After three planes and a bus ride, we had arrived at or next destination: the Borneo paradise eco resort- Our tranquil yet welcoming home for the next week. This was our first stretch in the state of Sabah which initially was a bit of a culture shock, even in comparison to Sarawak. No more shorts for the girls, even when we were doing copious amounts of games of duck duck goose with the children.
The agenda for the week saw that we'd finally get to interact with the children from the local palm oil plantation. I think I can safely say we've all gone to bed with heads, shoulders knees and toes firmly implanted in our heads this week... and possibly for the foreseeable future haha! Although we played and played, then played some more. Our learning integrated games proved to have worked, which meant the children were able to correctly answer questions asked by their teachers. We were given an impressive 9/10 on improvements in the school overall... not bad for rookies!
With early finishes at the school, we had time to spare so we got stuck in to "banana chip" making.
While we weren't perfecting the banana fritters and chips, we also took up fishing which coincided with a small completion with the locals. We quickly realised that it wasn't the sport for us. However, if the winner of the fishing competition was the person who lost the most bait with least amount of catches, we'd have aced it!
As the week drew to a close, we said our goodbyes to the students with a morning full of dancing, followed by some paint work on the newly renovated classroom. The busy day led on to a BBQ with most of the local community- including some familiar faces from the school. We carried on dancing (including our amazing performance of wannabe by the spice girls), eating more than our body weight in Malaysian deserts and singing the night away with karaoke. Following on from our previous karaoke night... we were now pro's.
Now on to the next few days where we will be river cruising and coming up close with orangutans in the Sepilok conservation centres before we embark on our jungle trek!