Now everyone can fly !!

In order to get to Sipadan, I was supposed to fly to Tawau, the nearest town to Semporna. But being kiasu and all, I booked for a free AirAsia flight to Sandakan, had paid only RM40 for tax and whatnots. I wonder when AirAsia celebrate their 50th anniversary, will they be giving away 50 million free flights?

With 3 days to spare before my diving trip, I had planned to spend 1/2 day in the Sepilok Orang Utan Rehab Centre and 2 days living in a homestay near Sukau in Lower Kinabatangan. Alas, everywhere around the Kinabatangan river was flooded due to incessant rain. The Gomantong Cave, Sukau village, river confluent, even the forest for crying out loud. Since the bad weather made jungle trekking and river cruising dangerous, and also decreased chances of animal sightings, I ended up spending all my time in Sepilok. So much for spotting a Proboscis monkey!

Stayed at Sepilok Jungle Resort and paid RM18 for the dorm with brekkie (forget bout buffet...just bread, butter and jam). Shared the room with Lisa, Katie arrived later, and there was this other m'am from Brisbane. She was so well equipped... mosquito net, ear plugs (coz the other girls n I were always the last to go to bed), and even a miniature iron!! Like what Lisa said, she doesn't even own an iron at home!! I was lucky to have found companions to kill time with....cause there was nothing to do besides going to the orang utan centre...and there's only 2 feeding sessions per day. We spent most of the time just lounging at Banana restaurant, napping, and maybe 3 hours at the orang utan centre. Must admit that the environment made us really lazy! The most rewarding part (besides seeing the orang utan...ooh..they're so adorable) is learning a few card games and tricks (apparently I can make money from these tricks when travelling in EU later). I played Canasta for the first time with Lisa, Joerg n Steven, am obsessed with the game now !!

Not dat I'm complaining, but I noticed there're always two different pricing for the locals and foreigners. I paid only RM5 for the entrance fee to the orang utan centre, whereas Lisa had to paid RM30. Even on local and express buses, I had inform the bus conducter for a cheaper local rate...everyone seems to think dat I'm jap.

We went for 2 feeding sessions AM & PM at the orang utan centre. The orang utans are such loving and gentle creatures (tho mischievous at times). Cant comprehend why humans are so evil and violent even tho we share 96% of identical genes. Like some stupid tourists who cant even understand simple instruction to keep quiet during the feeding session. I fell in love with a pair of lovely orang utan couple...Romeon n Juliet I think. They were so into each other. Always hugging, arms around shoulder even when they're eating! The orang utans really do have characters. There was a playful fella who tried to shake his fellow comrade off the line when the poor fella was crossing. And we also had a group of models posing in funny positions just waiting for us to take a snap shot of them. Finally when the feeding session was over, a huge family of Macaques consisting of five generations turned up as scavengers and cleaned up after the orang utans.

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