Mystical experience.. anyone?

Inspired by true event.

"Yuuuuu~~~Huuuuu~~~"My signal yield sounded so loud and pierced through the quietness of the forest, no echoes, and then almost immediately I received a shout-back, the voice was too spread-out as the forest was so not confined. I believed it was from Amir or Boy, who were about few meters behind of us.

"... maybe we should wait for them, they are on their way to CP2," I looked at exhausted Sue, "what do you find in that another trail?"

"No," Sue drank up her bottle of water, "as you said, no sign of trails at all.. we'll follow the one you picked just now," Sue needed my help to stand up. Her knees pain was killing her, but her determination surprised me very much.

"Let's go. Maybe we'll see the white-red tape right in front," I tried to put on a light tone though deep inside I knew that we might have chosen a wrong pathway which might lead to anything.

TECHNICALLY, we were not lost. We were just confused with two choices of pathways, which both did not seem to be familiar at all for both of us. We eventually chose path 'A' as Sue and I agreed that path 'B' did not have any sign of trails. And things were not so optimistic as we still did not see any white-red tapes after half an hour of going downhill via pathway 'A'.

"Follow the white-red tape." This was the last advice or guideline that we received from Boy, our guide to Gunung Ledang, before Sue and I decided to move ahead of them.

"I don't think this looks familiar, " Sue claimed her intuition. I had to admit Sue got real sharp intuition, but in this scenario, even the least intuitive person like me could easily tell, the trail that we were stepping on, it was so new and unfamiliar.

The trail was so steep and slippery, covered by thick carpet of leaves and grasses. And it was broad, up to a feeling of weird. Too broad and too clear. No trees stood in the middle of the downhill trail, they were just aligned at the both side of it. And the thick carpet, so soft and green, I even thought I saw it glowing with a smooth diffused greenish glow, but it might due to some kind of optical illusion or any scientific explanation, like my drops of sweat hanging around my eye sort of created a diffusion effect to my sight , or maybe it was simply the glowing algae on the trail yada yada yada.. but.. the trail was different, I could tell, even Sue.

"I think this is the pathway for 4-wheel-drive.." she said while trying hard to get every step down on the trail. Yes the trail was broad enough for vehicle, but "do u see any tyre print?" I asked, helping her to come down to a little platform where I stepped on. The trail was so virgin that we couldn't even notice any traces of human footprints. PLUS, up to that moment I still did not see any white-red tape.

We might be on the wrong track. I thought to myself. Not telling Sue as she needed every concentration to make sure she din fall and slide down. The pathway was very slippery and I had to hold to a tree or make my heel-stop on any bulge on the trail, although my KANGAROO hiking shoe gave reliable grip most of the time.

"Do you see any tape ahead?" Sue's NIKE running shoe was obviously not for this type of outing. She had to sit on the steep surface and slide herself every inch downslope.

"Not YET." I started to pray.

"So you DO believe in spirits?" suddenly I heard a voice asking. A lady's, not from Sue.

"Yes I do," I tried to ignore the mysterious voice but I answered unconsciously.

"..because you prayed just now. " the voice smiled. I arrived a turn with all the worry and curiosity. "Sue are you alright?" I made it loud enough so that my own voice could pull me back to the reality.

"...any tapes ahead?" she was getting closer to me.

"Not YET..." I held on a tree trunk besides me and waited for her. Despite Sue's sit-down-and-slide way of going downhill, we relied on the trees or plantations on both side of the pathway very much while moving downward.

We moved on when Sue arrived my side. It was a turn, not really sharp one, but steep, and the broad clear greenish pathway extended downward after the turn. Everything seemed to be the same except a tree.

A tree that stood right in the middle of the trail, with 3 white-red tapes and 2 black-yellow tapes tied around the trunk.

Almost running and skidding, I rushed to the tree and leaned against it, before I fell down and slided all the way down the trail. I held the tapes and felt them, making sure that they were not any illusion or mirage.

"Sue I think we got the tapes, A LOT of them." I declared carefully, while looking up to the tree. This tree stood in the middle of this trail was... ... I dun know, it seemed like a man to me, maybe a lady, standing in the middle of our way, welcoming our arrival with all the tapes that Sue and I were looking for.

