National Parks near Kuching, Part II

Arriving Bako was a small challenge of course. First to find the bus (and arguing with some taxi drivers about the price) and then the 1 hours ride to the Park Headquarters and then the exhilarating boat ride (47Rm)to the park itself. I was lucky to get Andy as a companion from the Headquarters and share the boat with me. I was feeling miserable when I arrived and Andy did his best to cheer me up.

The arrival at the Park was hot and the reception where we got our keys was kinda messy. Felt more like the personnel were not really coping with the amount of visitors there was during the days. This was also seen in the hostels. It was incredibly hot on our room (there were 2 fans, but still) and the windows need to be closed because of the nasty monkeys. Also, the room of four beds was filthy. I don´t know when it was cleaned the last time, the floor was black and the previous guests had left a huge amount of trash (empty water bottles, tissues, paper) under the beds. The toilets were malfunctioning and the showers were gross. During my trip, this had been the only time I had been upset about the filth. The 2 Canadian French girls I shared the room with were making my mood better, as well as Andy, Anna, Greg and Dounglas and others later on. I owe them big time!

Anna told us later that on arrival she did not get any information about the monkeys, or anything else for that matter. The macaques were the worse. they knew when there was just the right amount of people at the canteen, and then they stroke. Even if Andy was starting to be very qualified with the slingshot the canteen personnel used to scare the monkeys off. The problem with the monkeys was simply the ignorance- the day visitors thought monkeys were cute, started taking pictures and became easy targets with their snacks and water bottles in plastic bags in their hands.

Also, some people would have appreciated the info about really needing GOOD TREKKING SHOES around the park. We saw far too many day trippers wearing only flip flops, and that was just not healthy. Water was also needed more than average, because the heat was almost unbearable at some points. 1 liter per one hour, at least.

So, the overall view of the Park facilities and information was not too impressing. But the walks were! A massive amount of plants, wild flowers, various landscapes from mangrove forest to "moon scene" was present. The walks were well marked and one had to write down the track where one went indicating both leaving time and arrival to the facilities. The night walk was also a nice thing, but the groups tend to be a bit too big. The walk that I took part was a bit uninteresting because it was too hot, and the animals were deep in the forest. Andy told that the previous night walk had been more than excellent. I was not complaining because I had a nice chat with our guide.

When the temperature dropped, the proboscis monkeys arrived to the facilities and made it a joy for everyone.

Kuching recommendations

It is a beautiful morning after along night rain in Kuching. I am sitting at the airport Starbucks, having my morning coffee and feeling incredibly lucky to have been in this city. Definitely, I will come back. As I am too exited about my flights home, I`ll just leave you with a lists of recommendations about some stuff I forgot before.

The airport is buzzing with the participants of the Rainforest Interhash and event I had never heard in my life before this. The hashers arrive around the world with their own clubs to run, and drink beer afterwards (the drinking club with a running problem) and seem to be very familiar, friendly and most groups wanted to adopt me immediately. Funny though, they have their own hash-names for the event, it is discouraged to use ones own real name.

The Constitution of the Hash House Harriers is recorded on a club registration card dated 1950:
-To promote physical fitness among our members
-To get rid of weekend hangovers
-To acquire a good thirst and to satisfy it in beer
-To persuade the older members that they are not as old as they feel

Apparently Hash events are a South East Asia thing, started as far as in 1938 in Kuala Lumpur by a group of blokes.

Ok. Back to the recommendations.

Books

The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby (the same guy who wrote High Fidelity)

For the rest of the trip I decided to buy the John Irwing´s latest one "Last night on Twisted River", trusting that his charm will kick in this time as well. Then I bought also the new "traveller bible" after Life of Pi has been read over, Aravind Adiga´s "White Tiger". I have seen it now in the hands of many packbackers, so, I will have a go.

