A Very Foreign Language: recess week in borneo

now this is how every fall break should be spent. recess week in singapore is pretty amazing, mainly because (1) it's actually a full break (2) it's not in williamsburg and (3) it was spent in sarawak, malaysia in borneo.

borneo my friends, is so close, yet so so far away from singapore.

the trip to borneo was with 10 people, and we rented a two story cabin in the rainforest of borneo at a place called the permai rainforest resort. not exactly 5 star material, but well-suited for budget minded college kids if you don't mind bats, lizards, giant ants, oversized bugs, snakes, and monkeys [none in your cabin of course!].

our two-story cabin: 500 USD for the week

the girls room

we were located right along this unique blend of beach, rainforest, and mountain so the view from our "resort" was great!

we arrived on sunday night with not much to do, so we ate dinner and hung out in our cabin. the next day though was the start of a week-long adventure!

monday morning, piotr, felix, and i explored the beach while 3 others went into town [kuching].

later, we all met up for a session of night kayaking along the ocean. we didn't take our cameras because we didn't want to risk getting them ruined, but the view was gorgeous! we left shore around sunset and saw the sun dipping into the horizon. before the sun set though, we were able to sea a group of dozens of sea otters playing in the ocean! we relaxed in the water and sat around talking in our kayaks until it was dark. then as we were rowing back to our resort we saw a mysterious glowing light in the water.... glow in the dark plankton! it was the coolest thing ever!

tuesday, with our expanded group of 9, our cabin split up and 6 of them went to hike up mount santubong, but cat, piotr, and i decided to laze around the beach again. a perfect vacation sort of day. nothing to do but swim around in the ocean and listen to music in the sand.

we were there from sun up til sundown when we had dinner and had a great view of the perfectly blue night sky.

on wednesday, whilst most of our group hung out at the beach, cat, blair, and i went on an exciting 3 in 1 tour to see dolphins, mangroves & crocodiles, and go snorkeling at satang island!

our fearless & hilarious seafaring tourguide & "pilot"

we did see lots of dolphins, but there were all too quick to get pictures of. we never saw their bodies though, just the fins that would come up while the dolphins got some air at the top of the water.

capturing a crocodile on camera however, was much more successful. after wandering around in the mangroves for quite some time in our boat, our guide spotted a 2 meter long crocodile lazing about in the trees. the crocodile looked amazing! our guide warned us that we couldn't get too close because crocodiles jump and leap into the water. we didn't quite believe him until.... well, the crocodile jumped and leaped into the water. he actually almost grazed our boat! we could have been eaten!

there were also tons of other animals crawling around in the mud. mud skippers, bright blue crabs, flying fish, and all sorts of birds.

tiny bright blue crabs in the mud

after the excitement of the crocodile, we headed over to satang [turtle] island. the water there was much clearer and prettier than the water near our resort.

here we went snorkeling in the ocean and it was so cool! we saw all sorts of coral and ocean critters! crabs, oysters, clown fish, blue fish, spotted fish, big fish, little fish.... generally lots of fish! i wish i could have taken pictures! we snorkeled for about an hour, had lunch on the boat, and then headed to shore to explore the island from land.

we found a cool wooden branch swing that we took lots of pictures on and around the tree.

afterward, we split up to go exploring

cat and i however, were sought out by our boat driver and were told "baby turtles!" as he pointed to his pants pockets. intrigued, we followed him, and lo and behold... he had found us some baby turtles!

we actually got to reintroduce them back into the wild! we had a turtle race to see whose turtle could waddle their way back into the ocean the fastest. unfortunately, my turtle lost. but it was definitely the cuter one! a definite success!

on thursday, with the arrival of alice the night before to complete our cabin of 10, we all went to bako national park. first we took a taxi ride to the ferry, and then a ferry ride over to the park. our driver was this cute little kid... hmm, only in asia.

the ferry port

our 10 year old boat driver

bako national park was excellent! it's an interesting mix of mud, beach, rainforest, and rocks.

after exploring the entrance of the park and packing up on snacks and drinks, we took a short hike up to a waterfall where we later got to swim around in the pool of water that the waterfall poured into. it was like a scene in a movie! a fresh, cool waterfall pool in the middle of the jungle surrounded by trees and animals galore!

we were up there eating crackers, splashing around, and having good fun... until we heard thunder. on our way back down it started pouring rain and well, it was actually lots of fun. hiking in the rain in the middle of a rainforest in borneo is quite the once in a lifetime experience.

after we got back down from our hike, we took a rest at a gazebo looking thing out in the mangroves. bako in malay means mangrove, so there are tons of mangrove trees in the park.

we were quite disappointed that we hadn't seen any of the famous proboscis monkeys on our trip, but as soon as we got up, we looked out in front of us to see a group of them playing in the muddy mangroves! proboscis monkeys are only found in borneo and have extra big red noses.

aside from the proboscis monkey though, we ran across a rather vicious group of monkeys waiting by the pier. one of them grabbed onto my bag as i went to take a picture with them. silly, monkey. multiple epic battles went down and we had to watch out in case the monkey tried to grab us from behind.

the monkey eyeing my bag

the monkey trying to steal my bag

a mommy monkey and a baby monkey

after playing with the monkeys for a while, or rather, after escaping them, we took some more pictures along the beach and met up with our ferry driver again to go back to our cabin.

on our taxi ride back, felix insisted that we stop at a roadside stand for some fresh watermelon for after dinner dessert which was actually very delicious!