August 11,

I woke up at 0300, and I was wide awake!! Uggh! Guess I had enough sleep- NOT! I started blogging. Jeff awoke at just before 0500, with the call to prayer. We got around by 0700 as our breakfast of Nasi Lemak arrived. Nasi Lemak is a National Malaysian dish of rice that is cooked in coconut milk & pandan leaf. Ours was served topped with anchovies, peanuts, half of a boiled egg, and a sambal paste. It is not our favorite but we ate it. We had our Javas and a bit of yogurt. Jeff started a load of laundry, as I continued to work more on the blog. At 0930, we talked with my sister. We hung up the laundry to dry. Then we talked with Jeff’s sister and her husband at 1140.

After we finished catching up with our family, we went out for a late lunch. We chose Min Satay Corner. We were given a menu in Malay, but it was explained to us. We ordered four sticks each of – Chicken, Beef, and Goat; one serving of rice; one serving of veggies (water spinach and onion in oyster sauce); one iced lemon tea; and one lemon juice. We were also given the peanut sauce and a broth soup that was savory, but with clove aromatics. Between the sweetness of the peanut sauce, the saltiness of the oyster sauce, and the aromatics of the broth – we had an Umami meal. It was simple but very tasty. It all cost us 35.30 Ringgit or $8.34.

Now we returned to our place and finished up the blogging. We had a nice chill day! We have been so go, go, go for almost a week it was nice to relax and just listen to music. We had a light supper of crackers & PB, a spicy nut mix, and some of the great chocolate we still have from Laos. Bed by 2130, such party animals!!😏🤣

      August 12,

Well I slept better but Jeff awoke at 0300! We got up and about, having our Javas this morning with our delivered breakfast. This morning we had Seri Muka, which is a “Banjarese and Malay two layered dessert with steamed glutinous rice forming the bottom half and a green custard layer made with pandan juice” per Wikipedia; and what seemed to be mini-muffin type brownies. The Seri Muka reminded me of a lightly salted malt-o-meal topped with a slightly sweet, otherwise tasteless custard. There were six pieces – I had two but Jeff only had one. The cupcakes were chocolate and we both liked them, eating up the six small mounds.

We readied and headed out on our scooter to see some sights in Sandakan town that Jeff had found. Our first place was a somber one – Sandakan Memorial Park – a site of a WWII Prisoner of War (POW) encampment and ending with 3 death marches. Information is from placards and an audio we listened to. The prisoners who suffered here were Australian and English. There were nearly 1,500 Australian POWs shipped here in July 1942 from Singapore, to build a military airfield under the command of the Japanese. In 1943, over 770 British POWs arrived with another 500 Australians. All were housed here at the Sandakan POW Camp. By January 1945 the first of three ‘Death Marches’ took place. Many POWs had already died, but the 1100 left were force-marched 260 km to Ranau. These three death marches claimed all the remaining POW lives… that is except for SIX POWs! These six only survived because they escaped!! Also these six were all Australians. On the Audio Guide they had interviews with a couple of the survivors. These audios and memorials are always moving, reflecting and pensive; but a necessary evil to remember history. There were a couple of pieces of machinery: a boiler, used for electricity generation; and an excavator or trencher to aid in speeding up progress of the airstrip, which had been sabotaged- sand placed in the engine. They are displayed as they were left. They are now rusting, hulky reminders. We finished going through the new, nicely constructed remembrance hall.

We took our scooter to Sandakan Rainforest Park. It was free entry and is basically a cemented walkway loop through a forested area. It was nice and peaceful. We saw a couple of Flat-backed Millipedes, and heard many other insects. It was pretty cool outside today due to the cloud cover. There were a few others out getting exercise. It was a nice place. We even did a little “off-roading” on a dirt trail, but not very far. We completed the concrete loop and moved on. It was a nice place to get steps.

We went to Puu Jih Syh Temple. It was a Buddhist Temple that sits along the top of some hills with great views of the bay of Sandakan and the ocean. It was open and we went inside. We both forgot how over the top some of these temples are. We explored a bit and found another temple building and went down to it. It was much simpler inside with the Buddha statue of wood. Jeff drove the scooter down here and met me. When we finished we loaded up and moved on.
Lastly we went to Saint Michael Anglican Church. It was founded in 1888! Unfortunately it was closed up. We peaked inside of the stonemade church and saw beautiful stained glass windows. I wish we could have gone inside… but it did not happen.

We went back to our place. Around 1400 we went back out to return the scooter and a late lunch. We returned the scooter without any issues. Then we walked to Bistro 88, but it was closed. So we just walked along the bay shore and found an open, more “local” place called D’Beach. We ordered a Lamb “Chop”( it was a shoulder steak) Plus Western; and Nasi Goreng USA – with chicken. The Lamb dinner included a large, bone-in shoulder lamb piece smothered with a black pepper gravy (and a small side of the gravy), sweet coleslaw, “camp” beans, and fries. The Nasi Goreng was a bit different than normal with a scoop of stir-fried rice topped with an egg, and stir-fry of chicken and veg with a bunch of sauce. Both were good and came out as normal separately. We were almost finished with the Nasi Goreng when the Lamb Dinner came out. This is very typical. Anyway, I had a ginger iced tea drink and Jeff had a coconut shake – that came with a scoop of ice cream and sprinkles… more of a dessert. As we were finishing our lamb dish a little girl came up begging, putting her fingers to her mouth. Jeff gave in, but instead of money he let her pick a drink. She chose some soda drink. As soon as she left another girl came up the same way, but he told them to share. Anyway that was added to our tab. We finished and paid 70 Ringgit or RM, which is $16.54.

We left and walked to the mall to finish getting steps. We checked out their grocery store but it was Muslim- no alcohol. Jeff E-hailed a Grab to get us to the grocery store that we can get wine at. We bought a bottle of wine and walked back to our place- it’s fairly close. We relaxed and had the wine with crackers, an apple, PB, nutella and chocolate. Then I blogged and we enjoyed the last views of our balcony.