And whoever hangs around Green HIll in Kuching could go to test these places;
Aha Organic, an organinc cooking restaurant, VERY GOOD FOOD.
The Junk, restaurant, EXTREMELY GOOD FOOD.
Black Bean coffee, my place to have THE coffee in the mornings

Weird animals

National Parks near Kuching, part I

And finally some text in here too.
At the moment I feel lazy and even if I did wake up early enough to get myself to the famous Sunday Market of Kuching, I decided to sleep long (and maybe start to get used to the rhythm back in Finland). I still have the time for Sunday market when I get back from my last visit to National Parks.

My first stop was Gunung Gading National Park. A one and a half hours ride by bus to Lundu town and then a walk for half an hour. I was lucky to get there by nightfall and did a short walk around the forest before settling down to my hostel room. I was the only guest and facilities were good. I don´t mind bringing my own food and preparing it in a good kitchen and afterwards enjoying it on the porch, accompanied by writing a letter to Wajska. The next morning it was raining and there was no guides around, but the park personnel told me directions how to see the Rafflesia and I took my change to discover the world outside the plank walk. It paid off, as you can see in the pictures, and I did not even step on the buds!

I got a ride back to Lundu town with some workers going to the town office, got back to Kuching, and there had to negotiate a ride with a taxi to Kubah National Park.

All public transportation is very poor to that direction and the information just is not given to foreigners! The normal price for a one way trip is 40Rm and one old guy asked a taxi for me to take me there for 35Rm. That taxi guy was nice enough to give me his number to get myself back, but I found my own way, as you´ll read from the following chapters. Ok, all good when I reached the Park, only it was raining heavily, but what the heck, I got a real RAIN FOREST experience. The night was pretty much as I expected; alone in the hostel (which was even nicer than the previous one) but not as alone as I thought in the beginning...

I went to bed after inspecting the wounded grass hopper on the wall. I spotted a HUGE bug on ceiling over my bed, but I thought to leave it alone, because it might never bite me. I was too easy on that one...I woke up after some hours and the THING had made it´s way to my head end of the bed and was about to take the few steps and tangle in my hair. With the help of the kitchen tools I managed to get the bug (after a 20min fight, boy it was strong!!) out to the porch! Then I slept the rest of the night without interruptions. Hah, and the French guys in Kuching were talking about small bed bugs...

The next day started with less rain and I thought to get myself through the most popular Watefall trail. It was humid,and it was also scary to walk though the jungle on my own, thinking about all the animals that were probably lurking behind every tree, I just could not see them. The first encounter the previous day had been a red tailed squirrel, today it was a wild cat or a skunk on the road. I also saw a few smaller than small squirrels around the trees, big and colorful butterflies, a lot of insects and the flora was amazing. It took me more than 2 hours to reach the waterfalls as I was so intensely taking photos of everything.

On my way back I run into 2 other humans! I was surprised, and those people were staying in the hostel with me. They were from France, apparently, but they never told me that...It was a very awkward feeling to sleep under same roof with people who totally ignored you. It is a common, unwritten law among travelers that you at least say something to the people in the common area. You do not have to be the best friend in any way, but show some respect to the others, just say hello and tell/ask where you´re from and maybe change a few words about the trail or something, or leave the others think that at least they can ask something if there is a need to. That was a very strange encountering indeed and it did leave me with a lot of thoughts.

After the 2 nights I started my trip back to town. I thought to try my luck with hitchhiking back. At first I took a ride with a man who took me to the main road intersection and from there I got a ride with beautiful lady Sallyanna. I bought us drinks on our way back and we had a good conversation! She promised to take me shopping some local Sarawak layer cake next weekend before I start my trip back home!

Now, to the shower. Which actually reminds me about the toiletries I brought with me and wanted to test on my trip. Here we go; a topic for a new blog entry.

Wind cave near Kuching

Wind Cave Natural Reserve

from Samarinda to Balikpapan and Pontianak

Arriving to Kuching. It is quiet. No one is calling after me, but I almost shout out loud. A WESTENER! Another, one more...many. The first joy is gone. I have been thinking how I might look like in the eyes of the local people, now I know: ridiculous.

