops in Singapore, the staff at Japamala Resorts treated their guests with equal respect and dignity, regardless of skin colour or other observable differences. Well, at least, that's how Dear and me felt. Perhaps they may have given Caucasians preferential treatment but we certainly didn't feel as if we were getting the short end of the stick. And this is one point that I would commend them for.

Our dinner was relatively simple. We ordered a dish of mixed vegetables in oyster sauce, a mixed seafood curry and some rice. The curry, though a little salty, was fantastic. Again, it was like nothing I have eaten in Singapore. The restuarant is part of the Tamarind Restaurant chain and Dear said it is some reputable chain. I don't diagree with her on that; the food speaks for itself.

We wanted to watch a DVD after dinner, as it was dark and we had nowhere to go. Oh, did I mention that you can borrow DVDs from the front desk, at no extra charge? Each room comes equipped with a DVD player and a television (not connected to aerial, hence, without any viewable channels). We were intending to watch "Big Momma's House 2" but my fatigue got the better of me. A poor night's rest coupled with an afternoon of splashing about in the pristine waters finally caught up with me.

Before we can sleep, there is an incident. A minor skirmish erupted, as two moths were bent on hovering near the hanging lamps and Dear was not too pleased with their presence. We managed to capture them in plastic bags and released them outside the room. With Dear visibly satisfied, I mumbled, "Good night" and rolled over into slumberland.