5/5/09 - 11/5/09 Malaysia - Kuching

5/5/09
Crossed the border by bus to Johur Baru then caght a flight to Kuching (Malysia Borneo). Arrived at our Hostel in the evening Borneo B&B.
The hostel is a family run place, got checked in by the two sons, room was well basic....& not made up as they didn't get our booking because the internet was down.
The bed was bending in the middle & J got up in the middle of the night & it actually broke!!! So spent the rest of the night with L.Planet books underneath the break for support!

6/5/09
Got up & found the bus to the Cultural Village so hopped on. The place has 7 different houses representing the different tribes of the Sarawak area. Got a passpot to take into each house to get a stamp, did the whole lot & ten watched the show with all of the different tribes dancing & traditional costume. Saw a guy using the blow pipe & then J got up on stage for a dance with the locals!

Booked our longhouse trip through Boreo B & B as you go & stay with her Sister at her Longhouse & our hotel (Tune Hotel) for when we got back after 2 nights, 3 days roughing it.
HAd Wonton soup at 'Green Hill Corner' with 'Gorgeous' the waiter/ess, lush home made wontons!
7/5/09
Left for the Iban Longhouse trip, dropped off at Kuching main bus station, got the bus to Sri Aman & then got picked up by Auntie in the smallest car in the world!
Our trip was just 3 of us, us two & Ray who was 72 years old. He was on a mission to travel & find his Father In Law's lost war grave as noone knows were he is buried.
Funny trip, got in the small car with Ray's big case , she said to me 'ou sit in the front as very big!', so the 2 blokes got in the back with Rays great big suitcase on top of them! Ray also had to mind his feet as she'd stored a live fish by his feet that she'd bought from the market!
On the way out we went to see a delapitated English Fort from the war time tha looked out as a guard against the Japs coming down the river.
Drove along to an old graveyard in the grounds of an old school (St.Lawrence) where Iban children board, the kids were funny, ran all round us saying 'hello. how are you, what is your name?' They were well cute, we took photo's of them & showed them on the play button & they were cracking up... J was disapointed at the amount of Man U shirts though!
Next stop was a modern longhouse, brick built & not wood, met the Chief, had a cup of tea, J rolled loads of ciggarette's for each of them as he as only the 2nd person they had seen rolling his own! Saw the Head Hunters 'Skulls' in a basket with the bones of the warrior in a tomb above them to watch over them. Each week they smoke the skulls to preserve them! Very rare to see this now.
Cracked on, had a drink & some monkey nuts with Auntie & the locals in the shop before getting to the actual Longhouse in Batu Lintang. In the distance you could see the purple hills of Indonesia.
Unpacked the car & the fish & was met by Gloria(daughter in law), Julia(Grandaughter) & Jeffery(Grandson), they love the English names!
Went for a swim/shower in the river to cool off & clean up. Auntie brought the soap! Aunty gave Nic a sarong to wear like a proper Iban woman!
Out the back of the house Antie had a couple of pigs which she was fattening up ready for her celebration at the end of May, very smelly when the wind changed!
Had dinner & sat around, her Son Charles arrived home, thought he was acting a bit weird especially when he laid down in the missle of the lounge & went to sleep but it turned out he'd been drinking with his cousin all afternoon.....
The Langkow (rice wine but boiled to make it stronger in alcohol, it's illegal Longhouse brew bought for 5 Ringets a bottle) came out then it all got messy! We all sat on the floor drinking shots followed by a glass of water to take the burn away, I had to have very small glasses & hold my nose! When that went we had a small bottle of normal rice wine which was a lot easier to drink then we went to bed on the floor & giggled at the fish splashing around all night in the tank by Ray's room! Poor old Ray went to bed tired without Langkow. Auntie said'He's very old'....

