Mabul, we didn't expect

day 8 1, May

Last day on the Mabul Island.

As is always the case, divers get to know each other, and exchange information. 2 people on the same diving team told us that you can go walk on the island. One of them ( an intelligent couple from KL ) told us that the inhabitant of the filthy village is either Indonesians or Philippines, but definitely not Malaysians. I was very curious what was going on the island, since it was very obvious that 100 meters away, economical difference is 10 times or more. On the water village, people spend US$ 200 per night, and just over there, US$ 200 seemed like their annual income.

Well, so we went , off the water village and into the Mabul Island. I left everything in my room so that I wouldn't get robbed.

Ok, so this is what the people on Mabul Island is seeing everyday. Their house = a boat ( which probably is a residence for more than 6 people ) and the water village that we'd been staying at.

Kids everywhere. Some kids had no clothes on.

One of these kids came up to me and said, " hello, money" while sticking his hand toward me for money. I just had to tell him the truth. " I don't have anything", but my husband did. He happened to carry a small bag of snack with him. Kankichi gave that small bag to a small kid. Small kid seemed to be very very pleased, but he only had that bag for about 5 seconds. The bigger kid took it from him...

What do the parents do for living ? They seemed to be fishermen, wives tend to be a sales women at their own shop like this. If you are wealthy enough, you'll get to have a shop like this, and sell shark's bone, sea shell, and corals. Yes, CORALS ! It seems as if they broke the corals just to sell it here. One European guy who was on the same diving boat was furious about this fact, but these people got to live, right ? It may be better if someone told the village people that divers are not interested in purchasing those corals, instead divers want to see them underwater, so start selling something else !

Total spent time in the village: approximately 20 minutes. I couldn't bare being there longer.

After coming back from the village, we packed our diving gears and got ready to leave the island. We did a good job in packing that we started to drink in the bar while waiting for the boat to pick us up.

We got to talk to the bartender (whose always very busy at night) . He told me that he was from the Philippines, and some of the other members of the staff were, too. Most of the staffs are from Malaysia, and some are from the Mabul Island, but not from the village we'd visited. He said that there's a decent housings ( where he and other staffs live) on the other side or the island and even a school.

We left the resort with great memories of diving, but a bitter feeling lingered. Living on a paradise island that divers dream of, is not necessarily a paradise.

Mandarine Fish !

27,Apr.-30, Apr.

Diving, diving, diving ! Every day, we went for

• 2 Sipadan dives ( about 30 minutes boat ride from Mabul)
• 1 Mabul boat dive
• 1 buddy dive
  We saw many interesting stuffs. Kanichi took a lot of pictures, so here they are.

my all time favorite: Porcupine fish, but be careful, this cute looking creature can bite off your finger if it wants to! Mandarin: famous for its' authentic colors. They lived in a particular coral close to the dive center. We buddy dived every day, just to get the picture of this small quick moving creature. There were about 5 or more Mandarins in one coral. They come out around sun set for matings. Don't know where they are at day time. Does any one know ? They are about 3 cm, very small. You'll be needing a good lighting system and a macro lens to get a good shot of it.
Barracuda: always beautiful, the school in Sipadan was bigger than the ones I've seen in Palau.

Bump Head Buffalo Fish: look at them ! a big school of them with their teeth showing. We saw them at the " Barracuda Point ". There's always something exciting going on at the point.

Flying Gurnard: looks scary, but an interesting specie.

Ghost Pipe fish: Oh, we were so lucky to see this one ! Can you see it's face ?

Pygmy Sea Horse: this one, too. Very lucky to see it, and so cute ! It's really tiny, like the name tells you.

Sipadan is not a big island, but you'll get to see a wide variety of animals there. One guide told us that he'd even seen a Whale Shark. Actually, when we were there, some other lucky guys had seen the Whale Shark. Whale Shark was around the " South Point", and showed up for consecutive 2 days. Hmm... we never got to see it there.

If you want to see more photos , go to Kankichi's Picasa album.

