MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM MALAYSIA

The Christmas decorations are up in the shops here and unlike Australia, Malaysia put them up in December (very sensible), the carols are echoing throughout the stores and restaurants and children are wide-eyed and excited.  

We’re glad to be coming home for the festivities.  Actually we land in Australia on Christmas Day (morning ‘pagi pagi’ – very early) and for those of you we will not be able to catch up with while gadding about the various States we send Christmas greetings.

Please forgive us if we don’t send cards – one, we are too lazy to write them and two, we don’t trust the local postal system.  So we will post this instead.

THIS YEAR HAS BEEN JUST AWESOME

FROM THE MAGNIFICENT AUSTRALIAN COASTLINE

TO THE BEAUTIFUL INDONESIAN ARCHIPAELIGO

FROM THE WONDERFUL NEW FRIENDS WE HAVE MADE

TO THE NEW CULTURES WE HAVE EXPERIENCED

OUR LIVES HAVE BEEN ENRICHED AND EXPANDED

(NOT TO MENTION OUR WAISTLINES)

Do I really want to eat this?

WE DO, HOWEVER ALWAYS REMEMBER OUR ROOTS

 

AND THERE IS NO DOUBT WE ARE VERY GRATEFUL FOR THEM.

WE SEND ALL OUR LOVE AND VERY BEST WISHES FOR CHRISTMAS AND THE NEW YEAR

 NEIL AND MARGARET

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Danga Bay, November-December 2010.

We are still here.  All is still good.  We have been to Singapore to meet family who flew in for a brief holiday and spent another few days with them back on the boat.  Shopping, shopping, shopping ‘til we dropped but the prices for authentic/non-authentic sports gear are too good to refuse.  The price of everything else is pretty darn good too.  How many new pairs of shoes did daughter go home with?  Didn’t count, but she borrowed an extra bag.  How on earth can we afford to live back in Australia? 

Our home in Johor Bahru

 

The marina is a popular place for the locals

Singapore island is very pretty, lush and green and we saw most of it on the bus journey in.  How you ask?  We catch the bus outside the marina in the normal manner to take us to central, sorry Sentral Johor Bahru, walk half a mile through the Customs, Immigration, Quarantine station, which by the way is enormous, fill out a Departure/Entry card (which we didn’t know about and had to go to the end of the line to fill one out), walk the other half mile out to the waiting bus, travel for – oh about 5 minutes across the river - disembark, walk another half mile to ‘check-in’ to Singapore and then find yet another bus to take you to Singapore city.  Phew.  We apparently caught the SLOW bus to town and had a nice tour of the island and ALL of it’s bus-stops.  Next time we catch something that says “EXPRESS”. 

Finally we arrive at the terminal to be met by our patient but hungry relatives and find a food hall serving authentic food for a delicious lunch.  Don’t ask us what authentic Singapore food is – it’s just more rice, noodles, chilli, chicken etc.  Then a walk around the city and a visit to the famous Raffles Hotel for a very expensive Gin Sling and to throw peanut shells on the floor (a tradition) took care of most of the afternoon.  After being joined by more family members we enjoy a dinner at a roadside café and then trek off to find the Laser Light Show reportedly at the SunTech City Mall.  Huh!  Wasn’t there, was it.  But as we arrived fairly late it was possible we had missed the show altogether so, nothing for it but to find a pub (not easy to do in Singapore) and order a cold beer.  An Irish pub actually where business was a little quiet but chairs, shoes off and cold beer – aaahhh.

Raffles Hotel, Singapore

Next day, reverse our journey and return to Johor Bahru (this time in the EXPRESS Bus which more than halved the trip through Singapore) then walk – check-out – walk – bus – walk – fill in card - check -in – walk – TAXI!

Generally our days have been quiet here in Danga Bay after the fleet and family moved on – but there are a handful of boats still here and a couple of new arrivals so lonely, we are not.  It is well into the wet season and after mornings of humidity and oppressive heat, we all look forward to the afternoon thunderstorm which brings torrents of rain and some welcome relief.  New umbrellas all round. 

