Across the South China Sea - Sabah, Malaysia
Growing up, I had visited most of the Peninsula of West Malaysia, many times. All the night markets, from the highlands to the islands, all the states, hopping from one family household to another. I love West Malaysia, I have so much fondness for the place and it is the closest place to what I can call a second home. However once, I crossed the South China Sea to Sabah, East Malaysia.
I had no words for it back then, but now, I think, if I had to put it in words, I'd say that I was profoundly moved during my stay. That it was there where in I experienced the Ethereal. The unforgettable.
There was the rainforest and a kind of heat I cannot even begin to explain properly. There is shade everywhere, absolutely everywhere, trees that go on forever and a sky reduced to a distant memory. And you are still, you don't move, not even to breath and your pores are crying, crying from an incredible heat that cuts into the body. All this and you are still waiting there, waiting for those Orangutans to emerge – a species so close to human and yet not.
There was a Buddhist temple with white steps that went up and up and up, and from the top sea view that open up and a glimmer under the horizon. There was a wooden restaurant by the water, food that crackled with spice and the chatter of Malay-English-Mandarin-Cantonese-Hokkien-Hakka absolutely everywhere. Tongues here were jacks of all trades, transitioning from one word to the next with a fluidity I couldn't help but envy.
There was a downpour that couldn't even be called rain, as if God grabbed a bucket filled to the rim with water and dumped it all over the country. There weren't even droplets of rain to discern from one another, just water flooding everywhere, all evening and all night - a steady rhythm that accompanied late night movie rentals, and a beat that lulled you to sleep.
Then there was the morning after. There was my father, a tap on my shoulder: "Wake up" he mouthed and threw open the window. Are there even words to describe such a sight? The world was knife-sharp and crystal-real, yet strange, almost foreign, all at once. As if it is impossible for the world to look that beautiful in reality. A green that was greener than green, the sharp dew smell of forest and grass, the open sky an impossible pure blue, flowers that glittered under the sun like jewels and the air - so pure that breathing in and out was like a cleansing ritual. The world was a wonder and all of a sudden a small thought cut through me as it whispered: "I will never see anything this beautiful ever again."
To this day, years later, I still hold this to be true. If you ask me what I think of Malaysia, I will say I love it, it's so much fun and has some of the best cuisine in the whole wide world. But if you ask me about my thoughts of East Malaysia, I will say: "There is no place like it in the whole wide world."
- Li Yuann Chua
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