March 15, 2012
The food that was offered there was identical to those of many other eateries that I had my meal with, but then again I couldn't ask for more and ordered this Nasi Goreng (Fried Rice) with a piece of fried chicken wing.
Thirty minutes later it was time to move and I made sure I had set the direction right, towards Kuala Terengganu. As I drove on the route AH18 highway, I saw a signboard stating that the Cherating Beach was just one kilometer away, since I was so near I figured that I might as well just revisit the place. (I was there in 2011 fishing trip.)
The wind here was super strong but too bad it's blowing towards the land. The South China Sea was rough and the wave was strong. I didn't fish here due to this rough condition and I was still recuperating from the morning session.
I remembered that during the 2011 trip the weather wasn't this bad although I had came during the same period of time which is in the month of March. What is happening to this Earth? Could it be the "El Nino" effect?
Continued my journey towards Kuala Terengganu and stopped by this place called Geliga, which is a small coastal town not far away from the Chendor town. During the 2011 trip I stopped by at this place as well and had done some grocery shopping at a supermarket here.
This supermarket at the Taman Seri Geliga saved me quite a bit of money and they contain many items, from tooth picks to gas stoves and fresh seafood to canned food. I got myself some Instant Noodles, Shampoo, Soap and a pack of Butane Gas Cylinder for my portable stove.
Friends always ask me this question, "How come you are not afraid of roaming around at those unfamiliar places whereby most of the time it is the place that is majority Malay races. A Chinese guy going into their territory alone, what if they found you intrusive and felt offended? What if they attack you?"
I don't blame them for their shortsightedness as most of my friends in Singapore here have the perception of the Malay community in Malaysia not liking the Chinese. I do not disagree with them either as there are some racist people around. But most of the time or I should say, every time when I was visiting a new unfamiliar place alone, be it a Malay majority or Indian majority, I had never once encountered hostile treatment towards me and sometimes I even got new Malay friends which would offer to show me around or bring me to their secret fishing spot.
But then again respect and mutual understanding is a must when you are in someone else territory, you need to have some basic knowledge of their culture and never mess around with their taboo. I do have a advantage of being able to speak and understand the Malay language.
This eatery here were selling home cooked dishes and white rice. I browsed through the dishes and decided to had some fried chicken meat and a sambal fish (chilie paste fish), the soup was FOC though.
The Mak Cik here were very friendly as they kept asking me,
"Masih lapar? nak nasi lagi? (Still hungry? Want more rice?)" they sat just right beside my table and repeatedly asked me if I wanted more rice.
This was because when the first plate of white rice was served I emptied the plate in split second and the second plate didn't last long as well.
"Dah! nasi cukup. Kak, Ais Limau lagi satu! (Rice is enough. Sis, one more Lemonade!)" I replied as I finish off the last piece of the chicken meat.
"Nak pisang? (Want bananas?)" When she brought the lemonade to me she asked.
"Boleh juga! (Also can!)" The morning session at Chendor must have took away most of my energy, I felt like I could finished off everything they had here.
So the total damages I caused were, a plate of fried chicken meat, one whole Mackerel fish, two plates of white rice and two glasses of lemonade. Oh ya! two more bananas after the meal.
I guessed the Mak Cik must be wondering how a slim guy like me could stomached so much food. I was very satisfied with the food and I believed this friendly atmosphere played a big part on my huge appetite.
While I was resting after the meal, a Pak Cik (Malay uncle) came sat beside my table to have his lunch. When he had done his meal I politely asked him if there is any good fishing spot nearby. The Pak Cik wasn't really into fishing but he told me that right behind this housing estate there is a beach named Pantai Teluk Mak Nik, he suggested me to go there to find out.
I followed his instruction and found this place but I decided to give it a pass. Reason No.1 was the place looked very new and the beach doesn't seems natural, it could have been reconstructed with new sand that was brought in from else where. Reason No. 2 was I started to feel tired and was thinking of finding a cool shaded spot to have a rest.
I went on to search for a hide out and came upon this shop at Kemaman, the shop has a garage which stored a few fibre boats. Out of curiosity I stopped by to find out what was inside the store. It turns out that this shop is doing boat renting for fishermen, the shop owner told me if I wanted to he can arrange a Tekong (Skipper) to bring me out to good fishing spot. The rental for the boat is Malaysia Ringgit $120 not inclusive of the petrol, another $40 was needed for the Tekong (Skipper), the Skipper would accompany me for a full day session which was twelve hours. As I wasn't very keen on the boating at that moment and I was travelling with a budget, so I told the shop owner I would be back some other time.
As I moved on I spotted a stall at the road side selling some local snacks, it looked identical to the Otar or Otak-Otak (Toasted Spicy Fish Paste in Attap leaves) that we normally eat here in Singapore.
They used the same kind of material for the wrapping, which is the Attap leave. The one which is different in shape is called Satar, it is wrapped into a pyramid shape and I guessed the name Satar came from the English word of Star. They did sell the Otar as well. I ended up bought both items for my tea break.
It took me around one hour to reach this place, which I discovered it from the map. The place is called Teluk Kalong and it is another man made rocky beach.
I trailed along this rocky path towards the far side and ended up at the outskirt of a construction side. Bulldozers were busy scooping up the sands and rocks onto the trucks, the fully loaded trucks were then driven over to the shore line and unloaded, some road rollers could be spotted as well. It was a very busy work site and it was super noisy, the coast line was disturbed and I could see the nearby sea water was quite milky. Well, maybe I should came back in the later date when this newly reconstructed coast line had settled down.
