So I went to Jangkar two Sundays ago. It’s this incredibly beautiful waterfall an hour away from town. There aren’t many untarred roads left so close to the city. Rumbling along untarred and be-pebbled roads for long stretches bring me back to the days when my family would rent a van or minibus to go the unsullied sands of Siar Beach. On occasion, mum would even bring her TV along. I swear that’s true.
My days of constant jungle-trekking are pretty much over, or at least dormant. So I was only prepared for a mid-range 4-hour trek at most. But a relatively easy 55 minutes later on a mild up-slope, the waterfall sang its thunderous song of water and rock right in front of me.
The day was overcast. A light drizzle cooled the walk down nicely. And the water was refrigerator cold. As with most of my forays into the forest, it was a bunch of guy friends and me. Ah Huat and I ended up on one end of waterfall and sat there just taking it all in.
At first, I thought it was just sandflies, or any one of 1001 elements that make you scratch your skin when you’re in the great outdoors. And then Ah Huat gave a manly shriek (it was manly, but still a shriek nonetheless).
I looked down and there was the tail end of a rather stubby brown snake, the skin glistening in the water. It was between the fold of my knee and the rock I was reclining on. Quite calmly, I moved my leg to let it past. It decided not to. But made like it was going to do a u-turn. Ah Huat shrieked again (in the same manly manner). That got me quite panicky by then. I stood up to let the snake past. And started to slip down the rock I was on.
That was it. I could either smack back down on my backside and sit on the snake or I could jump back in the water and swim for my life.
I swam for my life, closely followed by a panicky Ah Huat.
