The Story of Panang Pasir

Now I know I am making a huge thing about this amazing place and all the gifts I am receiving but I really do need to write about it again today!

I fell asleep to the sound of the waves and woke at 5.20am to the sound of Princess barking. 

Slightly confused as no one can theoretically get to this beach without a boat I got up to pear over the low wall of my house only to see another smaller and dark dog heading down the beach towards us.

Princess stopped barking as recognition took over and she bounded down the beach to meet this new comer.

Awake and refreshed I decided to walk along the shore as the full moon illuminated the entire area in a soft warm glow.

The new dog scattered as I approached but Princess was happy to accompany me for our early morning stroll. High above me the stars seemed far away, the tide was also incredibly far out.

Mud flats and a shallow reef cast patterns in the moon light while the water lapped gently around.

Lights shimmered on the main land as early morning commuters arrived for the first ferry of the day.

I returned to my bed while the sea remained silent and was soon fast asleep again.

I awoke this time at 7.30am as the sun rose over the sea to shine on the far end of the beach.

I looked out onto the exposed reef only to see something long and low running over the rocks.

A sea otter!!

(zoom in between the two sets of six jetty poles, that tiny dot is the otter looking at me!!)

I grabbed my camera but as I reached the beach the creature froze, I stopped too although I was still a good distance away. Moments passed as the creature, now aware of my presence, decided what to do.

He watched me as I stood still, daring not to move, simply stared at him, then he turned and headed back over the rocks to the open sea. 

What a way to start a day!!!

Before the sun reached my end of the beach I swept and raked the area clean, expanding the cleaned area by another few meters while the sea had raced in to cover the reef.

Hati had spent the night on the island as he wanted to talk with his business partner who was due to arrive that day.

Breakfast was served on the boys veranda while I began a second offering to my beach.

During my beach combing I had found a half coconut encrusted in barnacles, more string had been added to my pile, along with shells and coral.

Bit by bit my new mobile took shape.

Looking at the remaining collection of shells I decided to design a coral and shell garden beneath the tree at the end of my balcony. 

Hati wandered over just as I was finishing and for a while we talked about the ideas he had for the resort.

Suddenly Princess started to bark and shot down the beach. Neither of us could see what had disturbed her until, at the last moment, a long sleek body shot across the beach with a squeak and dived into the incoming sea. In the shallows the sea otter looked back at Princess as she stood on the shore, her interest dying now that the otter was off her beach and back in his sea.

The otter pipped and squeaked at her before diving beneath the waves only to surface five meters closer to where we sat. Three times the otter dived each time surfacing closer and closer to me. On the fourth dive he surfaced opposite my balcony. His head swivelling left and right before he dived down again and surfaced further out to sea.

No more that twenty meters had separated us. I sat in silence for about ten minutes as I watched my visitor disappear.

Eagles were now soaring on the thermals above us and I remarked on the wild life on the island. There were dolphins too Hati replied, seasonal visitors that played with the boats in the channel beyond the beach. 

Quietly he got up and strolled down the beach enjoying the tranquillity as much as me.

I sat for another twenty minutes just watching the moving sea, subconsciously looking for dolphins and otters, even though it is not dolphin season, before returning to complete my new mobile.

At 2pm a boat approached the shore and a figure stepped onto the beach. We were not expecting anyone until 5pm so curious I wandered over.

A slim man with a long wispy white beard and features similar to my father approached me smiling. 

My Workaway host Mr Ishak had arrived.

(Although I later learnt that everyone calls him Gahsri -Malay for Beard)

I was welcomed with warmth and asked how I was finding the island. I answered honestly that I was in heaven and was enjoying every moment.

I asked about what work he wanted me to do only to be told there wasn't really anything he needed …... except maybe some help with a web page. I explained I didn't have the ability to create an entire web page but I could write introductions and information for him. "Perfect!" he smiled, "Writing isn't my thing," he confided.

The beautifully written Workaway profile, it turned out, had been written by someone who had come to the island by chance and had helped out for a few weeks. He had loved the place so much he had ended up staying for fifteen months!!

It was only when he was on his fifth visa run that the government got suspicious and had refused to renew it!

Unable to receive a renewal he had had a week to arrange his departure from Malaysia.

On his last day on the island, as a gift to Gahsri, he had written the piece that I had read on the Workaway web page. 

His final gift, amongst the others he had left on the island, had been to spread the word and find more help for the amazingly generous man who had opened his beach to him.

Just then another boat turned up!

It was turning into a busy day! 

With things to attend to I left Gahsri to greet the electric meter readers and headed to my balcony for lunch.

Later that day, Gahsri arrived to sit on the porch with me and I asked him his story.

When he was younger he had travelled all over the world buying things that he then sold to the Malaysian government. He had even bought ships in Plymouth and Southampton in England and his knowledge of the world was vast. 

