These are just some random shots of the island and it's inhabitants. All the girls fall in love with Cap'n Min. The 9 foot long Monitor lizards are just a part of daily life. Every once in a while a scream will echo over the beach from someone who saw one on the footpath. "Mutual hate" are the two words I'd use to describe my relationship with this particular garbage eatin', bum-rushin', vermin that is calleda monkey. The plane has to do very hard bank in order to land on the postage stamp sized runway. I always tell people to sit on the left side of the aircraft on take-off so they don't see the propeller clipping the mountain. There are very cold fresh rain waterfalls on the south side of the island. Every sunset should be on the cover of Conde Nast Traveler. On Tioman people actually climb coconut trees to harvest. There are two squirrels that live near us. Secret Squirrel is small and stealthy and can jump vast distances without making any noise. Unsecret Squirrel (pictured) is like the older alcoholic fat uncle who thinks he still has his mojo. You know, the high school quarterback who is still living in his glory days. When Unsecret Squirrel jumps the whole tree bends backwards and you can practically hear him whincing "whooooa boy, too much tree root last night!" And as one would expect, the local children are absolutely delicious.

At this point it’s impossible not to talk about the cast of characters in our lives on Tioman.

Marya and Ivo. Marya is Spanish and Ivo, Czech, they met in London and ran away together. She spent years working in an herbal healh store and he is MacGuyver, give the guy a rubber band and a coke can and he'll make an airplane out of it. Between the two of them they can fix anything, anybody, anywhere at anytime. While biking their way around South East Asia they decided to take a break at Tioman. Their first place in Salang was a squat in an old condemned hotel. They pitched a tent on its huge beautiful veranda that overlooks the sea. We went there a few times for dinner at sunset and the view was by far the best on the island. Unfortunately, they were evicted because the owners are going to try to fix their “little” foundation problem. “Little” meaning that there is very little foundation to support the massive structures that were built onto the hill. The engineers leave around 5pm, so in the evening it becomes “The Yoga Squat.” The sunset class is absolutely magical. I always finish it just as the last strands of the sun streak into the evening horizon.

There’s Andy too. A chef, English teacher, dot-commer and dive master, Andy is a first generation American who’s parents fled Cambodia during the Vietnam War. His father had worked as an assistant to the US State Department and when you look at the old news footage of the emergency evacuation of the US Embassy in Phnom Penh, his family was part of it. He told me that they were only allowed a certain number of passes for the US bound flight and his brother made it out in a suitcase. Andy made it out in his mom’s belly. When we go to Cambodia in September we’ll hook up with him again and then I’ll tell you his dizzying family story. The second picture is him with Jeanette and Kris who took the island by storm. The whole beach was saddened when they left. They were from our "hood" in Brooklyn so we spend many an hour catching up on all the latest Williamsburg gossip.

One day Ivo and I had the brilliant idea to play Indiana Jones and cut a path up to the mountain top. After eight hours of mosquito assisted jungle hacking with machetes we realized we were only half-way up and we decided we’d had enough for the day. I mean, it’s a little intimidating when a mosquito burps after draining you. Exhausted, blistered, hungry, and sore we struggled back down only for someone to tell us, in a very condescending tone, that there was already a path...what did Forrest Gump’s mama always say: “stupid is as stupid does”? Anyway, at the end of the day it was good fun and we did find some pretty amazing caves that no one seemed to know about.

There’s no cars on the north part of the island so getting from beach to beach is done by speedboat or jungle trekking. One day Marya, Ivo, Helen and I decided to go on a little hike to Monkey Beach. Why they gave it that name is still a mystery to me because every monkey on the island conveniently lives right behind our hut and spends every waking moment going through our trash or physically attacking innocent picture taking tourists.