More Singapore Stories III BY Rozie

This story happened when I went to Singapore to visit friends, not long after spending several years living there. There was me, and my three friends, two Eurasians and a Caucasian, J,G and D. D got a crush on this one guy and she learned that this guy and a bunch of his friends were going camping at Bukit Timah Natural Reserve by the quarry (sort of like Bukit Shahbandar with a gigantic unused pool) and since we were all hanging out she managed to convince us to go and join them. The me, J and G figured ok, we'll go for the day and leave before evening. We packed some food and clothes and went.

I remembered we swam in the quarry, jumping off the cliff especially the boys who were showing off their daringness. The water in the quarry was murky and it was amazing that it never occurred to us that anything dangerous could have been in the waters, for all you know they could be spikes of wood or metal that could have impaled us as we jump in.

By evening we dried off and had a fire started and we did the old cooking by the camp fire thing, I remembered burnt marshmallows... and the guys were wrapped up in their own thing and ignored us girls and I wanted to head back to civilisation. Somewhere at that time, I had a fight with D, I can't remember what it was about anymore but I got fed up with her, stood up and started walking back into the forest to get out of the place. I remembered I just wanted to get far away from her. J and G came after me and I think J managed to get D to join us and just leave the place.

We didn't even have a torchlight to help out make our way out but somehow we did. It was a still night, nothing was moving, no wind, no crickets noise, it was quiet. All of the sudden I smelt something sweet and floral, like the smell came up from behind. We were walking in a single line and I was up front, J was behind me. "J, are you thinking what I'm thinking?" I asked her.

"Yes... G?" and G replied, "Yup."

D asked us, "What are you guys talking about?"

None of us answered and we sped up. We dare not run we just walked faster. D complained we were moving too fast, and we just told her to keep up. The smell got stronger. Dogs were barking in the distance and I was praying we get out of here safe and trying not to imagine anything. I warned the girls to keep looking ahead. D was still bitching when all of the sudden she stopped talking. Can she finally smell it? We didn't ask and just continued.

Finally we managed to get out of the forest and into a clearing, the barking got louder and the four of us walked side by side. We could see street lights in the distance and made me feel slightly better but it was still far from safety. Ahead of us we saw the dogs, probably about a dozen in numbers barking straight at us. Oh crap, and we need to get pass them to get out. I told the girls to just continue walking ahead, I figured we can always fight off the dogs if need be than trying to fight whatever was behind us that's giving off that smell that just seemed to threaten to engulf us.

As we got closer to the dogs, I wondered why they didn't lunge at us, they just stood there barking their heads off. The four of us walked right by them and I realised the dogs weren't interested in us, they were barking whatever was behind us! As soon as we passed the wall of dogs, the smell stopped. The dogs continued their barking and we got onto the main parking area as quickly as we could and onto the road and hailed a taxi and get out of there.

Since we were staying at J's place, we took the precaution of making sure we washed our feet and walked around the house three times before heading indoors. After we got ready for bed we started talking of what happened earlier. D said she at first had no idea what we were talking about when we were in the forest and she wondered why we were so quiet and was moving quite fast, when suddenly she smelt something sweet from behind her was when she finally understood what was happening. J, G and I were impressed, because we always wondered whether Caucasians get affected to, now we know, cos D is a blonde haired blue eyed orang puteh and the four of us almost had our first encounter with what I assume now was a pontianak.