Bangkok, bad weather, changed plans and a hunt for sunshine!

So we had half term recently, and a few girls and I decided to go to Bangkok for 3 nights and some islands near Phuket for 3 nights. We booked it (80 quid for all flights!!) all then checked the weather reports and discovered it was still monsoon season in the Andaman Coast, which is where Kho Phi Phi, our ideal destination, is. Eek! We thought we’d go for it anyway.

Bangkok apparently is like Marmite – you either love it or you hate it. I loved it! Luckily we went with someone who used to live there so she was able to show us the best places to stay, eat, go out etc and we ended up in a really cute guesthouse in a cool area known as Sukhumvit. We basically ate lots of good food, had thai massages, looked at amazing temples and shopped (or attempted to shop in my case). The Grand Palace is out of this world…seriously one of the most amazing places I’ve visited – we spent 4 hours (in the flipping hot sun) just wandering around it and saying “Amazing…” a lot. The shopping…well there’s this huge weekend market with over 6000 stalls. Perfect for shopaholics! I lasted about 10 minutes then found a café to sit down in for 45 minutes.

So after our lush 4 days we boarded a plane to Phuket with the intention of getting a ferry to Kho Phi Phi asap so as not to spend long in Phuket. I’d heard it was pretty hideous and can confirm that it is a complete dive. It’s like the Benidorm of SE Asia! I don’t think I’ll be going back any time soon! We ended up having to spend a night there as missed all ferries. However as it turned out we arrived in the middle of a very bad storm! Further investigation revealed that the whole of Southern Thailand was enjoying this lovely storm; we weighed up the pro’s and con’s of spending 3 days on a tropical island in the pouring rain and gale force winds and promptly changed our flights back home.

And so found ourselves back in KL searching the internet for rain-free beaches within easy reach. It seemed that every good beach/dive site was covered in thick, black cloud! But within 6 hours we were on a night bus headed for Mersing on East coast of Malaysia, where we then took a ferry to Tioman Island. And guess what?? Sunshine! Hurrah! The next 3 days consisted of sunbathing, eating, snorkeling, diving and card games. Happy days! Tioman isn’t quite as beautiful as Perhentian, but it’s much cheaper and the diving was slightly better. I did a brilliant dive around all these boulders and there was one bit where we swam into a cave bit at the bottom then swam to the top of it to get out…it was JUST like Ariel’s trinkets cave in The Little Mermaid! I had a singsong to myself.

Have a look at the photos on Flickr (link above).

In other news…my class are finally beginning to ‘get’ me and are talking a lot more, which I’m thrilled about! They’re really cute and I’m enjoying the class a lot more now! We’re trying to get Wake and Shake going in school and I’ve found myself leading whole school dancing 3 times a week (inspired by you Miss Dixon!)! We’ve got a Deepavali (Hindu Festival of Lights) celebration day coming up and the staff (well, the cool members of staff) are learning a Bangra dance for the celebration assembly – it’s SOOOO cool! We’re also getting our own Punjabi costumes made for us and we’re going to get some of the parents to henna our hands – SO excited!!

Outside of school everything also good…lots of attempting to keep fit. I’ve joined a gym and have even been to it a few times (they phone you if you haven’t been for a while!). We’ve found some cool dance classes to go to. Eating out a lot as I’m lazy and I don’t have lovely housemates to cook for me, but I tell myself it’s ok as eating out is very cheap, and food from the supermarket isn’t! Getting bitten a lot by mosquitoes no matter how much repellant I use! Flat is finally tidied and sorted ready for visitors so get out here! Going shopping today to ‘Megamall’ – think Cribbs x 10. Wish me luck!

Coming up…a trip to Sumatra to go on a jungle trek and up a volcano or something – I don’t think I’ve read the itinerary properly but sure it will be fun (sweaty, but fun!).

Take care y’all!

