It was so good to be back to Sandakan again after my last goodbye to it four years ago. I was stationed there for four years and I gotta say it had shaped me a lot as a person – the experiences that I gained while I was being there were invaluable. Before coming to Sandakan, the eastern part of Sabah was quite alien to me so I was eager to explore. And true enough, my job had required me to go all over, even traveling far out into the ocean and spending hour after hour after hour on a boat ride which could turn rough at times, to remote islands that I never knew existed and to villages that could only be reached by river.
It really was a down-memory-lane for me. I went to those places that I used to go to when I was still stationed there. I loved Sandakan back then and I still do when I returned again 4 years later. Sandakan has not really changed much. I mean, there are new buildings here and there, with new hotels springing up like mushrooms after a long rain but overall it still looks pretty much the same to me. I noticed the existence of McDonald’s, Secret Recipe, Kenny Rogers and even Big Apple of which all I missed having around back then. Continue reading
