Saturday
19th April, 6.30am
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| A bit of Islamic calligraphy to start the day |
I am
up early; couldn’t sleep a minute longer…I kept having very vivid dreams in which
I didn’t wake up in time to catch the ferry and there were poor tired jetlagged
Nicky, Gavin, Hamish, Angus at Langkawi airport, bereft and abandoned… So I am drinking
a cup of tea and reassuring myself that I am indeed awake and ready to catch the
8.45 ferry!
It took many cold showers, before and after each small bit
of effort, but we are now ready to welcome four Tasmanians onto 2XS. Angus’s bed was a challenge because it was so
loaded with THINGS – a large solar panel, a spare corner windscreen, this that
and the other. It is now, as you see,
ready to receive a twelve year old boy.
He only has to share the bed with spare couch cushions* (large, blue,) a large plastic box containing spare polystyrene beads and a
very heavy box containing…kittylitter**… And over his pillow I have draped,
attractively, a large yellow t-shirt from the Muy Thai competition in Phuket –
surely he will love it, even thought it is made of the most squeakily synthetic
fabric you can possibly imagine?
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| Singapore orchids - why not? |
I see Misty (JunglepathSlasher from SV Tamoure) most days,
but she continues to be my penfriend, by email, which causes me great joy and
mirth. She thinks I made a very bad
strategic error posting that awful photo, close-up, of my tired blue-painted
face…the mystery is destroyed! Well yes
she is right but one of my secret aims with this blog is to be as honest as
possible, and not just to chronicle the happy soft-focus moments… And this
definitely was not a cheery soft-focus moment!
She, on this theme, wrote the following:
We
were once somewhere very tidal where women found it hard to get out of dinghy
and UP THERE to dry land, and I remember the dinghy dock resounding to cries
of: "Push my bottom...!!"
which amused me immensely.
It reminded me of very unhappy times I have experienced over the years
trying to drag myself up into various dinghies without benefit of a
ladder. Oh the indignity…I have had men
drag me up by the arms, push my bottom from below (grunt! heave!), and
generally see me at my most ungainly and undignified…I try never to get into
the water from a dinghy which doesn’t have a ladder!
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| So many technicolour boats - a hazard to swimmers! |
When we were at Raileh (Thailand) I set off to snorkel
along the shore, keeping a wary eye out for speedboats, longtails, ferries,
jetskis. Jabba had been for a little
trip in the dinghy, and he decided to come and pick me up on the way back, so
that I wouldn’t have to keep a wary eye above the water line. This was very nice of him but…how was I going
to get into the dinghy?? I did not want
him to pull me up by the arms, or push my bottom from below… Jabba is such a
nice bloke; he could see the issue and immediately set about fashioning a
foothold out of a handy bit of anchor rope.
I put my foot in it and gracefully ascended with NO heaving or grunting!
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| Jabba |
* Why extra
couch cushions?? It’s not as if we have an extra couch…
** Why kittylitter??
When we were in Cairns we met Tim and Barb Moncrieff (MC Rubicon Star)
from Hawley, Tasmania. They had been on
the Indonesian and Malaysian rallies four years ago and were – reluctantly - on
their way home.
They were very encouraging, helpful and informative, and in fact they
still are – we often Phone A Friend for help and advice, and it is possible
that they will fly to join us in Borneo for the Rainforest Music Festival. One of Barb’s bits of practical advice was to
invest in a big bag of kittylitter, and to place small amounts around the boat,
to absorb moisture in damp times. One thing
we haven’t had much of for the past twelve months is damp moments but…the
kittylitter awaits!
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