Jen

Perhentian Islands

Just got back from a few days in the beautiful Perhentian Islands, two islands off the north-east coast of Malaysia. There are photo's on my Flickr account which you can access following the link above. It is an amazing place, and made me remember why I decided to come to Malaysia. Don't get me wrong, I love living in KL, but sometimes in big cities it feels like you could be in any city in the world, and it was brilliant to get out and see a bit more of Malaysia. I went with a friend from work, and there was another family from work staying there at the same time. Me and my friend Amy decided not to fly; it's a short journey and you have to do your bit to help the environment! It would also involve a 1 hour taxi ride at the other end. Instead, we took the night bus, which took about 8 hours and dropped us right outside the jetty in Kuala Besut, the nearest port to the islands. From there we took a 'ferry' (not the kind you would imagine, more a boat taxi) to the small island, Perhentian Kecil (literally 'small perhentian'). We stayed in a place called Impiani on Petani Beach. The journey back was worse, it took 11 hours and meant I was 1 1/2 hours late for a party that I had already paid for! But it was worth it.

We spent a lot of time on the beach snorkelling, sunbathing (for about 30 seconds then moved to the shade) and generally relaxing. The snorkelling is amazing; some say you will see more snorkelling than diving because the visibility gets worse deeper down. The whole island has a 'no fins' rule when snorkelling as they are trying to protect the coral reefs. If you didn't know, corals take years and years to grow and can be destroyed instantly by people clumsily bashing into them. Also the rising sea temperature is bleaching and killing more corals, so it's more important than ever to take care of them. The islands are trying to be very conscientious about conservation issues. There are turtle sanctuary's all over the place and you can even volunteer to help out, which I may do for a week soon. Turtles and their eggs are hunted by the Chinese for use in their medicines and most turtle species are endangered as a result, which is awful because they are amazing, graceful creatures.

I did some scuba diving whilst there, at a place called Universal Divers on the large island, Perhentian Besar. They were fantastic, really friendly and helpful. I did 6 dives over 2 of the days we were there. I was worried about my breathing as in the past I have been known to use up my oxygen really fast, but I got a lot better here. The water is very calm and easy to dive in, there is rarely a current so you don't use much energy once down there, you just float about. Maintaining your balance is easy, which is good because again, you don't wanna bump into any corals (or worse, scorpionfish, stonefish or triggerfish which can get a bit cross if you get too close!). I saw some amazing things, the highlights being a green and a hawksbill turtle, but more than that I just loved being underwater again! Our dives were really long (longest 59 minutes) and it was absolutely fantastic. If you haven't tried scuba diving yet, you HAVE to have a go! It's amazing just swimming around in a completely different world full of the most colourful and graceful creatures.

The best thing about this place is it is literally jungle and beach. Nothing else. No roads, no cars, no giant buildings. There is one tiny fishing village and everything else is dive centres or accommodation. You can only get around by taxi boat, no one ever wears shoes; it's pointless as you are always getting in and out the water. It's just fantastic and whenever anyone comes to visit me I'm taking them there! Have a look at the photo's, enjoy and thanks for reading! Back to work tomorrow so better go and do some prep! xxxx

New school and stuff

First week at school!!! The kids, or ‘learners’ as we are encouraged to call them, are lovely, very very cute and extremely quiet but luckily I do have some crazy characters so I won’t get bored! I have 21 now, the biggest class in the school (how is that fair?!) but I’m not complaining (much – I would have preferred a number which had more factors but there you go). They are very polite and call me Miss Jenny, which gets me every time as I try to work out whom they are addressing.

It’s so funny as we’re really cold in our classroom because of the lush air conditioning, but step outside for even a second (the building has open corridors, so no roofs and sometimes only 3 walls) and you get a nice sweat on – luckily staffroom etc are quite close to my room so I avoid the beetroot look most of the time. I don’t actually know how the kids run around at playtime – but they do somehow! Most of them support Man U, Liverpool or Barcelona – the really well known teams basically; no local teams for them to support so we’ll let them off. They love a kick-around on the boggy (and I mean boggy) school field.

