...of fishermen & smugglers in Lanunland

I am sure there are plenty of people who are like-minded, who chose not to travel during festive holidays where the highways are jammed up, the airports, hotels and resorts both in the highlands or at the seaside are overflowed with homo sapiens. My son has been asking me, intermittently...dad, are we not going anywhere? and I said firmly NO! Then yesterday evening I thought...hmm...why not take a quick day trip to a place not soo far away? I browsed the internet to read what residents of this crappy island (Pulau Ketam..heheh) described themselves...hahaha...according to the island website...their main preoccupation are fishing and smuggling. I like that smuggling bit hahaha. Anyway, the last time I was there, we got stuck for a few hours at Kampong Lima with a lecturer from Nottingham in 1990! Little did we realise that the next boat or ferry was hours away, there wasn't a single soul around and that the only way to the actual pulau ketam is by boat! Both these places were separated by mangrove swamps! luckily a malay fisherman in small boat offered to send us to Pulau Ketam proper! OMG! the place really hasn't changed much since.

This morning, I looked like a white man ('Kwailo' as they say in Hong Kong hahaha) during the heidays of 'Plantation Malaya' in the 1930s...wif my white polo t-shirt, khaki shorts, white socks and a pair of yellow adidas track shoes. (more like a Japanese tourist actually..haha according to my wife!). And most oustandingly, was my australian riverine guard hat I bought in Freemantle in 2005 for RM550 (bloody expensive mate!)...and o ya clad in my latest golf agent XXX type sunglasses heehee.

I spent the whole day today at Pulau Ketam with my smuggler Teocheow, Hainanese and Hokkien khakis...juggling cautiously amidst the mangrove lybyrinth of lanunland at an alarmingly treacheous low-tide situation...I take my hat off to the taiko who navigated us safely out into the open sea back to Port Klang...Thank gawd I survived to blog you that experience hihi....

Oh I forgot ... incidentally that boat could probably be owned by the German Secret Service...heheh (note the word HERR on the name plate!...hahahahahahahahaha).