Today in Kuching I have seen in one hour more white people than in the whole time in Kalimantan, where it was us 2 (Me and Simone), The Team America at Pulau Derawan and some random Swiss guy who had been sailing up the river with a boat transporting timber (getting material for his thesis).

The past week needs the own posting, but some info about my previous leg of the race around Borneo. Started yesterday at 06.00.

Samarinda City Center-> anghot (small van made to a bus) to bus terminal (30min)
Samarinda bus terminal -> bus to Balikpapan (2 1/2 hours)
Balikpapan bus terminal ->anghot to Balikpapan Airport (20min)
Balikpapan -> to Jakarta by Lion Air (2 1/2 hours)
Jakarta -> transfer flight to Pontianak, by Lion Air (1 1/4 hours)
Pontianak airport -> city, private transportation (!!!) to the Bus Terminal (time...)
Pontianak -> by night bus to Kuching (10hrs)

Arriving in Kuching at around 07.00 the following morning. Only a bit tired.



Now, I have the Air Asia ticket to my connecting flight in Singapore, 2 weeks left and I can start to think about home. But first, some jungle, some beach, some culture, some museums.

AND I have;
Working wireless in my room,
A warm shower
A western sitting toilet AND toilet paper
Hostel management speaks English
It is quiet
Beer from the front desk ( ice cold)
NO ants or other bugs
Kitchen with facilities
Electricity 24hrs

Tawau

23.05.2010 Tawau / Blog entry on my computer

Finally alone. Finally on the road again.

I am happy about my decision to leave Semporna. All on all it was not my place, and definitely not my place to go through Dive Master training. Sweden has not paid me anything yet, and I am sort of money. The rest of the trip will go with strict budget.

I am not having second thoughts anymore about Dive Master training. I am going to do it, some day, if not now. I have to admit that my expectations of my own stamina was wrong. I have to face the fact that almost 35 years old may not recover 15 kilos weight loss that happened over 2 months, in a very short time. The exhausting weather did not help nor did the sun burns. I was also surprised how easy it was to make me upset during the Rescue Course. It has been said that it is the best course there is...but I could say that for me it was like living hell. Every morning getting to the boat to Mabul from Semporna just made me more upset and I had lost all my ability to enjoy diving as well as learning something new. It was a horrible experience, nothing more. Still I think I have some abilities that a good DM needs. I believe I am a people person. And my Rescue Diver burn marks are fading day after a day.

Nella and her mother joined me at breakfast. I suddenly felt too shy to speak German, but I tried my best at that moment. I need a bit more time to be fluent. However, I was capable to communicate in some way, still I was not satisfied.

When I went to pick up my bags from hostel Ebu said that she is sorry that I was leaving. Both she and Lady Gaga (one of the reception young ladies) hugged me and hoped to see me again. For them, I could go back. It seems that I have been the one of the guests to be talking with them the most. One guy opened up one evening and told about some of his bad experiences, some others as well. I did not see Linda or Helen to say good bye to them.

Seems that the Semporna hostels small ants have been hiding in my backpack and now they cover my bed again. It feels strange to have my own toilet and shower, not to have a bar downstairs and not to have a wireless internet connection. I enjoy it. I enjoy the soda water I was able to find in a supermarket. I enjoyed the Pizza Hut triple cheese pizza with no regrets. Three weeks without cheese, and now that I am sailing to south, no one knows when I am able to get cheese again. Yes, I am fairly easy to please.

Peeling and leaving

It is time to say good bye to Semporna. Pay all my bills and hit the road again to south, to Indonesian state Kalimantan. All my friends are about to leave as well, so, I decided also to move on.

Unfortunately not with Nella. She got her symptoms back and flew her mother on an adventure of a lifetime. Her mom has arrived today and I am hoping to meet her as well.

I also found out that my sunburns are the second stage burns and they need 2 to 3 weeks to heal. Not very nice. At least not when it is combined with mosquito bites. After the water bubbles on my skin; I am now peeling off and look totally disgusting. I have been trying to hide myself under long sleeves both outside and in the water.

