Day 14: Sandakan

Instead of the planned bus trip we rent a car instead with Nor, Sofrie, Dave and myself for the long haul so we could stop at waterfalls, hot springs and get heaps of food (rice based meals breakfastlunchanddinner). I grab the wheel of this tiny car and somehow managing to bust a tire halfway, sweating hard we make it to get fixed no worries, (tube replacement and labour cost $7 AU!!) nice one. Arrive at Sandakan to some nervous looking locals but they seemed very keen on seeing some whiteys play any form of music. Even though the scene there was incredibly small we had a cool two piece grind band open for us called "Agonizer" covering Inhale/Exhale by Nasum and donnig brutal truth and warsore t-shirts! Cool to see for such a tiny scene. The venue was a tiny shop front about the third the size of blackwire. The nervous studio owner wouldn't allow people inside for "security" reasons so the 40 or so locals had to mosh on the street. Even if they weren't allowed in the same room we were playing, their happy faces squished against the shopfront glass was a relieving sight. After the show, every camera and mobile phone got at least 3 photos of us and our cheeky smiles and faux-metal nice faces with the locals. We Are Rockstars there now. After trying to convince the grind locals to start a healthy grind scene so we come back I crash out early for the trip back. (Dave actually continues to socialise though)