Compliments are welcomed.

http://picasaweb.google.com/ksaito30/MabulSipadan08GW

Sipadan Mabul Water Village

day 3 26, Apr.

Tawau. 45 minutes flight from KK. You'll get to see Kinabalu Mt., and endless palm tree plantations from the sky. I read somewhere that planting palm tree which produces palm oil is popular now, and they took over the rubber tree, which Malaysia used to be very famous for.

Again, another 1.5 hour drive from Tawau ( middle of nowhere) to Semporna. The resort that we were going to stay: Sipadan Mabul Water Village picked us up.

http://www.swvresort.com/home.cfm

then the 1 hour boat ride...
On our way, we saw cottages built on corals ( I think).
I was thinking... " OK, it's bit different from what I had expected ", thinking that the trip to Mabul would be like a boat ride to a resort in Maldives where you have a nice looking cruiser and well dressed captain, but every staff wore usual t-shirts, nothing special.

Just as we were reaching to our resort, I saw " Sea Venture ", right in front of our resort. It was originally an oil dig, now it's a lodging. I woudn't call that a resort. Sea Venture doesn't seem like a great place to stay, but as a dive point, it was great. Many things to see, big and small.
Finally, our resort " Sipadan Mabul Water Village"A lady explained us about the resort in strong accent, and off we went serching for our cottage.

Our cottage... cottage... where's our room ??? Sipadan 126, 126... It took us about 15 minutes to get to our room, I needed a bike. The resort next to us " Mabul Water Bungalow " was very close from our room and they had bikes, they even had a cart like the ones you use in golf courses. ( bit too much for a resort )
http://www.swvresort.com/resort_layout.cfm

I would say S109 - S111 are the best rooms. Great view, and still close to the front office, restaurant, and the dive center.
We had our first dive ( a check dive) right away in front of the dive center.

Our room was nice and tidy, 270 degress ocian view, spacious and the bathroom was clean.

Ok, just a check dive... but I enjoyed it, 2-3 lion fish, porcupine fish, black spotted puffer, and all. Kankichi didn't take his camera with him for his check dive, so no diving picture for the day.

KK River Curise

Day 2 25, Apr.

1 full day at KK.

In the morning, we spent an hour or two, walking around the market. There was a big Spearfish in the middle of the street. I found out that this was nothing unique to KK, the very same Spearfish was in the middle of the street of Semporna. I wonder what it means...

The KK market was full of interesting stuff. Spices, fish, vegetables, not so many people though.It was a hot day, and very good day for drying fish. Hmm... do the cats happen to test the tastes of these fish before we eat ? Seemed like no one was guarding the fish.

Good for drying the fish, and so were we.... dried like a beef jerky.

Time for refreshment ! We headed back to our hotel. Massage !

We booked a package course of full body scrub and oil massage for about 1.5 hours, 496 Ringet (approx. US$ 150 ) for 2 people. Not cheap, but the room was neat, and my massage was just what I wanted, not too strong, not too weak. I'd say it was worthwhile.

Not having enough time to have our lunch, we headed to the main event in KK; the
Klias River Cruise Wildlife Excursion.

I booked it through the inter net. ( Japanese page looks fine, but the English page is too simple)

http://www.borneo.org/jp/tour_top.html (JAP)
http://www.borneo.org/ajwt/ajb4(b)05.htm (ENG)

We were supposed to see a Proboscis Monkey (they are interesting looking), and Fire Flies.

http://www.proboscismonkey.org/

We were the only participants from the Borneo.org. , so we hopped into the old van for 2 hours (!) drive.

When we finally reached the small port, it was dogs and cats. Good thing I brought my Aigle water resistant jacket. We found out that we were not the only participants. There were many people of different nationalities there.

So, we went into the river.
What's funny is that you are supposed to be in the middle of mother nature, but you get to hear typical city noise like motor bikes, and old ladies yelling. So, will there be any monkey in this river...?

Yes ! You see, I kindly circled around Proboscis Monkey, so that you don't have to put your face into the PC screen.

