Hello Kitty, Hello World!

Nevermind. Inside joke. I didn’t get the memo about the incompatibility of inside jokes and blogs.

I’m sitting next to Aussie Matt and German Patrick in the awesomely named Genesis Internet Centre in Kota Kinabalu (KK), Sabah, Malaysia. That’s the main city in the eastern part of Malaysian Borneo to you.

The three of us are safe and sound after our short and sweet Air Asia flight this evening from Johor Bahru (the Shenzhen of Malaysia just across the Singapore border.) Predictably, we ran into four other NUS exchange students at the airport who were also on their way to KK. Rather than hang out with that group, we ran away from them as fast as we could. Don’t get me wrong. They’re perfectly nice people; but they’re also going to be joined by another 8 exchanges for their Mt. Kinabalu climb. You read that correctly. 12 Western exchange students travelling together in Borneo. That they’re even interested in travelling as a group of 12 boggles the mind. At least, it boggles our minds.

The hostel I booked for us is cozy, clean and cute. www.borneobackpackers.com It’s pricier than anything Matt and I have stayed in in Malaysia but we’ve accepted the fact that Borneo is generally more expensive than the peninsula. Still, we can’t complain since my complaining to the administration of the hostel secured us a private room with air conditioning.

That’s a story for you. I went through all this hassle to book a triple room for tonight and a quad room for tomorrow to make room for Dirk’s arrival. Yesterday, when I tried to double-check the confirmation on our booking over the phone, the receptionist says, “Oh sorry. The triple room is full. Not available.”

I’m like, “Uh…I just talked to someone this morning and she confirmed my bookings. How can the room be full? I didn’t make alternative arrangements since I was told that I would definitely have the triple room for Thursday night.”

Customer service reps don’t like to mess with me when I’m being polite, but firm. Maybe they can smell the future lawyer in me. 😛 Right away, she says, “Oh I see…hmmm…okay, okay…okay! It is okay now. The room is free. You have a triple room.”

I have no idea if she booted people out of the room to accommodate my group or if she was lying through her teeth before; but either way, when we arrived, we found ourselves staying in a room with 3 bunks. That’s enough sleeping room for 6 people, but only 3 beds were made just for us. *shrug*

If my experience in Malaysia is any indication, someone else got screwed over because I insisted on getting my fair end of the deal. Oh well.

After checking in at 9 p.m., we went on a hunt for food. Since I’m travelling with men who are all over 6 feet tall and with amazingly fast metabolic rates, food hunts are bound to be frequent and urgent. We ran into a few touristy spots that reminded me of Kuta, Bali. As we walked into one such area with loud, obnoxious 80s style cheesy rock, I said, “I bet that the others are here.” And voila, the aforementioned exchange crew were downing a few icy Tiger beers right by the stage. We exited stage right and found a little local purveyor of a Malaysian Chinese beef stew called “bak kut teh” that tasted like “dong kwai.” This reminded me that I haven’t smelt nor tasted the stuff in years.

We are planning to go to Tanjung Aru tomorrow to relax and enjoy the ocean. I love me a good beach. The waters around this area are supposed to be beyond gorgeous. It’s actually quite sad that we won’t be venturing to the famous island paradises nearby to check out the sea life. (Google Mabul and Sipadan.) With only one week for travel, some tough choices had to be made!

Saturday , we head to the Kinabalu National Park where (duh) Mt. Kinabalu is located. We’ll check out the many offerings of this natural UNESCO World Heritage Site before starting our ascent on Sunday. That night, we’ll stay halfway up the mountain in an unheated(!) lodge of frozen discomfort. Monday, we leave before dawn and head to the summit to catch the sunrise before descending.

Tuesday, we plan to take a ferry to Labuan island (a weird little tax haven) and then transfer to another jetty to the capital of Brunei.

Thursday, we fly back out of Kota Kinabalu to Johor Bahru (the Malaysian city just next to Singapore) and head back to our home in the S’pore.

I’ll update you as I can! Send me some loving. I’ll need all the prayers, good vibes and words of encouragement especially when I’ll be clawing my way up the mountain in an altitude sick delirium.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 15th, 2005 at 9:37 am and is filed under Travel, Wheee!.
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