"This is the answer for your prayer, cuz you'd never prayed like that before, right?" The voice.

"What?" I turned around.

"I SAID, so are we on the right track now?" Sue repeated, with a tone that full of hopes.

"Oh.. yeah, I think so.." I looked up to the tree, touching it and feeling it. The tree was real, ".. you OK there?" I was about to ask "did you hear anything just now" instead.

"Be careful, make your step over here. This tree is firm enough to lean on," I instructed, while leaving the tree so that Sue could have the space to catch her breath.

My steps moved on, but not my mind. "What was that?" I kept on wondering, and "Where am I?"

"This is the walkway for royalty of this mountain, that's why it is different, and you two stepped onto it," The voice.

"Huh?!" it was rude to gasp, especially when everything in my mind seemed to be read by this somebody.

"I thought you believed in spirits?" see I told you.

Yes I do. ".. but you seemed to be confused. The prayer just now, it was a mess. Why?"

Maybe I din know which God to call for.. "Funny," the voice cut off my non-sense explanation. I was embarrassed. The voice continued, "it is the heart that we listen to," the voice consoled me, "like what you always believe in, the differences possessed among human beings are just different in forms..."

Yes, the languages, the cultural, the skin colors, the religions...... they are all just various forms of human appearances, "it is the heart that matters,"I agreed. The voice smiled.

"So why are you still confused?" She asked.

"Maybe I absorbed the variety too much and too easily that I couldn't sort them out when to think of my own root," I tried to explained it in a better way.

"WHAT? Now I'm confused. Did you not listen to my question?" Sue gave me a punch, "I SAID, we got the markers now, then WHY ARE YOU STILL CONFUSED?"

"Oh..." I suddenly realized that Sue was walking in front of me now. She found a tongkat which helped a lot to her movement. ".. I... I mean.. because we only have one marker .. I mean 5 markers tied on 1 tree..., and there's no more ahead," I tried to recover from my 'day-dreaming'.
"C'mon buddy, we only have one way down, this IS the right way," Sue suddenly sounded excited. I thought I saw what she saw: the end of the this steep broad greenish trail, or the glowing carpet royalty's walkway.

"Go. She's right. At the end of this trail you'll find your familiar track back home," The voice again, "as at the end of your confusion, you'll find out that we'd never run out from your root, it is inside your heart."

"Embracing variety is not meant to make confusion, only those who are able to overlook the differences can celebrate variety." This was the last statement echoing in my mind, not sure it was from the voice or it was actualy from myself. We arrived the end of the mysterious trail and came to our very surprise, we saw the entry of this trail at the bottom of it was blocked by tree trunks and branches -- the road block was apparently setup by the authority of Gunung Ledang, indicating a clear 'NO ENTRY' sign for those mountain climbers.

We found our confidence back when we saw a signboard showing the direction to CP1, and white-red tapes were seen at the distance of every 1 meter. Sue and I were the last to arrived the headquarter of Gunung Ledang. Sue was surprised as she thought the group of Amir and Boy was behind us at CP2.

Everybody was concerned bout us, even Amir did not realize that they overtook us. "We used another track down, perhaps was not the one we used to hike up," This was my answer plus apologies to everybody, "but we still followed the white-red tapes." I tried to put on a light tone, even though I wasn't sure about the ONLY white-red tapes we had throughout the mysterious 'walkway'.

..but what was the voice and who was talking to me? I had no idea at all. The royalty, the fine sense to the complicated feeling deep in my heart, the wisdom, the gentle way of talking -- the only name I had in my mind was related to the legend of Gunung Ledang, which it shouldn't be mentioned throughout our journey in the legendary Gunung Ledang.

Footnote:
I later asked Fariz which way should we actually take after CP2 since pathway 'A' was THE ONE we chose and it proved it wasn't the right one while pathway 'B' did not seem to have any trails. The answer of Fariz was rather simple: "Din u see the sign board showing the direction RIGHT AFTER the CP2?"

No I did not see any signboard there, neither did Sue.