~ journeys end ~
don't they! On returning from Kudat we find a cheap lodging once again in Sinsuran. The room's a small one, not much bigger than a double bed! It's up on the top floor on a corner and next to the toilet and shower rooms. It has lots of fresh air courtesy of a missing window. It's RM20 per night and quiet. The place is a Filipino-run place called the 'Kudat'. It's affordable! And livable. It's 'home' for the remained of my stay...our stay together in Kota Kinabalu.
I continue the daily walk-abouts. We go out to Tanjung Aru beach...cheaply by local bus a couple of times...to break things up. But mostly it's cheap afternoons down at the esplanade fishing with Noni. Kota Kinabalu's not unpleasant but it's become for me, increasingly depressing. It's not a new experience! I've been just recently before Kudat. I don't have too much money left. The realization is sinking in that my journeys are about over. It's taken two rather short months to travel leisurely to Penang and Melaka then on to Sumatra, Madura, and Kalimantan before Sabah!
I reckon I've got about two weeks worth of funds to gently blow before I must leave. Should I try to find a job and stay together with Noni? I have the feeling that it'll probably be a disaster. As a result I don't make much of an effort. I did make it out the university to have a look around though. And I did have an interview at a girl's Catholic school but nothing eventuated. I was relieved.
I'd stopped recording my daily activities and impressions on meeting Ms.Noni. By Wednesday, April 28 however I catch myself writing: “No jobs here. And Kota Kinabalu's definitely worn off anyway. Today buy a flight out to KL for Saturday, May 01. Just enough dosh left to do the new passport thing and find a job in Thailand, or head back again to Vietnam.
I thought, about 10 days ago, “...there are job possibilities here, and I'll give it until the end of the month”...but nothing has materialized! I continue introspectively: "I'm spending considerable energy love-making and combined with equatorial malaise for anything but pfotos this leaves me with absolutely no motivation or energy to write up the events I am experiencing...as I was doing”. “Ill write up later when I'm on my own and a bit more centred and balanced”, I continue.“Killing time in Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok waiting for the new passport I'll have time enough”. “I'll just let the pictures tell the day-to-day story of the second Kota Kinabalu visit”. I then try to analyzing the situation and my feelings: “I'm less at ease...why?”.
“Ms Noni's definitely crazy. I could handle this at first but not so much now...lately I'm becoming more 'uptight' with her...especially her antics in public. Earlier they seemed fun...just frolics! “Probably she's just milking another foreigner cash-cow. I feel like I'm once again just a walking ATM" This is often the lot of a foreigner boyfriend in South-East Asia. But it's unsustainable for this poor nomadic English teacher. “Like, literally, she's eating like a horse and getting fat. And she hasn't had her period like she should have, so could she be pregnant?”. “The old vasectomy hasn't let me down at this late stage, has it?”. "If she's pregnant, well,she was before I met her...on the rebound I think, from...”. To finish up this lone diary entry I find written: “Been in the same room for the duration” as if adding explanation...“Been in the same room for the duration”!
Our well-worn daily routine, perfected since Kudat's been going something like this. Sex in the morning after which we head out to the Indian 'roti restaurant' to start the day proper. I'd spend seven or eight ringgit on roti and kari ayam...my favorite. After that, in the afternoons there's sometimes a short expedition, for example down to the Fish Market or up Lookout Hill overlooking the town or a longer one out to Tanjung Aru beach. On one occasion we just kept walking in the heat of the day into the distance ending up at the far end of the airport runway. On the way back though, we sat and ate and drank at the very pleasant mid-beach restaurant.
Most days we'd have a bit to eat above the day market down on the front followed wiling away the afternoon at the 'new' esplanade'. Planes taking off from Tanjung Aru climb over the city banking out to sea overhead. Noni always yells out to them "Bye, bye, babe". I'd think, yeah, I'll be up there in a couple a days time not sure whether to laugh or cry!
Noni fishes with some line and hooks she finds. I hang around observing the sea and the waterfront. Evenings are always spent at the Filipino Night Market eating cheap delicious fish or my favorite terangbulan. We'd then buy our cheap Filipino cigarettes and wander back to the lodging for an ice-cream at one of the convenience stores along the way. Back at the room I'd upload the days pfotos and together we'd look through them together, Noni seeking faces and animal shapes in the clouds! We're generally asleep by 10!
Kota Kinabalu has delicious sunsets. Everyone who's visited Kota Kinabalu has surely witnessed tremendously colorful skies in general and sunsets in particular. The esplanade's excellent with it's offshore islands and cloud-banks just above the horizon. Another great sunset vantage point is on Lookout Hill. The special thing about sunsets from up here is that the town's buildings many with lights already on are silhouetted! Nature is to the fore on the walk up from Merdeka Park. Freedom...Independence...
On May 01 the Sabah journey comes finally to an end. I've got to leave! I take what little I've got...and freedom. It's out to the Air Asia terminal at Tanjung Aru by local bus in lots of time. Noni comes out with me. I leave her sitting outside the terminal while I check-in. She creates a big mess around where she's sitting...litter, plant material, cigarette butts. There's a trash container within easy reach. It's her way of showing that she's sore at me for leaving. It gives the cleaners a sense of being needed. The supervisor even comes out. They seem to feel sorry for her, understanding of her 'plight'. Eventually she walks off about 30 minutes before my boarding time. She's got five packs of the cheap Filipino cigarettes and RM50 I could afford to give her. I stare after her with a numb feeling, moisture in my eyes. So that's that! I had been dreading a big scene. Emotions boiling over...And journeys begin ~