Click here for the corresponding pictures.
*Forgive any grammar mistakes or sloppy sentences. I'm exhausted at the moment.
Then we had picnic breakfasts prepared by all the homestay moms. Ours was really good, but I was covered in sand, so it was kind of uncomfortable eating it.
After the picnic, we played games on the beach. They were actually a lot of fun! It was kind of nice to act like a kid again, and most of us were pretty bad at the games, which made it all the funnier.
Each homestay family split up after that, and went to the Wet Market, which is essentially like a farmer's market combined with a community yard sale. The pictures of this explain it pretty well - people were selling all kinds of things, but mostly either clothing or food. In the food category, there were tons of fruits, and also a lot of meat. The meat area was kind of sickening (as you'll get a glimpse of in the pictures), and there were far too many flies for me to feel entirely comfortable. In any case, our host parents were mostly at the market to buy food for lunch, so we didn't actually get to spend much time wandering around.
We returned to our house after that, and I showered and took a nap. My friend had explained to me how to use the shower head to actually shower - apparently it's just like a normal shower, except you're standing in the middle of the bathroom instead of in an enclosure. This time was infinitely more successful than the night before, and I actually felt clean (and so thankful!).
When we woke up from our naps (it was one of the best naps I've ever had in my entire life - the window was open and the temperature was perfect), oomi was preparing lunch. She told us we could walk around the house and take pictures if we wanted, so we did. She also pointed to a house across the backyard and told us that was the sister's house we had been at the night before, and another sister lived right next door. They really do value family ties, I think.
Lunch was really good, though it once again included a ton of fish. Oomi and abba kept encouraging us to eat with our hands, in the local fashion, but I didn't really feel up to it. One interesting thing to note was the order of feeding - we the men ate first, with abba and our 13-year old host brother. Oomi and the daughter had to wait until we finished before they could start.
The conclusion of the homestay was pretty anticlimactic. After lunch, all the families met up at the welcome center for a closing ceremony, and that was the end of it. Oomi and abba gave us their address, and told us that if we ever came back, we could stay with them. You can see why I get the impression that Malays are very kind, generous, and welcoming.
After the homestay was over, we went to Mini-Mosque World (that's not the official title, obviously). This is exactly what it sounds like - a sort of amusement park/museum with miniature models of the most famous mosques around the world. It was actually a really awesome park, and we all had a lot of fun wandering around and taking funny pictures (as you'll see).
The Mini-Mosque World concluded our stay in Terengganu, and we rode in the bus for most of the rest of the night. We stopped at a sort of carnival for dinner, but there wasn't really that much food around. What we did find was sketchy and kind of disgusting, as most carnival food is. The carnival was kind of neat to explore, but we didn't have a lot of time and the locals kept gawking at us. Our graduate coordinator and one girl from the trip rode the roller coaster and ferris wheel that were set up. The graduate coordinator threw up.
The bus ride from the carnival to Kota Bahru, our final destination, was long and late. We played "never-have-I-ever," though, which helped pass the time and taught us all a lot (perhaps too much...:-P) about each other. It was one of the best bus bonding periods we had on the whole trip.
Of course, once we got to the hotel, we checked in and went right to sleep. Thus ended day three.
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