We slammed to a halt in the middle of nowhere. The screeching stop woke me from my three-day travel daze, drooling on myself pressed against the window of the bus. I saw no coast, no sea, no waves. Just the maze of other buses and trucks careening down the highway like a bat out of hell. The bus driver came walking up to me screaming in Malay with what I could only image being, “Get off you stupid tourist!” Hazily I grabbed my backpack of camera gear, with the shoulder strap wrapped around my leg, stepped off the bus and grabbed my board bag and stood confused on the side of a Malaysian highway not having any idea of where I was. Watching the bus take off leaving me in the smoke of its diesel fumes, I was beginning to wonder what I had gotten myself into.

I saw the week previous what I could only imagine being the swell of the decade to hit the South China Sea and arranged to check out this mysterious left point a friend swore to me would have incredible waves. He knew of a local shaper to introduce me to that could put me up and show me around. All sounded good when booking the flight and bus from Kuala Lumpur, but now on the side of the road not knowing where I was, the thought of a left point break seemed bleak. I managed however to hitch a ride and tell the driver vaguely where I wanted to go. Luckily he knew and drove me into town, only a mile or so hidden in the trees on the other side of the highway. Ran into the shaper, booked my stay for the week, and immediately eyed the sea in hopes of seeing a wave worth flying half way around the world for.

Walking out to this giant spit of sand with a forested headland, I saw nothing but brown water and dribbly little lefts peeling down the line. Something I’d imagine my toilet bowl does after a rice and fishplate from a nearby restaurant. But looking up the point, the vision of any horny surfers wet dream appeared with a draining sand bottom point with hollow doubled up barrels.

As I was catching my breathe in shock at what I was seeing, a kid went running past me with a board. A brand new, Dylan Longbottom with a Billabong sticker on it. He had to have been no older than 18, but as I watched him paddle out, it was obvious that he knew what he was doing. I took off my backpack and put my camera together and watched this kid through my viewfinder. To my delight, my trigger finger burned my memory card at what he could do. I am unsure whether it was the fact that there was someone in the South China Sea that could actually stand up, or the fact that this kid killed it, but he stood with style and speed. In fact the kid had a mental layback. He kept going down the line and that is when I realized that this wave was special. But not just special, unknown. I was in the South China Sea, in Malaysia, and was witnessing a 500-meter long wave with at least one local kid who could easily hold his own in a NSSA contest back in California.

As it turned out however, he wasn’t the only one. There were three in total that ripped. He was Yen. Yen was what continued to be the drop wallet master. Every wave, he would eye the section he wanted, pursue down the line with as much speed as possible, and just lay into it. He was unmistakable. The second was Mamat, the power guy. He could throw as much spray as anyone while still having the style of Occy. Also being a jokester, he would see a friend down the line and purposely go out of the way to just spray the bits out of them while falling, giggling, knowing he got them good. Lastly was Didaqt. Didaqt was progression. Progression in that I don’t know if three months of ride able waves is enough to determine that an 18-year-old kid can do air three sixties.

The next week was something I never would have expected. Everyday we had shoulder to head high waves and perfect winds with less than ten guys out. Less than ten guys at a wave that could easily give you a ride a minute long. I couldn’t believe it even existed. It wasn’t even a thought on my mind a couple months ago.

We were getting fun waves and some good photos from land with the guys doing airs, power carves and laybacks. But there was an evening where the winds switched offshore, the tide dropped and the shoulder to head high rip able point break turned into a dry, sand-sucking barrel. I remember running as fast as I could back to my room to put my housing together to get a barrel shot of these guys. It would be ridiculous to get a shot like that in the South China Sea, of an unknown kid. No body would believe me. People were taking drugs and slugging beers a hundred or so kilometers from here, and I was putting my housing together and praying that a sand sucker would go screaming past me with a local kid perfectly perched in its mouth.

While I was in my room where my cameras were, I ran into Mamat. I told him the wave was going inside out and that I was going to get my camera housing and get shots of them from the water. He turned to me and laughed and said, “You really think you are going to be able to swim out there with that current?” I paused and looked back at him almost laughing back, “Are you kidding me? Their cant be that strong a current.” He grabbed his board and continued laughing.

We got to the jump out point and he paddled out and caught a wave almost instantly and got a dry barrel that vomited him out. It looked like the footage you would see of Skeleton Bay. Brown water, head high, and just a mechanical, scary barrel that you knew if you were to fall on, you would get thrown over and land on dry sand. Coming up with it in every orifice of your body.

So I jumped out and began kicking. Kicking as hard as I could to get out past the detonation zone and in the spot. But long story short, it didn’t happen. I didn’t even come close. The current that Mamat was talking about, the current that I jokingly threw away because I thought that there was no possible way it could be that great, swept me down the point. I felt like I was in a river. I remembered trying to fight the current and kicking as hard as I could to stay where I was, only to look to the beach and realize that I was still moving down the point.

So I therefore had to get out and run up the point to try again, only to be shut down again, again, and again. There was clearly a force in the water that did not want me to capture an image of these guys. I did however manage to snap a couple of images, but nothing to the extent of the holy-grail barrel shot I had in mind.

They were telling me that there are only waves a couple months out of the year and that when there isn’t surf, they go back to there jobs working at 5 star hotels down the coast, saving up for the time there. Jobs working nine-months a year, and surfing for only three. The talent that they offered was beyond anything I have seen in person for such a short period of time.

These three: Mamat, Yen, and Didaqt, are going to continue this cycle until they have full sponsorship and get the opportunity to surf year round. They said that they were grateful for the three-month wave period, and wouldn’t trade it because of the lack of crowds and the quality of waves. These guys get to surf a perfect draining left hander that also offers 450 meters of rip able face, with hardly anyone out. Doing so alone, and sadly, unknown. The trip was better than anything I could have imagined. The waves exceeded the expectation and would be grateful to return and see how these guys have progressed as well.

As Seen in: Magicseaweed