Through careful negotiations he had become a rich man and at the age of forty he had decided to retire. He had bought some land, invested some money and slowed his pace of life to a relaxed meander.

It was while sitting in a back packers hostel that had been set up on the beach across the bay, he had first seen this beach.

He liked solitude he said, he also liked the idea of owning an island.

As we talked he reminded me more and more of my father.

He had four wives he confided, being a born Muslim he was legally allowed four wives and had eight children, five of his own and three adopted. 

His first three wives chose to live independently on the main land and for a while he had divided his time between there and the beach.

As time went by however, he had wanted to spend more and more time on the island and eventually, through mutual agreement, he had decided to simple move over to the beach and leave the three ladies happily where they were.

Bit by bit he had built his first house here, installing wells for water, a generator for power before the island had installed the big generators on the far side.

Now he had government power and water but his wells still supplied many of the taps around the place.

He had not planned to marry again and had lived for three years on the beach alone.

But at sixty he had met a lady who loved the idea on his beach existence and ten years ago they had married. Life had continued happily.

He had built a back packers dormitory and a second house that he could rent out. When visitors came his wife happily cooked and helped even though she spoke no English.

But when there were no visitors she found she felt a little lonely when Gahsri was working on the land and asked if they could have a child. 

We will adopt Gahsri had informed her and a baby in need had been given a home. 

Life on the island had been complete, his daughter had had the undivided attention of two parents, he had the lifestyle he craved as well as loving company.

But life has a way of surprising people and he had been diagnosed with a form of throat cancer. Radio therapy had luckily put the tumour into remission and he had received the all clear. 

Life had once again fallen into his dream life until the daughter reached six and was due to start school!!!

Unfavourable tides, choppy seas and a monsoon season however brief had made travelling back and forth from the beach a logistic night mare so life had changed again.

Luckily he had some land outside Kuala Lumpa so at the age of seventy he had built a house and settled his family there during the school months.

Even before his illness he had ensured that his wives were all self sufficient, as well as his children. They had the finances they required, the facilities to live their lives and he was once again free to live on his island.

His priorities had also changed since his illness.

Life was to be savoured, simplicity was to be embraced and so he had invited Hati to join him in a joint venture to expand the beach.

New structures were being built from the original hard wood he had used to build the first of his homes.

Once built Hati would manage them and arrange the bookings, while Gahsri enjoyed his garden and beach.

As we parted I realised I had enough information to write a book let alone a web page and began to make notes.

A swim, a shower and a few hours later I was invited to stroll around the property with Gahsri. 

Like my father Gahsri loves the paradise he has created and was lively as well as passionate as he pointed out things of interest.

We looked at the compost heaps remarking on the fact they were a little dry, I toured the various plants and trees eating fruits and leaves straight from the tree.

He opened a coconut for me with ease, presenting the lily white flesh inside for my consumption.

A wonderful plant grew in bushes in his garden, a plant with bright red seed pods that were delicious.

With a little sugar, some preparation and boiling they can be made into a thick consistency that can either be spread onto brad like jam or can be dissolved into water to make the most delicious drink.

"Tomorrow I will show you how to make this", Gahsri promised.

We passed the aloe-vera plants as he explained how to eat them, leaves were picked and their properties explained.

Here was a man not only of great knowledge but a man who had used this knowledge to create a heaven on earth.

He even had a bread fruit tree!!!

We retired to a bench to enjoy the coolness of the evening air as the boys began work on the beach house. 

We talked of life, we sat in silence, I talked too much, we drank our drinks.

Across the shore the last of the sun shone on the beach where he had sat looking at this one.

When he had bought his land thirty years ago he had bought the strip parallel to the beach. In Malaysian law no one could own the actual beach front and the sixty yards between his land and the sea was technically no man's land.

Anyone, theoretically had the right to settle there. There was no planning law, no health and safety, nothing to stop a complete stranger from invading his dream.

Over the years he had built up a reputation to being a grumpy crazy man as when people had arrived on his pristine clean beach he had informed them that they were to take every scrap of rubbish and tin foil home with them.

I agreed with his sentiments entirely as I too believe you should leave a place cleaner than you find it. 

Over the years people had stopped invading his space and now in his later years he wanted to make sure no one arrived to develop his beach and so he was developing it himself, with Hati's help.

Eventually I took my leave and as I wandered back down the beach Gahsri wandered back to feed his fish that lived outside his house. 

Despite his illness or possible because of it, he was living his dream.

At seventy years old, life had just begun!

Back at my open house on the beach, I cooked myself some supper and sat beside one of the burning leaf and debris piles to think.

The flames flickered and roared in the evening breeze.

I thought over all the stories I had heard during the day and as the waves swept the beach ten meters from my feet, I picked up my lap-top and began to write .........