A childrens' theme park is close by

We have spent most of our days recently either Christmas shopping or just browsing to compare prices and varieties, fixing programs on the computers which seem to throw themselves into oblivion just for the hell of it, and cleaning out our lockers.  We are also awaiting some new shade and sail covers which are being made with the assistance of a fellow cruiser.  Now a warning!  Do not attempt to have anything sent to JB from overseas via FedEx.  The local office here it seems will do their best to extract extra cash payments from you for any excuse they can think of.  If you refuse, they will delay delivery or tell you they cannot deliver or invent some other excuse (which they seem proficient at) not to deliver the goods.  However, they have not met the skipper before.  LOL.  We have our parcels thank you, and we did not part with any cash. See main page with side-bar link to ‘FedEx and the case of the Canvas Ransom’.

Johor Bahru is an old city and they really try to ‘westernize’ things but it seems that once it has been built it is forgotten and many buildings and systems are dated and in need of a good scrub or repair although many roadworks are in progress.  Going through Customs on our trip to Singapore the young lady checking us in asked if it was our first trip to Singapore.  We told her yes, she looked at our entry card (which noted we were returning to Johor Bahru) and said “and you are going back to Johor?” as if we were crazy.   Funny.  We explained that our boat was there so we had to return.  “Oh” she said, still not convinced we were not crazy - seems Johor Bahru is not THE place to be.

The mechanics have still not finished working on the engine but I’m reliably informed it’s close so maybe we could cruise up the Strait of Malacca soon.  Now here’s the thing.  Once upon a time… the skipper was mucking about on the internet and came upon some cheap airfares from Kuala Lumpur to London.  “Oh yes”, I said, after he told me for the third time - “why don’t you book them then” I said.  Well…. HE DID.  So come 2011 we are off to Europe.  And now we are not sure how far up the coast of Malaysia we will actually get in 2011.  But you get that.   Now it’s the crew’s turn to surf the internet to find places to stay and tours to take.  Where do our relatives live again?  OMG she needs new shoes too.  Just kidding.  Gave the skipper a fright though!  LOL. 

It’s time to head off up the beach for some wonderful satay and special fried rice.  The rain has stopped, the washing is hung up, the ship is nearly ship-shape and well we deserve a break – no we don’t really but someone has to do it.  

One of our favourite cafés

The Aussies at the Bar - typical!

Here’s a little shopping story for you?  We took a bus ride the other day to a market called KIPMART – wow, lots of everything here – cameras, computers, electrical goods, car audio players, DVDs (authentic of course – cough, cough), shoes, clothes, cars, pets, …..on and on and also fresh fruit and veg and the biggest selection of fish, chicken and buffalo meat we have seen yet.  All very nicely displayed and appearing very fresh.  Freshest of all was the buffalo - very.  While talking to the butcher and admiring the meat we spied the poor victim’s head at the butcher’s feet.  The butcher asked the crew if she wanted meat and she pointed to the head and asked “is that him?”, “yes” said the butcher “do you want the head?”. “You eat the head?” replied the crew “oh yes” was the answer.  “How you cook it – soup, stew?” said crew.  “Oh yes” Was the answer.  We declined.  Although the fresh meat did look really very good.  Our only experience with buffalo was on Lombok where we tried fried buffalo skin.  Not to be recommended.  Looked great, tasted like buffalo smell.  Not good.  Give it a miss.

The local butcher and his victim (look near his feet)

2145 hours on 2/12/2010 - sweet music to our ears – the engine is going YAY.  It sounds pretty good too but I will not say that just in case.  Oh yes, we can clean up the mess.  YAY YAY.  We will have a cockpit again without all the engine parts (and grease) in it.   I know it won’t happen for at least a week as the generator and anchor winch are still in bits – but it’s a start.  We have been stepping over tools and motor bits and pieces for at least a month now and the crew was determined not to clean the grease and grime from where mechanic’s hands and feet have been until it was finished.  YUCK.  No visitors until it’s done.  

