Malaysia and Thailand

Dec 8 2008

We were in no rush to leave Kuching. There are several National Parks nearby to explore and we were getting comfortable with this mixture of modern and small-shop Asian life. The modern is several multi-story fancy hotels, including a Holiday Inn and Hilton, right near us and a refurbished promenade along the river. We aren't sure what the occupancy rate of the large hotels here as Kuching doesn't seem to be a world-class destination - yet - although I am sure they would love to be.

The usual Asian style is evident in the small shops lining every street. The stores are set back from the upper stories of the buildings, providing a shady overhang for the shop and pedestrians. The problem is that each small shop tries to make the sidewalk in front of their shop unique. The owner not only tiles the sidewalk in a pattern that suits the business, they make sure the level of the sidewalk is a few inches higher or lower than the adjacent shop. This creates problems for the pedestrian. If you don't walk carefully you are liable to miss your step and land on your face. Maybe this ensures the pedestrian walks more slowly past each store instead of rushing past. Plus, who rushes in a hot Asian country anyway. We learned to take our time, walk in the shade and avoid sunstroke.

Kuching is actually Malaysian for cat, so there are kitschy painted concrete monuments to cats demarcing the business area. No one is sure of the correct origin of the name but various theories say that the city was renamed from Sarawak to Kuching after wild cats that used to roam the area, or the local dignitary, when asked the name pointed out a cat passing by, then again it could have been a corruption of "cochin", an asian name for "port". Anyway, cats are the symbol of the city.

Kuching Cat Tower

Seafood Restaurant

Another unique feature of Kuching is the seafood food center located on the top floor of a six-storey parking garage. We loved the food hawker centers in Singapore and were pleased to find they are a feature of Kuching as well, but the location of Top Spot was unusual. We had dinner there one night and returned the next night as well. Large stalls line two sides of the open air rooftop location. Each stall has a multi-tiered display of their wares. Live or freshly caught fish and seafood of every description on the bottom tier and fresh vegetables on the next two tiers. You line up in front of the display, choose the seafood and vegetables you want, priced by weight, choose how the dishes are to be cooked, add rice to accompany your meal and wait for it to be cooked. You sit at big round tables set in front of each stall and order your drink from roving servers. We were advised not to order too much because if you are still hungry you can order an additional dish and it will quickly appear. Delicious.

We have been visiting the many local sites and museums. The Sarawak Museum has interesting exhibits of each of the tribes who live in this area and the longhouses that were once the communal home of the people. It reminded me of the West Coast Indians. The Borneo people even had their version of a totem pole outside the longhouse. Most of the traditional culture has disappeared, much the same as the native North American culture.

Kuching is the craft sale center for Borneo. There are numerous shops right near our hotel selling both genuine stuff and cheap souvenir imitations. One quality shop is co-owned by a local artist Ramsey Ong and the owners of Singgahsana Lodge, our hotel. Ramsey paints and does collages using traditional materials such as bark cloth and the owners are talented photographers. There are many art works decorating the walls of the lodge. The shop also showcases other local artists and beautiful textiles, some just display peices, some fashioned into clothing. I would love to bring a few pieces home but the price and the thought of lugging anything more around for the rest of our trip have stopped any purchases. Instead I visited the new, excellent Textile Museum and admired the talent of the women who wove and decorated everything they used and wore.

One morning we had a treat. We visited the Semenggoh Wildlife Rehabilitation Center, about 30 km SW of Kuching. The draw for increasing numbers of tourists are the semi-wild orang-utans. There are 24 orang-utans and two as yet unnamed babies is residence. The center is in the middle of a government owned jungle forest area. The area looked in need of protection as housing developments are being built right up to the edge of the center.

Tourists come to see which animals will turn up at the twice daily feeding stations. The conservation staff fill bowls of fruit on platforms at two areas beneath the trees. There is no guarantee that any urang-utans will turn up but we were lucky. Three family groups, the two mothers of the new babies with their young clinging to their shaggy orange fur, both with an older sibling tagging along, plus a third mother with a two year old. At the stations, the urang-utans descend on ropes and vines to grab what catches their eye and climb back up the ropes to eat and show off. The other orang-utans are able to forage in the surrounding forest for themselves.

One of the mothers with her infant clinging to her decided to come down to ground level in front of one of the conservation buildings. We had been warned to keep a 5 M distance between us and the animals but several people, including me, walked over to the area where the mother was, still keeping our distance. Orang-utans are reputed to be 7 times stronger than humans and a mother with a baby is not to be trifled with. All of a sudden the mother started coming directly towards me and I was on a roped walkway trapped against the building. The guide who brought Ray and me called to one of the conservation workers to come to my rescue. I just remained quiet and he put himself between me and Mom while she quietly passed us along the walkway and swung down onto the forest floor below and was gone. You are not supposed to touch the animals but I could have.

One of the must see tourist spots outside Kuching is the Sarawak Cultural Village. Hundreds of visitors come each day but the 27 sq-km park can easily manage the crowds and does so with taste. The village is beautifully situated around a small artificial lake with jungle covered hills in the background. The compound includes six homes typical of the many cultures found in Sarawak state. There are the longhouses of four different indigenous tribes, a Malay town home and a Chinese farm house, as well as a large theatre. The government has gone to great lengths to ensure that everything is authentic and that the buildings are constructed according to traditional methods.

Each building is staffed by tribespeople who demonstrate crafts such as basketry, weaving, instrument making and even blow-pipe shooting. For a small fee, you can even dress up in a traditional costume to feel more part of the community.

Traditional Stringed instrument

traditional dancers

There are twice daily performances of traditional music and dances in the theatre, performed by the tribespeople. It has been a great success and the mainly Malay crowd there when we attended enjoyed the show just as much as we did.

The other must visit spot is Bako National Park. You take a 45 minute bus ride then a 30 minute boat ride to reach this National Park at the mouth of the Sarawak and Bako Rivers leading to the South China Sea. The park is the home of the rare Proboscis monkey, several very nervy macaque monkeys, plus several other animals and reptiles. The macaques were right beside the boat jetty, waiting for some unsuspecting tourist carrying a bag of snacks or a soft drink. Before the tourist would know it, that snack or drink would be the next meal of a macaque. Our boat driver helped us get past the cute, cunning little beasts by yelling and threatening them with his flip flop. It worked.

macaques mother and baby

Proboscis

Just past the macaques was a group of those weird-looking Proboscis monkeys; that's him with the long dangling nose. They are much more docile and entertained us by watching us and jumping from tree to tree.

Bako has lots of hiking trails through the jungles. We did the Lintang 5.8 km circle walk that brought us up a limestone escarpment to enjoy views of the surrounding countryside. We got back to the park canteen just in time to take shelter during the daily rain storm. We put our day pack down on a table intending to choose our lunch from the canteen restaurant. If it were not for a vigilant staff member Ray would have lost his day pack to a macaque perched on a tree beside the canteen veranda! A Dutch tourist told us his girlfriend lost a hot dog to a monkey and then her can of pop! We moved to a safer table to eat our meal.

We shared our last dinner at the top-of-the-car-park restaurant in Kuching with some American tourists. We ate a delicious meal of red snapper while listening to their rave reviews of their travels in Sabah state, our destination in a week or two.

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