The other day I took a trip to a place called Dalat; two hours upriver from my hometown of Sibu, to visit a Sago processing plant owned and operated by family friends. This trip was part of some of the writing that I’m currently doing as educational work for Pearson publications in Singapore. We left at about nine in the morning to the pier, and were greeted by a crusty old experienced river-dog that obviously knew the terrain like the back of his hand, judging from his sundrenched skin and toothless grin. We went with the teenage son of our friend Martin, who was one of the six sons that helped to run the business.
The river ride was like most I have experienced in Borneo. But most of the time I have headed in a different direction of the Rejang river. I have usually headed south-east, in the direction of Kapit, Belaga and the lands beyond. This time, I was heading northeast, into land that I haven’t been into since childhood. The route we took this time saw me through a painful scene through the more industrialised areas; areas where law, environmental preservation, and common sense are second to profit margins. It was painful to see parts of the river bank inundated with waste and toxic contaminants.
Perhaps at this point I should backtrack a bit. Let me tell you about my hometown, Sibu; a place I love and hate. Sibu has been described by many as a dusty, rough little frontier town. It’s a place where many people have cut their teeth on the realities of business negotiation skills and gone on to prove themselves in the big bad world of business, but it is also a town where modern day land and river pirates thrive and survive. We are a town of some two hundred odd thousand people; of which the population mainly comprises of Chinese. Of this group, the Chinese here are mainly of Foochow origin. My people. My father was a first generation Malaysian Foochow. His parents left Southern China before the turn of the 20th century.
Back then, Sibu was a busy river port filled with traders and merchants. The people preoccupied themselves with building their families and their empires, and I’m lucky to count myself as one of those that share that ancestry. The Foochow people were, and still are, a proud people that put their families before anything or anyone else. They busied themselves with progress, and as soon as the opportunity presented itself they sent their children off overseas to gain better educations. Unfortunately in modern times, we have been left with many of the ones that had no chance, or no capability to prove themselves overseas. As a result, Sibu has become somewhat of a cowboy state where law and order is second to personal gain.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m immensely proud of my heritage, and my family still have a base here, but it is certainly not a town that I feel that I could live out the rest of my natural days in. The politics here have been mired in corruption and violence for as long back as I can remember. And as a result, business over here is determined by who has the most clout, and by who carries the biggest stick. Us Foochow people are good at business; be it legitimate or otherwise.
So when I was on the way up to Dalat, I saw scores of industrial interests that had absolutely no regard for the environment; that flouted any safeguards set in place for the protection of the very place we live in. This made me more than mad. I saw scores of boats. Rusting hulks in the water. They were no less than boat graveyards; rusting and leeching away toxins into the river. All I could do was to shake my head as we skimmed past them. About half an hour into the trip, further away from the epicentre of Sibu, we finally saw less and less buildings, however the riverbanks were still occasionally littered with rubbish. I saw the local species of crane congregating on the banks of the mighty Rejang. Upon entering some of the smaller tributaries, I saw Crabs, mudskippers, and fish in the shallows.
We powered our way through the tidal river surge, and after quite some time, entered the slower moving waters of the Dalat tributary. This area is home to many of the Melanau people; an indigenous race whose main source of livelihood is from the river. We swept past numerous water villages, whose main road was the river. I saw children clambering aboard small outboard boats on their way to school. We past rafts of sago palm logs that were tied up together; acting as small pontoons in the river. On these I noticed scores of Macaque monkeys either resting or fishing for food. Some of them scampered for the safety of the shore upon hearing the outboard motor, but most of them, more likely the experienced elders, simply carried on, unperturbed by the drone of the engine.
Finally, after much winding around river bends, we came to the factory, where we were greeted by Martin. The fumes from the industrial burning of the sago pith were overwhelming, and smelt like animal dung. We went on a tour of the factory, that I cannot at this stage reveal too much about due to copyright infringements because of the nature of the visit. After all, I can’t repeat what I have already written about the Sago manufacturing process on my blog after I have written it for my employers. Let’s just say I had an interesting time manoeuvring through a facility that wouldn’t pass even the most basic Health and Safety standards in New Zealand.
We were treated to a traditional homecooked lunch by Martin’s 80 something year old mother, and also had a brief conversation with Martin’s 80 something year old father who still runs the business, tending to daily matters. To them, it was obvious, that age was merely a number. It was amazing to see people of their age still so with it, and still so involved in something that they had built from the ground up. The factory had been in operation since 1985, just one year after I was born. There is something to be said about the traditional way that businesses are run in Asia. Family pride and continuance are common themes. Martin described and explained the way the business was run. There are 11 children in his family; 5 daughters and six sons. The brothers helped to run the business, and they had a constitution in place that prevented them from in-fighting.
A truly remarkable feat, if you ask me. Soon after lunch, we headed up the tributary again to meet the headwaters of the Igan river that would eventually flow into the mighty Rejang river. I drove the boat part of the way back, glad to break the monotony of the constant up-and-down motion of the boat by finally being able to concentrate on something else. The debris in the water was a constant reminder of the deforestation that has, and that still continues to wreak havoc on the land and waters I call home, and every now and then the craft would slam into tree trunks left floating in the river in the wake of the chainsaw’s destruction.
It was an interesting day, but also a day that made me sad, as well as a day that my heart bleed for my land and country. The land of Borneo, where the wild once roamed, and where legends were made.
My state of Sarawak.
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