Borneo - The diving paradise

In the midst of mine internship, I had thicken my face and ask for leaves from my boss during my second day of intern. She allowed ! Hence, here am I with totally roasted skin to share my pieces of experience ;) About my roasted skin... It is seriously roasted! Everyone who saw me, will comment about it. Even I feel like african now XD



Journey to Semporna required transportation of Bus, Aeroplane and Boat. Overall, It will took around 4-5 hours to arrive from KL. And to my surprise, Air-Asia was so punctual this time.


The 3 hours of flight ain't that enjoying at all. I am weak when facing sea and air. So I love solid ground the most. Anyway, almost my entire 3 hours of flight was entertain by kids noise of crying and shouting. And the source was just next to my seat =.=


What you see, is a seat of 3. But there were 2 adult and 4 kids on it ! As for Air-Asia SOP, all passenger must obey the rules which including to put on seat belt when being instructed so.
Guess how the 3 seat belt could fit 6 adult on it ?

I also don know..But I do know they make a lot of noises and air stewardess have super difficult time with them. The kids just keep on unbuckle the belt and the stewardess have to buckle for them again and again.

Neway, after 3 hours of noisy flight we finally arrived to Tawau airport.


And ride an another one hours of bus to Semporna. As booked and planned, our trip will be take care by MataSinga resort.


Upon 5 minutes of speed boat, we finally arrive on the resort ! and we have warmly greet by their workers which most of them are pinoy.

welcome sir, welcome mam

And first thing I saw as I enter the resort, is

Bananas XD

To my amaze, the resort was built on the water! and my mouth was wide open as I witness the pure cleanness of their sea.


I was like, What the Heck ! we are not even going to Mabul island yet and it is so damn pure clean already.




We have our lunch before we check in to our room. The foods is superb! But I tend to keep it at the end of this post as I will share with you guys one shot of all the seafood that goes into my tummy ;)

My family and I were living here.


All the building were connected by bridges. Well, the room was not as nice as hotel and even the cheapest hotel in KL can beat it.. but

With its window open, we get to enjoy the wind from the sea.


As we come out from the corridor, under us is the pure clean sea water which swam by small fishes. In fact when the tide is rise during early in the morning, you could just jump down into the sea from the bridges as the water is deep enough to avoid your buttock to reach the ground XD. As the matter of fact, I did it.



Before we went out for our first island hoping, we get to take equipment from the resort.

Well, for us is free. Because of the special relationship ;) And I get to wear a fins without having to pay ! yippie



And so, we visit pulau sibuan. Or it known as poor village.





As we arrived at the island, I saw some villages and a lot of coconut and trees. And the folks over there start to come over, especially kids.



They are not here to greet us, in fact the came over to beg for money. And in return they sell us whatever valuable items they got, especially shells. So dirt cheap ! rm0.50 for a very nice shell.

This island was on its own. The people here were once a refugee from Philippine and now they were neither Malaysian nor pinoy. They have no electricity and water supply. All they do is to hunt sea creatures to feed on their hunger daily.

As I look at them, I realize how lucky I am.


They must pretty envy with my excess fats and big spare Tyre. Set aside the guilty, this island is even more magnificent than the resort I stay in.


This is not the lake.. this is the seaside ! So damn crystal clear. Because this island had no resort built up and only colonized by indigenous people who still don know what plastics is.


With such a superb view, I am so regret that I have don't have a better camera like DSLR. All I can do is to exploit my camera phone N82 to its maximum capabilities.

As the sun was blazing hard. We continue to snorkeling above its coral bed. And as expected.

It is all freaking alive !

Well, too bad my phone is not water-resistance !

When we went back to resort, we are dead tired and roasted. But amazed with the beauty of sunset.




And we ate our dinner with LOBSTER ;) photos later ya.

And the very next day, we get to visit an island called Mabul which is just 15 minutes from Sipadan island !


But to reach Mabul island from Semporna, it took 40minutes of boat ride.




As we arrived there, we saw a resort had already established. But this island were inhabit by a village of poor people too. But better than the island we went yesterday. At least they do business here like grocery.

Resort there were own by white-man =.= And we have slight quarrel when they knew we were crossing their bridges .





One side of it, is a sign of luxury, and just separate by few metres were the sign of poverty.



