Whatever Next - Miss Punjabi!

Yes  Malaysian Day has come around again and we have a day off today to celebrate. For the last few weeks there have been flags flying everywhere and the children in school have been encouraged to sing patriotic songs and colour in Malaysian flags.Yesterday I decided to make an effort to join in the "dressing up" of "One Malaysia" and after trying on a few options I decided that I looked the least ridiculous in my old Punjabi outfit, bought many years ago in Singapore. I hadn't realised that this year we were going to parade around Ranau waving flags with patriotic songs blasting out of speakers but off I went in the front waving my little flag dutifully. After we had done a tour of Ranau and chanted "Merdeka Merdeka" at every opportunity ( meaning Independence) we got back to school where the pupils proceeded to sing Malaysian songs and then finally prizes were given to the best dressed Dusun, Malay, Chinese and Indian costumes. Even the teachers were included and much to my surprise, although to be honest I didn't have much competition, I was awarded Miss Punjabi and a cash prize of 10 ringitts!

Me with my lovely teachers.

The winners!

   As we know throughout history, brainwashing the young is always a good way of ensuring a future for an ideology or cohesion in a country but I wonder are the adult population really taken up by this same patriotic fervour. As government workers we are not allowed to be involved in any political activities and if the government wishes patriotic singing and flag waving at schools to be part of the curriculum then that is what is done. However, the reality is that if one visits Peninsula Malaysia it is easy to see that the roads are good; the schools are well equipped; everyone has electricity and running water and the people generally have a much higher standard of living than Sabah. Sabah contributes a substantial amount to the Malaysian revenue from petroleum, palm oil and tourism and yet I feel that the Sabahans are not getting a fair deal and being treated as equal partners in the "One Malaysia". There is an election around the corner and the same party ( the United Malay National Organisation) has been in power since 1957, before Sabah joined the Federation. The opposition parties have been hardly heard in all those years but I think they are beginning to find their voices. It will be interesting to see what happens in the next election (date not known yet) and if Sabahans can find the courage to voice their own opinions.

Mantanani Islands

Sunset at the Tip of Borneo

We left Ranau on the Sunday  morning of Hari Raya leaving behind a frenzy of excitement and celebration with fireworks going off and the preparation and cooking in full swing which reminded me of Christmas. I felt guilty about not participating and sharing the festivities with my friends in Ranau but it was time to see and explore more of Sabah with my friends. As we drove to the Tip of Borneo (again!) we passed people on their way to the Open Houses, dressed in their shiniest and most glamorous clothes. I think the men in their pink, purple and turquoise satin pyjamas with their hats and short skirts surprised Christine and Valerie the most. My taste has definitely evolved in a year and I now am beginning to think they look attractive.!!

Hari Raya pyjamas

The sisters at the Tip!

 We arrived at Simpang Mengayau and installed ourselves in the longhouse Tampan Do Aman. Our legs were still agony but the swimming in the sea seemed to help those poor muscles recover. It seems strange for me at first to suddenly be among so many tourists after living quite an  isolated existence from the whole tourist scene in Sabah. As in all backpacker places I enjoy meeting people of all ages and having the time to chat and hear about their travels and where they are going. Yes it sometimes gets rather repetitive as most people tend to follow the same circuits especially if they are carrying The Lonely Planet and yes there are a few young blaze travellers who talk about where they got “wasted” but  I met several very interesting people: a teacher from Brunei; a lady who had worked in Afghanistan for five years; a Tasmanian art therapist etc…. We spent a lazy few days, swimming, eating, chatting and getting burnt!  Why do I never learn??

