In Continuum.

South By South East: The Journey

It started with a Tuesday morning that was completely unexpected. Due to unforeseen circumstances, I had to head down to the Immigration Building to get my passport expiry date extended. There is a new rule in the country that you cannot exit the country six months before the expiry date comes up, which to me is a rule just as unnecessary as banning chewing gums in Singapore. Why give a two year extension, when you are going to prevent people from going overseas within the last six months? Just give us an one and a half year extension, at least that'd make much more sense. That information was fed to me through a phone call by Jonathan while I was comfortably asleep on Monday morning, a day before the trip started. It was already late in the afternoon, and it was about five minutes till the immigration building closes back then. The only option left was to be the first in line on Tuesday morning, get my passport extended and take a cab straight down to the ferry terminal on the other side of the island by nine in the morning. It all sounded like a harrowing task, but a task I was willing to take.

You won't believe the amount of people desperate to get out of the country at eight in the morning. Upon arriving at the immigration building, a line was already formed before the glass doors that acted as the entrance, with the line itself wrapping around the entire building like a giant serpent of sorts. It was a queue that was longer than a line for the Rolling Stones concert, and there I was at the very end of it all, amidst a bunch of foreign workers who sat around with their breakfasts in hand and talking in a different tongue. I was anxious to get my things done as soon as possible, but the queue before me was daunting at best. When the glass doors were pulled opened, the giant serpent slithered through the opening and dispersed inside the building, as if it was being digested by a much larger animal. People were rushing up the elevators, escalators, and were bumping into one another all over the place. I for one, took my time getting up to the second floor where I was met with the Malay lady behind the counter, who had the following conversation with me.

Malay Lady," When is your flight?"
Me," In an hour. It's a ferry actually."
Malay Lady," How old are you this year?"
Me," It's written there, 1986. I'm 21 this year."
Malay Lady," YOU HAVE YET TO TAKE THE OATH!"
Me," Yeah, I know. I have an one year window. I know."
Malay Lady," YOU HAVE YET TO TAKE THE OATH!"
Me,"...I know. I have now till the next August or something."
Malay Lady," YOU HAVE TO TAKE THE OATH BEFORE YOUR NEXT BIRTHDAY!"
Me," Yeah, but that's ten months awa..."
Malay Lady," OR YOU WILL LOSE YOUR CITIZENSHIP!"
Me," I know. I know. Now, about the expiry date extension."
Malay Lady," YOU HAVE YET TO TAKE THE OATH!"
Me," OK. I swear that I have my loyalties for the country, I am not a spy and will not bomb any government buildings because I am a religious extremist. Even if I want to kill employees of a government building, perhaps I will do so only to you by stamping expiry dates all over your face. There, my oath. Now, chop my damn passport and be done with it. I have a ferry to catch."

OK, I didn't exactly say the last line, but that was exactly what I wanted to say as I sat there before the counter, being rudely scrutinized by the lady at the counter. It was as if I was some kind of political refugee, trying to escape the country or something. I WAS trying to escape the country though, but it was only for two days. Besides, if I really want to escape the country, I'm probably not going to end up on an island such as Bintan. The Malay lady gave me the expiry date extension with much hesitance, for a mere six months from my December expiry date. Great. Now, to the ferry terminal we go.


Jonathan was kind enough to meet me in the morning at Lavender, and the both of us cabbed all the way down to the world's end. Now, I know in the last entry I called the Raffles Marina Country Club the place at world's end, but the Tanah Merah ferry terminal is on the other side of the world's end - another world's end altogether. If you think that the Changi Airport is the Eastern-most end of the country, the ferry terminal is even further. It is located in the faraway corner of the island, tucked away like a shameful piece of furniture in your house. On the map, it is merely a dot amidst everything else, and away from any forms of civilization altogether. Our trip there was a fast and swift one, but one with much haste as well. The gates were closing at fifteen minutes to nine, and we only had fifteen minutes to get there by the time we were on our ways. It was a ferry that we had to catch together, and our friends were already waiting at the terminal for us. The female drivers stepped on the gas, and we were flying down the expressway quicker than the wind.

