Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Arrival at Berjaya Resort Langkawi.

Our Langkawi Holiday

The Grand Welcome.
We arrived in Langkawi and were picked up and taken to the Berjaya Resort and Spa Hotel, a very impressive place, built on about 50 acres of jungle land on the side of a mountain. There are 500 chalets scattered through the jungle all the way up the mountain side and on the beach, even built on stilts right out over the sea, these ones are the most expensive executive suites.
Most of the chalets are built either single or double side by side, ours was a single one about three quarters of the way up the mountain, surrounded by jungle full of all the animals, birds and insects of the jungle, reached easily by a 24 hour shuttle service, the small vehicles raced up and down the narrow roads and we could often just flag one down like a taxi, when we wanted to go to the beach or the lobby, or one of the 6 restaurants, or to the nearby Oriental Village.

I forgot to mention when we booked our accommodation we asked as we always do, for a basket of local fruit for our room. Sometimes we get it sometimes not, we are quite prepared to pay for this fruit, but seldom have to, as it is so nice to have something to nibble on when you arrive in a strange country.
We had just settled in to our chalet when the doorbell rang and a little Malaysian girl stood there with a nice fruit basket of apples and oranges and nashi pears. We were delighted, and she told us have a look in our fridge as she had put a cream cake in there for us. We looked and were amazed to find a heart shaped cream cake with ‘Happy Honeymoon’ iced on the top. Oh dear, and heres us married for 12 years already! I have to say it was probably the nicest cake we have ever eaten and didn’t last long, I wish I had taken a photo of it.
Shortly after another lady rang the doorbell and gave us a Dragon fruit, a strange red fruit with creamy white flesh full of tiny black seeds, tastes quite nice and sweet, but this was getting embarrassing, we were effusive with our thanks.
Following quickly on her heels was yet another older lady, the most amazing of all, she had cradled in her hands like it was a precious jewel, a fresh mango. It blew us away when she said; Yesterday, when she was at home out in her own garden she saw this mango fall from the tree and thought of the couple coming from New Zealand arriving the next day and how we had most likely never tried a fresh mango, (and she was right,) So she brought it to work with her and gave it to us!
Wow, to think that a Malaysian Lady, Bless her, was thinking of us, whom she had never met, total strangers, when she was in her own home the day before we even arrived in the country, its positively mind blowing. Boy did we enjoy that precious mango it was so tangy and flavoursome.
We were almost scared in case the doorbell rang again! But fortunately that was it, but what a grand welcome we had, so we settled down to enjoy a second honeymoon – or should that be, the 12th honeymoon, as we go away every year on these wonderful trips.

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