There's always someone with their head in our engine

Malaysia - Danga Bay

The cruise through the northern islands of Indonesia was somewhat uneventful and relaxing apart from a little hiccup with the autopilot compass getting a bit confused after the equator crossing and wanting to steer us back 180 degrees – a magnetic anomaly?  We had to keep convincing it that we wanted to go further north and everything was ok – only upside down if you are a compass calibrated in the southern hemisphere.  And then we hit the Singapore Strait.  OMG.  Smoke haze from Sulawesi was being blown across Singapore and visibility was very poor.  Those of you who know the Singapore Straits will appreciate our apprehension at trying to cross the one-way channels straining our eyes to see ships emerge from the smoke gloom and hoping that their radar equipment told them we were there before they actually ran over the top of us.  Singapore harbour and Straits are extremely busy waterways and we kept a close watch on the countless ships traversing the channels.  We did eventually cross both channels and decided to drop the anchor for the night just inside Singapore waters – fingers crossed we would not be questioned by the marine authorities as we did not have the required papers.  We had a very quiet night anchored amongst the tankers (flying the Singapore flag), until first light when we dodged our way through the shipping traffic and up the river to Malaysia (now flying the Malaysian flag of course) under the watchful eye of the numerous Singaporean police patrols.  You see, the middle of the River is the border – Singapore one side, Malaysia the other.  Police boats one side, fishermen the other.  

This village is built on stilts out over the water

We arrived in Danga Bay Marina on 20^th October to be greeted by an Australian accent over the radio.  The Marina Manager is Australian.  He sailed here, liked it so much he decided to stay.  The marina, in the last throes of completion, is free of charge to the fleet (except for electricity usage) and very comfortable.  The office staff are friendly and accommodating and we are happy to be here.  Well, here’s the thing……the engine (I know, I know, not the engine AGAIN) but the engine has been threatening to give us grief by spewing oil all over the bilge making a big mess and progressively getting worse.  We must say that it just keeps ticking over and sounds quite good following some TLC from our friends on ‘Amulet’ and ‘Sunray II’ but the oil is now sending us a different message.   So after a walk to the local service centre we are put in touch with a mechanic.  Let’s hope the Malay mechanics are not like the dodgy Australian mechanics that obviously didn’t do their job properly.  But don’t start us on that story eh?

Luxury

We also visit the nearest shopping mall and discover ‘PappaRoti’ a bakery that bakes only sweet coffee cream rolls YUM, a Thai Massage Shop and an Optometrist.   The crew broke her glasses around Komodo somewhere and has been using the cheap magnifying sets laying around the boat so while the Skipper wallows in the luxury of an hour-long massage, the crew has an eye test, orders multi-focal lenses and new frames – delivered in 4 days – for around $140 Australian.  She is very happy.  The skipper on the other hand comes limping out of the massage shop after having himself tied in knots and pummeled from head to foot saying “I think I feel better, not sure yet, give me a minute”.  He did enjoy the Ginger Tea though.  I’m pleased to say a couple of days later he is feeling a bit more flexible and indeed is talking about returning for more torture.

We find this southern end of Malaysia totally civilized and reminds us a little of Australia (they drive on the same side too) and after a bus trip out to the ‘Jusco’ complex which is every bit a ‘Westfield’ shopping town we now feel a bit sad that Indonesia and its raw charm has been left behind.  But of course the shops helps the crew feel a bit better (especially the shoe shops).    Not to mention the numerous eating cafes dotting the shoreline – all of which serve basic, tasty and cheap cheap cheap meals so eating out is very affordable. 

A government building in the traditional style

Sail Malaysia gets in full swing with activities on the shore, tours to local shopping centres and briefings about the next four ports of call.  We enjoyed the official rally dinner – which was actually Chinese cuisine – and a day tour to a national park mangrove area, a ‘mock’ Malaysian wedding, a sumptuous lunch and a tour of a Pineapple Museum.  Yep, they have a museum dedicated to Pineapples – it’s more of a research facility actually and yes, they research Pineapples.  OK.   Our tour guide was a very informative man with a wonderful sense of humour which made the day pass very quickly. 

