“Blond Baby (Momentarily) Abducted by Photo-Seeking Chinese Woman at Malaysian Butterfly Farm.”

Wednesday, December 19

On Wednesday we wound our way around the small highway that hugged the coast en route to the northern part of the island. The butterfly farm was quite cool with Gabi and Rania excited about seeing all the butterflies.

But the most memorable event from the trip was something that only Auntie Tasha could believe. As we were walking around the enclosed butterfly farm, this young Chinese girl swooped down and grabbed Rania in the hopes of being photographed with a beautiful blond baby. Rania, who was happily wandering along with the butterflies at this point, was not amused by being abducted by a total stranger. Her screaming displayed both her displeasure and ruined her Chinese kidnapper’s perfect picture.

I could only laugh at the event while all of the abductor’s friends profusely apologized (but not the Chinese woman herself!). Unfortunately, Rania was considerably less willing to walk around the farm alone, so I had to spend much of the time in the humid enclosure carrying our youngest daughter.

Despite this hilarious interlude, we were amazed at the many beautiful butterflies, exotic beetles, large spiders, colorful ducks, and tropical fish which were part of the butterfly farm.

Once we finally made it into a little video enclosure, Rania calmed down, and found her most pleasure in walking in and out of hanging beads that separated two rooms.

Since we had promised Gabi a trip to beach, and our exotic hotel has a great view of the sea, but not a sandy beach, we had to stop at a beach. It was certainly not a nice beach, and with a sharp drop off and coarse sand, we figured that there are plenty of other places to enjoy great beach vacations. At least Gabi got to make her sand houses with her grandma Ramona, and Rania giggled as the waves crashed over her toes.