Most of the children are Malaysian (and there are Malay Malaysians (mostly Muslim), Indian Malaysians (Hindu) or Chinese Malaysians (Christian or Buddhist)) or some Korean, and there are a few Americans, English, Australian etc. It’s great, the majority speak fantastic English (unfortunately in American accents), as well as Bahasa Malay, Mandarin, Korean and/or loads of others. Many of them have lived in different countries for long periods of time as they come from families of diplomats or businessmen.

First lunchtime duty was interesting – half an hour out in the sun with no shade = a very sweaty Miss Jenny. For that reason I will dread Wednesday’s forever more! Everyone is expected to lead an after school club and I opted for photography (as it's indoors mostly) but then the head of PE asked me to lead Secondary Netball...! I agreed, but only if my Photography club proves too unpopular to run as they are supposed to be on the same day. As you can imagine I am canvassing for support for my photography club so as to save myself from more outdoor exposure! Hopefully I will get a lot of kids and escape!

Anyway school was great this week, but it will take a lot of getting used to as the kids are different - they don't seem to get my (ahem) humour. As you all know, I was hilarious in Bristol, but it seems I'm not funny in Malaysia...booo! There is literally one kid who laughs at everything I say, whilst everyone else just stares at me as if I'm mad!

The staff are lush and great fun - we went to a champagne brunch at the weekend, a first (but definitely not a last) for me. We do a lot of socialising, got water-skiing on Putrajaya lake coming up and also a possible staff trip to Borneo to stay in the Jungle with the Orang-Utans. Also made some friends from the bigger international school in KL who live in the same Condo as me. They're all lovely and we have enjoyed a good few meals out etc (eating out is extremely cheap)!

Loads of time off school here - today is Malaysia Day, then next week is a 4 day one and I have the whole of the following week off for Hari Raya (end of Ramadam and the most important festival in the Muslim Calendar). Me and my Garden (the name of the other school) friends all planned a holiday for Hari Raya hols - booked it and everything - then when discussing our impending trip we realised that our school had arranged for their holidays to be in different weeks so I couldn't go - they're off next week!! Hideous. You'd have thought we would maybe check these things but apparrently not. So I'm probably planning a diving trip on my lonesome for Hari Raya but I'm not too fussed about that - desperate to see a bit of Malaysia!

Anyway better go, I get the feeling I'm rambling.

Hopefully will get internet access at home soon and will also get pics of my apartment up here.

Thanks for all your lovely messages!

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Blog that I wrote ages ago but have only just posted.

I wrote this blog after my second week in the hotel but have only just managed to post it as I only have internet at school at the mo and try to spend as little time as possible there! Got a day off today (31st) as it's the Malaysian Day of Independence - borrowing my friend Jill's dongle to get back on track with the old blog.

I’m finally out of the hotel and into my lush new apartment!! It’s beautiful but expensive. I have to keep telling myself that the equivalent in London would cost an awful lot more! There's a lush swimming pool, tennis courts, table tennis room, sauna and gym (as you can probably guess, I have only frequented the pool so far). Lots of my new friends live here as well so it's a very sociable place to be. I’ll put some pictures up here when I have some and when I know how, and then I won’t have to explain it all.

Something much more amusing to talk about is the fact that Malaysia’s Biggest Loser was being filmed at our hotel last week!! During Ramadam which seems a bit harsh!! It was quite funny being sat at the pool when suddenly loads of large kids come rushing over to swim a few laps followed by an angry personal trainer shouting at the top of his voice and an entire film crew – I beat a hasty exit before said trainer started on me as well.

Also of interest is the first proper thunderstorm I’ve witnessed. In fact I think all the other ‘storms’ I’ve ever seen in England have been fake, warm-up storms. I’ve never seen anything like it! It’s like someone has just turned on an almighty tap onto full power and the plumbing’s gone bad. And the lightening is IMMENSE. Brolly’s are useless in these situations I’ve discovered, as the rain practically demolishes them and you get completely soaked anyway. The weirdest thing is it’s even hotter when it does rain, so storms don’t have that clearing the air effect that they do in our more temperate climes.

