A Trip To Cherating

A Worthless Week, The Dangers of Blow Outs and a Weekend in Cherating

Just to make it clear, I am working in my job. Just very, very slowly, with ample time for BBC news and Wikipedia in-between the extremely small amount of actual material I’ve been given to do. We are still waiting for the University of Malaysia (eternally inadequate) to get our visas sorted which without means we cannot work on site. Thus we’ve all been stuck in the office since we got here, slowly wasting away into the computer chair. Anyway, to top off the week the rest of the group decided to go to Cherating, a beach resort somewhere on the east coast of Malaysia. I joined them at the 11^th hour as I had originally thought a couple of friends were coming to KL on the weekend, but had got the dates mixed up by a factor of 1 month.

Map of Cherating

Cherating is over 300km away so we fired up the protons, navigated the labyrinth of a road system through KL pretty poorly and headed out on the scenic and at times worrying drive East. A couple of hours later, whilst cruising at around 120kph (about 80mph) the back left tyre exploded, and Keith expertly brought it to a stop whilst the outer exterior of the tyre rolled past our damaged Proton Saga.

One shagged tyre.

A quick change later, and we were back limping along the Eastern road with a severely worn and semi inflated spare.  We probably should have seen this coming considering the amount the car was vibrating on the drive, but it’s such an archaic and worn saga that we didn't realize anything was amiss. Regardless, we’re lucky James knew a bit about cars otherwise the whole procedure would have been a lot more timely and dodgy.

By the end of the holiday we had both cars serviced, putting our minds at rest and we're going to avoid using them on any kind of long journey in the future if we can.

There's always time for a photo

Anyway, we made it to the resort, (8 quid a night, each) and went for a couple of drinks. On the way we had booked ourselves into a Firefly watching excursion, and so we made it down to the riverside and boarded a small power boat. Our guide went on for a bit about some professor then we headed down the river in to the night. The atmosphere was spectacular, with the subtle moonlight reflecting off the waves caused by our boat and the tropical rainforest engulfing us on all sides. A much welcome contrast after the smog and haze dominated atmosphere of KL. 

Stopping intermittently, the guide would use his magic torch to coerce at times hundreds of Fireflies, defined by their bright lights out of the trees and down onto the boat, hovering all around us. It’s difficult to explain it appropriately, and no photos did it justice but the whole experience was most excellent.

On the boat (Stolen from Pooja)

We grabbed dinner, decided to try and scout out an open bar in an effort to wash away the day’s earlier troubles and made it to a bar on the riverside called Little Bali.

Little Bali

The night got pretty hilarious, beginning with dancing in unison to some kind of Asian dance routine with a bunch of locals who didn’t know the steps. Later I was called up (via her eyes) by the singer of the band and attempted some kind of alcohol induced dry humping manoeuvre whilst joining in a duet of “Hot Stuff”, despite the only words I knew of the song being; “Hot Stuff”.  (see photos)

The band was pretty sweet, the drinks were flowing and the atmosphere was bagus.

 Alcohol induced sing along (stolen from Keith)

Later, while chilling in the bar we had previously tutted at for causing so much light pollution against the poor fireflies and overlooking the river we had previously traversed, we laid down some pseudo bets that if someone crossed the river, they’d get 100 ringgit. The river was dirty, dark and full of animals with questionable intentions.

Some of our local Asian friends from the dance floor began to jump into the river and swim about, probably a practiced custom in the bar akin to a dance or a slammer. The next day I would learn that whilst gazing upon one such creature, I uttered the words “I need to caress that fish, like I would a lover” and whilst consumed with jealously at the fun they were having, stripped off, heaved myself onto the bar and jumped into the river below. This is probably standard practice for people who have been tubing, but it’s the first time I’ve ever ended up jumping from a bar into a river on a casual night out. (see photo, courtesy of Keith”)

Jumping in the 2nd time, courtesy of Keith for the expert shot

A few of the other guys followed suit, and before I realised what was going on we were all in the river, embracing our new found Asian friends and screaming the words “1 more time!” at each other.

Anyway, that happened. I mashed up my foot a little bit getting out but not to bad, while Tom slipped completely and ended up smashing his left cheek into the rock face, leaving a cat like paw mark. We all danced a little victorious dance with the other jumpers and  enjoyed a shower from the water running off the roof of the bar due to the torrential tropical rain. A few random guys briefly treated us like local celebrities, getting a few photos with us where I’m sure I look like a grown up milky bar kid gone bad (see photo). Returning to normality, I stripped off naked in the club to get out of my wet boxers and go commando in the shorts, and got a couple more drinks in. Unfortunately alcohol in this country is very  expensive when you compare it to our wage, so a bucket of tiger each had to suffice. 

The only real drawback is that right now I’m living in fear that I’ve contracted some kind of monstrous tropical disease that has yet to show it’s ugly head, but so far so good.

The next day we got the tyre swapped, where the mechanics laughed at our spare when we told them how it happened and the speed which we were going, went for a swim on a pretty beach in the South China Sea, grabbed some food and headed back.

Pretty Beach

That was really long, for the 2-3 people who may have made it this far, haven’t you got something better to be doing? Slackers.

Auf Wiedersehen.