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Published: April 22nd 2007
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Sunset on Teluk Nipah
Every evening a wonderful sunset winds down the day of heat. After having seen bustling cities, with its neverending noise and business and having seen highlands of jungle and farming it was just natural to head now to the beach. I was recommended to go to Pulau Pangkor, the beautiful island as the translation sais, which is a favourite with the locals.
It is a small island with one road of 20km circling the island. Molli (a newly found kung fu friend) describes Pulau Pangkor very well in saying that is the most beautiful but also ugliest island that she has seen. I still can not make up my mind whether I like it or not. It has definitely hidden beauties and small dirty but still charming villages.
I spend 4 days on Pulau Pangkor, predominantely going sunbathing, swimming and snorkeling. I have actually seen parot fishes, loads of others as well, which I have no clue how they are called and I have different corals. Unfortunately we had rain at nights making the view within the water only 1m far, sometimes less.
It was a time to recharge by resting, going for walks, fighting with cheeky monkeys - oh and cats for my food. Apparently our guesthouse
Pulau Pangkor living
The island is covered by jungle, leaving a superb cover to local houses and chalets for tourists. keeps about 20 cats... and our cooks food was the best in the village... now you can count one and one together and understand my animalistic protection instinct rising for my lovely food. Nasi Gorengs, Pancakes with honey and bananas, I even had a big crap, crunching every bit to get some meat out and lovely fresh pressed juices that I always welcomed with a big smile on those hot days.
One day, Mollie and I took out a scooter each and headed towards unknown grounds on the island, just to find that we had to head back to the guesthouse as on Mollies scooter the petrol cap was locked. Well with a mighty hump and knock a guy opened it up and we headed back to Shell, enjoying the wind from riding the bikes in this unbearable heat.
Now imagine - green on one side of the road from a lush jungle, sometimes offering sights of monkeys, leguans and colourful birds (one bird in particular, forgot the name but its beak is bigger that the head and alf of the body of the bird, I wonder how the bird keeps its head up, must have super hero neck
Friends
Long days on the beach snorkeling and sunbathing are nicer when shared with multi-cultural friends. Dana, Jana and me (Molli taking picture) muscles) and from the other side the beach with fairly dirty beaches from garbiged that has been washed in but turquoise water. Mh, what more do I have to say - its like being in paradise.
Our paradise dream was once in a while hindered by another sharp turn of the road making us feel very adventurous or a traffic light, just without the light, which were only a few. On one I think we caused mutual disorientation and the locals understood to let us go our way before we cause any accidents. They are very clever I guess - Molly just said: I better not stick to any road regulations or I will cause accidents 😊.
Than we decided to use our freedom to do the most loved activity of women - shopping. A variety of handicraft, clothing and food stalls offer a diverse mix of everything a human being might need. Just one thing seemed to be an act of frustration - finding pants for myself (as my old ones ripped after 3 months constant abuse). I thought that my height would be perfect for shopping in Asia as they are sometimes even smaller (I do
Flower
Beautiful tree flowers all around not lie!). However the Pangkor town market must have sworn not to tailor any trousers that are suitable for my short legs.
All 15 pants that I tried on in the heat, seeing my wet self in small cabin mirrors (I was thankful for those that didn't have any but had a fan on) were at least 10cm too long. It appears that all clothing is one size only, so with all the tall tourists and crafted locals (they must have one of those hand sewing machines that you can buy everywhere, shortening their legs themeselves) I was again a minority. This reminds me of a saddening feeling of when I shop in Europe, that I have to put an extra 10 Pounds on every price of trousers, which will be paid for the tailor afterwards.
Arrived at the last shop I still was keen to find something, but even when the last trousers made the sales assistant smile - I gave up. Too soon though as the lovely sales assistant pointed out that she had one pair that might fit me (she was my size). Thoughts of terribly colourful and wide trousers appeared in my head -
Swimming in Malaysia
Similar as in India, where women go swimming in their whole Sari wear, the women wear all their clothing in Malaysia too. but then she arrived with some nice linen earthy/dark orange coloured pants, which actually fitted. Ah! I could have given her a hug.
Anyway, those are the pleasures of female shopping spries... sorry about that guys 😊. After having shopped and eaten at a chinese stall, we headed further to explore more beaches, when we felt it was time to go swimming ourselves. On the way back we got into school run in Malay - thus you see small children (very cute some with head scarfes as long es they are themselves) riding in front of the parent, behind, sitting, standing, laying... on a tiny motorbike. Amazing, especially managing to get 3 of them on and having the nerve to stare at me - one lone traveller on a big scooter. After exchanging big white smiles, loud hellos and arm waves (how scary, especially when a turning comes).
We also passed some temples, mosques, chinese graveyards (have you seen those, they look like a family grave, very big, round, with small compartment for the family member I guess) and fishing villages.
Overall a fantastic short beach stay, which gave me new energy to travel on and practise some yoga.
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Carsten
non-member comment
Great blog and photos
Hey Ali and Katja, just love reading your blog. So lively! It makes me want to go there too. Have save travels. Carsten