#Hol horse and- you know what let’s not unpack that

[moonouns]

I love this image set.

Me & The Boys At The Club

[gmtpluseight]

Blowing bubbles

SEPTEMBER

Well here we are. 

Knee-deep in Standard Operating Procedures, post-summer hols back at school, but at least back at school, rather than confined to a wardrobe (admittedly, a large wardrobe) trying to teach virtually, locked-down, doubled down, terrorised by my own children. The horror, the horror. 

Briefly, the Virtual School Experience flickered back to life this week as a local water contamination that affected the entire Klang Valley dragged its heels. The taps in the classrooms sputtered. Talk was we wouldn’t be able to flush the loos. Giant water tankers delivered so much, but not possibly enough. 

The last thing you need during a pandemic: a lack of means of washing hands. 

Thankfully, it lasted a day before it was resolved.

What a summer it was, though. Not the one we expected, although we can’t be alone in that. Instead of returning home, we made a new home, moving from one enormous condo unit to another. Less than 100m as the crow flies. 

Still a job to pack up. 

JULY

We trolley boxes across the basement carparks, dodging speed bumps and squealing slow-moving cars. 

We buy enormous plants at ridiculously cheap prices to pad out the space a bit. 

I spend close to two hours with the owner of our previous condo unit and the housing agents, arguing over imagined damage to the property. 

In the end I win. But everyone also loses. It’s a compromise.

I meet one of the agents later that afternoon out front, jumping into a cab. I need a drink she says. I know the feeling.

In between before and after packing up and down, we master short hops to impossibly beautiful destinations. 

JULY-AUGUST--ISH

We spend several hundred ringgos in Decathlon in preparation. We visit a dive shop in a mall beside a purpose built Scuba diving-training-swimming pool. Two men, one bare-chested, sit at a table beside, swigging from a bottle of whisky. I guess lockdown affected some businesses more than others.

First up, Perhentian Besar, where friends John and Christine make friends with everyone. 

Where the kids take telly breaks inside, sheltered from the lapis blue skies. We use dive mask boxes as crisp buckets. 

I take trips to the peer to eyeball the local triggerfish as it nibbles at barnacles. 

We take a boat trip to neighbouring Perhentian Kecil and walk past one of our neighbours from KL. A storm creeps over the hill as we sip cocktails and attempt to distract the children from their boredom. We nearly get stranded but our boatman basically decides to roll the dice with our lives and before long we’re bouncing off the waves with hair-shredding winds whipping across and sea spray more like shower spray dousing us. No more boats travel that evening as the waves grow even bigger.

THE THIRD TRIP - PENANG

We check in to a lovely hotel with hands-down the most comfortable bed I have ever slept in. Several other friends and their children from KL are all in the same hotel. 

By day we take in local sites along and about the Batu Ferringhi stretch. Penang Butterfly Farm is vast, and predictably, it is filled with butterflies.

It’s also filled with other things.

Spiders, scorpions and a toad, I kid yeeeee not, as big as a melon. Not quite a watermelon, but a very decently sized cantaloupe.

Most of the spiders are behind glass. Amazingly, one enclosure has no glass. Just a big empty space. Couple wispy bits of spiderweb reach right out into the corridor. I practically walk through them as I approach to see what’s inside. Nothing, apparently.

That spider could be anywhere in the entire Butterfly Farm. 

I spend the rest of the visit with that thought on my mind.

By late afternoon/evening, we hit the beach bars. 

The beach keeps the kids happy. 

The bar keeps the adults happy. Everyone’s a winn-

KIT GET OUT OF THE SEA! KIT! KI- 

He’s deliberately ignoring me. He’s started doing this loads.

KIT! KIT! KI-IIIIIT!

Now his shorts and t-shirt are soaking. Great. Soon his nappy will be hanging round his knees, soaked with seawater.

One night, we witness a proposal at the beach bar.

The eagle-eyed can tell something is afoot from the moment we arrive- there’s pink balloons, fake flower petals and candles set out in front of the VIP booth bit. No future groom no bride to speak of yet though. 

Clearly, balloons are interesting to small children.

It’s a job keeping them away from the flower petals too. Let alone the candles. Eventually they start splashing about in the water instead. 

Inside, there’s at least three photographers circling. 

There’s a change in music. 

Someone Has Arrived. 

There’s a general movement towards the balloons and flower petals and candles at which point the children regain an interest in it all. They gambol over in the end-of-the-day, anything could happen, I’m-on-holiday-too and if-you’re-not-going-to-provide-entertainment-I’ll-make-my-own sort of way.

One photographer shoots me a look of sheer, unbridled terror. 

I do my best cat-herding, distract and befuddle the children with a mixture of unfulfilled offers, bribes and bird noise imitation. It works.

Moments later the bride-to-be saunters through with a friend. 

Then, all the bits you’d expect. Hands on mouth. Gasps. Grins. Searching the faces in the crowd for her suitor.

He’s not there.

A band emerges from around the corner. Actually, no, a group of her friends. One has a boom box and they’re all singing terribly, kicking sand playfully and moving slowly. I don’t recognise the tune. But that could be down to their singing.

A few more moments later, and from behind us a horse jerkily walks towards this scene. On top, a man dressed in an oversize Mickey Mouse costume, who clearly has never ridden a horse in his life. 

I’m no Frankie Dettori, but I can tell this guy doesn’t know the front end from the back of a horse.

He struggles to dismount. 

He’s got these giant clown-shoes on and he gets them caught in the stirrups, then his head lolls forward as he tries to look down at the snag. Eventually, he makes it onto one knee. Later the kids squabble over balloons and Kit is beyond inconsolable when they are released to the sky. It’s a clear night, which makes it worse. He watches them sail away for ages.

We while away the rest of the night to the sound of the house band. Two guys. A guitar and a drum set made of old tins, teapots and gas cans. It’s a marvel to behold.

THE FOURTH TRIP - PANGKOR LAUT

Now this place. This place really take the biscuit. 

The last hurrah of the summer holidays before back to work. A private friggin island. When else can I say I have visited a private island.

There’s hornbills everywhere.There’s infinity pools. There’s a massive tree filled with flying foxes that sweep across the sky at night. There’s a little minibus that takes you to the other side of the island, to a secluded bay and another gorgeous beach. It’s simply idyllic.

There’s also a pack of marauding macaques that sniff out the packet of dried apricots that the ants had already sniffed out. Left outside our room door, they come hungry for it. By that point we’d already gone to the beach. The Mutters, next door, hadn’t though. They ended up barricaded in for a while as the macaques descended.

The clientele at the island is not what we’ve experienced so far. Comes with a place like that I guess. Everyone is visibly less patient, less enamoured with and less pleased by our children. I mean. I don’t really blame them.

THE SPUR OF THE MOMENT TRIP / THE THIRD TRIP

Langkawi. Ah, Langkawi. 

West coast beaches are definitely not east coast beaches. But it’s still a giant playground for an under 5. Bliss.

Our hotel has the world’s most incredible swimming pools (yes, pools) with slides and bridges and water spouts and people who give you ginormous towels and a 5 foot monitor lizard, one day, who decided to take a dip.

We watch a parent eagle teaching its young to fly. We watch coconut tree shimmiers machete off coconuts and leaves. We zip off to the other side of the island and Stanley Mutter, aka Crab God, charms the local fauna. Then we go home, unpack, wash everything and start thinking about what to pack for the next trip.