For divers who are used to being close to what you want to see, this river cruise wouldn't make you happy. The monkeys ( at least on the day I visited), were very far away.

What I did enjoy were the Fire Flies. I had seen Fire Flies in Japan, but only 10 or 20 of them. The Fire Flies in Borneo was bright, and with overwhelming volume. ( no photos, since it was too dark) The Fire Flies seems to like particular type of tree, and they gather in the tree, which forms a great volume of light, just like a Christmas tree. That's something worth wile to see, even if it costs 230 Ringet per person ( approx. US$ 60), and have to bear 4 hours of drive.

I slept like a baby after we got back to our hotel at 22:00 pm.

Just before I went to bed, I had placed my order for the room service, so that I don't have to miss my breakfast before we get on the plane to Tawau next morning.

Room service... I love room service ! Even if you haven't got dressed or combed your hair, you are entitled to eat ! So, here it is, me and the room service breakfast at 4:45 AM.

KK & Chinese food

Day 1; 24, Apr. 2008

Nagoya to Hong Kong (CX)
Hong Kong to Kota Kinabalu (KA)
Stayed at Hyatt Regency Kinabalu Hotel

It was Thursday, I and my husband Kankichi had started our Golden Week just a bit earlier than the fellow folks who are working.

First day of the trip... flying flying flying.
About 4 hours to Hong Kong, 1.5 hours to KK (the 2nd largest city in Malaysia).

I always enjoy flying with CX; Cathay Pacific. Their aircraft carries small screens on every economy seats, and you are able to choose whatever movie you want to watch.

KA; Dragon Air on the other hand, was an OK airline. KA is supposed to be a subsidiary company of CX.

It took us more than 40 min. for a transfer in Hong Kong. We had to line up in a very long line of happy looking Japanese who just started their holidays. Other than that, everything went fine.

Hyatt Regency Kinabalu Hotel is in the very center of the KK.
Le Meridien KK which is about the same price range seemed bit nicer, meaning new.


http://www.kinabalu.regency.hyatt.com/hyatt/hotels/index.jsp


Having stayed in a comparatively expensive hotel, we chose to have our dinner in a cheap restaurant. We went to " Fatt Kee ", a local favorite Chinese restaurant on JI Pantai. The place was full of Chinese Malaysian. If you don't mind one or two hair in your meal, this is a place for your dinner. Cheap, delicious , exotic. They do have an English menu, but the explanation wasn't good enough. If you can't read Chinese characters, just go point the plates someone else is having and say "this one ". Tofu clay pot was my favorite dish, great soup and very healthy.




left: vegetable of Sabah, center: tofu clay pot, right: spicy fish


While I was having my dinner there, I searched around "Fatt Kee" for some intellectual stimulus. As an HR specialist, I can't stop thinking " who's responsible for doing what, who gets paid more, what makes their pay different ( relying on customers' tips, boss' decisions, or may be nothing at all and all the employees' motivation is as low as a birth rate in developed country excluding France; a country of romance) ?"

It seemed "Fatt Kee" has a very strong hierarchy. The lady who takes the order can speak English and is the one who takes care of checks. She wore a slight make up and had a neat T-shirt on. Other ladies wore filthy T-shirts, no words uttered, no motivation at all, slow motion, no expressions. My guess would be that those other ladies would not get any pay raise, they'll be working for low cost forever, which is very sad to see.
Malaysia has been under the Bumiputra policy ( an affirmative action for the native Malaysians), and it seems that Chinese people here aren't as powerful as they are in Thailand.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumiputra

On our way back to the hotel, we stopped at "Seven-Eleven", a convenience store, which we Japanese are very familiar with. We bought some beers, but I'm telling you, DON'T.
1 can of beer was 8 Ringet ( about US$2) . If you go to a supermarket where the locals shop, it's 3.4 Ringet.

About this blog

I always think that blogs offer us the best travel tips.
My blog will contain tips for people all around the world who happens to plan a trip to wherever I went.

photo credit: marukichi, Maldives

Photo copy rights are reserved by Kanichi and Mari Saito