8/5/09
Got up for a real shower which was actually a bucket of water with a big ladel so you could throw it on yourself... was clean tho..
Went for a jungle treck in the morning, walked past where we had our river shower the night before, saw somw pine apples growing, I'd never seen them growing before... walked over a rickety old briged and round to where they had there cememtry for the local people of the Longhouses.. Ray was loving that, we weren't too sure, took a few photos.
Walked thru the jungle which was mostly all Aunty's, there were lots of fruit trees, unfortunately harvest is end of October so nothing for us to see.. walked past a small shed where Aunty used to have a Indonisian family living who used to work herv land. Went past some big holes in the ground which used to be under their old Longhouses during the war, they used to use them as bunkers when the Japanese attacked. Walked on to where all her Rubber trees were and had a go at cutting the bark to release the rubbber river which then drained down in to a cup, they used to then take that too market... there were hundreds of trees about.. we searched out some Bamboo shouts, we pick these and peeled them and chucked them in the bag, these were for dinner.. we went back to the house for lunch, Nic and I went for a quick river dip as we were melting alot...
After lunch we wandered down the river to get in Aunty's boat to go down to her vegetable garden.. had to prune a few pepper bushes, well actually loads of them, the whole lot between us, Ray got told off for slacking, he was very old she said, there were chilli plants and herbs too... had a few bananas and water abd more cigarette, aunty loved a smoke...
Went back down to the river for a swim and a jump in, there's a a film clip of bottler me.. hen had a funny journey back up stream to the house, we kept going off course and getting a bit stuck... we were meant to put a net in for fishing but it was going to rain so couldn't, the water get really high and would have washed the expensive net away..
Got back to the house, we helped prepare the Bamboo shouts for tea, while Gloria did everything else as usual... Had dinner went round to another place in the long house, Aunty's cousin there does handi-crafts, we didn't buy anything, Ray bought a couple of bits and bobs... got back to the house and watched a bit of TV, I just commented 'no Langkow tonight then?'... Charles went and got some so t 4 of us got stuck into that.. ended up drinking far too much, 2 bottles of the hard stuff laughed alot and then went to bed...

09/05/2009
We dropped Ray off at the bus stop and then Aunty took us back to Sri Aman for our bus, we had time to have a look around the Jungle market, all the local paople bring their produce to sell, Aunty got us some fruit for the journey..
got to bus back to Kuching, no air conditioning, after an hour we realised we could open the windows.. divs..
Got picked up by two of the sons from the B & B and got a lift to the Orang-utan Santuary (Semenggoh Wildlife Rehabilitation centre)..
we saw a Mother and the youngest baby of 2 months up by the car park then we went down to the feeding area, they hadn't seen any Orang-utans there for 4 days cos there was loads of food about for them in the jungle but we were really lucky and saw about 4 there, they were playing and messing about, was really great to see, the facial expressions were brilliant... the rain started so we headed away from there, and the Mum and Baby were down in another area. We wandered down there, there was a 3rd, a young male having a feed.. I sat under a shelter while Nic got some photos, the mother and Baby had the same idea and came to sit next to me, we heard that the mother had gone for a Chinese tourist who had got too close before, I was scared so made a move, Nic just about got a fuzzy photo of me with them...
Got picked up by the boys and went back to Borneo B & B, we had already booked into to the Tune which was a bit imbarrassing cos Mum had made up another nicer room for us.. felt very guilty we did...

10/05/2009
After a nice sweaty walk we found the Jungle market in Kuching, it's on every Sunday where all the villagers come into town to sell their wares. Saw the Jungle ferns again that we'd eaten at the Longhouse, had a spot of lunch away from the stinky market & then went to the Museum. It was actually surprisingly interesting all about the history & hw the war came about, all stuff we didn't have a clue about until Ray opened our eyes.
Got back after a few watermelon juices & beers & then off out for dinner in the local hawker place so J could watc the footie!

11/5/09
Got up early, walked to the bus station, grabbed a Chinese bun & got on the local bus to Baco National Park. After an hour or so on a bus with no suspension & hard plastic seats we got to the park base where we shared a water taxi to the actual park. It was blistering hot! Arrived & booked our boat time back, on the way to the office we spotted a huge group of rare Silver Leaf monkeys playing near the beach & the even rarer Proboscis Monkey's in the tree's with the funny noses! So result no need to walk a trail in the heat (no such luck). Walked the Paku trail through the jungle for 1 hour to a nice secluded beach, on the way J spotted a massive spider in it's web where we saw him munch some insect & a Hermit crab who was a funny thing moving around!
At the beach we saw some funny lizard things skiming on the water. Left our tops in the sun to dry out & had a rest!
Saw some monkeys in the trees on the way back but not a really good view, we could hear them though.
Saw a huge Wild Boar, pig thing by the office when we got back & missed the huge snake that was aprently sitting by the canteen! Saw some weird tiny one clawed crabs too in red & turquoise colours....
Got the boat back & hopped onto another local bus although a taxi was very tempting! The bus was full of kids as we'd hit the school run, they all said hello again & wanted their photo's taken....

12/5/09
Left Kuching for Kuala Lumpur on an Air Asia flight.