Semakau Island, Singapore: 29 Sept 07

This is a nice sunny day, a good weather for nature walk at the shore. This is my first intertidal nature walk after my 5 months holiday and i am really looking forward. i was assigned to be a hunter seeker for the day. Initally, i am rather reluctant as i think i am not a good "things spotter" and i think it could be stressful to find things that the visiotrs wanted to see. But in the end, i ended up enjoying the task as i could take MY OWN SWEET TIME to take pictures of the animals and this is a privilege that i would never have as a guide (a guide could take picture but not on your own sweet time. :). As i always said, i grown up by the sea and there is no place i feel more home than the sea. The sun, the salty and fishy smell of the shore and the breeze were the big welcome to me. The rich and colorful lives of the shore is too temptating to keep me in door. So never asked me why am i this tan again!



This was the first time for me to go to Marina South Pier. I took the train until Marina Bay and transfered to bus 402 to get there. The bus is not frequent, so i think it is good for me to take a picture of the bus timetable for future used.



i like building. This new Marina South Pier building is beautiful. It even has a lawn at the third floor, overlooking the sea.



The sea is blueist and quite clear.



Telescopium, big snail normally find in mangroves. i found them when i was looking for horse shoe crab (They are abundant and just lying there!). It normally coats with a layer of mud but in fact it has beautiful brightly colored shell.



This tiny whelk has an anemone on its shell. It looks so cute and delicate! (So please consider to stop eating snails! :)



Sand collar. It is the egg mass of a kind of snail called Moon Snail. The eggs are laid in mucus that combines with sand and hardens.



Thorny sea cucumber. The sea cucumber breathes through its backside. :)



Moon crab. I found this crab and i shouted to Luan Keng, "i found a cute crab but i couldn't remember its name!" Then while waiting for Luan Keng to come, instead of trying to catch it, i was just standing there and trying to recall its name. It ended up this burrower burrowed into and sand and we had to dig it out beneath the sand.



i thought these two slugs were nudibranchs but they are flat worms. Flat worms are much flatter than nudibranch and they tend to move faster. The most significant different should be, flat worms don't have flowery-like external gills on their back.



Green sunflower mushroom coral. It is a kind of hard coral which unattached to the substrate and able to move about on the reef.



This is my second favorite of the day except for the moon crab, a blue spotted sting ray. Luan Keng and me played a little trick to catch it and we had fun!
Remember how that famous crocodile man died? The venomous spine is at the base of the tail.



The visitors. We had 'good' visitors for the day. How we (or may be me) defined "good visitors":
1.) They are interested with the shore and the stories of marine lives. At least they don't scream and said "it is so gross!" when the guide show them the CUTE and BEAUTIFUL slug!
2.) They stay in the group and don't try to explore the aras themselves hence stepping and cause the death of more corals and other animals.
3.) They never complaint that it is so muddy and so hot. (What can you expect when you come to the shore?)



The beautiful sunset. Especially in this metropolitan Singapore, sometimes we spend so much time trying to get more money and we forgot what has been provided by our mother nature. You don't have to change the nature to make it more beautiful ...



The nearby petro-chemical plant, Bukom Island. Those chimneys look like christmas trees at night time.

The trip ended at around 7.30pm and of course we saw far more creatures than what i put here. Unfortunately, i am not a good photograher, so i would prefer to put only a few better phographs. Other animals that we saw: Seahorse, gymnodoris nudbranch, octopus, egg mass of octopus/squid, sandfish sea cucumber, stonefish sea cucumber, hairy crab, knobby star, common sea star, fan worm ...

Tekek, Tioman (Day 3) - 12 Apr 2007

i graduated!
i am now a NAUI Advanced Scuba Diver.

* Sorry to Abect, my dive instructor, though. i put his photo here without consent. But i really wanted to have my graduation photos here!



The seaview looking from the dive centre.



Tekek Jetty. People were busying loading and unloading the goods from the ferry.



This is one of the resort/dive centre/restaurant at ABC village.



Salang Village. The chalets on the hill really looked nice in the picture.



Renggis Island. This was where i did my last dive before i left and saw the sharks. Last time, we saw turtles here.



My dive mate is very kind to send me some underwater photos for the dive at Renggis.
So, this is me with fishes swimming around.
More of the underwater photos can be seen at his blog:
http://sun.ap.teacup.com/alamshah/
http://www.geocities.jp/kuantannih/



We saw this blue spotted sting ray.



You won't miss to see clown fish! This is something 'die-die-sure-can-see" for every dive trips.



i was taking picture for whatever... (i couldn't recall now).
i brought a manual underwater camera.



Mersing street, near to the jetty.



