May 19, 2005

taman negara - 05

[020205] back into e world of ringing handphones, blaring radios & noisy TV sets =| unloaded all our barang onto e floor of Lia Restaurant, & exhausted their supply of ice once again by ordering mango shakes....

back at Ekoton chalet, e staff were kind enough to let us bathe there even though we had already checked out e day before. to speed things up, some headed downhill to e green-roofed public toilet that has shower facilities too. while showering, e cat washed a bee out of its hair....have this feeling that e fella had been stuck in there alive all this while, until it drowned on contact with e lethal combination of shampoo+water.

left Ekoton chalet for e last time with a bunch of guys yelling behind, 'Why you leave without me??'

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Park HQ + Mutiara Taman Negara Resort jetty. there are signs all over stating e charge of 50 sen per person for e crossing between e Park HQ & Kuala Tahan sides of e river by boat, but none of e boatmen collected anything from us, nor were they seen collecting any payment from anyone else?

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to remind drunk tourists where they are?

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boats grounded at Kuala Tahan at e end of e day, which explains e next two photos....

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playing poker, writing logs & watching TV to pass e time while waiting for taxis to Jerantut, as all boats had stopped running for e day. by now we knew practically everyone in Lia Restaurant who appears in this photo, as well as e fish in their fishtank....

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sun getting low in e sky behind Simpang Tualang

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looking down Sungai Tahan, Simpang Tualang on left. perhaps should head down this river to Lata Berkoh falls on e cat's next trip here?

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Kuala Tahan beach clean-up crew, which also keeps e grounds of Ekoton chalet relatively litter-free.

two taxis finally showed up on e Kuala Tahan beach after unloading tourists who had just arrived from Jerantut.

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got into e taxis, & then got out of them again, as they had trouble making it up this slope leading uphill into Kuala Tahan proper. plenty of oil palm estates & one police roadblock later, we were back at Jerantut station. had 7+ hours to kill before catching e 2.30am train back to Singapore, which were eventually spent at a seafood restaurant with many many cats for company & a lot of cat poison on e table, & then at a kedai kopi with bottles & bottles of Tiger beer. once again, one of e Europeans tried to order beer in a Muslim-run establishment....!?!

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how to koon on e edge of a longkang without falling in, as demonstrated by one of e Jerantut train station cats. e cat likes Malaysia because there are cat friends everywhere, & people's idea of making a cat go away is to feed it until it is full & satisfied & moves off to find a place to nap, rather than hitting or kicking it out of e way =)

found some space to sit/sleep on e floor of e station platform - seemed as if e streets of Jerantut were so quiet at 2am because everyone was waiting at e train station. a KL-bound train came & left, & then another KL-bound train came & left....& came back again....for some unknown reason, much to e bewilderment of both e passengers on board & e station staff. before we could find out why, e Singapore-bound Ekspres Timuran pulled in about half an hour ahead of (Thailand) time, & we were finally on our way back, leaving e KL-bound train & its puzzled passengers behind.

[ filed under: thewanderingstraycat + taman_negara_2005 + cats1 ]

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