How shall I describe my wonderful friend Ethan? I think he can be most accurately compared to a fine bottle of ruby-red port; not because he is classy or because he makes you feel warm inside but because he is best avoided before noon. Some people are morning people. I am a morning person, I actually quite like the morning. Ethan is not a morning person, more of a mourning person and in fact I’m pretty sure that Ethan and ‘the morning’ have not been on speaking terms since they had an argument about what time the sun should rise a couple of years ago.
I am not a particularly adventurous person, danger- unlike the mornings- is about as unappealing to me as a racist egg mayonnaise sandwich. I have been aptly able to avoid all hazardous happenings for the vast majority of my life, however our trip to Borneo presented me with the unenviable task of getting Ethan out of bed in the mornings. Let me paint you a picture. Imagine a bed, its not hard, i’ll give you a hand:
Ah flip, sorry!
That’s better. Ok, on this bed, you need to imagine a massive heap of bed sheets and linen. As you approach, you will realise that this is in fact a cleverly spun cocoon, a burrito of grumpiness. If you are quiet, two bleary eyes may appear, glaring at you in the beautiful morning light. You say “good morning,” a crazy decision, leading to all sorts of uncertainty bubbling forth from the compromised position that you have wrangled yourself into. Silence is possible, unrecognisable neanderthal grunts are likely, hatred and resentment are so certain that I would bet my house upon them. Well maybe your house.
It was therefore a complete shock when Ethan offered to join me on an early morning visit into the rainforest canopy at 6:30am. If I had been sitting down, I would have fallen off my chair. If I wore a toupee, it would have comically flittered off into the wind. If I had had a jaw, it would have dropped. Shame I left it in a locker at my local swimming pool. I half expected the promise to be more of a goodwill gesture that never materialised, like when you meet somebody you quite gladly haven’t seen for a while and you say “You must come over for a catch up some time” whilst frantically plotting a method of never seeing that person ever again. Nevertheless, at a time not too unrelated to 6:30am, an awake Ethan emerged from the chalet that he and Ben were sharing.
We were staying at the beautiful Sepilok Nature Resort, a quiet retreat just outside the world famous orang-utan reserve. We had returned from our exploits at Sukau the night before for a short interlude before heading off towards our expedition up Mount Kinabalu. Nestled in a small glade on the fringes of the rainforest, the lodge was comprised of small, comfortable chalets scattered among calm waterways and a gorgeous array of fluorescent flowers, whose pleasant aroma lingered in the air creating a succulent, almost edible atmosphere. We had spent a pleasant evening playing cards on the veranda overlooking the resort, the humid air doing its best to drown us like a flea in a darts players armpit. As we left the resort early in the morning, we were hoping that the heat and humidity would be less intense. It wasn’t. The humidity was stifling. The heat was offensive. Hungry, tired, and desperately trying to avoid aqueous asphyxiation, Ethan and I began our long, dangerous trek towards the unknown.
I say long, in all honesty our destination was less than 2km away. I say dangerous, it was quite frankly completely safe. I say trek, in truth it was tarmac the entire way. I say unknown, in actual fact we had visited this place the previous afternoon. In theory we were looking at a twenty minute walk around the corner to the Sepilok rainforest discovery centre. Unfortunately life is not purely theoretical.
I was not feeling particularly chatty. Neither was Ethan but in fairness he was awake. Thankfully, the local birdlife gleefully filled our silence. Birds have a wonderful gift of simply being happy in the mornings; they just can’t help singing. At least, thats what I assume is happening. Maybe I’m just naive?
Hornbill 1: “Did you watch Jeremy Kyle yesterday?”
Hornbill 2: “No, because I’m not a complete plank.”
Or maybe:
Black and Red Broadbill 1: “What do you think about Brexit?”
Black and Red Broadbill 2: “Harry are you sure you want to keep flogging this very dead horse?”
Perhaps Black and Red Broadbill 2 has a point… that horse is so dead it’s probably prit-stick.
Serenading us with their beautiful, innocent-sounding and benefit-of-the-doubt-encouraging song, beautiful birds lined our path: an avian guard of honour. A crash to our left alerted us to the presence of a large male proboscis monkey. Then ahead of us, something caught our eye. It was an otter! At least I think it was an otter. It certainly looked as if it could have been an otter. Small, brown fur, medium-sized tail. Unfortunately, it was too difficult to distinguish for sure.