Today I made some unfortunate money transfers that did not get through. I was able to pay my hostel, but the diving is now waiting. Hopefully the transactions will show tomorrow, and I am able to go. I did succeed with the money transaction with some other money though. Nella gave me a huge bunch of bills in an envelope and told me to hand them over to some Belgian guys that would arrive by boat from Mabul resort. The Belgians had given Nella almost 1000€ worth of money to be exchanged by the time they arrived and she asked me to deliver the amount. Now it is out of my hands, the guys got their money and everything is ok. I have been really thinking that while travelling the people tend to help more with that kind of things and REALLY trust. I have been loaning my stuff all over and today I need to get them back together again for packing, but it does not bother me too much, because, me too, I trust. And besides, why not, if I have a book that can help someone, if I have a laptop that someone can use in a cafe to read the news and emails, why not?

Crossing borders to Indonesian side seems to be made quite hard. No information anywhere...at the moment I am going to get there to see it myself, how to get from Tawau to Tarakan and then later on further. When I find that out, I will put all the information online to help someone else who is making the same trip!


So, making the long story short, I will continue with diving stuff. I made through the Rescue Diver Course. And the first aid. Then I needed some time to think over what I was about to do. I decided to take a few days of fun diving and see, if I got back to myself in the water. I did. I did not make it ll the way to Sipadan, but I dot not regret it. There was a lot of talk about the experience in there; some said it is totally over estimated, some said it was the best dives if their lives. For me, I think everything after my night dive will be less interesting.

The night dive was amazing. I was diving with Flem, and his 2 Advanced course students Luke&Kate who were taking their night dive specialty. It was great to somehow take part in the course, to remember what are the important things and just listen. When we descended, Flem asked us to sit on the sandy bottom, to turn off out torches by pointing them closely to our bodies and then play with the water. The water was full of curious shrimps. And when you waved your hand in the water, they flashed as if they were fireflies. Beautiful. When we started our very slow dive, we discovered the incredible amount of crap that people throw to the water. Millions of plastic bags hovering in the water among the jellyfish that were size of a bucket, diameter something like 50cm. Ouch! We saw huge boxing-shrimps, crabs of all kinds, sleeping fish etc.

After a while Flem pointed out a flamboyant cuttlefish and we took our time to follow it with our torches. What happened was, that it lead us to some seahorses and stopped something like half a meter from them. At first it was tough decision to decide which animal to look at, but when the seahorse started giving birth to some little seahorses, it was an easy choice. A very very very rare sight!! This will be hard to beat at any dive. Maybe a manatee would be the next one to be wait.

Rescue Diver!

Now I finally reached the test of a Rescue Diver! Last night I was very tired but happy. I got another Dive Instructor, Flem from Denmark to guide me through the day. He did not quite understand why I was put through another day...and after all, his positive guidance totally helped me to do everything nearly perfect. I good positive comments about my calmness and my excellent buoyancy! He said that I can be happy about that. Also, I figured out a way to count my rescue breaths (a Finnish stupid poem) and completed the rescue safely on the Jetty. The 2 "hell dives" were not near the hell we went through during the previous days. Flem said it should be just in a proportion of sanity. I feel more confident now, but I still have to do some thinking.

This morning I had a short chat with Ric (one of the owners) and decided to get myself on some fun dives for the next 3 days just to relax. Leanne (instructor) said I should give a go on the DM. However, now, checking my bank account balance I am not sure if I have the money to to that, and I have only 6 weeks to complete if I started. It might not be enough taking in consideration my skills in learning...well, still a few days to think about it.

