Hi Everyone,

     Here is part two of our visit to Agnes Keith’s home and the English Tea House just near by.  Randal and I fell in love with both places and would have moved right in. 

     We are coming to the end of our visit here in KK.  If all goes as planned we’ll leave Wednesday morning for Tiga Island (of Survivor fame), next Labuan and then back to Miri, Kuching, Sebana Cove, and a new stop Danga Bay, Indonesia, just outside Singapore as we retrace our route that will take us back to Peninsular Malaysia.  Then we’ll head up the west coat of Peninsular Malaysia.  Some old places and then some new ones.  We both really like Kota Kinabalu but we’re both ready to head on our way.  I’ve attached a photo of an excel file that show the lat and long numbers.  Randal really does spend lots of time looking at the routes to make sure they don’t have us cruising into obstacles, oil rigs, shallows or whatever.  You don’t just draw a line on the chart from point A to point B.  You have to look very closely at the entire route to see what you’ll encounter.  We have autopilot to steer the boat but it doesn’t do the thinking.  Randal does the navigation thinking.  If I absolutely in a pinch had to plan a route, I could do a crude one without factoring in current and weather….not a good idea, but in a pinch. (A pretty big bad I don’t want to think about it pinch!)  I think I could use the electronic chart.  Randal actually sort of agrees. 

   The two lucky stones I found on the beach several days ago seem to be helpinf the Sox!  I’m going back for more.  And I found enough sea glass to fill an empty large size instant coffee jar.  I’m going back for more of that too.  It’s almost impossible to find anymore but there’s lots over on the little beach near the marina.  Better than lots of plastic in my opinion. 

    So that’s it.

Ru

Agnes Keith continued..

It’s funny that it’s always called Agnes Keith’s House because she wouldn’t have been there without her husband who worked for the British Charter Company. The original house had been destroyed during the war but was rebuilt on the ruined foundations of the original house.

“Agnes Newton Keith was born Agnes Newton in Oak Park, Illinois. Her family moved to Hollywood, California when she was very young. Her father was one of the founders of the Del Monte Company. She attended the University of California, Berkeley for four years, and upon graduating got a job with the San Francisco Examiner. Eight months after starting her journalism career, she was attacked by an assailant who was convinced that the newspaper was persecuting him by printing Krazy Kat cartoons. She received serious head injuries which affected her memory. She also became seriously depressed, and after two years of illness her father sent her and her brother Al to Europe to recuperate. Returning refreshed to the States, Agnes decided to become a writer, but soon afterwards lost her eyesight for two years as a delayed result of her injuries. During this period she studied dancing, modeled clothes and ‘did bits in the movies.

In 1934 she married Henry G. Keith, known as Harry. Keith, an Englishman, had been a friend of Al’s when both boys had been at the same school in San Diego, and Agnes had first met him when she was eight years old. Keith had gone on to work for the Government of North Borneo, and Agnes had not seen him in ten years when he visited California while on leave in 1934. However, as soon as they re-met they decided to get married, and were wed three days later. Three months after their marriage, following an operation to cure Agnes’s eyesight, they sailed for Borneo.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnes_Newton_Keith

Agnes Keith and friend. Agnes treated the native animals as we do cats and dogs; they became part of the family. Photo from the brochure.

Randal and I spent a good deal of time in the house looking at the photos and reading all of the captions. Obviously we’re both big fans. If you read, Eat Pray Love or Under the Tuscan Sun; you’ll like Agnes Keith’s books too. Claudette Colbert played the part of Agnes Keith in the movie version of Three Came Home about the war years. I think Katherine Hepburn would have been great for the part. Randal and I really just wanted to move into the house and spend the night. Instead we said farewell to Agnes and Harry, retrieved our shoes and walked over to the English Tea House for scones and tea.

http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9502EFDE173DE03BBC4951DFB466838B649EDE is a New York Time review of the movie that came out in 1950.

English Tea House. Randal found the stick on our way up the “100 steps.” I don’t know if it helped but he carried it all the way up and all the way back down.

This is the view from the Tea House but would also have been the view from Agnes Keith’s House.

This was our waiter Din during our first visit to the Tea House. Din is taking away the freezing cold damp wash cloth that I was given to wash my very sweaty hands, face, anything else I could reach that wasn’t covered by my clothes. It felt wonderful.

We went to the Tea House twice and both times had wonderful tea and scones. Well, I had the tea; Randal had 100 Plus which is like carbonated Gatorade.

You could try your hand at croquet.

They had an old phonograph and telescope. They played big band music softly in the background. We could have spent the night here too!

After our warm scones with clotted cream and strawberry jam we were off to walk around Sandakan and see the sights. A good thing too since we had just eaten about a billion calories of mostly cholesterol. The scones were more like a heavier southern biscuit. When we were finishes there wasn’t even a crumb for the birds or a sign that there had ever been any butter or jam in the small serving dish. Randal was in heaven and I was good too!