You are probably thinking to yourself, “well of course, this animal must have ran speedily into the forest as soon as we came into view. It is hardly surprising that it was difficult to identify.” You would be wrong. In fact, the creature didn’t move, rooted to the spot, as if it had been glued to the road using the prit-stick that the dead horse that I have been flogging had been made into. We approached cautiously, desperately hoping that it wouldn’t bolt like, well like Usain Bolt. It didn’t. Slowly, carefully, we got closer, even to the point that we loomed over it like the unspecified date of a wedding anniversary of an unknown quantity of years, hangs over a desperate husband. You may still be wondering why this critter had not run.
Unfortunately, it couldn’t. It was phenomenally dead. More dead than the Brexit horse I have been flogging and has recently become prit-stick. This poor creature had been pasted to the floor somehow, rolled like dough, flatter than the pre-socratic earth. Such was the utter destruction of this pile of mush that I considered putting a Heinz label on it and selling it in a bottle. Flies, desperately trying to resuscitate the poor animal, trampled every inch of its body like a writhing blanket. It was strangely fascinating. We stood over the corpse for a considerable amount of time, trying to work out what it was, before we decided that, as time was beginning to march off into the distance, we should continue our journey.
The road was long. Despite the tree cover on either side, the heat was difficult to escape from. Occasionally a car would roar past. At one point, we waved to an old man sitting peacefully by the side of the road. But it was monotonous. And then… a dog. I’m not a dog person. I’m more of a cat person to be honest, I prefer animals to be capable, clean and sassy than needy and slobbery. I don’t dislike dogs and there are a few that I am genuinely fond of, but having been bitten by three in my life, I am often uneasy around them. So when a large stray dog began to follow Ethan and I along a seemingly endless road, my hackles were more than raised. I was scared. I understand that dogs can read body language so I tried to remain calm, not making eye contact. When I am calm, by body language can be difficult to read, enigmatic. I’m pretty sure that if this dog was to read my body language, it would be able to read me like a book. A Where’s Wally? book. Ethan, perhaps more comfortable with dogs, perhaps still partly comatose, seemed more assured. However, as the dog, drooling, mangy and swollen, insisted on following us, that assurance slowly began to wane.
I have never really been unwell. Apart from normal illnesses such as chicken pox or the common cold, my immune system has put in a magnificent performance throughout my life. I had no wish to introduce my white blood cells to rabies. The tip-tap of the dogs claws on the tarmac continued to stalk us. Finally, as we approached a settlement and a large roundabout, the tip-tapping stopped. I looked behind me, it was gone. Phew. However, relief evolved into consternation very quickly as Ethan and I realised that we had no idea where we were. To our left was a pleasant-looking school, the happy chatter of children filling our ears as they were led back inside one of the brightly coloured classrooms. Ahead of us, traffic argued its way around the unfamiliar roundabout. We stood like indecisive lemons in the middle of the road. Should we continue and assume that we had seriously underestimated the journey? Or should we cut our losses and head back? The time was approaching 7:30am, the curtain was already beginning to come down upon the dawn chorus. We turned back towards the hotel. And the dog.
But it turned out that the dog was not to be the villain of the morning. Apparently the placid canid was offended by my obvious terror. It refused to show up. We slowly lumbered back down the road, intense heat bouncing off the tarmac. We had not even had breakfast yet and we were already approaching 35 degrees. To say that we were sweaty was an understatement. And on it went. And on. The old man who we had waved to had also disappeared. Maybe he was consoling the dog. Predictably, the otter had gone nowhere. It had remained, faithful, patient, a true friend.
Welcome to the Sepilok Rainforest Discovery Centre
Ethan stopped. I stopped too. I groaned, it was his turn to copy me. And then, unstoppable, irresistible, involuntary wheezing laughter squirmed from us. We had stood underneath an enormous sign welcoming us to our destination. We had ended up walking for approximately an hour in the wrong direction, drowning in sweat and pursued by a disease-ridden canine. Why? Because we had been distracted by road-kill.
King Ahab was led astray by Jezebel, Solomon was led astray by his stadium-filling number of wives. My wonderful friend Tudor was led astray by his sat-nav, also known as Jezebel. I was led astray by roadkill. I blame Ethan.
But wait until you hear about what we saw up in the canopy! We saw a squirrel!
Though the forest was teeming with life, we saw very little that morning. Nevertheless, it was a pleasant way to welcome the new day, high up in the trees overlooking the rainforest, watching beautiful birds, fascinating reptiles and playful squirrels. However, this day will forever be etched in my memory for what we saw later that day.
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