Malaysia Trip

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We got up early in the morning on 9/2 to catch the cab to the boat station to the Perhentian Islands. Apparently people don't wear seatbelts in the back seat of a car in malaysia, and the cab drivers just drive flat out. It is pretty incredible how they can weave through oncoming traffic in the right lane to pass anyone going less than twice the speed limit. Most people drive motorbikes, so the cars drive down the very center of the road to avoid the bikes on either side which are traveling much slower (in the country) or faster (in the city) than the cars. When 2 cars come up to each other head on, it's sorta a game of chicken to see who will pull to the side of the road and let the other through. We took the aptly named "slow boat" to the islands. We could clearly see our destination for the entire duration of the 2 hour boat ride. The boat looks like some sort of fishing boat from early last century, and I doubt it has had much mantinence since. There are 4 high capacity bilge pumps working all the time to keep it afloat. Apprently this is the normal course of operation. I saw several other boats doing the same thing. I would think the bilge pumps would only serve as a safety net to give you time to run the boat to shore if you were taking on 200 liters of water/minute, but I guess not. We stayed at the Flora Bay resort and I took 2 chartered boat dives (with a guide). The first dive wasn't so great because I was just getting used to diving again (it has been a year or two since my last dive) but the second dive was absolutely awesome. I saw hundreds of types of corals, and tropical fish. There was a huge school of gigantic Bumphead Parrotfish (about 20 of them, each 3-4 feet long) which swam in a circle, each taking one bite of a large flat coral each time they swam by. They devoured the entire thing in a matter of minutes. There was also a massive stingray. One of the divers I was with had an underwater digital camera, and I will post the pictures from the dive when he sends them to me. The whole stay for 2 nights, and 2 dives cost only about $50US! I am thinking about possibly returning for more dives later in the trip, but there are still so many things to do....