Ahoy, Mate! We're Stranded!

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face and a grey dawn breaking.
~John Masefield

All this while, the humming of the engine had created the ambience for me to get to sleep. Thus, I was mildly aroused when the bus came to a stop. Normally, I’d get irritable when I’m intermittently disturbed during my sleep. But, I was just too tired now to complain about it.

The driver had probably stopped by the highway for a while to ease himself, I thought. So, we should be on our way again in no time. It was later that I found out that we had a punctured tire. Okay, we were in a sticky situation here and no one was happy about it, including me. But as the platitude goes, when things turn bad, “look on the bright side”.

Alright. The “bright side” was, we were ahead of our schedule, with a few hours to spare, so there was no harm spending them here on the bus with the air-conditioner at full blast. Luckily, I had enough food supply to last through breakfast. Furthermore, things could have got worse when you travelling in a one-tonne bus with a punctured tire and travelling at a break-neck speed of 100km/h… We could have spun and crashed down a ravine. Oops, my imagination runs wild under stress!

Meanwhile, it wasn’t too bright out there since it was only four in the morning.

When some of us went outside for a breath of fresh air, we finally had an inkling of our present location: exactly on the other side of the road, there was a huge sign board which read: “FELDA Development Project – South Trolak”. Good news indeed, though the name of the place did not ring a bell at all. At least we were not in the edge of some African forest.

I wonder if you have heard of how some animals such as wolves mark their territories with urine. It happened that one of the wise guys is an avid fan of Animal Planet documentaries and did know about that. Reckoning it as a valuable survival tip, he marked our territory at the bushes by the road in the desperate bid to keep man-eating tigers in the jungle away from us. It did not took us long to follow suit, not for the same reason, mind you, but merely to ease ourselves.

Throughout our four-hour ordeal, cars came and went. Some flashed or honked at us to acknowledge our presence or perhaps to jeer at us. None stopped to give us a hitch. “The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” is coming to the silver screen and I wonder if offers any guide to “hitch hiking on the highway”…

Soon, the sun rose albeit hidden behind some clouds. It was then bright enough for me to assess our situation.

There was some sort of a tertiary jungle on the east; the development site mentioned earlier was on the west. I stared down south and up north but could only see the never-ending road that strecthed towards the edges of the world… and a couple of vultures not far away, flying low in circles… A harbinger of doom… Or were they just a bunch of crows?

More than four hours had passed. As we were about to abandon all hopes for survival, a bus could be seen approaching us from the horizon. Our spirits were high when it slows to a stop, and offered ten of us a hike. The mind loves to play tricks on the desperate soul but thank God it was not a mirage! So, ten of us alert (and selfish) ones grabbed our bags and made our move before you can say “hallelujah”. Those least-fortunate ones were still looking bewildered when we rushed on board the other bus, leaving them behind, agape, in the foundered vessel, fate unknown.

And so continued our journey to heart of Kuala Lumpur, which took us a whopping nine hours in toto. Compare this with the typical time logged: five hours!

Here, I end my account of our swashbuckling adventures with the following excerpt from the captain’s log.

8th May.
8th hour since our departure from homeland, Penang.
Cloudy. Some 53.4 nautical miles (99 km) north from our destination. Strong wind is blowing in favour of our course. Smooth sailing.
Current speed: 59.5 knots (110 km/h). Expect to harbour in another hour.
Spirits of the crews are high. Let’s just pray we don’t bump into any pirates.