Starting school on Monday!!! Will let you all know how it goes! xxxxxx

Week 1 done!

Well it's been a crazy week! There's lots to talk about; first impressions, school, flat hunting, making friends! It's pretty late and I have to work 9 - 5 at school tomorrow (unheard of in teaching! ;-) so may keep this short, but so far so good, I'm loving it, not had a hint of homesickness yet (but I know I will at some point and probably the things I will miss will be a) PG tips with proper milk b) being able to walk outside without turning into a shining red beacon c) my friends and family (obviously!).

So I arrived on Sunday afternoon after a pretty good flight (watched Iron Man 2, Toy Story and Date Night) and it turned out that the people in front of me on the flight were also teachers, one of them in my school and two from our partner school, which is WAY bigger than ours. Got picked up by the head of primary and the principal and taken to the hotel which is very very nice, met some other new teachers as well which was cool. The school is lovely, very big but not many kids yet as it's only 2 years old. They're currently building a boarding school which is quite exciting, maybe an opportunity for getting involved in that in the future. Everyone at school very nice indeed, all up for a laugh and in the same boat so we can get to know the place together.

Our hotel is quite far out of KL and we've been at school every day so haven't actually managed to see much of KL so far but I have been briefly to the Petronas Towers Shopping Mall looking for a cheap mobile - it's HUGE and TERRIFYING if you don't like shopping!! And I must admit I went in, found the relevant shop, made a purchase and legged it - I'll go back again soon and do the touristy thing tho! Also explored Bangsar (an amazing place full of modern and old shops, restaurants and all sorts), Chinatown (again, great markets and eateries, and this crazy place where you pay to put your feet in a pool which has these fish that EAT the DEAD SKIN from your FEET!!!! Singularly the most hideous yet hilarious experience ever) and a place called Petaling Jaya (lots of restaurants but not much else). I've been out a few times and most importantly met loads of people from our partner school which is great for my socialising and potential future holidays. SO much more to see and can't wait til I move to Mont Kiara next Saturday to be closer to the centre (have an apartment but more on that next time).

The people here are lovely, there are a mix of Malays, Chinese, Indians, Philipinos and Expats from all over the place and everyone seems to get on with their own lives, despite the many different religions. I'm sure there are underlying tensions but as a whole everyone seems very tolerant of differences and it really is a melting pot. Everyone speaks English and the other common languages are Bahasa Malay and Mandarin. Not sure if I'm going to learn one, I know I should but...how difficult!! Things happen a lot slower over here, for example a drink can take about half an hour to arrive in some places, but it's all part of the laid back attitude and it's definitely something I'm going to have to get used to!

Weather: it's hot, there's no denying that. VERY hot. After 5 minutes outside about 80% of people will be sweating. I guess you do feel constantly dirty and minging but actually it's a lot more manageable than I expected, and after the cold aircon in every building it can be a relief to come outside and feel hot. The temperature doesn't seem to change that much whether the sun is shining, it's overcast or raining, but I did get sunburn today despite being in what I thought was the shade the whole time (!). A record even for me.

Things happening next:
1. a week of 9-5 inset days on curriculum, planning and preparation, and meeting all the existing staff.
2. moving into my lush new (and hideously expensive) apartment.
3. a few more formal parties.
4. a few more informal parties.
5. more explorations (desperate to go to the Aquarium or Zoo).

Thanks for reading see you next time!!

Jen xxxxxxxxxxx

Not left yet...

So, lots of people suggested I start a blog to share what I get up to when I make the big move to KL in August so here we go! Obviously not going to properly start now because nothing has happened yet (apart from the pre-departure panic and risk of tears at any given moment!) but am having a go to make sure I can use one as I won't have a Miss Dixon to ask for help out there!

Anyway will not bore you with the exciting details of packing and preparing, but if you did want to keep in touch and see what I've been doing, then have a little look on here every now and again - I am hoping I will get a hectic lifestyle worthy of not being able to post blogs that often!

And come out to see me if you get the chance (or meet somewhere in between)!!!

Jen x