EXTRACTED FROM MY DIARY

Time to leave.
i woke up late at 8.30am due to the late night yesterday. i took a quick breakfast and then started to have my photo sessions with staff in the dive centre.
One last dive before i am off and completed my course. The certification card will be sent to my address later and i guess i need to photocopy my dive certificate for my up coming dive at Vietnam then. (i planned to dive at Nha Trang)
The last dive at Renggis was good. A beautiful closing to my trip with the sighting of 3 blacktip sharks and a giant groupe. The visibility was the best in the past 3 days but no current, too bad. I was looking forward to a drift dive. A Japanese who dived with me offered to send me some underwater photos, so at least i would get other than the 'dried' photos.

i hope i will see more Asian single traveler like me, but it was really unfortunate that, i did not even see one Japanese single traveler. Probably this is why i always end up to hang out with some foreigners, as there are not many crazy Asian woman would do what i am doing.

Initially, i planned to leave at 2pm. But Akemi said, there is no ferry at this time, so i better leave with the ferry at 12.30pm. It was almost 12pm by then, so i took a quick lunch, bid farewell with them and Akemi sent me to the jetty using her motorbike.

As usual, the ferry was delayed. It was there at Tekek Jetty at 1.30pm. Then went here and there to drop and pick up passengers, so by only 3pm then we really headed to Mersing. With this, we got to Mersing at almost 4 hours later by 4.15pm.

It was embarrased that, i somehow put my ferry ticket in my pocket and i couldn't find it later. i almost emptied my pockets and sling bag, but couldn't find it. The ferry staff was waiting for me while everyone were staring at me. Then finally someone saw my ticket on the floor. Phew... Or else i would need to buy another one. Lesson learnt, always keep whatever ticket or receipt properly.

i learnt another lesson from this mini trip. i really should avoid wearing short or small T shirt during my long trip. This small shirt was barely covered my money belt so i had to wear my money belt inside of my pant! It could be really inconvenient if i wanted to ge something like my passport from there.

The whole journey from Tioman to Singapore took me 9 hours! i left for Tekek Jetty at 12.30pm and arrived at home only at 9.30pm. I was very tired, so when i got a call from my friend, i basically just told her that, "we will talk next time!" Sorry to her, but i had really no more energy to talk. Remember, i slept at around 3am last night.

i met two girls on the same bus from Tioman to Johor Bahru. When we alighted from the bus, a tout approached them for trip to Singapore. Out of good will, i told them that i am taking bus to go back to Singapore, so they could follow me if they want to. i think, they were likely to pay much for a trip to take a cab to the town then from there to Singapore. It would be better if they just take bus to Singapore and then take a cab in Singapore to wherever they wanted to go. They followed me to the bus 170 platform, but later decided to take a cab though. i think this is because their bags were really heavy and they did not want the hassle to on/off the bus and custom with their bags.

The encounterment with them made me think about, what will i do if a local girl told me that i could follow her? i think, i am likely to just follow the local despite of the hassle. In a way, this will definitely be cheaper and should be safer to follow to someone who knows. It reminded me also, don't bring more than i am able to carry with ease.



MONEY MATTER AND LOGISTICS:

1.) Food - RM 12

2.) Transport -
* Speed Ferry from Tioman to Mersing: RM 35
* Express bus: S & S International from Mersing to Larkin - RM 8.80
- The last bus is at 5.30pm and they don't go to Singapore directly now.

Tekek, Tioman (Day 2) - 11 Apr 2007

This is the dive centre, Tioman Reef Divers.



Some corners of the dive shops are pasted with many photos of the divers and students. Two of Mei Siang, Brad and my photos are still here.



The dive boat. However, i did not use this one as most of the time, i dived with the intructor, Abect, only. So we used a small speed boat.



The newly built Tioman Marina and Katie and Mathew's yatch, El Sea. (Should be, the yatch they are bringing or working in.)

* I don't think it is right for me to put either Katie, Mathew or Chris pictures on the web without their consents.





Mathew was pumping air into the small rubber boat that we later took to see sunset and to ABC Village.



This is the yatch, El Sea.



EXTRACTED FROM MY DIARY:

i woke up at 6.30am, i think i was just get used to my working hour. i slept at 10pm last night, tired from my previous days of late night sleep.

The weather was not good today. It was raining a bit when i walked to the shore. i remember there were this intertidal areas some where near to the dive centre. i wanted to go and see what could i still find there. (Last time, i saw rock sea star and many corals.) i saw many onch (a kind of slug without shell), oyster, limpet (a kind of snail) and abundance of mermaid fans. The tide was not low enough to expose the coral reef. There was another patch of intertidal area, but it started to rain heavier, so i headed back to the dive centre. In the end, it started to rain cats and dogs. So Reeno played a DVD of his friend dived at Coco's Island at Columbia while waiting for the rain to stop so that we could off for boat dive.



Onch



Black Sea Cucumber



Clam



Limpet



Oyster



The weather is strange now. It is supposed to be hot season and yet it just rains most of the time. It looked like it is going to rain for this whole day.