Our chalet

The smallest Mantanani Island

 The  next stage of our holiday was to catch a boat to the Mantanani Islands which are a small group of islands about one hour from the coast of Kota Belud. We had slight difficulty finding the jetty but fortunately got on the boat  and arrived in time on our idyllic island for lunch. There are three islands but only one is inhabited and the main occupation of the villagers is fishing. There is a primary school  and two small villages at each end of a beach about 2 km in length. There is very little tourism except for the “Mari Mari Backpackers” where we are staying although we did pass an abandoned “resort” and another that was semi opened on the beach but had no one there except the caretaker asleep in the hammock! Our "resort" consists of 12 chalets built on the sand, on stilts with a seating area/ hammock under our bedroom. It is basic with shared washing facilities and electricity from 6 pm to 6 am and the staff and people on the island are charming.We have done some snorkelling ( I had the thrill of seeing and swimming with a turtle)  lots of swimming, played cards and even more reading. I finished a book yesterday that I didn’t want to finish and know that whatever I read won’t come up to it’s standard. It was written by an author I have never read before - Amos Oz and was about his childhood memories growing up in Israel in the 1940’s and 50’s A Tale of Love and Darkness. He compares his writing to being a watchmaker – taking each word out in tweezers, looking at it from every angle and placing it carefully back in the correct place. Everything he wrote was so well written I feel ashamed to be using words to tell you about it!

Local children having fun

Mantanani Island sunset

   Today we catch the boat back to the mainland and on to KK for the last night before Christine, Valerie and Marc leave for their journey back to France. I will miss them and they have been wonderful travelling companions..

Un Petit Mot de Christine a Borneo

Marc en train de faire la grafiti!

Notre plage a Manana

Enfin nous sommes a Borneo! Valerie, Marc et moi sommes arrives le 3 aout apres 26 heures de vol et 2 escales a Abu Dhabi et Kuala Lampur. quelle joie de retrouver Fiona!
 Apres le froid des salles d'attente des aeroports du a l'air conditionne la chaleur humide equatoriale nous a litteralement enveloppes; c'etait tres agreable. Moi qui souffre beaucoup du froid j'apprecie beaucoup cette chaleur genereuse.Le soir meme nous avons deguste nos premiers poissons grilles en buvant du jus de mangue. Le bonheur!
     Fiona  nous a ensuite emmenes a Manana, un echantillon de paradis avec eau bleue et chaude! Ne pas hesiter une seconde avant de se jetter a l'eau etait pour nous une experience nouvelle: En ce qui me concerne l'Atlantique au large de Biarritz est ce que j'avais jusqu'alors connu de plus chaud et je vous assure qu'il n'y a aucune commune mesure avec ce que j'ai ressenti en entrant dans l'eau ici.
   Puis nous sommes arrives a Ranau ou Fiona vit.Apres une journee de repos entrecoupee de degustation de jus d'ananas et de mangue prepares par Fiona grace a son super mixer nous sommes partis a Sepilok, plus a l'est pour vivre l'aventure de l'enfer vert: une semaine dans la jungle a la  recontre des ourags outans, des nasiques et toutes sortes de macaques, de varans, d'oiseaux aux plumages somptueux sans oublier des serpents, des crocodiles et une grosse araignee noire et velue qui s'est invitee dans notre lit et a litteralement tetanise Valerie!

Fiona, Valerie et moi venons de rentrer de l'ascension du mont Kinabalu le plus haut sommet de Borneo ( 4095 metres). Nous sommes fourbues;toute l'ascension ou presque se fait par des escaliers dont les marches sont taillees pour des geants et pourtant les guides malais les gravissent allegrememt sans parler des porteurs qui effectuent la montee tous les jours avec des charges enormes sur le dos; bombonne de gaz, matelas pour les lits du refuge, nourriture pour la soixantaine de grimpeurs qui vont y dormir.  Marc qui est reste chez Fiona nous a vu revenir completememt cassees; Apres un rapide calcul il a estime que  le denivelle etait de 39% pour 100m et il en a conclu que nos courbatures excedaient totalement le degre reel de difficulte de l'ascension! on n'avait meme plus la force de le frapper!

Moi, comme un Afghani  et Valerie tres fatigue!