It was around 3pm and I was reaching to a point that a rest is a MUST. Found a spot which was shaded with some trees and huge rocks were placed here, it looked like a resting area made by the construction workers. I was too tired in both physically and mentally, without thinking much I parked my car there and parked myself into resting mode...
An hour later I was woken up by the heat and my shirt was soaked with my sweat. Gees! I was smelly and sticky. Although it was quite windy here and the place was shaded under the trees, somehow the tropical heat still manage to find it's way to warm me up. Oh! for your information, I locked myself inside my car and the car windows were left with only a one inch gap, some safety precaution was needed anyway.
Sometimes back during one of my fishing trip I bought a five liter bottled Mineral Water, after it was finished I kept the empty bottle as I figured that this five liter capacity bottle could be useful somedays. It was made into good use on that day, it had been filled up with tap water at a petrol station in Johor Bahru. I took the bottle out and with the newly bought face tower (from the Geliga Supermarket), I cleaned up myself from head to toe.
The one hour short rest was really helpful as I felt energetic again, the wash up with the tap water soaked face tower was an added bonus, my body temperature was cooled down almost instantly. Alright! It's time for another bonus. I took out the flask that contained boiled water which I refilled it from the Geliga Malay Eatery, (it was free!) made a cup of the energy boaster "Renggit White Coffee".
It's Tea Break Time!! The Otar and the Satar I bought from Kemaman were ready to be served.
I started off with the more familiar looking Otar and it did feel the same as I unwrapped the Attap leave, until....
Some brief introduction on this local delicacies. The main ingredient inside the Otar is fish meat, as for what kind of fish used is unknown for this one here, mostly it is the Mackerel that is used in Singapore. The fish meat will be grind and marinated with numerous of local spices, some flour is added too. It will then wrapped with the Attap leave with two small bamboo picks to hold them together, next it is sent for toasting.
P.S. Many different version of recipes can be found online, some using Coconut leave instead of Attap leave and some stressed that the Banana leave is the best.
The first bite was shocking! It was a completely different taste from what I normally tasted, this was a SWEET Otar! Although that I had discovered the people here at the North-Eastern part of Malaysia preferred sweeter taste in their food, but I never expected this traditional Peranakan delicacies to be modified into a dessert! And the best part is IT IS NOT SPICY at all! Weird....
My new friend, Ah Huat the three legged goat was attracted by the smell of the Otar, so I gave some to him...
It seemed even Ah Huat also disliked the sweet taste as he spitted out the Otar and ran away, probably went to search for water to rinse his mouth.
I proceeded on to the next snack which was the Satar. The fish paste was white and it was almost certain that this Satar would not taste hot as well. True enough after the first bite it had no chilie added at all, but this was much more tastier than the Otar as it wasn't that sweet. The fish paste was soft and smooth, you don't need to chew on it because it virtually melted inside your mouth.
The extremely sweet snacks I took made me super hyper, I packed my stuffs and carried on exploring which ended up at this place called Pantai Penunjuk.
The weather changed again without any given notice. Dark clouds were looming the whole sky and the pacy wind was pushing hard onto the sea surface, it thus created strong wave which smashing as hard as it could on to the beach. This place was a lot more rougher than the Cherating beach. Gosh!
This beach stretched some five kilometer and is joined with the Kijal beach
The wave swept in continuously on to the beach, it's getting higher and stronger too. I did have a urge of setting up my rod here as I ever read a post about "How storms affect fishing"
The author explained that, "As a storm system approaches, a low-pressure warm front rides up over the top of a high-pressure cold front, causing condensation to take place in the form of clouds. During the time the skies are clouding up, and right on through to the end of the storm, there is a slow and steady drop in barometric pressure that increases as the main body of the system approaches. Once the main body of the storm hits and moves through the area, rain, winds and sometimes thunder and lightning form along the frontal line. The pressure continues to drop until it bottoms out as the storm runs its course. The fishing should be good this entire time, although lightning and heavy rains on the water's surface might spook fish. "
Over at the other end of the beach, huge rocks can be spotted which might be a good fishing spot.
I hesitated for a while and eventually I made up my mind not to fish here, I would stick to the initial plan of going to the Kijal Jetty.
On my way out I accidentally drove into another housing estate and to my surprise this estate is basically a Chinese community, almost all the houses here are Chinese family. I figured that since the mistake had been done I might as well do a short excursion around here.
I roamed around the estate and came out to a small road which led me to this narrow bridge. It is just nice for my car to squeeze through and I saw some strange objects right in front, it looked like a structure with a ball shaped roof. What is that? Where am I? Did I accidentally barged into District 51?
It turned out to be the satellite station for the Malaysia Telco, Celcom.
Such an important and expensive infrastructure which the Telco must have spent millions of dollars to built it, but it is left unguarded. I was loitering around this area and came up close to the station. The signboard of "An Armed Man Shooting the Intruder" was spotted on the gate, it did terrified me a little as I get closer. Anyway, I am still alive and there was no security personnel came out to chase me away. Well, this is in Malaysia. You can never expect this to be happened in Singapore.
To be continued...
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Always Tight Line, Hardcore is the Spirit!
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