Where's Scott?

Met up with Seb and Mebal in Tawau, and grabbed an hour taxi out to Semporna. It’s great to catch up with Seb, and we jump straight into motormouth mode. Mabel is very shy at my arrival, and I think our coversation may be a bit fast for her English, so she dozes most of the ride.

Semporna is, for lack of a more descriptive (and polite) term, a bit of a dump. Trash is everywhere, but after a while you just stop noticing it. The people here are very sweet. Lots of smiles greet us at every corner. Most of the kids (and there are _lots_ of kids) want to practise their “hello!”s on us, and we’ll call back “salemet pagi!” or “salemet malam!” (good morning/evening in Malay). Semporna’s a small town, mostly apparently on stilts over the water, and Seb and I are very “visible” — it appears that the only non-Malay’s about are from our scuba house, Scuba Junkie (which is also a small guest house), and the local hotel, whose guests don’t seem to make it to town much.

Every bit of streetfront is a shop, and all of them are packed to the gills with “stuff”; there’s no rhyme or reason to it either (apart from the fish/fruit areas), everyone sells whatever they can: candy, shirts, balms and spices, flashlights, soap, anything! Most of the stalls have several people tending them, but there’s almost no aggressive salesmanship, most just wait for a sale (although I see almost no sales or money changing hands). There’s lots of activity and people milling about, lots of colorful clothing, and despite what appears to be a majority in poverty, the locals are all clean and surprisingly well dressed. Just about all are clearly Muslim, the head scarf is pervasive on the women, and alcohol can’t be found anywhere but the Scuba bar and a few Chinese restaurants/market within a few blocks of the Scuba house. The beer is criminally expensive at $2 a can (or 6 ringot, Malay’s currency), and the selection of Tiger or “Carlesbad” only rubs salt in the wound. Seb almost refuses to drink it on principle: bad beer, extortionate prices (…almost means only 4 cans a night)

The Scuba Junkie crowd are a friendly bunch, a mish-mash of Swedes, South Africans, Scots and French. They run a pretty tight ship, and the boats leave and return like clockwork. The other tourists/travelers are an even more mixed bag, many from Sweden, some from South Africa, Germany, Ireland, or Scotland, a few from Singapore or mainland China, but far fewer Aussies than I’d expected (but the have their own dive paradise!). There’s even the odd Californian, the most surprising being one of the instructors, Julie, who went to Crystal Springs for a couple years (meeting someone half way around the world who went to your tiny suburban high school makes the world seem smaller than it should!). Most of the guests are very shy, and only a few are easy to engage for more than a few minutes of coversation — they’re here to dive, and it’s all business!

Seb and I haven’t made any reservations up front, and the “prime” dive spot, Sipadan, is out for the first day — it’s a game preserve, and there’s only 100 visitors allowed each day (and the Malasians, if nothing are sticklers for the rules!). We opt for the “other boat” with goes to a different island each day, and it’s going to Sibuan tomorrow. All the islands look like paradise! No problem!