Demain nous partons tous les quatre pour le nord de Borneo: l'aventure continue....

Yes we can! Yes we did climb Mount Kinabalu!

Iwing's photo of us at the summit!

Sunrise on top of the world!

Our guide Iwing, aged 60 years old!

A porter resting his heavy load.

       I wasn't supposed to be climbing Mount Kinabalu until I had at least done some training but somehow I ended up setting off with Valerie and Christine to attempt the 4000 m. How did I end up being so foolish? Well circumstances seemed to take over - the government decided to give everyone a holiday at school on the Friday; it was a beautiful day when I brought Christine and Valerie up to the headquarters where they had booked their climb; they had one cancellation for that day and I thought Patrick didn't find it too hard, surely it can't be that difficult to do. I had put my shoes, jumper and a waterproof in the car just in case and before I knew it we had started the ascent. Looking back now I can say the 6 kilometre climb up to the hostel  at 3000 m was the most pleasant part of the experience although there were times when I thought we would never get there. There was a lot of interesting traffic on the path - porters carrying gas bottles, mattresses, rice and everything needed for the hostel and of course other climbers going up and coming down. We arrived at the hostel after about 6 hours of walking steadily upwards and the weather continued to be kind to us.

Fiona at 3000 metres

Sunset 

   We ate and then everyone went to their dorms at about 7.30 to be ready for the 2.30 am departure. It came far too quickly and even though there was rain during the night when we woke up the sky was clear and shining with stars. We got ready in our warm clothes and torches on our heads for the final ascent for sunrise. In the dark we started climbing up these huge steps that seemed to go on forever. At this stage I felt terrible - my heart was pounding and I felt dizzy but somehow kept going until we got to the rope climbing bit. After that it didn't seem quite so bad except like a mirage we never seemed to reach the summit. The final climb to the actual summit came into view just at sunrise and as I knew that Christine and Valerie were waiting for their slow friend, I made a great effort and got there. It was amazing to feel on top of the world and when the sun exposed the amazing unearth-like landscape of the mountain, I felt great satisfaction that I got to the summit of Mount Kinabalu. When the sun came up an enormous shadow was thrust out into the sea which is many miles away - it was unreal.

The decscent

So now we just had to get down which will be easy of course won't it? NO it wasn't! The first part of the descent was scary and I don't think I would have climbed up it if it I had seen it in the daylight. My legs were already like jelly when we reached the hostel at 8 ish. We had our breakfast and set off with our guide, Iwing at 9.30 am and estimated about 3 hours to get down. Five hours later I reached the bottom and there were times when I thought I wouldn't make it. My legs didn't belong to me and I could hardly get down a step! Christine and Valerie felt more or less the same and we staggered to the car and got home, had a shower and fell asleep! Today we are feeling very sore and are walking like old ladies. The moral of this tale is "Always do some training if you are thinking of climbing a mountain of 4080 metres!

A visit to Kampong Merungin

     If you can cast your mind  back to April when I became a recording artist and was spending my free time burning CD's on my computer, I was in and out of the one shop that sold the blank CD's in Ranau and eventually the owner asked me why I needed so many. I explained and she duly bought one of the songbooks and then later contacted me to see if I would be willing to sing at this very isolated village that they visit from time to time. Sing what? I asked, " Songs from the songbook and maybe some Christian songs" she replied. Help! What do I say? I only know "Kumbaya" and "Give me oil in your lamp" and they are very rusty. I explained to her that I wouldn't call myself a Christian these days however I would be very happy to play the guitar and sing along with the villagers because as you can guess I was intrigued and fascinated to go to the village.

One of the houses in the village

My retirement home!!

