Snapshots of Life!

Veni Vidi Vici

Nobody grows old merely by living a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. ~Samuel Ullman

My job at MindValley involves a lot of web copy writing (I'm still working on it!) and once in awhile, I gain inspiration by looking at other material available on the web. This particular quote struck a chord with me. Especially since I'm at a life stage where I want to do everything and am realizing that I may not have enough of me to get it all.

Anyway, this blog entry is not about growing old - but more about my very recent trip to Langkawi.

It's Thursday today - I just got back from Langkawi on Monday night. Longest freaking bus ride ever (8.5 hrs) because the bus driver was showing old horror films like SharkMan. It's a stupid show, don't watch it. Being in the second row, I could hear every dialogue and scream. Ughs.

Still, Langkawi was amazing! I'm a wee bit crispy right now -- glorious sun and sea!

See All Pictures Here >>

Here's a little recap:

Day 1 - Arrive at a town ferry terminal at 6:30am after a 7 hour bus ride from Kuala Lumpur. We get tickets for first ferry leaving for Langkawi at 7am! As we arrange for the pick up on the arrival side, I'm told our hotel reservation does not exist. Bleghs.


Take a cab to the hotel - thankfully they find our reservation. We get checked into an apartment suite with 2 gorgeous bedrooms. Our hotel resembles a pink cake with too much icing as decorations. Ooh! But there's a gorgeous pool (reputed to be the longest swimming pool in Malaysia). I see kids everywhere...

Rent a car (note: Proton Kancil) and Andrea becomes the driver while I act as co-pilot. The roads all lead to one another and there aren't very many roads for us to get lost on anyway. Stupid Kancil gets stuck between gear shifts. I swear the car was straining to take our weight or something.


Explore the western end of the island - lovely Harbor with yachts. Quite surprising since I never knew the island was popular with the sailing peeps. Proceed onto a waterfall which has 7 natural pools. We climb too many stairs getting to the top. My butt hurts from the serious exercise.

The waterfalls are beautiful! We are at the very top and overlooking the western part of the island. Even better were the pools...since the rocks were smooth, we could slide from one pool to the other. Wee!


Head back down to the cable car ride. Spectacular views of the island! Coming back down was not too fun though - i couldn't look down and had to stare off into the distance to stop thinking of the height.


Seafood dinner where I get to demonstrate my crab crunching and eating powers. Jana is a fast learner and very efficiently gets all the meat of the crab claws. German powers! They have to be so fast and efficient with everything they do! heh. I lose control of my crab claw and it flies into my lap. :(

Night drive is scary - roads are pitch black so I turn on the Nightfocus in my eyes and attempt to spot water buffalos that might be crossing the roads. We manage to find all the turns and get home safely to the pink icing cake...oops...I mean hotel for a good sleep.

But not before a mini drama:
Some dude thinks one of us has a husband who has rented his motorbike and not returned it. He calls us 3 times demanding to speak to someone about the motorbike and when he doesn't get a response, comes banging at our door at 1am looking for this person. I was thankfully in dreamland by then, and being a heavy sleeper...quite oblivious to everything.


Day 2 - We get up for an early brekkie and do a coastal drive to the opposite end of the island. The Black Sand beach is a disappointment...thanks to Andrea's quick observation...we realize the slightly polluted looking beach we pass by is the famous Langkawi black sand beach.


We find a lovely stretch of beach which is literally empty save for an Open House for some local wedding in the area. The beach has even been levelled by a bulldozer based on the tractor marks on the sand. Some guy in purple/white comes out to us and very nicely informs us that the beach belongs to Four Seasons Hotel, and we have to leave before we disturb the non-existent hotel guests on the beach.

Undaunted, we walk pass the boundary line and settle on a spot not too far from the wedding but close enough to the gorgeous waters and white sand. As we lay there in our bikinis, I wonder if the wedding guests think we're crazy since we're wearing very little clothing compared to them. I find more sea shells for my collection at home.


Noontime, we head to the ferry terminal to get tickets back to the mainland. The Kancil starts to really squeal and strain with every mile. Andrea notices smoke and we stop the car...only to realize the left tire is burning. Oops! Call the car rental company and finally get a mechanic to come "tow" the car after speaking to everyone at the rental shop.


By now, we're running late for our island hopping trip by 30 mins. Thankfully, Malaysians are very relaxed and so we get to the boats to find a monster sized group waiting for us. Lovely...proceed to board the speed boat where we spend the next 3 hrs at a beach, a lake and feeding eagles! The eagle feeding was amazing - i mean, you get to see these birds a few meters away! So they were picking up chunks of chicken and not live fish but that was cool nonetheless.

The best part was that it was raining really heavily on Langkawi when we were out island hopping...so we got lucky with the rain. :) We head back to the hotel for a cultural dinner only to find there was no cultural performance.


We wrap up the evening at the hotel pub called "D Enigma" which was playing really cheesy love songs from the 80s. The crowd starts coming in at 10ish pm...and an Asian dude tries to get Jana to dance with him. This guy needed a serious lesson in picking up girls - all he did was go up to Jana...without introducing himself or saying hi, grabs her hands and tries to drag her to the dance floor. She wrestles her hands out of his grip and he stands there holding one hand insisting on a dance with her. Suffice to say, Jana is a little traumatised by the "not-so-smooth" approach by this guy and we leave the pub to chill in our rooms with the TV. :P


Day 3: Some duty free shopping - a full bottle of Absolut Vodka is only RM 42!!! That's only US$11.60!!! Even though I'm not a big fan of vodka...I prefer baileys or khalua...I wish I had smuggled another bottle in for a party that has not taken place in the near future.


This pretty much sums up the weekend in Langkawi. It was Thanksgiving at about the same time - usually spent in Chicago at my aunt's place. While I did miss the Thanksgiving shopping this year...this island trip more than made up for it! I can't wait to head out to Bali in Jan... :)

posted by Li'er @ 6:24 PM