(Daniel) This morning I woke up and decided that I have had enough of this place. I finished packing the Wolf, and cleaned the house before locking the doors. I checked the map and put the destination in the sat nav. By the time I had finished packing the vehicle and locking up it was lunchtime.

I drove back down the beach, and stopped at the same restaurant as last night, wanting to see the girl from yesterday one more time. I ordered my food, and then ate the food which came, which had nothing to do with what I had asked for! As I went to leave, Nick phoned me, and we spoke for a while about what had been happening here. I told him about my exasperation at not being able to talk to anyone, and the surreal way that I had gone from instant popularity, to instantly being ignored. As I spoke I noticed the girl watching me, and when I said goodbye to Nick, she asked to see my phone. When she gave it back I could see that she had put her number in and her name, Zi. She was She had done this in full view of the rest of the staff in the place, who I took to be her family, and I got the feeling that it was they that had told her to write the number in my phone. I was torn, leave now and never see this girl again, or stay one more day and see what happened.

I decided to stay, after all I had left the key in the post box, and that would be easy to retrieve, I would need supplies though, beer for a start, and food. The nearest proper town was Kuala Terrenganu, about 30 minutes drive away. I decided to go there, and jumped in the Wolf and headed down the coast road to the town.

When I arrived, I found the Chinese area, stopping first at a hardware shop to buy a Parang, the Malay version of a machete. It is very big and heavy, with a handle like a gun, ideally suited for cutting bamboo, which I got a feeling I might see a lot of in Cameron highlands. After this I found a Chinese shop and bought some biscuits and a crate of beer. I asked the young guy behind the desk if he spoke Malay. Which of course he did. Then I asked him to write down a list of phrases which I gave him, everything from I am going to Cameron Highlands tomorrow, to you are very beautiful. Then I asked him to type some texts for me, which he did. I got no reply, which seemed ominous, but I thought that perhaps she was busy or had no credit. Then I went to the shopping centre, a simple place and bought some fishing supplies, and a few DVDs, they didn’t have a selection so to speak, only some Manga films, and a couple of horror movies in English. I bought some of each and then walked back to the car to head back to Batu Rackit.

When I arrived at back at the house. I took out my laptop and set up some music, then I got the candles out from the trailer and made the place look nice. Once everything was ready I called Zi. She answered eventually, and we had a very surreal conversation. I think that her whole family were stood around the phone, and every now and again, the conversation was drowned in the giggling of several people. I realised then that these Orang Campong or village people were too old fashioned for me to expect Zi to be able to come out. And so it was that I sat alone in the house, wrestling every now and again with phone conversations which I couldn’t understand or be understood in. Eventually I went to bed.

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