As we walk around to tour the village. We saw kids were playing with their peers. Because of poverty, they make their own toys. Even a small kites made from plastic bag can fly ! and they use stones as it is a ferrari.

Just like the previous island, the kids were following us around and beg for foods and money.

Even a bottle of normal mineral water could please them.


And they drank it dry as soon as we gave them. Neway, we did snorkeling on this island. And need not to say more. Mabul island is Magnificent !

The coral bed was huge and living. Variety of fishes and corals. For my advice, please go to redang first before stepping your legs to this island. Cause this island is

FUCKING BEAT THE HELL OUT OF REDANG !

And from the island, we could see Sipadan island with our naked eyes. And it is only 15 minutes away.

And we went back to our resort to take a rest. Our resort had a big pool of sea water which is kept filtered and isolated from the outer sea. It kept variety kind of eatable fishes inside.




I have no idea what the fishes called in english, but in chinese we called it 'sek pan', 'sou mei', '7 star pan' and etc. And their size was enormous especially the' sou mei' and 'long dan / dragon egg'.

Try before to swim around the fishes that is eatable ? Fishes that cost few thousand of ringgit? Fishes that is almost the size of human ?

I did it =) The pool was mean for diving and snorkeling.





When my relatives threw bread into the water. The big fishes were all around us competing for foods. And when you get hit by a fish which has a size of your stomach.. it ain't funny. You actually felt the impact. Haha

Guess what, I saw an rainbow on my last day of Borneo trip.


what so special about the rainbow o? You can look the same as in KL wat .....

Well, in KL you will never found its ending, but in Semporna, you can !

Woah, I should swim to there and get the pot of gold !

Well, We do visit the town of Semporna. A lot of auntie want to buy cheap seafood after they had taste the greatness of Sabah seafood. So, we drop by the town of Semporna.





As expected from a develop town.

Rubbish all over the sea ! So damn disgusting. Gosh.... 5 minutes away from my resort can be so different.

Frank said that Sabah-rian love to buy 4 wheeler because the road tax over there is dirt cheap. It is true that I came across a lot of 4 wheeler especially HILUX


One glance on the street I could easily catch 5 of them. Road tax cheap doesn't mean the car also cheap right? Hmmm

Night life on my resort is rather relaxing. It is a place for people to hang out and relax. Stay away from daily noises and technology.


with a cup of tea or coffee, we sit down and enjoy the tv show. They will prepared supper for us like

Sweet potatoes soup or red bean soup which could help our digestion and avoid constipation XD.

Out of the thirst, I bought a can of beer.


which cost rm8 per can. Well, I know it is expensive. But once a while no harm wat.

Let talk about the foods ! If you are fancy of seafood, please come to Sabah and forget about Pulau Ketam or Klang etc... once you taste Sabah seafood, else where is rather incomplete :p

First time to dine on Lobster. Never imagine that it could be this tasty!

First time in my life to eat so many kind of fishes. all this fishes can be found under the sea water pool. The foods I took was just half of the amount I ate for the last 3D 2N, I get too busy eating and misses some of the foods served. Regret! The package we took is custom made package. Which is cost around rm800 per pax because we wanna include the superb seafood cuisine for all 3 meals per day. And it is really worth it.

The normal price for all the guest out there is reasonable.

It only cost rm80 per night for
-free simple buffet meal for breakfast, lunch and dinner
-include snorkeling gear

and rm250 per night for diver which include
-free simple buffet meal for breakfast, lunch and dinner
-excluding diving gear (need to rent, I think is cost rm50 only)
- Hop 2 islands.

Reasonable right? for more info you can go to here

One funny thing I encounter at Sabah. I forget to tune my clock according to Sabah time. When KL time is 6am, Sabah is 7am. So I get freak out when found out that sky start to bright at 5.30am in the morning. I was like ... Woah ! by 6am the sun already shoot your asses. Finally I found out the clock in sabah is showing 7am when my clock showed 6am. Hahaha..

Oh god, I am so tired and hot(because of my roasted skin). I think I would end it right here.
Before that, I really enjoy this trip and it open my eyes to witness the actual pure clean sea water and living coral reefs.

Thanks pap and mom for this opportunity =)