Once
upon a time, years ago, a lovely couple came and took me out on a
kayaking excursion in the mangrove. To respect this
couple's privacy, I now name them as Mr & Mrs Romanian.
This
post is dedicated to this lovely couple because without them I would
not be out there kayaking and would not had such experience in
the swamp that turned the impossible to the possible.
Here's the story:
A
journey by boat to our kayak put-in point was a bit bumpy with some swells. During our journey, we were rewarded with the incredible landscape of 490-370 million years old karstic limestone of Setul formation that formed the
Eastern rim of Langkawi.
Langkawi's uniqueness: The Karst and Mangroves
While I was occupied with spotting for Brahminy Kite Haliastur indus and the White Bellied Sea Eagle Haliaeetus leucogaster, Mr Romanian was occupied with his camera clicking away.
Loads
of trash welcomed us on a secluded beach as we prepared ourselves
for the kayaking through a cave tunnel to get to a salt water lake. The tide was
reasonably high enough for us to play around in between
the Rhizophora trees with our kayaks. We saw a couple of mudskippers, tree climbing
crabs and lots of mullets.
We
headed out to the sea after that and kayaked along the coastline into
the higher density of the mangroves. After some time exploring in there,
we met up with our boatman at the edge of the swamp.
I
instructed the couple to pull their kayak alongside with the boat so
that they could stand up and climb over. My kayak was next to them to help stabilizing their kayak while Mrs Romanian climbed over onto
the boat. Seconds
after Mrs Romanian was on the boat, I saw something small and shiny
passed me, knocked on the starboard side of my kayak and bounced off ...pluurrrp.. into the water. It was too fast for me to catch it.
My
first thought was, "A loose screw!". I first looked around my kayak.
Nope. My kayak ain't got screws. I looked around the boat and then at Mr Romanian. He was frantically searching for something.
"Looking for something?" I asked. He replied, "My wedding ring..."
"Uh..oh"
I said to myself. He asked me to check around my kayak. I dare not tell
him that something went into the water and so I pretended to search
around my kayak. Alas, I told him that I saw the ring went into the
water and it was hard for him to believe my statement. He stared at me for awhile.
He
had his large swimming goggles with him and went into the mangroves
water to search for the ring. The water visibility was near zero and it was
impossible for him to look for anything. The boatman and I told him to
be careful on placing his footsteps because we didn't want him to step on
the ring pushing it deeper into the mud.
I
was sitting on my kayak looking at him searching for his wedding ring
and thinking to myself, "This is impossible". And then I decided to do
the impossible by joining him into the swampy water. It was only waist
deep and I could stretched my hands to the mud feeling for anything. I
was worried by doing that could worsen the search.
Mr
Romanian was searching the area where I pointed the ring has dropped. I
suggested that the current may had pushed the ring further away. But he
was very convinced
that the ring cannot be pushed much because it is heavy. I later learnt
that the ring was made of platinum but I have no idea how heavy a platinum ring is.
After
fifteen minutes in the water, Mr Romanian decided to call off the
search and surrendered to the impossible. We climbed up to the boat and
headed out to the sea.
I
watched how Mr Romanian who was smiling from ear to ear at the
beginning of the excursion and now it was from jaw to jaw. While his wife was consoling him, the boatman and I were silently
sympathising the couple.
Suddenly, the invisible light bulb above my head lit up!
I
knew the tide was going out that time and that area will be dry in the
next three to four hours. I rechecked the tide table on the time of the
lowest tide and quickly discussed with my boatman. So a plan was
developed. I
presented our plan to the couple and without hesitation, Mr Romanian
liked it and he seemed very determined. There is still hope. Yes!
The
lowest tide on that evening was a quarter to five. We set out at three
in the afternoon and it was just three of us without Mrs Romanian. This
time the sea got rougher and our ride was bumpier.
As
we got there, the boat could not go right into the spot where the ring has dropped because the tide had gone down a lot. With our double kayak, Mr
Romanian and myself paddled on below knee deep water into the shallowest stream-like channel. I told myself not to have any expectation and just enjoy the moment in the mud.
It
was amazing to watch the mudflat. Blue-spotted mudskippers were
everywhere! The crabs scattered away as we were approaching the spot. "Uh...urgh
... hmmm" as our feet sank into the soft soggy mud. Mr
Romanian is a huge 6 footer and he sank in at thigh-deep mud. I am a
much shorter Asian person and so, I sank into the mud up till my waist. We scanned the area very slowly by sweeping the top layer feeling for any hard metal object before taking another step. I had to crawl out of the mud in order to take another step. As
I was doing so, I was apologising to the numbers of small tiny shrimps,
crustaceans and other zooplankton that we stepped and crawled on. I
felt ssooooo guilty.
During
the search, it was also an opportunity for me to discover the mangrove fauna. Besides the shrimps, fiddler crabs and mudskippers, there were
blood cockles too! The blood cockles here were almost the size of my
palm!
Blood cockle or what we call them as "Kerang" in Malay is an edible marine bivalve mollusc. There are many ways to cook them. The simplest way is a quick cook in the hot water and can be eaten on its own or stir fry them with noodles. The small sized Kerang is a must ingredient for our delicious Malaysian hawker dish known as "Char Koay Teow" (Fried Flat Noodles)
My
boatman joined us into the mangroves by leaving his boat outside. But
he was sitting on the Rhizophora tree roots watching us because he was
wearing a white T-shirt. He was giving us tips and suggestions on what
else we can do as if he is our supervisor.
 |
| Penang Char Koay Teow... Yum! |
Sand
flies were everywhere biting us and we were scratching crazily on our
arms and thighs. Those huge biting flies were around too and had started
to annoy Mr Romanian. He was wearing only his swimming trunk and I had
my long sleeved rash guard and shorts. Almost
forty five minutes later and no sign of his wedding ring except for
those huge gigantic blood cockles. Those irritating flies were too much
for Mr Romanian that he decided to call off the operation. But I felt
it was quite a waste to give up now when we had came all the way in and
the tide was still low. Luckily, my boatman supported my thoughts and he
encouraged us to keep looking.
Photograph
time while we took a five minute break. While Mr Romanian was resting, I
crawled a few meters searching at the tiny mud drain where the water
was running out. And suddenly, something shiny and white was staring at
me. It was just sitting next to the mud drain. I went over to touch it and it was
hard. Metal! I picked it up and asked Mr Romanian if this metal belongs to him. He
took it from me to check and then he said calmly, "All of us should
go out for dinner to celebrate". Found it!!! The ring drifted at least five meters away from where it dived into the water.
I was leaping in joy and of course I couldn't leap up because my legs were stuck in the mud. My boatman was clapping and I was shouting in joy. I don't know but it seemed that I was more in the ecstasy of joy than Mr Romanian. Maybe he has yet to recover from his shock.
As we paddled our kayak out to the sea with our hands on very shallow water, I was still feeling guilty about those sacrificed shrimps and small juvenile crabs. Oh well, there will be thousands to millions more of those but only one platinum wedding ring... just a thought to console myself.
Mr
Romanian was back to smiling from ear to ear and our mission
accomplished. Am I starting to believe that miracles do exist? Now back
to my blood cockle... hee..hee... my precious.
Ever since this incident, I have to remind myself to remind my guests to temporarily remove their wedding rings before kayaking. It is very rare to be as lucky as Mr Romanian.
More than eight years have passed and this experience will remain as my best moment being a nature guide. I am still alive to tell this story and now I am sharing this with you. It is a long post, I know and thank you for reading this.