When the rain got not as heavier, we proceed to the deep dive (30 meter). i should practise decompression stop and basically we would explore a wreck and stay longer so that we needed a decompressions stop. The different between training and recreasion dive is, seeing things during training is just a plus as the main objective is to learn the techniques.

i think i am still not as good in my buoyancy. At least sometimes, i need to hold on to something to just stay at certain depth. The dive instructor basicallly didn't baby sit me anymore. It was different to when i was in Scuba Diver Course that the dive instruction will constantly look after me/Mei Siang to make sure that we did not shoot up to the surface. This time, i got a one to one coaching and yet the dive instructor with his 'expectations' on me, did not pay particular attention to me. Later, he said my buoyancy was good enough and i am not likely to have problem to get in control.

Someone from the dive centre asked me about my ring at my left hand. i told them that, it was an engagement ring. But the fact was, someone suggested that, wearing a ring would save me a lot of troubles when i travel to the remote areas in Asia, such as India. People got less interested with you when you said you are married. In my case, i think i looked younger than my actual age, so engaged will do me better. With my previous relationship fresh in my mind, i found it particularly easy and 'fluence' to make up a story of my fiancee and others. So this was my 'practical' before my long trip.

Little did i expect that, my simply kind act of friendliness will bring me such a wonderful evening and to know these wonderful people. i got so bored eating alone that, during my lunch, i simply approach Chris who was eating alone too and asked whether i could join him. Of course, it is unlikely that people will say no to girl, so we started to chat. Chris is from France and his English is not as good. So when i talked to him, i need to speak really slow and choose some simple words and basically forgot all about the grammars (if you are thinking that my English is not great too, then i ensure you that, he is not even achieve 1/10 of my level). He was a nice guy, working as a computer engineer in Franch and will in Malaysia for a month.

i got 3 dives for today and it merely involved different kinds of trainings. After my last dive, i walked from the beach of the resort to the newly built Marina. While eating my ice cream on the way to walk back to the resort, i met Chris again. I called him to just said hello and he said he is going to meet some of his new french friends and invited me. Since i have nothing to do, so i just followed him.

That was how i met Katie and Mathew. I was still wondering whether last night was a dream. Watching sunset in the middle of a sea on a small rubber boat (i am not a romantic person), took a boat ride in the middle of the night to go to a bar (from Tekek to ABC) and i heard the most words of French in my whole life. It was just kind of crazy but yet wonderful.

Katie and Mathew sailed from France to Langkawi, they are skippers. From Langkawi, they went to Singapore and supposed to get the yatch/boat to Hainan, China. Unfortunately, the boat has some serious water leaking problem, so they have to stop here and later get the boat back to Singapore, Raffles Marina for repair. They said they are likely to just leave the boat in Singapore for the owner to decide what he wanted to do and they would off to Cannes, Australia, for another job and to practise their English there.

Katie is a year senior than me and she speaks the better English compares with Mathew and Chris. She is just not that kind of French woman that i watched from TV, wearing heavy make up, high heel and a LV handbag. But you couldn't expect a boat captain to be meeked right? She is cheerful, humourous but tough women. I really like her. Matthew in the other way was shy in the beginning. He is 22 and i think he is very good looking! They both knew from a sailing school in France and since then, enjoying time with each other.

3 of them were chatting in French, but in time, Katie or Mathew would translate. They were really thoughtful to me. They knew i am a vegetarian and i won't take alcoholic drinks, so they would check to make sure that, i got something to eat/drink. With such a great language barrier, i amazingly had a great time with them. We talked about animals, women in different careers, some French and English jokes.... Katie said, English called French frog because they eat frog and Frech called English pale beef because they are very fair and they eat a lot of beef! I found this particularly funny as to Asian, they just look kind of equally fair! We talked until the bar was closed and then again, took the rubber boat to return to Tekek at around 2am. i gave Katie my contact in Singapore and asked them to contact me if possible. She gave me her email and said she and Mathew are very sincerely invited me to visit them in Australia. She would cook me French meals! In fact, she repeated this "sincerely inviting me" for a few times during our conversation. Normally, i won't take any invitation from people i met during my trip seriously. But somehow i really believed that, she meant it.

When i parted with Chris at the resort (coincidentally, we were just staying next door), he hold me at my arms and looked straight into my eyes. We bid fare well , as he will leave to Kapas tomorrow and said good night. At that time, i was really thinking that, whether he is going to kiss me?? Then how would i react? I have never know any French in my life and i seriously do not know how to react if he does so as a kind of French courtesy. Well, i am glad that he didn't do anything and i suspected that this is because i got a 'fiancee'!

It was such a wonderful night with them that i started to believe that, i would have some kind of wonderful trip for the rest of my journey. The other reasons that i think we had such a nice chat was because we are all around the same age group, at least they are not some kind of party animals. i enjoyed the time with them so much that i even could ignore the second had smoke from Katie and Mathew, which i normally won't tolerate. :)



MONEY MATTER & LOGISTICS

1.) Food, including non-alcoholic drinks at bar - RM 29

2.) Others:
Peladang Mini Mart near to the Marina recylcle the 1.5 little mineral water bottle to use for selling petrol to motorcycle. If you don't want to just through away your plastic bottle, then it is good to give to them.