Return to yesteryears: Batu Gajah (part 3)

Batu Gajah has now become part of my parent’s daily life. They would be there almost every evening to relax and occasionally bump into one or two old friends from the neighborhood. Last Saturday, I went back to my parent’s and spent the whole evening at Batu Gajah with them. We were practically there spending some quality time chit-chatting away the whole 5-hours.

Being back to Batu Gajah has and will always bring back good childhood memories to me. It was our little hidden playground during the hot sunny days. Now more than 15 years later, I am glad to be back again. Though the place has changed tremendously lot, but the change has now turned it into a beautiful garden – undoubtedly a great little place to get away from the busy outside world.

Blue dragonfly

Growing wild mushroom after couple days rain

Bright yellow flower

Crawling plants

Fallen leaves

  

Picture (Left) - Daun Sirih; (Right) - An old vase

Picture (Left) - Wild plants; (Right) - Fern

Wild berries

My favorite spot

 

 The other sight of the river

 Serenity

 Small fishes feeding on a piece of crackers

 These bright colored ones were store bought and let to wild

 Look carefully...notice anything?

Monkeys! I had no idea what species of the monkeys they were. They had greyish-black body with white eye ring and lips - so adorable!

Return to yesteryears: Batu Gajah (part 2)

After the first visit, I was somehow fascinated with the calm and cooling surroundings of Batu Gajah. With the weather around CNY month goes up to the extreme and unbearable (well, at least that’s what I felt), I knew this is just the right place to be.

I persuaded my parents and a cousin to join me for a plunge into the cooling water whiles the sun still burning hot. My mom cooked some instant meals for us to feast over there and off we went. 

Plenty of flora and fauna

Wild flowers

White rounded brinjals

Ahhh…..now this is what I call heaven!

Return to yesteryears: Batu Gajah

I return to the place where as a child, I would spend most of my evenings there with my two elder brothers and a bunch of friends from the same neighborhood.

Locally known as Batu Gajah, our so-called playground is within the jungle forest of Tanjung Bunga. A 10-minutes walk from our home would lead us to a very shady area by the hilly rocks and a chilly stream at almost 6-ft deep. Of course, there was a shallow area for a young child like me (then) to play around too *grin*

Looking back, I could not recall how we ever plan of the meet up time, but somehow or rather we would end up in a large group leading to the same direction. Perhaps I was too young to remember all that. But I certainly recall clearly that almost every evening with the sun still shining on us, we would plunge into the chilly stream to cool down. The place is secluded with no one else is there to bug us (except of mosquitoes!).

When I went back to the same place after around 15 years later, the place has changed tremendously lot. The stream is no longer 6-ft deep and not as shady as before but I all can say is that this place is still a serene place to just unwind and cool down. The hilly rocks still remains the same just the stream is now merely 3-ft deep.

Standing there brings me back to my childhood times when there were no worries and all we do is just have fun and play all night long! We owned no computers, hand phones or any high-tech gadgets, but we had lots of fun times exploring the nature!

Some of the pictures taken from my recent visit...