Altogether it was a great trip, much better than I had hoped.
050507 – We set out a bit late as two friends were held up by traffic jam. The good thing was, since we made up almost half the bus, it waited for us. Up we went onto the bus. I sat with shu yin, with pui leng and chris in front. The guy behind me was quite shocking. When I wanted to lower my seat and asked him whether it was ok, he said something like, Sure. Lower also can, and he’ll give me a back massage. And bus trip there was quite boring, couldn’t really sleep, and whenever I almost dozed off we reached the rest station and had to go down.
060507 – Finally we reached the agency early in the morning and had to wait till 7am to eat our breakfast. The food was ok, but the toilet queue was so long, held up by one guy. The guy sitting behind me was waiting in line before me and shu yin, so we chatted for a while. He was quite nice, friendly. The tea was very tasteless, but the nasi lemak was quite different, a bit sour. I thought it spoilt already, but someone said that that’s the terengganu style. After breakfast we were sent to the jetty. There we girls locked ourselves in the toilet and began the Sunblock frenzy, slathering them on like nobody’s business. Prevention is better than cure I suppose. Pretty soon, the boat was there. It was more like a ferry. They showed us the movie ‘the mask’ while on board and we actually managed to finish the whole show. Of course, in the middle of the journey we climbed up deck and took lots of pictures. It was quite dizzy up there, but the sea breeze was very enjoyable. Pity there was not enough room to sit and just enjoy the breeze.
We reached redang. It was beautiful. But we had to transfer ourselves onto a smaller speedboat, and then climb down the rocking speedboat into the sea and walk onto the sandy beach of redang island. The climbing down was quite scary, but they prepared a wooden stairway, well, something like that, for us to climb down. Sadly for me, just before it was my turn, it broke! So I had to climb down a metal ladder. It went fine, but when I hit bottom, other people started climbing down. No big deal just that the ladder was on my feet. Oh well, I got a bruise for that. It hurt though.
We wandered around before checking in. Our rooms were very close to each other. I shared a room with caroline and hung jen. After lunch, we were supposed to go for our first snorkeling session. The coward I am, I didn’t go. Instead I went exploring along the whole stretch of beach all by myself. It turned out to be a good thing too, so that I had enough time to buy all my souvenirs and my famous rainbow handphone strap, the one that amazed Alfred so much. I was also able to tell them which shop was the cheapest when they had to hurriedly shop for their souvenirs near the end of the trip.
At tea time, I was very lucky that I met them just as they came back. It was more convenient so that we could have tea together. I met that guy again as I was refilling my water bottle. He began asking how come I didn’t go snorkeling, and remarked that I wasn’t wearing my retainer. In fact, he was starting to freak me out. After tea, they took me out to sea at the shallow end to get a hang of the sea. Dinner time was steamboat time. After that, it began pouring heavily, so we went to an activity room where they played pool and darts. We just sat there and chatted. After that, we walked over to redang reef resort to see the blue sand under the moonlight. It was quite amazing and beautiful, but lasted for such a short while.
070507 – we woke up late. Jeannie had to band on our room door to wake us up. After breakfast, we went snorkeling. I actually went this time, thanks to continuous support from shu yin, pui leng and chris. What made me so brave? Partly it was because I really wanted to see the marine park, and partly because chris actually managed to borrow a round tube for me. Actually I felt quite bad cause chris was so nice that he actually carried the tube around for me even though I guess it embarrassed him. Chris and pui leng are just so sweet together, it sets my standard very high. Haha..
Marine park was fun. Hung jen managed to get to know an instructor who tugged me around the sea to see fishes and corals. I even managed to see an eel, with big white teeth. I never knew that eels have teeth. At first I felt a bit bad that I had to burden the instructor, but after that I found out that I, or at least my tube, became the handle of many other people. After lunch, we buried hung jen in sand, then went to the shade to chit chat and play, quite cruel of us. Haha.. then, snorkeling again. This time it was at deep sea and was quite scary. Everywhere I looked, it was the sea. My goggles kept fogging up, and the sea was so choppy and turbulent that I became very dizzy. Besides, it was very scary and the sea was much deeper. Good thing the instructor was around again. When I climbed down from the ship, I was pretty terrified actually as my feet could not touch ground. Good thing chris was already down there and handed me my life-saver, the tube!
That night we had bbq for dinner, then we celebrated a friend’s birthday by surprising him at the beach where everyone was dancing. It was like a beach club. After that, we sat around and talked about snakes, since they wouldn’t talk about ghost stories. Personally, I think snakes are scarier than ghosts, since they can actually be around us any time.
080507 – it was all going to end soon. We had breakfast, cleared up, checked out, went to the cheap souvenir shop, then it was time to go home. This time around, they showed the night at the muzium. After that, it was the bus trip home again. They showed mr. bean’s the holiday and a Chinese movie on the bus. The guy was sitting on the same row as me and shu yin this time and was really freaky coz he kept looking at our direction with his round round eyes. But I guess later on he guesses that we were freaked out, coz he ignored us. We reached vista very late. First I went to shu yin’s house and surfed the net while she bathed. Then she came over and we ‘mapou’ together.
I would really like to thank all my friends for their support and concern, especially in encouraging me to snorkel to make the redang trip more worthwhile.
Thank you pui leng and shu yin and chris for all your support and care. Thank you pui leng and shu yin, for holding on to me while I was at sea. Thank you chris, for carrying my tube around for me. Thank you to all of them for helping me get on and down from the speedboat, and teaching me how to float. Haha.. good thing I held on to pui leng’s hand so tightly, or I would me floating god knows where.;p thank you shu yin for sleeping over with me on the last day when I was alone at home.
Thank you caroline and hung jen for being good roommates during this trip. Caroline taught me so many exercise techniques, I had better do them regularly!;p hung jen grabbed me while I was drifting in the sea. Both of them also stuck close to me during the deep sea snorkeling session. And hung jen got back my specs for me from the capten. Thanks a lot to both of them.
Thanks too to everyone else for their concern after they learnt that I don’t know how to swim.
May our next trip be as enjoyable as this one!=)
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