Sandakan

Well we left Sepilok in a a taxi as we could not be bothered to get the bus as no one knew what the timetable was and we could not be bothered to lug our 20kg of luggage each down to the main road and wait for a bus in the blistering heat. We arrived at the hotel in Sandakan that was a little out of town but ran a free shuttle service into the centre of town so it suited us (the hotel was a business one so of a high standard plus as it was the weekend so we got a good rate as there is no business stuff going on at the weekend).
   Breakfast was a bit weird though as this is not a hotel suited to western dudes, so we came down to the breakfast buffet to be confronted with spicy noodles (cold!) and cold greasy rice with spicy fish sauce. yummm! Is that all they eat here? Rice and noodles? We are so SICK of rice and noodles for lunch and dinner, so breakfast was just a step too far. Anyway managed to hassle the girl in the kitchen to russle up some eggs on toast but I could see from her expression on her face it was an unusual request. That is basically as good as Sandakan got! The town itself was a complete dump. Full of rats and cockroaches everywhere. The seafront has flotsam bobbing about in the sea with a strong smell of sewage, no beach as it is reclaimed land and rubbish everywhere. We had dinner on the seafront the first night which was unappealing with the sewage smell and the food well below par in quality. The only decent part in town was a new mall they had built which contained a new Sheraton hotel but why anyone would want to stay here in a 5 star hotel is beyond me. The view from their windows must be disheartening.
  Next day we went to the death march memorial park in a taxi which is a site erected to commemorate all the soldiers that had died in world war 2 (British and Australian) which were taken as POW's by the Japanese when they captured Borneo and Singapore, put into labour camps then treated very harshly where many of them died of malnutrition and disease in the camp but then when the allies came to liberate Borneo towards the end of the war, the Japs marched all the inmates that numbered nearly 2500 to another camp inland but on the torturous journey only 6 survived (all Australian) because they escaped en route but all the others died before they reached their destination. To lighten the mood after our visit we decided to get the local 'chicken' bus back into town which was a laugh as it had floors that had rusted through and the bus was from the 70's with the old London transport 'stop' buzzers on it. It was a rough old ride but a lot of fun hanging out with the locals who just stared at us the whole journey non stop.

The chicken bus has bars on the windows to keep you from escaping.

   Next day Kathy declared the town was a right off and could not muster the energy to go back into town and amuse ourselves. (we could not even find anywhere that sold beer!) and I was inclined to agree but cabin fever soon set in so I went on the towns heritage trail which visits all the old colonial haunts up on the hill that did not get bombed in the war. Kathy declined the trip and frankly she made the right decision. After a couple of drab war memorials I went in the government museum which had mock ups of how 'an English house would look like in the 30's'. It was drab and deserved none of my time although the walk in Chubb strongroom was kinda cool (like a big walk-in safe). Next a walk up the so called hundred steps to the top of the hill which turned out to be nearer 500 steps so someone could not count at the non-existent tourist bureau it seems. Here afforded good views of the scrubby town below and the tankers drifting into harbour but again was not even worth a photo. A visit next to a restored American authors residence that was quaint and I had the place to myself . The highlight was a home movie that the authors family had made about the war days in Sandakan showing footage of the invasion but when I got to the audio-visual room I could not get the film to play. Incensed by this as this was (as quoted by Rough Guides) the highlight of the visit I went and complained at the ticket office where a bored looking woman who was engrossed by her phone, managed the effort to look up and shrug her shoulders in apathy. This was not the response I hoped for so asked for my money back which she gave me with no fuss at all and went back to snap chatting some boy who she had randomly in her mind fallen in love with but who most likely had half the towns girls on the go.

American authors Agnes Newton Kieth's refurbished house.

   To console myself I ventured to The English Tea Garden which was a colonial throwback with servants dressed in Dickie bows with black and white pre-war costumes on a perfectly manicured lawn under a large tree. I treated myself to a pot of tea and a scone with cream and jam. The cream was weird and just melted in the heat and got absorbed into the scone which was also dry and nasty. The tea was nice though .After this I decided that I was trying to polish a turd with this town so conceded defeat and returned to the hotel to reunite with Kath for dinner in house which was actually good and cheap for a change.

The edible brick was accompanied by a cup of tea.

 By this time we had enough of this one horse town so booked a flight back to Kota Kinabalu. The flight was a late afternoon job so we asked the hotel if we could have late check-out. They wanted half a days money for 3 hours grace so we just packed and went down the cinema in town to watch 'Kingsman- The Golden Circle' which killed 3 hours and was a very entertaining film. It was classified an 18 cert film but we were curious when we saw kids and babies in the audience and kids playing truant off school. Different culture I guess? We caught the flight later and were glad to leave the boring unattractive town to get back to Kota Kinabalu.

More tea vicar?