Day 8 - The Mangrove Tour

Well today was quite the exciting day!  Being the third day of our stay here, we decided to mix up the happy routine (eat, yoga, gym, eat, pool, nap, drink, eat).  As such, we signed ourselves up for the guided, group tour of the Mangrove's flora and fauna.

We met our jovial guide--imagine Uncle Jimmy, minus the stint as a career soldier in Germany, plus a stint as a career steward on Malaysian Airlines.  The type of guy who smiles as a habit of squinting, and laughs as a habit of loving to entertain.  After the next three hours aboard our boat, I quickly surmise that the hotel brochure's description of his title of "Naturalist" may have been a bit generous.  More on that later.

We are joined by two other couples on our tour.  It almost read as a joke: 

So a guide takes out three couples - one set of New York Financiers, a Solicitor from London and his newlywed bride, and a Muscovite set engaged in various shades of shadiness.  

The Solicitor asks, 'What are you doing on holiday?' 

The New Yorker replies, 'On a two month tour of Asia.'  

'Brilliant,' he says.  'What do you do?' 

'Nothing' the New Yorker replies, 'I just quit my job....' 

'I dare say-- a Hedge Fund, am I right?'

We were heartened to feel that they looked every bit the Londoners on Holiday, as we did Financiers on Sabbatical.  And both sets of us were happy that we didn't look like the Russians on Getaway - he was squirrelly, she looked like she had come straight from the boudoir, and they immediately set about spritzing themselves with tanning oil as soon as the boat took off.  

So we motored around the island to the estuary, and started our progressively slower trek into tighter and tighter thickets mangroves.  We learned about the mangrove itself, how it fruits and seeds, the inhabitants it keeps.  On the way, we see an amazing group of brown eagles, after which Langkawi was named - "Helang" being Malay for "Eagle," and "Kawi" for "reddish." We saw a snake, finding shade resting on one of the taproots jutting out of the water.  We stopped at a fishery, where T tried his hand at feeding fish and monkeying around with a horseshoe crab.  Which brings me to our highlight.

Along the way, we managed to spot some of the local Crab-Eating Macaque.  Now this was a long awaited event, seeing as every breakfast, our tray arrives with a little tent card, saying "Our resident monkeys can be very cute.  Please try not to feed them."  This we find particularly amusing, seeing as "monkey" happens to be one of my husband's nicknames for me. As part of our morning routine, I start acting out about being starved, no one wanting to feed monkeys and all.  But despite much ado, we had yet to see such a creature.

So when we spotted one along the banks of the estuary, everyone in the boat got very excited. The monkey allowed us to get quite close.  We were as curious about it, as it was of us apparently.  "Is this a boy or a girl monkey?" the Solicitor asked.

"A boy," our Naturalist replied.  "You can tell by his size.  Plus if he were a female, you'd be able to tell by her tits hanging down."

Now I am an avid Discovery channel watcher.  Tits?  Never in my years of watching David Attenborough narrated nature shows have I heard this particular term used.  

"And guess how many times a day he does it?"

Given the turn of conversation, there wasn't much room for confusion in his meaning.

"200 times a day! Imagine!"

At this point, T is starting to chuckle.  As is the Solicitor.  He says, "200! Jolly!  But I bet each time, it can't be more than a minute, right?"

T starts to whinny.  The Naturalist nods.

"See Luv," the Solicitor says, turning to his bride.  "I told you that was normal!"