The southern-most tip of mainland Asia

A pretty RED pineapple

Aww, the bride and groom

Now a few days later, it is becoming more and more obvious to us here on Bluestone that with the engine pulled down, the anchor winch pulled apart AND the generator in bits, we just might be staying here and waving goodbye to the fleet.  Oh well, there’s always next year.  Nothing to do but look for cheap flights back home – hopefully around Christmas time.

We have made a few trips to the local auto parts and mechanical shops to be greeted with friendly, helpful advice and further to the many shopping malls that we get to hear about from fellow cruisers.  To hail a bus (going in the general direction) we stand outside the marina building on the main road and flag down a bus – if it stops we can ask if it is going to… wherever we want to go.  Sometimes we pay 2.4RM sometimes we pay 2RM, sometimes it goes in the bus machine, sometimes it goes in the driver’s pocket.  Huh? But we always end up getting to where we need to be.  And… on the way home, cross the road to flag a bus going in the opposite direction to ask if he is going back to Danga Bay.  Very easy.  Actually, one bus stopped the other day to ask if we wanted Danga Bay Marina (white people in this area generally come in yachts).   

………………………….We have now been in the marina for 3 weeks and said farewell to the majority of the fleet continuing North with the Sail Malaysia rally.  We will not be going with them this year.  There are several boats staying here and one that had to return after weathering a storm and having their mizzen mast flattened.  Unfortunate for them, but at least we will have company.  Not that we feel alone, we are enjoying Malaysia very much.  We have family visiting for a few days so it’s time to explore the region and Singapore too – legally this time.   But for now, a glass of something cold, decide where we will eat tonight and contemplate the next few weeks – decisions, decisions (BIG SIGH).

 

Belitung 7th – 16th October

Oh my, Belitung and it’s people are just tops and this is one clean island. The people are just wonderful and once we go ashore, they crowd around practicing their English and asking if they can take our photos with them. The children have obviously been learning English and we learn that most of our appointed Guides are their teachers.

Of course, we are taken on tours of this lovely island to visit the dam that the Dutch miners built in the early 1900s which is very impressive except they don’t catch the water and pipe it to anywhere, it just pours over the spillway. We visit the main city of Tajung Pandan that houses the museum/zoo – sorry to say the birds here are housed in very small, barren cages and the crocodiles and snakes also have small enclosures but the exhibits in the museum are very good. They have a small resident monkey here who makes a beeline for the crew while she is walking around (why do they do that?) but by her actions the keeper realizes she is not taken with the little …. and steps on his chain to avoid contact. Thank you. 

The Dam

The bus - pretty fancy eh?

One of the guides and three of his students

We also visit a smaller museum on the eastern side of the island before lunching with the Regent of East Belitung who is a very well educated man and speaks excellent English. These lunches are spectacular, the food is prepared by local people and it just keeps coming. Because Belitung is the rally’s exit point the majority of boats are here and there was over 100 people for lunch. Following this lunch we are taken up into the hills to visit a Buddhist temple – absolutely spectacular views from up here but unfortunately the gardens are suffering from diminishing Buddhist occupation – none the less, the temple has been kept in good order.

 Entrance to the Temple

The entourage at the temple - extra cars needed for this trip

Each day brings something new either in the form of a tour or meeting a local family who are more than happy to have you come into their home. We met, through one of our guides, a couple who are relatively influential on the island (he owns the petrol stations) and they could not do enough for us. We are treated to lunches, shopping, sightseeing (all of which we are not allowed to pay for) and told that now we are part of their enormous family. They both adore children and are godparents to over 60 (including our guide). They have 8 children of their own and conduct classes once a week in their large home. We invite them to visit our boat but they decline as they suffer from seasickness and are not keen on being on the boat so we give them a photo of the boat and a hat with ‘Bluestone’ on it. It seems very little after what they have given us but is accepted with enthusiasm and graciousness. 

We hope they liked the hat and photo

Lunch with our new friends - also friends from the yacht 'Amulet

A private visit to a school is also scheduled via our guide as she is a teacher there and four of us are taken to meet the children and teachers. We have to stand in front of the entire school and talk with microphones answering questions fired at us from the students. Absolutely delightful. 