    So the appointed day came and I met up with Mr and Mrs Kong and their daughter and we set off towards the "Interior" and after about an hour and a half on a gravel road we arrived. Not knowing what was in store for me I was a little surprised to find that the “Community Hall” had been prepared with chairs just to see me. I thought I was going to be playing the guitar for a sing along but it looked like I was the only attraction. The village Merungin is a small village of about 200 inhabitants with a mix of half and half Christian and Muslim. They very recently got electricity installed and fresh running water will shortly be there too. They have very little possibility of an income and live on what they grow and fish and the children walk an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon to go the nearest school.There were all ages and both religions at “my show” but predominantly children and I basically just sang action songs like I do with the young children at school. The Head Man was there and at the beginning and end he made a speech about the orang puteh (I have no name!) and I was given a  bag that had been made by a villager (sadly in plastic not in bamboo)

The Queen of Sheba!

 Afterwards some of the older children wanted to show me the new suspension footbridge over the  river Sugut close by and so off we went. It was certainly in amazing condition compared to some I’ve seen and they did their best to shake and jump and swing on it as much as they could to make me lose my balance! The next thing in store for me was two boys wanted to take me on their home made bamboo raft for a river trip. I first checked on the crocodile situation and then got on feeling like the Queen of Sheba sat in the middle of this raft while these young boys were punting the raft down stream. They were diving on and off and I couldn’t resist it so went in too. It was more difficult getting up stream again but fortunately the river is very low at the moment and we were able to push it.

     I left these lovely people promising to return again and on the journey back thought a lot about their seemingly idyllic way of life and how much electricity would change all that. We with electricity take it for granted and  know already what the advantages are that it brings but of course with everything there is always the downside too. Whether or not it was providence but my house was struck by lightning on Saturday evening and as I lay in the dark wondering what I could do with just my wind up torch, I realised that I could never go back to a time without electricity and why should I want other people not to benefit too. I just hope it is for the best.

Old Friends, New Places

The beach at Manana

      Not that I am suggesting for one moment that either Christine or Valerie are old, in fact many years younger than me, but Christine and I have been friends for many years. My youngest daughter, Gen and her eldest son Marc were in the “petite section” of the maternelle together and became great friends at two and a half years old. One day I received an invitation from Marc’s mother inviting Gen to spend the afternoon at their house and the rest is history. Seventeen years later, with nine children between us, full-time jobs and busy lives we have kept firm friends and Christine was one of the first to know about my decision to accept the job in Borneo. “ Je viendrai te voir” she said but I never really imagined that she would. Christine and her sister have never travelled outside of Europe before and there were passports, vaccinations and the organisation of leaving three children and husband behind to contend with.

Christine recovering from jet-lag!

   So there I was on Friday evening waiting for all the passengers to come out of the arrival gates. I waited and waited and saw some lovely reunions between families and friends but no Christine, Valerie or Marc. Had I got the wrong terminal perhaps? Had they decided not to come after all? Eventually with much relief I saw the familiar face of Marc who came to tell me that I was needed. Valerie’s suitcase had been badly damaged during the flight and there was very little left of it! So our reunion took place in the baggage claim office where we eventually extracted enough money to buy a new suitcase and a bin bag with all her belongings in.

Our chalet

   We stayed the night in a backpackers in KK and then in the morning set off to Manana, one of my favourite places to go. I feel like I am in the TV series "Fantasy Island" when I get in the rubber dinghy with the same boatman and I'm sure everyone feels more relaxed when they leave this idyllic spot. They loved it and we had a nice relaxing weekend along with a very sociable Saturday night with an international group of Europeans from France, Germany, Denmark, Holland and U.K.

Christine, Marc and Valerie near Mount Kinabalu

 We made our way back to Ranau on Sunday afternoon and Mount Kinabalu was very kind and showed herself to them. Yesterday in between me working we went to the Sabah Tea Garden for lunch and visited the market in Ranau. It is interesting seeing Ranau through their eyes as I am so used to it now. I think they are shocked by the huge amount of plastic used and thrown on the street but on a positive note amazed at how safe they feel and how friendly the people are. A few hours ago they left on the bus for the next stage of their journey in the jungle. They will be back soon - hopefully!