The ferry terminal reminded me greatly of the one I visited for three months in a row back in the army days. It all looked vaguely familiar, with the boats bobbing in the choppy waters by the pier, with the sides bouncing around dangerously. Jonathan and I met up with the rest of the gang, and we loaded ourselves up onto the boat - again, with much haste - and found ourselves seats at the front of the boat. It was deja vu all over again, with the familiar view from the front of the boat and the way the boat felt under our buttocks. Like the Penguin boats that we used to take back to Tekong island with much dread, it was a familiar feeling altogether. Only, we weren't exactly going back to that dreadful place, but to a holiday resort off the shores of Indonesia. The boat even had a little cafe in the middle of it all, and that's something not found on those damn Penguins.

The sea was rather calm on that morning, with the morning sun bouncing off the surfaces and making giant shadows of tankers and other cruise ships in the coast. We were just a small boat compared to those, as one of them loomed up so close next to us that the waves it created threatened to tip us over. That must have been the turning point for Cheryl and Kerri, as their heads started to spin at a hundred miles an hour. Seasickness has never been a problem for either of us, but I guess the waves took their toll on them, as Kerri started puking into the barf bags provided. She must have been the only person vomiting her guts out then, and the lot of us didn't know what to do. Shen bought her a cup of hot tea, while I desperately tried to hunt for garlic pills. But on a passenger boat like that in the middle of nowhere, it was as good as looking for a buried treasure chest in the seabed of South China Sea. Anyway, the girls tolerated their urge to vomit the rest of their organs out, and the boat continued its journey towards the island.

It was almost an hour ride, with Batam pulling up on our right and the rest of Malaysia on our left. Bintan was still nowhere to be seen, but there was something strange about traveling towards the equator. You just feel a little hotter than usual, though much of the prickling sensation must have been due to the psychological effect of things. But the prospect of the sea was appealing, and I pictured the white sands between my toes, purer than the ones at Sentosa. The clear waters clean enough for you to drink - if they weren't seawater - and fishes playing hide and seek between your legs. It was a great way to distract myself as the boat broke through the waves, and it didn't take long for the silhouette of the island to appear in the horizon.

Bintan looked pretty much like any other island that I have been to by boat. Green trees covered the most part of the coast, and it was hard to tell from where we were how different the life on the island is from where we came from. The harbor jutted out from the coast abruptly, a man-made structure out of a natural coast line. The girls were just glad that the land was in sight, while I was in my seat, feeling the heat through the darkened windows and the lack of sleeping slapping me in the face. It was already hard for me to keep awake, but the rest of the trip laid before our feet with much excitement. It took a while for the boat to dock, and when it finally did, the passengers exploded out of the hatch doors like seawater. We were officially on the island, and we were welcomed by a thick smell of the salty waters as well as the scorching sun, signature of the equatorial countries.

There was already a bus waiting for us outside the terminal, and it looked sort of like one of those mini-tour buses rock bands would sit on on their tours. We scrambled onto the bus which was dominated by us for the most part. Eight of us, all friends, traveled down the highway of Bintan at ten or twenty miles per hour over the speed limit. That is how the people drive on the roads of Bintan anyway, always above the speed limit. Like all good tourists would, we started taking pictures on the bus, making ridiculous poses and talked about what we were going to do for the rest of the trip. I tried to overcome my fear of waters, and turned down the chance to snorkel. But everything else sounded appealing, and I threw the thought of drowning out of the window. After all, I was already on the island, and it wasn't so much about "Why" but about "Why not?".

The roads reminded me of the highways in Malaysia, the way it would stretch on for hours without lamp posts along the road. Little cars passed us by for the most part of the journey because of the small population on the island, and it was evident that the island was still very much under construction. It was the closest you can get to the nature despite the holiday resort just around the corner, and the skies looked particularly different in this part of the world as well. The clouds just looked more delicious for the lack of a better word, but that was the first word that emerged in my mind when I first saw them. Yet again, it was probably one of those psychological things all over again.

But it was just a freshing feeling, to know that we were away from our homes on this random trip that came out from a random comment made by somebody over dinner. It was an impulsive trip, with everything pretty much planned on the spot and done out of spontaneity. But I suppose that is the beauty of it all, the way the eight of us arrived at the hotel soon after and checked in. That was as far as the planned trip went to be honest. For everything else after that, we left to fate and our own wild minds to discover and explore.