It's Rough But Somebody Has To Do It

Well it's me, Lightnin again....Thunder is slacking but when you see the pictures I'm posting , you'll understand why I'm not really complaing!

We are in Kuantan, Malayasia for this week. The first day in was my birthday. Thunder waited just until my feelings were starting to get hurt, before wishing me a Happy Birthday. He's sometimes like that. Then he told me he had to go to work but had a surprise for me when he got back. Okay, so now I have the day by myself and a surprise coming. Which by the way I hate surprises! Grab a book and head to the pool. We are only 3 degrees from the equator and let me tell ya it is hot, Hot, HOT! You can get burned in the time it takes to drink one beer even while using SPF 30! Trust me this is fact! I have some very good water proof sunscreen which is also good since I have to dip into the pool about every 5-10 minutes! So I spent the afternoon taking it easy and then back to get ready for my "surprise".

Thunder had made arrangements before coming here for the romatic dinner on the beach as my gift! He couldn't have done anything better! We had our own wait staff that seated us and started off with a bottle of champagne. Then came the carpaccio salad! Delicious. This is one of our favorites and have had it all over the world, but none compared to this.

Then it was a lobster bisque with prawns and parsley cream. We really should have quit right here, but no...it's a four course meal so let's move on! Now Thunder has picked out a bottle of Merlot to go along with the main course. Our main course was Tiger Prawns, a lamb chop and a chicken breast chop. This came with a baked potato and sauteed corn in a red wine sauce. At this point I knew we needed to-go boxes because I was already stuffed.

The dessert was one of David's favorites a Tiramisu served with chocolate wafers, passion fruit, kiwi and blueberries. I'm not a sweets eater but had to try it all. I think I'm hooked on passion fruit now! So now I thought we were done...wrong! The staff comes down to the beach to sing Happy Birthday to me and with them they have a heartshaped fresh mango cheescake that says "Happy Birthday For Mrs. Wise"candles and all, and a bouquet of fresh roses and other exotic flowers. Okay, so I cracked at this point. I felt more like a Princess than ever. This was truly the best birthday ever and there have been quite a few. Back at the room we finish the evening...now stop thinking that! There was an envelope with birthday wishes from SPC Dude that he had called into our hotel! What a great memory to have as long as the dementia stays at bay!

There are other fun things here also...creepy little monkeys everywhere and last night one visited our balcony that wasn't so little. There is also a creature described to us as "cat/wolf" that roams around! I'm pretty sure I heard one early this morning. There was loud bang as if someone knocked over a chair and then a horrible cat sound that would even put our cat to shame! These things are called masang so Thunder and I googled it....We really don't want to see one these guys! Thunder has been working very hard this week. He even did a double shift one day. But ya'll know Thunder he still managed to sing with a guy last night at a typical Malaysian resturant. It was a little too lounge-lizzardy for me but he still sounded great! Well tomorrow it's back to the Jing where hopfully we meet up with SPC Dude. We are all three going to make it to one of the Olympic events...Sand Volleyball! So there will be more post coming later this week. Hope I haven't bored you too much but we feel a lot like traveling food host, so eat your heart out Anthony Bourdain!