One tour takes us to a natural mountain spring that feeds into man-made swimming pools where we are very grateful for a cold dip after a hot day in the bus. Once again, we are spoilt with food and drinks and entertained by the dancing lions below.

The people of Belitung love their recreation and the coast is lined with lots of small huts that serve as restaurants that they frequent at the weekends. There are many picnic-type tables and chairs everywhere and also, I am pleased to say, rubbish bins! At one such location our hosts offer to buy us the traditional ice cream and we happily accept. Well, this is a first, the ice cream is made from the local fruit Durian quite a nice tasting sweet fruit we have had previously and the ice cream is the consistency of gelati – nice – however, this is then served in a small hotdog roll. Hmmm, first taste is very unusual but it turns out that the roll is the perfect receptacle for the gelati and by the time we munch our way through this concoction we all agree it was very nice.

One local proudly shows us a model of his fishing boat

Someone wanted her photo taken at our favourite eatery

 Our anchorage is also lined with these restaurants and while the rally is here they are open every day. So most nights we enjoy the local noodles, rice, calamari or fish and vegetables for a very small price. We managed to find a restaurant that served cold Beer as well – YAY from the captain. One restaurant owner remembered the skipper well as he would say every time he ordered dinner “tidak timun” which means “no cucumber”. The owner would then call out to him each time he saw us “tidak timun” whether we were at the restaurant or not. They have a good sense of humour.

Each night entertainment was undertaken on the huge stage and dancing and singing ensued as the guides would drag us up to dance with them. We were also encouraged (dragged) to join in the traditional dancing and once again, laughter is paramount.

Now, I have to say, the skipper has a new friend. The Regent of West Belitung is his new best friend. While attending a kite-flying afternoon at the beach, skipper is asked to sit with the Regent for the afternoon. They hit it off and the regent made sure there were plenty of journalists taking photos with him and Neil. We actually made the papers twice while we were there being interviewed for the ‘Sail Indonesia 2010’ page. We also lunched with this Regent and again, made the media with photos aplenty. A strange phenomena occurred during the kite-flying demonstration in that the sun produced a huge, perfect rainbow halo around it which brought oohs and aahs from the locals. The skipper thanked the regent for organizing it. I think that won him over.

Mr Neil, the diplomat

Instruction from the Regent on how to fly the kite

Now an expert !

(with the Regent) My new buddy .... Mr Neil

Welcome to the Regent's house

Lunch is served... traditional-style

A slightly more formal Regent after lunch

We could rave on for ages about this island but we have to leave (as Immigration and Customs have said we must leave on the appointed date) so we bid farewell after taking 8 guides and their friends out to the boat to have a look and have photos taken with them. We both feel that we would like very much to return to Belitung and spend some time just exploring and mixing with these lovely people.

Not once have we felt unsafe or threatened while we have been in Indonesia and very least of all at Belitung. The island has homes constructed of timber and concrete not like the traditional huts seen on Rote, Sabu and Sumba and they are the most pleasant people who love to talk with us always asking our permission first. A few of our guides also asked us to their homes but unfortunately time ran out. We arrange to keep in touch with them via email and hope that we can once again visit Belitung.

One of our guides and the two journalists who interviewed us presented us with drinking mugs emblazoned with their photos as parting gifts so we will always remember them. And a couple of days later we receive phone messages asking us where we are and are we ok. 

Farewell from the guide and journalists

Our 5 day sail up to Malaysia gives us plenty of time to reflect on the wonderful time we have had since arriving in Kupang almost 3 months ago. Our main aim was to get to Malaysia and to tolerate Indonesia as we have to go through it to get the Malaysia, but now, we feel very differently. We are not saying that everywhere in Indonesia you will get the same warm welcome and definitely the rally has a lot to do with the local people accepting us and treating us so well, but we feel deep down the Timorese and Indonesian people are a gentle, generous and happy people who so much want to learn western ways and fit in with the world in general. They have so little and give so much, a lot of westerners could take a lesson or two from them.

We crossed the equator into the northern hemisphere at approximately 0400 hours on 18^th October. We toasted Neptune and thanked him for a safe journey thus far. Hopefully, the next few months will be as good.