I got suddenly another offer. Yesterday at Mabul (the place where we did our courses, one of the resort islands) I sat on a table with a Swiss lady. She confronted a very unpleasant surprise on her 30th birthday; a decompression Illness on Sipadan on her first dive. Great. She spent her birthday in decompression chamber in Semporna hospital. What a great way to spend a special day. Memorable indeed. Then, she was told that she is allowed to fly in 2 weeks, but later it became 6 weeks. No risks, and she is kinda now stuck in around here. She is not advised to go KK, because of the altitude the bus takes on the road next to mountains. We had a nice chat during lunch and she asked if I wanted to go with her by boat to the Indonesian side.

I have been doing some searching now, and found an island of Derawan, where there´s good diving and great beaches, and a very slow way of living. On the way I could see Raflesias, probosics monkeys and other stuff...And the best part would be that I have a buddy to travel with. Don´t know how well we could get along, but then we could go separated.

A very tempting idea. Road less travelled.

Oh, my.

Yes. I feel like a huge failure. And I know I should just think about not to demand this much of myself...but still. I cannot remember a time in my life when I have felt like I am not able to do anything right. No excuses, I suck.

It was overwhelming. I was grilled much more than other students. I did not pass the course. I have to do one day more. My stress reaction kicked in big time, paralyzed when I had to do something, and apparently, when I did react, it was always something wrong. I try to remember what Sari wrote me about her Dive Master course. That she was almost tortured, but she survived it. And I, I keep thinking about my first days when I was learning to be a lighting technician...my help then was to have a very supportive teacher. I should stop comparing myself with other to this extend.

It does not help if I am painfully honest about stuff. Well, on the other hand it does help because I can talk about my problems and there has been a lot of help offered. I have also allies; Swedish Linda and American Helen are just adorable. With Linda we discussed a lot about atmospheres in here (weid for a new comer) and about the whole Scandinavian behavior. It seems that in general we ARE slower to to react and act on things. In Finland the way is almost to neglect when something is happening, maybe as a survival mechanism. Then again, facing fears should be a moment of self growth. Also, all my readers who have met me while travelling cannot say that I was lacking care for people or that I was unfriendly...but apparently these skills I failed to show on my course. Weird isn´t it?

All in all the last 2 days of the course was fun (except the fact that I burned myself badly of course, and decided to take this day off to cure my skin, think stuff over and take my day 4 of Rescue Diver tomorrow). We played scenarios in real time. The moment we four students stepped out of the boat in Mabul, there were about 10 victims already in the water and we needed to rush to rescue them. At first, like I normally do, I just stood there thinking "are you kidding me"! The second scenario was in water on a "fun dive". Ash, Ben and Big-Ben shot down in a second and started acting like fools, and fools that were totally drunk. They stole each others fins, took their weight belts off, started opening our tank belts so our tanks were not secured anymore and then took of all in different directions. Big-Ben even tried to put a stone fish in his pocket and other Ben assisted himself out of his BCD took the octopus in his mouth and rode on his tank as if it was a horse.


After lunch we had zero time to get to water and save both of the 2 Bens who had been seen on the right side of the Jetty but now were missing. A drowning victim will get a brain damage in 10 minutes, we had to find them in that timeline. The last dive was also a fun dive and the DMT´s and Ash were only mentioned to play around for a few minutes, but decided that it was cool to play along a bit longer..and it was 30 min. During that time and a bit after we saw five huge turtles from close,a ghost pipe fish and one fish that Ben claimed to be a star gazer.

The other Dive Master Trainees had completed their course and they had a "final snorkel test" last night. A bucket of booze through a snorkel until they puke. Not really my idea of having fun though, but the others were having hilarious time.

The beginning in Semporna

After the long period of stressing, carrying stuff, hailing a taxi, getting to bus I was finally sitting in a long distance bus from KK to my final destination Semporna, in the North East corner of Borneo island. During my ride I slept a lot getting rid of my jet lag but had the opportunity to observe the Mt. Kinabalu as we drove next to it and also the many many hectares of rain forest cut down from the places of new palm oil plantation and factories. Razor sharp edges and lines of emptiness on the same spots that used to be lush forest with diversity and undergrowth.

