Picture of Long Lamai, Kelabit Highlands, Sarawak, Borneo, Malaysia.

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Twin Otter skimming over the jungle to land at the Long Banga Airstrip in the Kelabit Highlands, Sarawak.

 

Our Twin Otter plane at Miri Airport. There were no allocated seats. So the six passengers had the choice of the nineteen available seats. Sitting up front there was a view through the cockpit window as well as the side windows.

We walked up the rocks on the side of the river whilst the boatmen pushed and dragged the boat up the rapids. Coming back down was much quicker as the boat shot down this section of the river.

 

There were intervals of gentle water where we glided under spreading trees with creepers and liana’s caressing the brown river.

Penan hunter returns with long blow pipe over his shoulder. The blow pipe has a spear head lashed to the front as a defence against wounded wild boar and for finishing off the animal. The hunter also carries a broad blade knife for cutting trails.

 

Wilson, the headman, holds a haunch of barking deer bought from the hunters. Gerit a village elder demonstrates how to make blow pipes. A stave of hard wood is locked in a vertical jig and a long mental augur is used to drill out the hole. The augur is also fixed in the jig to ensure the hole is perfectly aligned.

  

Margaret following a jungle trail. Allan examining the tree where the sap is tapped for the poison tips of the blowpipe darts. The community are marking out walking trails for visitors and tourists.

The Penan people are skilled at woodcarving and producing ratan baskets from jungle resources. All of the back baskets used by the community are produced locally. The black dye on the ratan baskets is produced by boiling rambutan skins.

 

The Penan Mouth Harp, left, is made from a sliver of bamboo. On the right, the Penan nose flute is difficult to play but produces haunting melodies that we enjoyed into the evening.

 

Families live in linked wooden houses with a communal balcony for chatting, community gatherings and enjoying music and dancing. The General Store is also located within the Longhouse.

 

The school was modern and well equipped with clean toilets and dinning facilities. The twelve teachers lived in modern wooden bungalows with 24hr electricity supplied from a 20MW diesel generator.

 

The Government, with 10% support from the Government of Japan, had recently financed a new solar powered Telecentre. The project was managed by the University of Malaysia Sarawak UNIMAS. The children enjoyed using the internet for Facebook and computer games whilst the adults used Google to explore religious themes.

           

           Allan writing reports with views of Longhouses behind.