Turtle Channel!!!

It was an exceedingly warm afternoon. We sat quietly in our small canoe, hoping to reach our destination soon. Two days ago, some natives informed our camp about the sighting of an old temple just down the river. What they forgot to tell us, was that the river is about 20 kilometres long, and gets rather treacherous to travel on at the halfway mark.

Nevertheless, here we were sitting quietly in a tiny canoe that nicely fits 5 including me, Edwin (our archeological expert), and a native guide. Full marks to those who managed to guess who was rowing the canoe...Anyway, we managed to bypass the rough waters by trekking through 15 kilometres of swampland. It was awful and camping there during the night left us all exhausted, but at least we're alive, which is more than one can say against the rough river waters. Again, no surprises as to which poor soul was left dragging the canoe throughout the entire swampland adventure. It remains a mystery as to how the native is still strong enough to propel our canoe towards our final destination.

1 hour down, and we finally arrived at the above-mentioned temple. We were extremely disappointed to find that it was probably built 30 years ago judging by its condition, design and the fact that it had a fan and a power generator. Behind the temple was a hill, whereby some kind fellow had carved out steps on the ground to make some sort of a stairway to the hilltop. We collectively groaned when we saw that on the other side of the hill, there were gravel roads, which meant that we could have simply driven here from our camp!

Nevertheless, Edwin decided to make the best of our situation and climbed into a pond directy front of the temple. He was splashing himself to cool off, when we spotted a very tiny, green something sitting on a nearby rock next to where Edwin was splashing about. It soon became apparent that the green thing was actually a really small turtle (also known as a terrapin since it is obviously a fresh-water turtle). The species of this turtle is unknown to me, as it is nothing like any turtle I have ever laid my tired eyes on. It had a small longish but flat shell and its head protruded from its shell by almost the length of the shell itself. It seemed to be rather agitated at our close scrutiny.

Rather than retreating into its shell (which is what most turtles would have probably done), it poked his head further out and started snapping at me. I started back in shock! The turtle was actually snapping. It snapped at me again even though Edwin was closest to it (I don't know why, but I suspect it may have something to do with it being blinded by Edwin's pink shirt), and this time, we could see its sharp teeth rather clearly. A moment later, the tiny thing literally charged at me, swimming very fast across the pond and running towards me. I had NEVER seen a turtle that snaps, let alone one that has sharp teeth. And until this tiny thing came along, I was always under the impression that turtles move rather slowly on land.

This thing was running at me. I dropped my bags and ran for the hills. It was only after I had climbed half of the man-made steps up the hill that I dared to turn around and scout for the location of the turtle. Apparently the turtle had given up chase the moment we reached the foot of the hill and had headed back to the water. I couldn't really see much from where I was, but I had a feeling my companions may have captured it as it appears to be a rather significant discovery.