13 FEB 09

After a tense 48 hours last week wondering whether or not the snow would lift enough for Heathrow to begin operating like a normal airport again, Mum and Dad walked into the Arrivals Lounge of Kota Kinabalu airport.

The last eight days have been so busy that I've not had time to write anything, but I'll highlight a couple of our momentous points before the cafe who's internet we're using closes. It's just taken Dad over an hour to type three emails because he's not used to this laptop and has been repeatedly deleting and re-typing them. At least it's nice and warm outside; I imagine that sitting outside a shop at midnight typing an email in England is the last thing most people would be doing in the current weather situation.

Today we visited Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre. For me this was the third trip in seven months, but orangutans never get old. Well, they obviously get old but not 'old'. Mum and Dad loved it (I think), and we watched several orangutans feeding on the specially built platform.
There was a young orangutan who seemed intent on winding up the adults in any way he could. This started with a mild pestering of his mother when he'd had his fill of bananas . Not getting anywhere he opted for swinging away from the platform along the rope, designed to protect the nearby saplings from the hungry mob twice a day, and bounding back onto the platform to stand over 'Mum' expectantly. Seeing that 'Mum' was still engrossed in her fruit-feast he chanced a tug at her fur, which resulted in an unimpressed look and Mum turning to face the other direction. The little one then turned to face Dad who was concentrating on a particularly juicy looking piece of lunch and climbed on top of him. Dad shook him off and gave him a very definite 'Do that again and I'll clock you one' stare. He went back to hang around on the rope for a while before getting fed up and swinging over to wind up a family of macaques who were patiently waiting for any leftovers from the great ape feeding session.
The next time I saw him swing into view he was holding a branch twice as long as he was tall in his left foot and trying to maneuvre back to the platform with his prize. I'm convinced he wasn't trying to be awkward, but like so many small children his intentions went misunderstood, and hitting his mother on the head with it whilst trying to drag it onto level ground didn't go down very well. She grabbed him by the arm and wrenched him back to a behaving, sitting position. Sulkily he snatched an entire bunch of bananas and retreated to the rope with the bunch grasped in his feet.
The 'eyes-bigger-than-stomach syndrome' soon set in though and he flumped down next to Dad in search of attention. None came his way, so he started poking his father. This, understandably, was as appreciated as accidentally hitting his mother on the head with a tree branch and resulted in a wrestling match with Dad, who must have been at least four times his size and weight. As we left, the little one stood up looking very proud of himself and probably would have been able to walk away with his head held high, but he chanced one last swipe at Dad and the fiasco recommenced, just as the park closed and we were ushered away from the feeding area.

The jungle's been flooded since the day Mum and Dad (human versions) arrived and it's been touch and go as to whether we'll be able to get there or not, but fingers crossed...

24 JAN 09

I've been in Kota Kinabalu for a little while now, a city in the north of Sabah. We've got deadlines and things looming, so we're here to use other people's internet connections, laptops and houses, although there was a little confusion about that to begin with.

On arrival in KK we were met by our friend Farina who's been keeping an eye on Boss Benoit's house over Christmas. Chloe and I could become joint Queen of 'The Land of Confusion and Misunderstanding', because we'd asked if we could stay with Farina, who we thought was staying at our Boss' house. She wasn't. So we ended up living there on our own. Naturally, Benoit was a little surprised to find this out, but he kindly let us stay and water the plants anyway. Just as well really as I'm not up to date with current squatters' rights in Malaysia.

Since then we've swapped houses, been to the jungle, returned to the city and swapped houses again, but it's not worth going into details! For the last couple of days however, someone has trusted me enough to drive their pick-up truck when we need to. To be honest I'm quite amazed, but very grateful as the house we're in is a little way out of town. There are, of course, several differences between driving a 2006/7 Toyota Hilux 4x4 in Sabah and driving a 1965 Austin A35 van-conversion in Dorset, and I'll try my best to summarise them...

1. Morphology (to use a biological term). The Austin is simple. I know where the handbrake and indicator switch are - they're in the right place; on the right and in the centre of the dashboard respectively. The Toyota prefers to conform to modern social ideals with a handbrake on the left and the indicator switch on a stick. A stick which I've been known to confuse with the windscreen wiper controls so that the wipers go into overdrive when all I really want to do is turn left.
2. Size. Ozzie the Austin is small. He's a van, so larger than his saloon counterparts, but he's small all the same, and that's marvellous for fitting into tight parking spots in Bournemouth. The Toyota is not small. Driving the Toyota feels like driving a tank, although I'm assuming that the Hilux is easier to maneuvre than a Challenger II. The saving grace is that the roads themselves also seem to be wider and longer, so relatively speaking I suppose there's no difference.
3. Other drivers. There are bad drivers everywhere in the world. The thing to adapt to is the different types of bad driving. In Vietnam it's the 'stop for nothing and no-one approach' that worries me. They swerve around obstacles forcing the person behind to swerve around them, which forces the person behind to swerve around them and... you get the picture; it's one big swerving mess. In the U.K. it's the combination of impatient drivers and those with such a lack of common sense that I'm sure if somebody were to remind them that they were in a moving vehicle they'd probably take the central reservation out in surprise. Here, and this is a generalisation based on my journeys to date, there seems to be confusion over the purpose of indicators. I'd been under the impression from a very young age that indicators were there to indicate, or signal, to let other drivers know what you're about to do. It's an ingenious concept which has the potential to stop people from crashing into each other when changing lanes, overtaking, leaving roundabouts and joining a main road to name but a few. Yesterday I was amazed to find that not only do a lot of people ignore the little sticky-out thingy that produces orange, flashing lights on the side of their car, but some go as far as to put the bloody things on after the event. We were forced to screech to a halt on a dual carriageway by a car with one headlight making a U-Turn into the fast lane we were travelling along. The daredevil Perodua in question very nearly entered in a puff of smoke with a loud 'bang' as accompaniment, but another plus point for the Toyota is that it has very good brakes. Anyway, the point is that this guy only decided to indicate once he'd joined the flow of moving traffic and I'd recovered from my semi heart attack.

The fact that I don't know the city very well hasn't caused too much of a problem. We've had a few hiccups, like a 12 mile diversion to Tuaran and back and driving around the block three times to find entrances to places, but other than that it's not been too bad, thanks to Google Earth which is always consulted before setting out. Last night I was on the verge of being lost (or at the very least confused) when I drove through a tunnel that we certainly hadn't encountered on the way out. 'Ah well, tiada masaala, pas de probleme, no worries!' I thought as I joined a queue of very slow moving traffic. I always think too soon.

A gaggle of policemen were pulling over cars of their choice into a little coned-off area at the side of the road, and of course they chose me. 'Okay, calm, I have my licence, insurance documents and a small amount of Malay to work with, just don't panic!' I muttered to myself, or Chloe, whoever was listening. I rolled to a standstill next to a slight but intimidating man in a blue uniform and wound down the window. Except that there's another difference between and A35 and a Hilux - the Hilux has electric windows and the switches are all next to each other. And it was dark... so the driver's side rear window opened perfectly and the wall of glass betwen me and the unamused policeman remained firmly in place. I smiled apologetically and pressed the other switch. I still wasn't able to talk to the policeman, but there was a nice breeze of fresh air flowing through the newly created thoroughfare between the rear windows. Oh dear. I eventually found the correct switch and handed over my documents. Not entirely sure what they were looking for, and trying to salvage what I could from the situation I thought I'd ask for directions for a particular road. The policeman looked confused, said 'yes' and waved me on. I don't think he could be bothered with the stupid tourists anymore...

...I'd only gone and asked him for directions to the road we were travelling on!