The first night was sleepless as I tried to get adjusted to heat by switching off the air condition...at the moment it works fine without!

My first course morning in here started with my beloved rain. I woke up too early and went for a walk. The night shift guys were asleep in the computer lounge, so I did not want to wake them up and decided to sneak out from the restaurant door where people were preparing for our breakfast. I took a walk down to the water, took pictures and enjoyed the fresh air. As usual, I was the only westerner awake at that time. I had a confrontation with the police; the guys scrolled down the car windows and said good morning. The morning market was busy, and the local good-transportation method used was wheel barrel.

On Monday morning I went to the dive shop as advised and got a boat ride to Mabul, a resort island where me and Freddy (young Brit) took our Emergency First Response course. The place was super, the instructor Ash was nice...but the mean frustration kicked in. I felt like I was very bad, it looked like I had never known any English in my life and I was totally confused with the masses of new words I had to learn, and as usual I did not give myself nothing but hard time. Yes, passed the test, but I was still feeling bad about all the confusion. Ash tried to cheer me up by finding me an extra place to Sipadan fro next morning and convincing me that I should take another day off. I decided to turn down the Sipadan offer (yes, it was tempting...the previous day 2 whale shark spotting, but as my contact lens solution was in my hostel room...the choice was made easier) and to study today. I of course did my first plunge into the water, went snorkeling and it was relaxing, also saw 2 white pipe fishes!

Getting back to village was indeed a good choice! I met some more people, some employees and some DMT´s (Dive Master Trainees) that gave me a peek to what it was going to be. The Swedish 'soon to be' DM, told me that she had felt the same as me for the first 3 weeks after her arrival. Keeping up with English language can be hard for a non native, and sometimes the natives just cannot see the struggle. I felt so much better after talking to her. Things will sort out, eventually. The next task will be the 3 days on a Rescue Course with bad diving scenarios.

EFR course was an easy one, to my luck, but it is getting tougher from now on. I should focus more on having fun and not stressing out. And hopefully the Rescue course will be the BEST as everyone keeps telling me, and I certainly hope that the Videos are better than with first aid. Maybe the only thing I learned from that is that I should carry disposable plastic gloves, eye shield and ventilation barrier as well as a bio hazard waste bag at all times to prevent getting infected by HIV or Hepatitis B or C, if you get into a situation where I need to give first aid. Of course this is in America. Where else can you can get a law sue after helping someone? Well, on our course we learned the most valuable lesson and a sentence of all times; “ Hello, my name is ----, I am a emergency first responder. May I help you?” And when said no, you just walk away...

At all times, you should STOP, THINK and ACT. My name is Katja and I am a emergency first responder. 

Task done!

Testing the durian ice cream. 

KK and electricity

A quick decision to run after Ally, share a taxi with her, almost get crazy with the cab driver, but finally ending up to the right hostel. Now I have already (or unfortunately) had 2 contacts with Finns..last night at bar I saw a friend of a friend that I knew to be arriving here at the same time. The radar was excellent this time, I spotted the Finns easily and had a fun night.

Right now I also got a Finnish guy sitting next to me in our hostel lobby. And I helped out a French guy with his electricity adapter if there is anything you want to know about electricity abroad, maybe  the best page to find out is http://users.telenet.be/worldstandards/electricity.htm


Yesterday, almost at my arrival I got a friendly shower from Mother Nature. When travelling, I usually like rain. It makes me feel that things are real. The life in here is real and not as if I was in a nice sunny postcard. One has to adjust to what Mom Nature has to offer. In here there are no big shopping malls to be lost in during the rain and no metro tunnels to hide from rain. It is just a human (nature) confronting the poring rain and flooding streets.

The picture is from my last (arrival night). Kota Kinabalu sunset and the local taxi boats leaving from the dock. Tomorrow I hope to reach my final destination. Today I got a friendly voice to talk to over the phone. At least there is someone who misses me enough to call me once in a while. Also, thanks for the comments as well as the FB comments. I like that, you know!